Here’s an excerpt:

Madison Square Garden can seat 20,000 people for a concert. This blog was viewed about 67,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Madison Square Garden, it would take about 3 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

Tom Cullen and Chris New, in Andrew Haigh's "Weekend"

“Weekend” is about two postmodern guys drifting through life in some unnamed city in England’s East Midlands. Russell (Tom Cullen) is a lifeguard at a swimming pool, but don’t expect to see him perched in Speedos like an iconic California surfer; his job is at a community center and not much fun. He lives in a concrete high-rise, which I took to be public housing, but he’s made it fairly nice within his means. (Recent British movies that don’t feature lords and ladies are nearly always about the bleakness of modern life. One can interpret this several ways.) He’s somewhat openly-Gay, his close Straight friends know and they’re the ones he mostly hangs out with; he’s not big on the Gay movement, which doesn’t fit him. Then he meets a guy named Glen (Chris New) who is filled with Gay fire.

This isn’t a political movie but a human one. Their encounter begins at a Gay bar; sex first, conversation after. The film is about their two-day conversation.

It turns out Glen, an art student, is moving to Portland, Oregon to enroll in studies, just as they begin to fall in love.

The film is available now on Netflix; if you belong, search there. Here is A.O. Scott’s rave review in The New York Times.

What made this a good Christmas night picture for me was the character of Russell; he gradually emerges as fundamentally honest and decent. He and Glen do a lot of drugs and clash repeatedly – Glen is a bit cynical and in-your-face – but they allow themselves to enter into a relationship, however brief it might be. They have a genuine encounter; they open up to each other.

I liked spending Christmas night with this film. I identified with Glen, but I fell in love with Russell.++

Evan Wolfson and Cheng He. They had a lovely celebration. (The New York Times)

New York State legalized same-sex marriage in late July, and since then I’ve entertained myself by reading Gay and Lesbian wedding notices in The New York Times. Some are them are touching – “Old Man Marries His Old Man after Shacking Up for 40 Years.” Some are mostly remarkable for the social status of the couple – “Ms. Williams, Goldman Sachs V.P., Weds CBS Treasurer Ms. Padrara.” And some are just filling up newsprint – “Steelworker’s Son Says Vows with Obscure Performance Artist You Never Heard Of and Don’t Want to See.”

I’m a little shocked at how many people become Universal Life ministers to preside at these occasions; online, ten bucks? People who obviously have no discernible faith, but go ahead and buy the piece of paper, which the state doesn’t know from an Episcopal priest. “Minister? Aisle 2. Thank you; next?”

I read these vignettes because they can be warm and fuzzy – “Ms. Vanderwhipple has a degree in Phonics from Shippensburg State” – and because I’ve got somebody in mind for broom-jumping someday. They’re nice fantasies, and if you get behind The Times’ paywall, they’re free. I enjoy them. The ones with bylines are well-written, and who doesn’t enjoy reading about someone else’s happiness?

How totally amazing; we can get married in New York. Kudos to Gov. Cuomo, the state Assembly and Mayor Bloomberg. Politicians did something right for a change.

With sincere congratulations to the couples taking advantage of this new law to get what they deserve and to honor each other, I also think about whether we ought to pin our hopes on legislation. Yes, lawmaking is very important, but will it get us where we need to be? What most liberates Gay men?

(I am in favor of Lesbian rights and everyone else’s, but I don’t write about them, when they write so well themselves.)

What social change would free up Gay men to really understand themselves?

Clearly our lives are better under the law than they used to be; thank you, activists, reporters, judges, pols and voters. Good work; thank you. But I’m not sure how much better off we are, 42 years after the Stonewall Riots. Two generations, but look at us!

Tyler Clementi, a student at Rutgers, jumped off the George Washington Bridge last year because somebody streamed video of him making out with a guy.

If you’re queer in Iran you’ll probably hang.

Republican presidential candidates are running all over Iowa on God, guns and Gays. How many decades has this been going on? Jerry Falwell’s body is oozing fluids by now, but still these Republicans are running on his old platform.

I don’t think politics is our final answer. Politicians are always behind the times, regardless of liberal or conservative. They react to events, they don’t cause them. They delay a Yes vote – all of them – as long as they can.

