On Where Life Is

I moved out of my parents' house two weeks ago.

Two and a half years ago, I moved back after royally fucking up a year at Brooklyn College. My tail was between my legs yet I was somehow defiant. I was going to be here for six months, maximum. I was going to get my driver's license, pay off my credit cards, and move back to New York, and do it MY WAY, dammit.

I got my driver's license, but didn't get the actual car until almost a year later.

I signed up for a personal trainer for a year. So stupid financially, right? But I still have seven sessions left and I don't have love handles anymore. Yes, skinny people can have love handles.

Just as I had most of my credit cards paid off, hello Nordstrom Signature Visa! But I really only use it for cute clothes, and the occasional trips. Speaking of trips, oh the places I went! I went to Los Angeles, Orlando, Chicago and Vegas, all the while wondering how I had a full-time job and felt like I never had any money.

My current living situation happened unexpectedly, as all great things in life do. About three months ago, the power in my parents' house was out for an entire weekend. There was a snowstorm, and houses all over Minneapolis were intermittently without power. Unfortunately for my parents, our house was the only one within a three-block radius without power, so we were fairly low on Xcel's totem pole, who were busy working on entire neighborhoods living in a blackout.

During the first night, I called my brother out of boredom. He had been drinking, but wasn't at that obnoxious level of drunk that he gets later in the evening. He was one step before that, when he is a wise and sagacious drunk. The life that I had been living was once my brother's. While I was off in college, getting plastered every night and having emotional affairs with boys of questionable sexuality and amazing abdominal muscles, he was fighting with my parents about things like leaving underwear on the bathroom floor. When he finally moved out, my parents had four months of bliss before I showed up from Brooklyn. He moved to a house with a few other guys, and I perceived them as ballers, as Dane would be calling me every weekend home from the bar. Yes, Kim Kardashian totally made eye contact with him during her appearance at Aqua.

"I know you think you're gonna go to L.A. or New York," he said. "And maybe you will. But just, sign a month-to-month lease somewhere, live in a divey apartment, and just LIVE. You're miserable there. You have this whole complex in your head that you live with your parents and you're a loser, and you won't feel like one if you move out."
"But I don't have any money," I whined.
"No, you do," he scoffed. "How much do you make a month?"
I told him, and he was convinced. "You've been there for over two years and you don't have any money? That's embarrassing."
But I had my excuses ready! My initial credit card bills, followed by the additional credit card bills! My two speeding tickets! My hospital bill from the night in February I fell on my face outside of The Saloon and had to be stitched up at HCMC! My failed semester as a film student at Minneapolis Community and Technical College to the tune of $2,200!

The next night, my parents' house was STILL without power, so I took a shower at my friend Dana's house. Dana graduated from University of Wisconsin and lives with her parents. I still have one of her T-shirts. I slept that night at my friend Sina's apartment. Sina lives in a rather famous apartment building with a questionable reputation, but I felt safe there. She told me how much rent was and I thought I could easily afford it. Sure, it had its drawbacks. Parking is impossible in her neighborhood and I could never have people over, especially my friend Julie, who would run away at the sight of the first Somali person. But it was close to the light rail, and it would be fun living in the same apartment with Sina! I could come down to borrow a cup of sugar, only in our case it would probably be a fifth of vodka.

December came around. My mother and I fought all the time, but that's been our relationship for the past ten years. My father and I often get along, but we fought more that month than we have in our whole lives. It was the stupid things, really, like the fact that the living room doubles as his bedroom and I just want to watch my Jeopardy on DVR, dammit, or I'd be late for work because he was in the shower when I needed it, or that he had to park in the street because I did such a poor job parking in the driveway, or his drunkenly barging into my room without knocking asking if I had his phone charger. IT WAS 2 IN THE MORNING. I COULD HAVE BEEN WATCHING GAY PORN.

An acquaintance of mine was hosting a going away party the third weekend of December, as he was following his girlfriend to Colorado. He had a note on his invite that he was subleasing his room if anyone was interested. I wrote him about it, and we talked about it over at the party. Nothing came of it, and I told myself it was for the best. He lived with three "dudes", and maybe we just wouldn't gel together.

The last week of December, my aunt and uncle were staying with us for a week, much to the chagrin of my father. The boy messaged me that day saying the room was still mine if I wanted it. I debated in my head. Could I afford it? What would happen when the lease was over? Should I suck it up at my parents' house for a few more months, then convince Sina to follow her dreams to L.A., and take me with her as her #1 groupie?

I officially made my decision at dinner, when we were all discussing our eating habits, and why you should eat breakfast.

