Author Archives: Joel Derfner

I am endlessly sorry to Faustus and his readers for being so derelict in my duties. Just about all my waking hours for the last few days have been spent in the midst of fellow typography nerds at Typecon, where we all get to let our freak flags fly and rant about the differences between the 7 different versions of Garamond (including Sabon, the pseudo-Garamond) without getting crazy looks. Sadly, I had to pass up a few cool type-drawing workshops because work duties overlapped with the conference more than I was expecting. I also had to miss a walking tour of some classic NYC signage, which was especialyl disappointing since the Times pointed out that one of the stops was my old high school, where apparently, “The ‘R’ is too small in the bowl, and too long in the leg.”

As tired as I am (since all the sleeping hours were spent trying to fend off the summer combo of cold/allergy attack), I have to hustle back there this morning looking as cute as possible, since my colleague Ina Saltz is giving a talk about typographic tattoos that will include some pictures of my work. If Erik Spiekermann finds me to yell about the why I altered the position of the dots in my Meta Bold umlaut, I want to at least look presentable.

Aw, who am I kidding? I want to look cute for all the cute type geeks who’ll come up and admire my arms afterward.

Damn Faustus for cursing his guest hosts with a daily obligation! Having a theme, though, does make it easier to follow his draconian orders. In fact, I should consider subjecting myself to similar rules on either of my other blogs — I could be much more prolific that way. Anyway…

See the eight-year-old
Knitting mittens on the bus.
Does his mother know?

I don’t really like kids that much, but there are a lot of things I like about kids. Enough, at least, that I find them entertaining in small doses. One of the things that I always love is seeing kids who haven’t had gender roles bludgeoned into them yet. Future-gay, future-straight, or future-whatever, there’s a time when a lot of kids just gleefully go about their business doing what they like before they realize they’re not supposed to act that way. I have a soft spot, of course, for little boys who haven’t been called sissies yet for the way they run around with arms flailing, or the way they like to play with dolls, or the way they like to dance, or the way they like to kiss mommy and daddy just because they love them so much.

Sadly, the messages come from all sides that it’s not so good for boys to be too girly, and the older kids get the more likely they are to toe the line. Better gender theorists than I can probably be more erudite about this. After all, I’m just another gay boy who had a harder time learning to be butch than most boys, but who still managed to develop a deep fear of being too much of a sissy. But patterns seem to emerge, and no matter how often we felt Free to be You and Me, we notice those kids who keep doing their thing longer than the other kids and we’re sure we know their story.

Now, I don’t think there was a direct correlation between my faggotry and my insistence that I pretend to be Jamie Summers as a kid, but I think that maybe I didn’t realize the other kids wouldn’t think that was cool for some of the same reasons I couldn’t quite figure out why I felt a little set off from the other boys with whom I played tag and whiffle ball and whatnot. The signs often all add up, even if they don’t add up too directly.

My friends and I would often eat at this diner down the street from where we worked, and we became very friendly with one of the waitresses who handled the lunch rush. (As a side benefit, we often got free cake.) She was single with an 8-year-old son who was her pride and joy. One day, she was so excited to show us his pictures from dancing school. There he was, captured forever in that moment when he was totally excited about working the jazz hands in his purple sequined tights, top hat, and fringed sleeves. The four of us — two gays, a dyke, and gay-friendliest single woman on Earth — shot glances at one another. We knew, and it probably wouldn’t be long before the kid figured it out, but it was at once so sweet and so sad that his mother would probably be the last to know. Well, maybe not the last to know but possibly the last to acknowledge it. God bless him, I hope he’s still tapping as fast as his light loafers will let him.

Yikes, this has to be a quick one so I can sneak in under the wire before midnight. Faustus ordered us to post at least once a day while he was gone, and that last one doesn’t really count. So on to the haiku:

Sitting at the bar,
My soul filled with deep longing
And deeper terror.

