Robert Rauschenberg.

I was just reading in the New York Times a review of a show of Robert Rauschenberg drawings. They are the beautiful "transfer" drawings, where he took images from magazines, soaked them in solvent, and then rubbed them onto paper.

When I was studying painting at Parsons (1981, I was twenty and had just moved to New York), Rauschenberg was a favorite of mine, along with Jasper Johns. But especially Rauschenberg. I got interested in collage because of my fascination with his work, especially the transfer drawings.

Very recently, I was reading another article, probably in the Times, either about Rauschenberg or Johns I can't remember which, in which they were referred to as long-term partners, or lovers, something like that. It was an incidental detail in a story about something else. As if everyone knew that. Maybe they do now. But I had no idea, especially not back then when I admired them so much. When I was aping their work.

That would have made a difference to me. It's hard to say exactly how knowing that my favorite artist was a homosexual would have affected my sense of myself as an artist, would have affected the trajectory of my life as an artist, but I know it would have, and I felt cheated and hurt to discover that it had been kept from me all these years.

Poetry.

I went to a lecture and reading tonight by Dana Gioia, the poet and chairman of the NEA. I like his work -- he uses plain language. The event was at the Ransom Center at U.T., and the audience seemed to be mostly academics a little older than me, or people who run with that crowd. Sort of a high-brow, literary crowd is what I'm trying to say.

He spoke for about half an hour, then he read a few of his poems, along with a little Longfellow and a little Auden. The title of his talk was "Poetry as Enchantment," I think, or, if that wasn't the title, it was his thesis. He made the case that poems, by using language in a specialized way that interacts with us as whole beings, have the power to cast spells. That poetry literally has the power to change us.

That these people needed to be told this was worrisome to me.

Ants.

I was just typing up some poems I wrote while I was in Utah last summer. They're the first poems I've written since high school. I've always been intimidated by poetry, regarding it as an esoteric art form that I would only embarrass myself by attempting. Which is just silly, I know. I like to think that one of my strengths as an artist is a talent for concision, an ability to reduce ideas and images to their essence. So why wouldn't I be a natural poet?

I drafted these Utah poems on a yellow pad, the kind I always write on. One of the poems is about some ants I observed on the floor of the yurt I lived in for a few weeks. When I flipped the page to this poem about ants, an actual, live ant crawled right off the page onto my desk and disappeared. It must have been there since August, just waiting for me to transcribe my poems.

Here's the ant poem:

All morning ants
are dragging corpses
across the floor
under me, a bee,
a moth. A moth!
but it's too heavy.
The ant gives up, leaves
the carcass. Relieved,
I go back to my desk.

A minute later I look up
and the moth is gone.

Animation.

J. and I went to The Animation Show last night at the Paramount Theater. It's a touring program of animated short films, curated by Mike Judge and Don Hertzfeldt.

All the films were wonderful, but a few stood out. "Everything Will Be OK," by Don Hertzfeldt was particularly beautiful and moving, as was "Dreams and Desires" by Joanna Quinn. Both were beautifully drawn. The experience got me to thinking that if I really want to incorporate my visual art training into my film work, I should be doing animation. Hm.

Gardening.

Jay is building a fence around our garden. I gave up helping him and came inside. I think I'll let him make the fence, and I'll do the planting tomorrow. It's still sometimes very difficult for us to work on a project together. Even after all these years and so many lessons, so much forgiveness.

Here's the pattern, as far as I can make it out: J. has a plan. I'm unclear on the details of the plan. I ask for clarification. J. seems reluctant to answer. The more I press, the more frustrated he becomes. Not having a sense of the outline of the project, I decide to see if I can figure it out as we go. J. becomes frustrated that I'm not forging ahead on my own but waiting for his cues. He stops talking, but keeps working. I'm angry because I don't know what the hell is going on. He's angry because I'm not helping.

Tired.

I feel tired and wonky. After the rabies ordeal, I only slept 4 or 5 hours and not soundly. So yesterday I was in a fog. I slept hard last night for 9 hours. J. and I went to see Lives of Others this afternoon. I loved it; J. didn't.