Jakey: "I usually eat really healthy when I'm at work, and then I just come home and eat everything."
Jakey's Aunt: "Because it's free."
Jakey: "...."
Jakey's Mother: "Well, I .... no ... he ... he doesn't eat breakfast in the morning, he never has TIME. He really only eats one meal a day. He ... you know, it's just ..."

Her effort to defend me was admirable, valiant even, but the message had been sent. Later that night, she agreed to give me a ride to the train station the next day so I wouldn't have to drive to the mall in the ice, and when morning came around, you would have thought I had asked her for a kidney. "But we're going to breakfast!!" she cried, and I realized that so long as I was under this roof, I was going to be the Spoiled Ungrateful Asshole Adult Son in the narrative of her life.

I am in a Dude House now. They aren't here a lot, and truth be told, I'm not either. I have, however had two different girls over in the past week, because I BE PIMPING. My roommates are actually cleaner than I am, which is just wrong. They don't even have sisters. Two weeks ago we watched the BCS Bowl and last week we watched the Golden Globes. They think Christina Aguilera looks better now with meat on her bones, and I found that to be uplifting.

Also, they are REALLY cute but that has nothing to do with the enjoyment of my new living situation. Really. Honest. Stop looking at me like that.

Fuck 2010

In the spirit of Dodai Stewart's amazing "Fuck 2010" post on jezebel.com, here is my edition:


Fuck that it's been two and a half years and I'm still living at home with $200 in savings. Fuck that my relatives perceive me as the loser asshole adult son who can't do anything right. Fuck that, while my mother and I have managed to improve our relationship, I still have anger issues up the wazoo and she still has her days where she wins the gold medal in the Passive Aggressive Olympics. Fuck that all of my close friends have moved away. Fuck that I am still in a retail gig and can't get promoted because I am a screw-up and show up late, hung over, and sometimes still intoxicated despite the fact that my customers LOVE me, dammit. Fuck the St. Olaf Gays and their fag hags who sat next to me at a wedding and said "Retail is only acceptable between the ages of 16 and 20", because I'M RIGHT HERE, DAMMIT. Fuck that this was the year my father went from a fun drunk to kind of a mean one. Fuck that I refuse to date because I am a loser living at home, and therefore either have emotional affairs with men on the Internet who are probably really 60 years old and obese, awkward one-night-stands that end in tears, or ridiculous emotional affairs with straight guys who live in Wisconsin. Lastly, fuck the Minnesota weather, and being stranded at the Mall of America in a blizzard. Fuck that my wallet was stolen when it actually had money in it. Fuck that two weeks prior, the parking ramp was an ice rink and I hit two parked cars and a young woman (who is going to be okay, but it was still traumatizing for all involved, especially her).

Read more: http://jezebel.com/5721528/fuck-you-2010#ixzz19xCG1K6f

I feel better now, don't you?

On St. Olaf Gays

I went to the wedding reception for my friend's mom. My friend went to St. Olaf for college so I hung out with the St. Olaf Gays when I wasn't awkwardly hanging out with kids who were in anywhere from seventh to tenth grade when I graduated high school and whose siblings I actually graduated with, and said siblings are now all engaged and have grown-up jobs and it is allegedly going to be okay. All night I had my usual existential crisis in my head -- I am Peter Pan and everyone else either stayed in college or actually graduated, Mommy Issues Mommy Issues Mommy Issues -- then quieted them with wine and convinced myself that such insecurities were all in my head.

After my sixth glass of wine, I was sitting at a table with the two St. Olaf gays and their gal pals. I was sort of a fifth wheel in that everyone at the table was conscious I was there and while they accepted my interjections, I still wasn't really part of the conversation. It was okay. I enjoy soaking things in. Then this happened as we were discussing the gay club experience (and they mentioned a gay club in Minneapolis that I have somehow NEVER heard of, WTF):

ST. OLAF GAY #1: I mean, I'm into older guys.
ST. OLAF GAY #2: They're more put together.
ST. OLAF GAY #1: So much drama otherwise.
ST. OLAF GAY #2: It's so immature.
ST. OLAF GAY #1: Or, like, they work retail.
ST. OLAF GAY #2 AND FAG HAGS: Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.
FAG HAG #1: Yeah, like retail is only acceptable when you're between 16 and 20. Otherwise ...
FAG HAG #2: Yeah!
ST. OLAF GAY #1: Ridiculous!
ST. OLAF GAY #2: Um, Nordstrom Rack is the exception.
JAKEY: I have to pee.