I am that goody two shoes that Adam Ant sang about. I don’t drink. I don’t smoke. On top of that I don’t do any drugs, I’m prone to crippling shyness, and caffeine makes me jittery after a while. (OK, I’m not that much of a goody two shoes because left to my own devices I’m prone to being slutty, but you get the point.) Therefore, the idea that bars are the easiest way for a gay man to meet another man has never really worked for me. Catch me in the right mood and I can be awfully sociable, but even with a group of friends hanging out in a bar is tough. I just don’t have the social skills for it. I can’t rely on alcohol to loosen me up (besides, I suspect I’d be either very maudlin or very angry if I ever got drunk), and drinking Cokes all night makes me hyper and fidgety. And since I’m pretty shy, I don’t really have much natural grace when it comes to chatting up strangers. Even worse, I’m too naturally polite to repel the unwanted advances of guys who creep me out. Bar hopping? It’s a death sentence for me.

Yeah, yeah, yeah — I know. Bars aren’t the only way to meet other people. Duh. But they seem like the thing to do sometimes when you’re bored, lonely, and tired of sitting in front of the TV all night again. In effect, they seem like the thing to do at the exact moment when my self-esteem is least prepared to deal with a meat market. It’s a vicious catch-22, and I’ve caught myself in it many times over the years.

Sometimes, though, I would just convince myself that I was making a big deal out of nothing and give it another go. Hope, or at least delusion, springs eternal. It’s been quite a relief to be out of that game for so long now.

While I have your attention, it behooves me to urge all of you to come check out the fun at a little event here in New York tonight:

This is our last show of the summer, since we go on hiatus until September, so if you’ve been tempted to come to one of the shows (and of course you have because you know Faustus would never participate in anything that wasn’t of the highest quality available) come on by tonight! It’s too bad Faustus is out of town this week, because I’m sure tonight’s theme would fill him with terror about his own trip to summer camp later this summer.

This is Sparky, your nurse practitioner in the doctor’s absence:

I know you think I
Like it when you slap my ass.
You are mistaken.

Have you ever been fooling around with someone and suddenly realized that you weren’t much more than an elaborate masturbatory aid? Like you were just one of the accessories of his scene? It’s such a disappointing moment. It’s awkward to go through those sexual negotiations with someone, trying one way or another to let him know what you like, trying to figure out what he likes. Sometimes he won’t get your hints, or you can’t figure out when you’re pushing the right buttons, or one of you feels silly just coming out and saying what it is you’re into. Ideally, though, you’re both trying, and you’re both trying to reach a common ground where everyone has a good time, gets a little sticky, and goes home (or rolls over, or curls up to you) with a smile.

But. BUT! Some guys just aren’t into your opinion. You can nudge, hint, take his hand and move it, or even blurt out “Quit it!” and he doesn’t get the point. Or, more accurately, he doesn’t care about what you’re after. It’s selfish, yeah, but it’s also self-absorbed. If I’m going at it with a gentleman caller, I’m trying to see to it that he enjoys himself. I really am! But I want to be in on the fun, and I have a few requests of my own. I like to think that he’s there because he’s into me in some way, not because I’m just the right size or shape to fit into his ritual. I want to feel a little chemistry. I do not want to feel like an interchangeable character in someone else’s script. Hell, even if I like the script (and I am, shall we say, a fan of a variety of genres) I want to be able to collaborate and improv a little.

This problem can show up when you least expect it. I’ve been with guys and experienced a real connection on the basest levels, giving and taking and get a kick out of each other’s enjoyment, when neither of us had even exchanged names or were likely to see each other ever again. That’s a lot of fun, and one of the reasons why I think even the most casual sex can be very fulfilling if you luck out with the right person and have a good attitude about the whole thing. Conversely, I’ve also dated guys who had no ability whatsoever to adapt to having me there, which is infinitely worse than being ignored by a relative stranger.

So seriously guys: don’t just plow ahead assuming you’re both having fun. Pay a little attention, and then maybe you both will.

This is Sparky, filling in for Faustus and working that gimmick:

It’s Dorian Gray
In reverse: you aged and yet
Your photo stayed young

It’s happened to most of us at one point or another, especially those of us who’ve chosen to embrace our inner slut during the Internet Age. We see a suggestive pseudonym, a few compelling statistics, perhaps a blurb of some kind or another, and a photo. (I hope you all at least insist on a photo these days. These aren’t the early nineties for god’s sake!) It always amazes me that there are men out there who think they can get away with fudging the basic parts of this kind of rudimentary advertising. I suppose what really amazes me is the thought that there might be other men who fall for this bait and switch, who might see that guy at the door and not feel swindled. Or at the very least, not call their bluff and withhold the nookie.