Instead I think we need to look inside ourselves; take stock, ‘fess up to our shortcomings, and devise a plan to free ourselves from this miserable apartheid.

The place to start is sex. That’s where liberation is located. Tom of Finland has more answers than the governor of New York.

Aviators

We have terrible attitudes about sex. And we’re as self-destructive now as we ever were in the bad old days.

Alcohol, drugs, smoking, food, materialism, pop culture, celebrity-chasing: they’re all reactions to shame.

That hasn’t changed in 42 years. We still define ourselves in heterosexual terms. If you suck cock – and why wouldn’t you? – you’re a faggot, a pig, a pussy, a cunt.

Because, of course, Straight men who don’t suck cock are automatically more desirable than any fag could possibly be. They’re real men, or so goes the ideology, which hasn’t changed this entire time.

Tyler Clementi, come down from that bridge.

Nobody really cares who you were kissing – or who you were sucking off.

What we really need is a full-blooded embrace of male sexuality.

We like dick; it’s desirable. We need to admit it, and embrace it, while rejecting the old ideology that we aren’t men.

We can never achieve liberation without rejecting heterosexual supremacy. We’re carrying apartheid laws around in our heads.

A man who fucks a man is a real man.

So is the man he fucks, if he opens up and spreads wide and shouts, “Thank you, Daddy, fuck me!”

That’s the world Tom lived in, and he was right.

We need to stop referring to ourselves in heterosexual terms. If you take it up the ass it doesn’t make you a bitch; it makes you a man, because what you’re wanting is that guy’s masculinity.

You’re not a girl. You’re not a pussy; you don’t have one, buddy. You’re not a pig; you’re not a fag.

You’re just a guy who loves men – and why would you not?

Heterosexual terms don’t apply to you; you’re in a different category.

Who wouldn't?

The essential thing is the opening of our minds. That’s why Tom’s art is so good, and lots of others besides him. Tom’s Men are uninhibited; they know what they like and they go for it.

American Gay men, as I perceive us, are still hugely inhibited 42 years later. Dudes, where does that leave Uganda?

We bought the “sissy” trope hook, line and sinker. We think the only real men are Straight – because they defined it that way.

No. The butchest men on earth are Gay.

They combine intellect, sensitivity and a roaring phallus. That’s what you want, so go for it.

Reject porn videos. They’re almost entirely homophobic, all about how you’re a bitch and a pig, just because you like male sex. Who wrote that script, Jerry Falwell?

Love the one you’re with. I’m serious; love that guy and let him love you.

Don’t tolerate abuse.

Admire his masculinity; his courage, his leadership, his ability to thrust. Even if he’s on the bottom now, he can poke it.

Do not disparage Straight men, but notice that their courage and integrity are often lacking. They’re afraid of each other; what if someone decides they’re not macho enough, because they saluted the flag, or kissed a daughter, or failed to vote Republican?

Apartheid is one big conspiracy. Understand it and it falls apart.

Gay liberation is not a product of legislation, but Tom of Finland. If you like getting fucked, then lie back, take it and shout.

You’re still a man; a better one for being honest.++

Just hanging out, hoping for some action and a nice guy to be with.

Bernard Law, the disgraced Archbishop of Boston, now with a cushy job in the Vatican.

Laurie Goodstein of The New York Times reports:

Catholic Paper Apologizes for Homosexuality Column

The official newspaper of the Roman Catholic archdiocese of Boston has apologized for a column that said that homosexuality is caused by Satan. The column’s author, Daniel Avila, is a lawyer and policy adviser at the Catholic bishops’ conference in Washington, where he works in the office that opposes the spread of same-sex marriage.

Boston, ground zero, the home of Church-protected child molesters. Does anyone wonder why I’m a Protestant?++

Move over, Edsel.

Many of you know I operate The Daily Office websites, here, here and here. You may not know that after 1.5 million visitors, I’m about to blow them all up.

I have grand plans for a new supersite, but I have to raise $50,000 (and then sell ads) to make them come true. I want to combine prayer and social networking to perform projects large and small for God. (How’s that for ambition?)

I also want to support myself and my family. (It appears I’m about to have a family, including a 13-year-old, totally adorable girl.) It’s one thing to be single, responsible only for myself. It’s another thing entirely to be responsible for two other people; to share responsibility, that is. Can’t let the girl go hungry, or The Boy neither.