Tonight I may go out to the Chain Drive for a beer or two. I haven't been there in a couple months, since before I met Z, and I miss it. I miss being stoned and beer-buzzed in a dark bar full of horny men listening to loud music and trying to pick each other up. Why does it feel like cheating? On the other hand, maybe I want to go out to prove to myself that just because I've been seeing one man for several weeks doesn't mean I am attached.

Rabies.

Z. picked me up at about 7. He had invited me over to his place to ignore a movie. We decided to go for a walk on the hike and bike trail first since it was such a warm evening. It was getting to be dusk, but there was enough light left for a quick walk around the lake.

We got around to the south side of the lake, near the pedestrian bridge, but instead of going over the bridge, we thought we'd go under and around a different way. We both spotted what we thought was a cat sort of strolling several yards in front of us, but when we got closer we realized it was a small raccoon. A baby raccoon.

It turned around and saw us and stayed where it was. We stopped about 20 feet away from it. I guess we stopped because we wanted to look at it without scaring it away, but it was not at all afraid of us; in fact, it walked toward us. I got a little scared. Something felt wrong. It walked right up to our feet, poked around at our shoes. I was backing away from it, but Z. stayed put. The raccoon climbed up onto Z.'s leg with front paws, sniffed a bit, then bit Z.'s calf.

Z. shooed him away, and he backed off, but not much. He kept trying to come back to our legs. By this time I was freaked out. As we tried to back away, the raccoon followed us. We decided to take the bridge after all, and he pursued us all the way to the stairs but didn't follow us up. We stopped on the bridge to look at Z.'s leg. It was a very minor bite, but the skin was broken in a little curved row of teeth marks.

I knew from the moment I saw the raccoon take a bite that we'd be headed to the hospital soon. Z. was less sure. We went to his place, looked up some info about rabies on the internet. "Immediate medical attention" was the phrase that kept coming up. We did pause to make out for a few minutes, which was pretty funny to recall later.

So instead of a movie, our evening's entertainment was the emergency room waiting room. We arrived there at 9:30. We remarked on the way that it was a good thing this had happened not too late on a weekday, that the emergency room would probably not be too crowded. At about 1:30, Z. saw the triage nurse. At about 3:30, he saw the doctor, and at 5:30 they were giving him three big shots, one in either hip and another one all around the wound (which involved sticking the needle in and moving it around to get what looked like about half a cup of liquid into the muscle). I had to stop looking at that one because I started to feel woozy.

We left at 6 a.m. and had breakfast on the way home. Neither one of us had had dinner, so we were famished. After breakfast, Z. called in sick to work. I think the ordeal was worth it for him for the amusement he got from telling his boss that he wouldn't be coming in today because he'd been "up all night with rabies."

Today.

J. deposits the rent in our landlord's bank account, so I usually transfer my portion of the rent into J.'s account at the beginning of the month. We keep receipts for anything we share (groceries, household stuff), put them on the bulletin board, and at the end of the month we add them up to see who owes who money. I always owe J. This month it's a lot.

Our utility bill was huge, because we used our heaters on lots of days in January and February. And we spend way too much on groceries. I hope we can get into a CSA farm before too long to ease that expense a bit. The produce from our garden will help too, but that won't be till summertime.

Z. invited me over to his place tonight to "ignore a movie." We haven't seen each other yet since I got home from the drug study.

A Prairie Home Companion.

Did anyone else think the movie, A Prairie Home Companion was not very good? (I greencined it and watched yesterday. I was in Utah when it came out, hours from the nearest movie theater.) I'm a big Robert Altman fan, and a big Garrison Keillor fan (well, I like his stories -- the PHC show itself can be pretty tedious), and I loved watching Meryl Streep and Lily Tomlin doing their thing, but there were many times throughout the movie when all I was thinking was, "this isn't working at all." The angel of death? Maybe it was too dry for me. I don't know. It felt fake, which was particularly jarring because what Altman was always really good at was creating a convincing world, whatever the world of the film was.

Home, sweet home.

Oh, it's good to be home!