I tried to cavort with the 20 year olds but I was too sad and could no longer hide it. I met one of their mothers and tried to joke about being on my sixth wine glass. She did not laugh. Halfway through my two-mile walk home in the Minnesota tundra, I realized that her son that introduced us has been in rehab and I am a real winner.

On Getting Tagged in Nasty Porn PIctures on Facebook

This is my sincere and humble apology to anybody who saw really gross pictures that I was tagged in. By gross, I mean GROSS. It happened not once not twice not three but FOUR times but I can now say with confidence that it won't happen again. I have since cut from my friends list people whose real identities I don't know, so now I am sure that I'm not friends with anybody who would think it would be really funny to tag me in pictures of pornography. And objectivity is everything, but this was porn that nobody needs to see. Really. If I was going to tag myself in such pictures I would have at least chosen something more aesthetically pleasing.



I take responsibility in accepting friend requests from people that I knew nothing about other than that we had one or two mutual friends. Maybe it was vanity, like "Ooooh! Friend number 1,223! You win a prize!" But I really don't think like that, at least on a conscious level. Last night I was tagged for a third time, received several text messages and wall posts in my e-mail, and promptly removed things as quickly as I could. I scoured my friends list and cut everybody that I didn'tk now. Turns out i missed one, because it happened again today while I was at work. I called a friend who bravely logged into my Facebook, and the pictures had since been removed, so thank you to that friend as well as the poor souls who reported the pictures. When I got home I went through my friends list AGAIN, repeating every single name to myself so if anything was unfamiliar they were removed. I also learned that I think I am friends with about 80 Ashleys, Megans, Chelseas and Johns.



Speaking of Facebook friends, last night I also added a real adult film star for shits and giggles and wrote to him about the irony that on the day I was tagged in porn pics I was friends with an actual porn star, and he wrote back "That's funny ... kinda." Then, because I am 13, I obsessed over it for five minutes. Wait, kinda?? Does that mean I'm annoying?? Does that mean it's not really funny?? Whatever, Austin Wilde! But I digress.



Then I started thinking about the mentality of someone who goes through with such a prank. FOUR times?? Really?? Get a life, my child. I was not the only person in a certain circle of friends who was 'hit' by this, and one of them was an 80-year-old woman, which I think is really awful and disgusting. 80-year-old women should worry about things like bingo and missing Larry King Live, not having pictures of them Facebook-tagged in gross gay porn.



I have since made a new photo album of rainbows and butterflies. I hope you enjoy it.



Then I went into Facebook Notes because no one really does these anymore. The very first note was someone coming forward about being HIV positive, which is one of those moments where you put life in perspective and realize that you're kind of a self-obsessed whack job. Minutes ago I was telling myself that I have post-traumatic stress disorder from this debacle, as every time my phone rings and my e-mail button goes off, I'm worried I've been pranked yet again and it's frantic friends witnessing disgusting pictures, and then I read this note (very well-written, by the way) and it's one of those light bulb moments. A disgusting pornographic picture can be taken care of with an 'untag' button, and a situation like what this young person is dealing with has many words that can describe it, but untaggable certainly isn't one of them.



I also realized that religious people LOVE Facebook notes.



In conclusion, I am, again, very sorry to all who witnessed such things. Thank you for not deleting me as a friend, and thank you for not thinking that I was doing such a thing on purpose. An extra thank you if you can find my Claritin-D at this juncture, because I could really use some.

On Albino Squirrels

First of all, I have to say that I have not been updating this thing nearly enough, and for that I apologize, not to anyone who occasionally peruses this, but really to myself. While I have been working on a book, I haven't been writing daily or even weekly anymore, and I realized it was because something had to affect me on a visceral level, something that, upon my reflection, I *had* to write about it.

That has happened over the past few days.

This week, I had a great time hanging out with a friend of mine and a pal of hers who was visiting from Florida. We drank together, we went shopping together, we drank some more, and it was wonderful to spend time with the two of them, as I was worried that I would feel like a third wheel of some sort. I love that I now have a "Florida gay" in my life.

But I am writing about meeting him not because vodka is amazing (which it is), because he was a first for me. No, we did not have any sort of a romance or affair as I think he's into muscle dudes, but he was the first kind of a particular person that I had ever met:

He was a gay Republican.

A gay Republican, to me, is like when an albino squirrel is in your front yard. You know they exist, but to actually see one right in front of you is very jarring. Should you take a picture? Should you stare at it? What if he runs away?

