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fiction and musings from a gay black dude with delusions above his station

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the gar spot fiction and musings from a gay black dude with delusions above his station

Tag: growing up gay

Queer Muppets: Representation Matters

Posted on September 19, 2018 by gar

Every few years, it seems, rumors swirl around about Bert and Ernie. Are they roommates, just good friends, or something more? Whenever such rumors come around, the Sesame Workshop, producers of Sesame Street, quickly issues a statement: they are just good friends. In the latest round of this “controversy,” Mark Saltzman, who wrote for Sesame…

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Olympic Outing Outrage: Shame on Nico Hines

Posted on August 13, 2016 by gar

Way back when during my waning days at UCLA, not long after I came out, the Daily Bruin did something unconscionable. Buried in the paper appeared a story about the campus police arresting some guys cruising each other in a men’s room. And the paper printed their names. I was mortified. And livid. With youthful, righteous…

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Comic Strip Heroes

Posted on May 22, 2016 by gar

I’m a long-time reader of the comic strip pages in newspapers. Peanuts and Doonesbury were favorites growing up. Nowadays I like Luann and Pearls Before Swine. And of course I’m thrilled that Berke Breathed has revived Bloom County. Even back in the day, I tried reading myself into some of the characters. I wasn’t so much looking for black characters,…

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Encore from the Archives: Carousel

Posted on August 3, 2013 by gar

(Originally published in October, 2011) I’ve always liked older boys. One summer day long ago my mother took me to the Griffith Park Merry-Go-Round.  I don’t remember if it was my first trip to a merry-go-round, but I remember how excited I was to be able to ride on it by myself.  I felt all grown-up….

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Newton’s Nutcracker

Posted on December 25, 2012June 21, 2016 by gar

Their bodies glided across a stage ankle deep in white mist and glittered with streams of tiny lights draped from above. “Newton, isn’t her dress lovely?” his mother said. “Yes, it is,” he answered. However, Newton wasn’t looking at the ballerina or her dress.  He was looking at the guy in the tights, which left…

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The Sad Crusade of Mrs. Cobb – Part I

Posted on August 22, 2012August 22, 2012 by gar

(Ed. note:  Loosely based on a true story.) Mrs. Cobb stood in the classroom doorway during recess watching her flock.  Two of her colleagues stood by an adjacent classroom talking, their voices deliberately hushed.  Mrs. Cobb paid no attention to them, nor did she take their two-way chatter as a slight.  She focused her attention…

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Dreams from the 1984 Summer Olympics

Posted on August 12, 2012 by gar

He walked tepidly to the end of the diving board, then stopped.  He contemplated in stillness, waiting.  Then he sprang into action, leapt, turned, flipped, spun, pirouetted, before straightening his body and slicing into the water with the stillness of a Zen master.  He kept the splash and ripples to a minimum, as if he…

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Fabulous Clayton Goes to Hollywood – Part I

Posted on August 1, 2012August 1, 2012 by gar

(Editor’s Note:  The ‘growing up gay’ tag is usually applied to essays. This story is strictly fictional.) For a 12 year old, Clayton Simmons maintained the most peculiar habits.  By a calculus all his own, he computed the precise number of movements and amount of time necessary to complete his morning rituals so that he…

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Sunday Evening Mic Check

Posted on March 26, 2012 by gar

Dr. Demento, every single Sunday, KMET radio…yeah! Back in the day, Angelenos heard four hours of the good Doctor, from 6-10 Sunday evenings.  I played it while cleaning the kitchen, scraping roly poly fish heads into the garbage under a soundtrack of Weird Al Yankovic, George Carlin’s “Ice Box Man,” Cheech & Chong’s “Sister Mary…

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The Romeo/Juliet Peep Show

Posted on March 7, 2012 by gar

The magic, they say, happens after the lights dim and the images begin to flicker on the screen.  In this case, though, for most, there would be little magic as the story was already known.  But for others who were young like me, black like me, and torn asunder by my queer loins like me,…

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