I survived the study with no detectable side-effects. J picked me up at the facility at 10:30 and took me right to Los Altos, a great little Mexican restaurant near our house that serves cheap, delicious breakfast, and I had my first cup of coffee in two weeks. And migas. Rapture.

It's about 85 degrees, sunny and dry, gorgeous spring weather. I have my door and windows open, and I'm sitting here with a big iced coffee, sucking on a square of dark chocolate, and printing out the materials I need to deliver by Thursday to U.T. to accompany my application (resume, C.V., reviews of my film).

What is better than my life right now?

Don't. push. me. 'cause...

I've taken to setting up my computer on one of the ECG tables (like a massage table with no hole for your face) in the "procedure room," which is the big main area where most everything study-related happens. All in all, I think there are more quiet hours here than anywhere else, though, as always, anyone can come in at any time and start playing loud funk music or having a marathon screaming match on the cell phone with her teenage child.

I haven't been writing much the last three days. Just distracted and ready to go home, I think. But I have been having great ideas for my screenplay just as I fall asleep at night. I value that even more than the time spent writing, because when I have one or two of those on my pad, I have something to get my pen moving when I sit down. I know I have something to write.

I was trying to read this afternoon, but I couldn't block out the conversations in the room, so I shuffled off to the TV room to see what folks were watching. They were just sitting down to watch The Guardian, so I stayed. It was long and, well, stupid. But I couldn't think of anything I wanted to do more, so I sat through it. I was hoping for more wet t-shirt shots of the Coast Guard boys. Can't we at least have that?

Now I'm back at my ECG table/desk. And there's a guy 10 feet away from me practicing harmonica. He has a little device that plays the tune, and then he has to play it. Beginner tunes, like Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. I want to feel supportive because he's learning to play the harmonica and anyone who wants to learn to play the harmonica should be encouraged. But it's about to drive me insane.

Home stretch.

Today is dose day again. No breakfast, so I have a nasty headache. Starting with the dose this morning, it got busy again. We're running from station to station, giving blood (12 times today, I think), having our vital signs taken, and giving them every drop of urine we produce for 72 hours. This means we're near the end. As soon as they get our last drop of urine on Monday morning, we're free.

While I've been incarcerated, J. has been turning the soil in our garden. As soon as I get out, Z. is going to take me around to his favorite nurseries and help me pick out seeds and seedlings. It's time to plant! For the warm season, we're putting in lima beans, peanuts, sweet potatoes, chilies, tomatoes, cilantro, and basil.

American Idol II (and I promise never again).

Tonight I watched a shorter episode of the show, maybe only an hour long, and, though I walked in about 20 minutes into the show and could have missed something, I don't think there was much singing. They spent the whole hour dragging each contestant up to the stage, repeating the humiliating comments made last night by the judges, and then telling them whether or not they would be returning for another round.

They only eliminated two contestants! How long does this go on?

So, they sent home one boy and one girl, and then what did they do, right after delivering the crushing news, but make the rejected kids sing the same song they sang last night which got them booted! I was really perplexed -- it just seemed over-the-top mean -- and I asked aloud why they did that. Food-hater said, "So they can see what they sound like with crap in their pants." That made my whole day.

Outside.

Our study coordinator arranged for us to have some time outside this morning. It's 80 degrees and sunny today. My fellow study subjects were practically drooling in anticipation.

I guess I'm not a real Texan yet, because I don't have that visceral need to be outdoors. I like a nice day, and I get stir crazy like anyone, but not so soon. People here are so used to mild weather pretty much all year round that if they're stuck indoors for more than a day and a half, they get antsy. Last week Z. and I went to a coffeeshop one of those nights when the temperature dipped into the low 30s, and the patio seating area was still full, everyone huddled and shivering by the gas heaters. I spent most of my life in the Midwest and Northeast where the winters can be so nasty you feel lucky to have someplace indoors to be.

The outdoor break was not mandatory, so I decided to stay inside while they all went for a walk in the yard. Not that I didn't want a break, but what I really wanted a break from was them.

American Idol.