Granted, I think there’s room for a little flexibility depending on what you’re really after at any given moment. I’ve been willing to overlook a little fibbing or the use of slightly misleading imagery if a guy was still attractive in person. It’s the nature of the business to put your best face forward, and I imagine it’s a slippery slope once you tell that first fib. I have a friend, for example, who dated a guy for years without confessing he was ten years older than this guy, and not five years younger. But he had the good skin and the limber body to inhabit the lie. I have — more than once — encountered guys who thought they could show a ten-year-old photo of themselves and assume I wouldn’t mind getting pawed by the cryptkeeper hands I eventually saw. When faced with such blatant, artless dishonesty, I’m too annoyed to even stick around (or play host) for small talk.

I’m often attracted to older guys, so it’s not a matter of age discrimination. But I like honesty. And the confidence that honesty requires. After years of trying my luck with personal ads (of both the reputable and tawdry kinds), I’ve lost a lot of faith in men’s ability to be upfront about what they have to offer, so I’ve learned to read those many little photos much more critically. Getting a good photo is much easier now than it was when I was more of a catch myself, thanks to the availability of scanners and digital cameras, which makes it even easier to assume that you can make a few key judgements about books from their covers.

A few of the guidelines that I’ve learned (the hard way) to follow over the years:

• Never trust a blurry photo. If he can’t find anything that shows the details, than he’s probably trying to hide them.

• That gets a little harder if a guy thinks his crappy cameraphone photo is good enough, but if he thinks that than his standards may be low in other matters as well, and so he can’t be trusted.

• Even still, a crappy cameraphone picture has a very different quality of crappiness than a blurry scan of an old print or even an old digital photo. Learn to spot the differences if you want to give a guy that extra benefit of the doubt.

• A young-looking guy doesn’t necessarily look like a young guy. He may look good, but it’s a different kind of good. If there’s any discrepancy between the photo and the age given, assume the worst. Either one could be a fib.

• Look at where that arm is placed, or that unusual posture. There’s something flabby in Denmark.

• And this is one you can only do if you’ve been around the block for a long time: if he’s still using the same picture for a couple of years, then chances are it’s been around for a couple more. At the very least, it’s probably not too accurate. If he’s still so damned handsome, then why can’t he ask someone with one of those fancy new little robot cameras to take another shot?

A little imagination, with a dash of loneliness and horniness, can make us see what we want to see, or read what we want to read. We fill in the details with what we hope to discover, and that’s where the trouble starts. We wouldn’t be silly romantic fools if we didn’t hope for the best, but we have to draw the line somewhere. I draw the line at that washed-out old wedding photo a guy shows when he’s trying to talk his way into my pants. Show a little effort, at least, before I waste the subway fare.

Greetings, kids, this is Sparky, assuming control of the Faustus, M.D., Clinic for Neurotic Bloggers for the remainder of the good doctor’s absence. When we authors ad interim were given our assignments we were instructed in no uncertain terms to produce at least one substantial post a day during each of our stints. That’s a nice idea, but when you’ve been at this game as long as I have, that kind of inspiration is hard to come by. The musical theater, however, provided me with an answer to the dilemma, as it does in so many things: “You gotta have a gimmick.”

So, for the next week I’m going to take a few of those gay haiku you’ve heard so much about, and tell stories that will illustrate why I found a few of them so personally meaningful. Voilà! Instant content.

Here, in place of the Doc one final time, I find I can no longer manage plurality — being in company — or even, for that matter, being. I carry on, naturally — what would I do except that? — but with nothing left to it other than to be alone. Alone and, well, virtual. Look, I’m not even here.

A terrible condition to be in, no doubt about it; that of unmitigated individuality, egocentric monomania, with only ever room for one. Bereft of the capacity for dialogue, for that vibration in the air between two (or more) people. No place here for community. No place for liking or loyalty or love.

How do we build anything, without each other? How am I meant to go on without you? You were my collaborator, my navigator, my colleague, my partner in crime. You were the love of my life. Without you, I became nothing.

Well.

It would appear I can go on, after all.

Hearing my empty voice echo around our recently-vacated hall, it might occur to you that I’m talking only to the brickwork, the floor, the air. You’re right, I am. What could I do differently? Where once you were, you are no more. What we were together turned into only you and me. We fragment; we all fragment like that. The gap can only get greater, the connection weaker, more forlorn, more lonely. The dwindling contact ever more faint.