That strange comparison aside, I think it's especially prescient to write about it this week. This morning, New York's Republican gubernatorial candidate Carl Paladino did a press conference denouncing homosexuality, reading a speech written for him by a rabbi who gladly espouses Leivticus's teaching that a man who lies with another should be put to death. This was the same morning that men in his state -- hell, the actual city he was in-- were arraigned for torturing gay teenagers and a man in a horrendous hate crime.

In Oklahoma, U.S. Representative Sally Kern is up for re-election; her opponent, a transgendered woman named Brittany Novotny, predictably has little chance. Yet Sally is known for Republicans because last year she announced that homosexuality was a bigger danger to our country than terrorism. Her comments drew a rare political reaction from Ellen DeGeneres, who rarely uses her talk show as a pulpit.

Here in Minnesota, Star Tribune columnist Katharine Kersten, the paper's lone conservative, argued that the most important issue facing Minnesota in our upcoming gubernatioral election is not poverty or unemployment, but the danger of gay marriage becoming legal and harming our children. The inexplicable, Maggie Lovejoy "what about the children?" was also a key point in Paladino's press conference, who re-itatered that homosexuals are indoctrinating our children and we must protect them.

It is 2010, by the way.

Here is what I am trying to wrap my head around: While I hate saying "I have Republican friends", not because I hate Republicans but just because I think it sounds just as stupid as when someone says "I have a black friend" or "my cousin is gay" ... I have Republican friends. And I respect and understand many of their viewpoints. A few months ago, I had a very illuminating dinner with a friend of mine who is a mother of a former classmate, yet I'm closer to her than with him (what? she's freaking awesome). I was worried about the discussion meandering into politics, but when it did, I was happy and relieved. She explained that, while she is a fiscal conservative and votes Republican, she doesn't believe in everything that our Republican governor Tim Pawlenty does. She was raised by a grandmother who spoke only Greek, and therefore was against the idea of "English-only" declarations in the legislature, and her experiences as a special education teacher instilled in her the importance of certain social programs. This was around the same time I had a discussion with my father and his friends -- all stuanch Republicans, yet they all had horror stories of the health care industry and, while against the idea of privatization or "Obamacare", understood that the system is broken and needs to be fixed.

Yet I still, especially after this week, cannot understand being a gay Republican. I do not think your sexual predispotion should affect your views on government spending, or health care, or our military actions in Afghanistan. But it was just two weeks ago when every single Republican Senator voted against the defense authorization bill that would have effectively repealed Don't Ask Don't Tell, effectively keeping us as the only country with a fully developed military with such a policy. And it is just this week, that, in the wake of far too many suicides of gay teens, prominent Republicans in the public eye are still denouncing homosexuality as "dangerous". Mr. Paladino went as far to say that it is "not valid".

I wish I would have been brave enough to ask my new friend about this, but I felt that with all the vodka flowing, things would have become heated, my other friend would have yelled that Obama is a Muslim, and I would have gone home crying. What I wanted to ask is, where do you reconcile your views? When you go to the polls, do you think about not being able to get married or to openly serve your country, or about your sugar daddy getting a tax break? This guy lives in FLORIDA, the only state where gay couples cannot legally adopt children, even ones they have raised as foster couples. Even Bill O'Reilly is against that policy, and he thinks gay marriage is like marrying your dog.

There is no tidy way to wrap this up. There is no "kum ba ya" platitude I can offer. I can only hope that the Republican party takes a cue from younger members like Meghan McCain, who has taken a more progressive stance on gay rights. I can only hope that these gay kids realize the entire world is not against them, even if it can seem that way. And I can only hope that we can all take a second to realize what is most important to us and the futures of our children, and all act accordingly.

End my pink soapbox.

On Rich Cronin

Rich Cronin, former frontman of '90s boy band LFO, passed away today of leukemia. He was 35.



I found about this a little more than an hour ago, and I'm not sure how to adequately process it. First there were the superficial thoughts: He was one of my first crushes as a sexually confused 12 year olds! With his biceps and golden skin, there was something a bit more mature about Rich than the Backstreet Boys or 'N Syncers (the only one I crushed on was Brian Littrell, really, and Trevor from "Soul Decision" would have likely given me wet dreams had I not been on Zoloft).

Then there were the random memories I have, since my brain is a hodgepodge of pop culture where things like algebra and American history should be. Maybe five, six years ago I randomly perused his website (it's no longer available). This was long after the boy band boom, and all the rage were the "emo" bands or hip-hop acts. Cronin's website seemed to reveal someone hopeful yet sad about the life of fame that had passed him by. He posted links to his poetry, and I'll never forget reading the line "I used to be friends with Justin Timberlake." Out of contest it sounds trite, but there was something beneath that: Like Rich, JT was a former boy-band standout, but had survived that category to move on to an upper echelon of fame. It may have been like in high school when your best friend promises you that contact will always be had, and then she goes off to Harvard and you only see her over holidays, if that.