I've finally seen American Idol. It's on at my dinnertime, and endlessly -- it's on when I sit down, for the last two nights I've watched it for about an hour, and it's still on when I get up to go. So, what's the object of this show? To find the loudest singer in America?

Even though I hadn't seen it, of course I knew a lot about it because people talk about it constantly. The buzz seems to be that Simon is cruel. Simon is not cruel enough. These kids are awful. Where do they come from?

Good lord, last night was the boys, and not one of them was better than bad. I mean really bad. Bad pitch, for goodness sake. If you can't sing on pitch, then what are you doing? Tonight, at least a couple of the girls were good singers. One of them was even a great singer. But I don't think she was louder than the two girls who sang Celine Dion songs, so I guess she won't win. Two. Celine Dion songs! What?

I don't understand this show at all.

Sparks.

I guess it was bound to happen. The guy who hates the food and the woman who talks loudly on the phone 18 hours a day (usually having very shall we say intimate conversation with her girlfriend) got into it today. In the "quiet" lounge. Which is never quiet, so I wasn't too surprised to hear shouting in there while I was showering. There are a couple people here who sound like they're shouting whenever they talk, and one of them is phone-sex woman. But this was real shouting, and apparently it was almost real fisticuffs when Food-hater told Phone-sexy to shut up and she invited him to make her shut up.

The altercation was about the volume or the style of music (hip hop) Phone-sexy was playing. In the "quiet" lounge. It turned into a racial clash (Phone-sexy is black, Food-hater is white) because apparently she asked him if it had been country music would he have asked her to turn it down and he said no. I think the word "cracker" was used. I couldn't take sides if I wanted to. I think nearly everyone in the study has had it up to here with the orgasmic phone conversations. And some of the guys have been taking bets before meals on what Food-hater will complain about first on his plate.

Five more days.

Bigots.

One of my fellow study subjects, sitting down to a lunch of taco salad, says, "What is this shit? What am I supposed to do with this? I don't even know how to eat this. Too many fucking Mexicans in the kitchen. We need some real food here, instead of this fucking Mexican shit." If I hadn't been so taken aback by the careless, offhand bigotry -- not to mention the appalling rudeness, since the woman who prepared the food was standing about 20 feet away -- I would have enjoyed a laugh at the thought of blaming the Mexican people for taco salad.

I'm a little sensitive because last night during dinner two young guys were loudly sharing their views about gay marriage (explaining why they would never vote for Guiliani), the usual blah blah about going against god. We all know I'm not a big fan of the gay marriage fight -- the irony of gay marriage being the progressive issue of our time is almost as funny/sad as blaming the Mexicans for taco salad -- but the standard arguments against it are all about saying one group of people is better than another and deserves better treatment. So, even though I'm not out there begging to get married, it still hurts to see how vehemently some people think I shouldn't be allowed to.

And anyone who says I'm hearing this stuff because I live in Texas just isn't listening. I heard just as many bigoted, mean-spirited conversations when I lived in New York and San Francisco.

TV.

I don't have a TV, I haven't in quite some time. Pretty much anything I ever want to watch on TV will come out on DVD soon enough. The times when I have had a TV in the house, I end up addicted to Law & Order and other stuff that's not really bad, but not really good either. I don't think it's necessarily destructive or evil, but it's not productive or edifying either, so you might as well have never had that hour or two in your life. That's what's sad. It's like smoking. Maybe it doesn't seem like such a big deal, but, truth be told, it shortens your life.

But I've been hanging out in the dining room here for the last three days, which has been great because between meals it's quiet and I can read (mornings and evenings) and write (afternoons). I just stay put and ride out the little noisy flurries three times a day and enjoy the peace otherwise.

There's a TV in here -- because of course there has to be a TV everywhere -- and when people come in they turn it on. It doesn't matter what's on, and it doesn't matter if they're going to watch it or not. In fact, most of them don't watch it, except incidentally while they're talking on the phone or chatting with someone or listening to music on headphones. Yet, they're visibly uncomfortable if it's not on.