Hello? Are you there?

Anyone?

Hello?

No. When we come down to it, in the final reckoning, no-one will pick up the phone. It can all only end one way.

A hum.

A click.

And maybe, too little, too late, unheard in the crackling fadeout: a goodbye.

Goodbye, cruel world.

Goodbye…

Our love-seeker is elsewhere, for a spell. I, Matt, am a temporary host while he’s away, to be vaguely glimpsed from time to time hereabouts, despite my camouflage of tortured prosody, before the duty roster rotates to its third victim.

So, it’s Friday. It’s a day for gratitude to deities or to sexual acts, for fish or calls to prayer. It’s Freya’s festival, or Frigga’s, or Aphrodite’s. It’s Crusoe’s sidekick. What shall we do today? Where shall we go?

I say: let’s take a tour boat to somewhere cheerful.

Picture a small isle midway from the south side of the Thames to its opposite. Just a little rocky outcrop, leftover from a rougher, readier time, before overseas trade took over the estuary. Boats sail by it daily still, despite its lack of reality: a mere chimera, it is, a fever dream of solidity amid the tidal flow of the river. But chimeræ are hazardous, as all steerspeople realise, so they give it a wide berth to this day.

The river is wide about this islet; to keep its folk at bay, perhaps. Atop the rock is a hamlet that’s quite a surprise if you compare it to the more usual grumpy pessimism of its locale.

The people who live there are famously agreeable. Whatever you ask of them, they will seldom refuse. Theirs is a microculture of almost ceaseless positivity. So dedicated are they to the affirmative that their peculiar argot lacks the most basic tools for its opposite. If they shake their heads, it is always to say “yes”.

For them, the world is all about the upside. Every day is a festival, every idle chit-chat a party, each word a gift. Their streets are paved with laughter. The little village hall is double-decked with the classical mask of comedy. They amuse each other with musical shows like Yes, yes, Yvette or Les Heureuses.

It’s so upbeat it could make you vomit.

Oh, yes, it’s a great place to visit. It’ll recharge your batteries, boost your morale, massage your ego. But by the time your little day trip is over, you’ll be desperate to catch the rickety ferry back to the real world; back to the luxury of shades of grey.

Who could take all that sugar from day to day? There’s a place for optimism, of course, but please. You’d have to be crazy to live there…

He’s away. He’ll be back. Meanwhile, in some hidden, sun-dappled glade of his blog, you chance upon me. You lucky, lucky people.

Carefree, smiling, dancing on sunbeams, we look around his garden and feel joy. Where should we wander, here, amid so many lovely leaves and flowers? Hearing a breeze ruffle blades of grass, seeing richly laden branches wave forward and back, we sigh in wonder; can we possibly decide upon a course which offers even more pleasure? Perhaps.

Moving on, our journey carries us by fields and groves and dense copses of woodland, all richly summery, warm and basking in sunshine. We exchange easy, playful hugs and kisses and skip along happily hand in hand, secure in our friendship and love.

Beside a bubbling brook, minuscule people garbed in blue hook huge golden fish, each one food for many weeks ahead. We decline several generous offers of a meal, and move on, laughing gaily, choosing a way ahead from many on offer, all equally alluring. Up? Down? Do we even care? So many choices, surely none will be bad?

Or maybe one.

When we’ve gone a mile or so down our chosen lane, we observe a growing darkness; colour leaches from blossoms overhead, dragonfly wings no longer iridesce, songs so long accompanying us we’d ceased even hearing drop away — and suddenly we hear once more. Hear an absence, an echoing loss.

Dismayed, we gaze on as a jewelled hummingbird hovers briefly before us, slows, and spirals groundward, dying before our eyes. Glancing up, we see leaves shrivelling on branches under a slender arc of moon, her dim radiance cold and cruel. Silence is everywhere. Somehow, we are alone.

Where did our happiness go?

A freezing wind rises and whips around us, pulling our hair and chilling our bones and dampening our eyes. Icicles caress our cheeks, now, and rime our lashes, and his absence burns so keenly in memory we fear we may never be warm again.

We hug ourselves grimly and — being all we can do — hope. If we can only survive his leaving, we may — some week, some year — rediscover sunshine. Spring will one day find us again, my friend. One day, surely.

We dig in for a long, sorrowful vigil.