But what most jarred my memories of Rich Cronin was this 2007 Vanity Fair article about boy band founder/convincted felon/sexual predator Lou Pearlman, who managed the Backstreet Boys and 'N Sync to great fame, along with a slew of side projects that included LFO. Of all these bands, only one of them had a member willing to speak on record about Perlman, and that man was Cronin.

That was the line, the 'aura,' I definitely heard that aura bullshit," says Rich Cronin, lead singer of the Pearlman band LFO. "It took everything in me not to laugh. He was like, 'I know some mystical fricking ancient massage technique that if I massage you and we bond in a certain way, through these special massages, it will strengthen your aura to the point you are irresistible to people.'

"I swear to God," Cronin goes on, "I had to bite my cheeks to stop from laughing. I mean, I now know what it's like to be a chick.… He was so touchy-feely, always grabbing your shoulders, touching you, rubbing your abs. It was so obvious and disgusting.… He definitely came at people. He came at me. In my situation I avoided him like the plague. If I went to his house, I went with somebody. I would never go with him alone. Because I knew every time I was over there by myself it always led to some weird situation. Like he'd call late at night to come over and talk about a tour, and you'd get there and he'd be sitting there in boxers. The guy was hairy as a bear."

By no means was Cronin's only legacy to the world as someone who spoke out on the abhorrent behavior of Lou Perlman, but it does give pause that, out of the 18 popular boy band members that Perlman managed, he was the only one to speak on the record.

Lastly, Cronin's death -- to me as a Generation Y member -- is one of those things when you realize your own possible mortality. Not only is 35 far too young to die, but it is only 11 years older than my own age. "Summer Girls" may have been silly, but it was also unforgettable in its catchiness; my sophomore year of college, I would routinely sing it with my lacrosse-playing, infinitely masculine roommate.

I don't know the inner secrets of Cronin's life; I can only hope his was a happy one. I can only hope that leukemia research continues so that no one has to die of it, especially a man of only three and a half decades. And I can only hope that we can all still think it's fly when girls stop by for the summer...for the summer.

Happy Birthday, Corey Cooper

I am over it, really. I will post on your Facebook wall later in the day, because right now I am the fourth person and that puts me in creeper status, even creepier than you already think I am. But then the right hand sign of Facebook said I should 'reconnect with you' and maybe that is a sign, but a sign of what? I am in Minneapolis and you are in Wisconsin, and I'm pretty sure you're not on my team, and I can't listen to "All I Want for Christmas is You" without thinking of the night I left my heart on the whorebox when I saw you kissing that girl, and I am convinced that Swedish pop superstar Robyn was witnessing the entire scene and used it as the inspiration for a song she would later release titled "Dancing On My Own".

I have been into signs from the universe lately. I had a dream two nights ago that my father got arrested for a DUI. Tonight I walked to the local pub and he was there too, slurring up a storm.
"You are not driving," I said, and I told him of my dream.
"God bless you, son," he said, "But I am an excellent drunk driver. I've done it for 35 years."
"But my dream!" I cried. "You should let me drive."
"How many drinks have you had?"
"Two."
"You weigh a hundred pounds. You'll be a toke over the line, too."


When we got in his truck he was putting the wrong key in the ignition, and I freaked out because I had left my iPod in the bar.
"I have to go back in!" I cried. "I left my iPod."
"Jesus Christ," he sputtered.
"Oh, wait," I said. "My iPod is in my back pocket." "And you worry about me." "But I'm just spacey. You're drunk."
He drove the quarter mile home with me in the passenger side and we were fine, but I worry.
"Do you have a savings plan?" he asked. "Will you ever move out of my house?"
"Hey," I cried. "I walked home from work with $7 in cash because I had one account and one declined account."
"Well, California, here we come."


Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if I stayed in Wisconsin. I only talked to Corey Cooper once during my tenure there (our other deep conversations, like when I asked how tall he was, occurred after I left and was just visiting). Maybe I would have graduated and had a big boy job, working at a clinic or family center. I would have had no pipe dreams of show business or fleeting fame. I would have been normal and happy. I would even have had good sex. I am not saying that sex is the most important thing in the world, but it is one of my what-if's, like having a driver's license when I was in high school.