Earlier a guy came in wearing headphones, which were attached to a small portable DVD player with a movie playing. He turned the TV on and sat down and watched his movie for about half an hour. Why? And just now, someone came in, the first person to arrive for snacktime (I had turned the TV off after the last of the dinner crowd left), and asked me if I minded if he turned the TV on. I said I didn't. He turned it on, sat down and ate his Rice Krispies treat, got up and left. He was in here for 2 minutes tops. He didn't even look at the TV, but it had to be on.

It's almost like an orienting device. If he was left with only his Rice Krispies treat and whatever happened to be in his head at the moment, he wouldn't have known where he was or what he was supposed to be doing.

I was reading an article in the Times this morning about MTV and how they're struggling to stay hip as people turn away from TV toward new media (the web, mp3 players, etc.). But from what I'm observing here, it doesn't seem like anyone's giving up TV. They're not as engaged with it, but they need for it to be on in the background while they do other stuff. They're not turning off the TV, they're adding layers to it.

Scrotum.

Librarians are banning a book because it contains the word "scrotum"? The book is “The Higher Power of Lucky,” by Susan Patron, and from what I've read it's geared to ten to twelve year olds and the scrotum referred to in the book belongs to a dog. And because of this word, librarians all over the country are banning the book.

No one in my family talked to me about sex when I was growing up. Not a word. Not once. I don't blame my parents. Sometimes you know you should do something and you just can't bring yourself to do it. God knows, there have been things in my life I couldn't face. My parents were uncomfortable with the subject because we are all -- despite the fact that erotic images of teenagers are used to sell products to us every day -- uncomfortable with the subject of teenagers' sexual lives.

I had about an hour of sex education in 5th or 6th grade. All the girls were sent to another room and a very young woman in a tight, low-cut seersucker pants suit came to our classroom, gave the standard biology explanation of human reproduction, and then giggled and blushed her way through a half dozen questions from a room full of boys. "What's a vagina?" "That's what you might know as a pussy." It was not helpful.

Nobody ever acknowledged how fucking weird everything had suddenly become. Nobody ever talked about love, or intimacy, or affection. (And -- and this is a whole nother reason to get indignant -- nobody ever ever ever even hinted that boys might start to find other boys sexy, or that girls might start noticing girls in a different way. Queer kids are pretty much on their own in that shame spiral.)

Thirty-five years later, people still can't see how it might be a good thing for their kids to be able to talk about the dog's balls and not feel ashamed or embarrassed? Can we just grow up, for god's sake? My heart aches for the kids who are trying to figure out what's happening with their bodies and their minds, who, instead of information and compassion, get a bunch of freaked-out adults pretending it isn't happening.

My favorite blog about gay stuff is Joe.My.God. and I loved what he had to say about this whole scrotum mess:

"Librarian Dana "Pee Pee" Nilsson says, "This book included what I call a Howard Stern-type shock treatment just to see how far they could push the envelope, but they didn’t have the children in mind. How very sad." Nilsson then excused herself to have a tinkle and powder her dirty pillows."

Maybe this time.

I spent three solid hours this afternoon writing. I think I may have discovered the secret -- the dining room. It seems to clear out in the afternoon, with the exception of a few stragglers, so if I set up in here before lunch and then just stay, eventually I can turn off the TV and get some work done. This is also the only place in the facility with a strong wi-fi signal, so I think it's gonna be my office for the next week. I'm trying not to get too happy about this discovery, because there is a TV in here and these people are drawn like moths to a TV. Cross your fingers for me.

Three hours! And it's only dinnertime. Maybe it'll be quiet in here again tonight. At this rate, I can have this screenplay in some kind of shape by the time I get out, next Monday. Reading the Baldwin bio inspired me.

Writing an email to my friend M. this morning, replying to her question, "What's it like in there?" I realized that it's like moving in with the group of people you would encounter in the waiting room of a free clinic. It's the same demographic mix.

The woman who coos to her lover on the phone all day is sitting behind me. She has one of those phones that clip to your clothing so you don't have to hold anything and there's nothing obstructing your face. She's eating and telling her girlfriend everything that's on her plate. "Peas, mashed potatoes, meatloaf... that's right baby, meatloaf!" When you're on the phone, does the rule about not talking with your mouth full still apply?