And yes, Luke, you get to come too.

What about me?

I feel good about what I’m planning, but it does come with risks. I assume that it will take longer to accomplish than I want it to; that the supersite’s rollout will have unanticipated bugs; and that some of the current “customers” may not like it. I also assume that most of them will.

If I were Coca-Cola, I’d certainly want to test all this out on focus groups and get as much feedback as I could. But I’m not Coca-Cola, I’m just Josh.

I do have help now, volunteer Subdeacons whose work, support and advice I value. If Clint ever says, “Kill it, it’s not working,” I’ll probably follow his advice. But so far, he is enthusiastic.

Social networking sounds trendy (or it did three years ago), but that’s not why it interests me. I want to introduce my current members to each other – the people who generated those 1.5 million page-views. They’re completely worth knowing. I realize that, as The Vicar and seeming hub of the wheel, but they don’t realize it yet, because they’ve never met.

I get their e-mails; I receive their comments on our blogs. Together these folks make up the best congregation I’ve ever been a part of. It’s like they’re the “real church,” more than the actual churches they go to. (Or don’t; they’re not just a bunch of pious old ladies.)

They care about me; I know it for a fact. I also know they will come to care about each other, if I enable them to get acquainted.

But touchy-feely will only take us so far; the issue is the Work, the Great Commission, God’s love and God’s justice.

Here’s what I want: Stephanie inviting all her online friends to give and pray and work for rebuilding a church in Haiti, or buying and installing a water well in a poor village in Africa, or erecting a Habitat house in Atlanta.

I want Fr. Bob to publicize that his parish hall is open all summer for hikers on the Appalachian Trail.

I want Leonardo to have a big place to post pictures of his latest artwork, and Amy to announce the next Quiet Day at St. John’s, Lafayette.

Facebook accomplishes some of this if people use it that way, but meanwhile my FB screen is currently showing an ad, yet again, so I can meet “Single Sexy Women over 40 in Your Area.”

A younger friend of mine, John in Texas, says Facebook is strictly for hookups; that’s how his friends use it, and the only way they use it.

Ergh, I don’t want that. Not even if they’re “Christian” hookups, y’know?

Meeting in church is a different story; I’m all in favor of that. (It’s how I met your Dad, little girl.)

Meanwhile, because of my websites, I receive a steady stream of church-related advertising. Famous Person to Speak at Our Webinar, How to Become a Fabulously Successful Church, Only $400! Those come from people I want to sell ads to, so I can feed the little girl and her Dad.

I also think of artisans and craftspeople with paintings or jewelry or vestments to sell; authors, musicians, tour groups, the CANDLES Holocaust Museum in Terre Haute, Indiana. Eva Kor, a Mengele survivor, isn’t going to be with us forever, and I want her legacy to live on.

I want music, videos, podcasts, without having to search through the clutter on YouTube.

Fr. Tom Fehr belongs to a looseknit group of Common Friars in rural Ohio. I want him to tell the world what his little community’s up to these days.

I want “all” the good Episcopal Church bloggers to locate in the same place, so readers don’t have to stumble across them one by one. I don’t care what they write; I care about having a central gathering place.

I want to offer the Daily Office in all the languages we speak – and I don’t want individuals to have to rely on word of mouth to find them. I already know – I’ve had it proved to me by all those visitors – that the Daily Office is a powerful tool for getting closer to God and learning to love our sisters and brothers, Christian and not, on this planet. Why should the people currently scattered not be united?

And if this will work for The Episcopal Church, it will work for any and every Christian denomination.

You can see I don’t lack for ambition, but it isn’t personal; it isn’t so I can say I’m the big man. I’m not. Jesus is the Big Man, the archetype of loving service, self-sacrifice and obedience. Prince of Peace; Joy to the World.

Truth be told, I want members to link to Occupy Wall Street and comment on the politics of the day. I don’t think we’re well-served by current economic and political systems – but if you disagree, please tell us why in a respectful, intelligent way.

And I certainly want a safe place for LGBTQ people. I think God demands it and the Holy Spirit works for it.

But I know that change is hard for people, and blowing up the old sites will cause disruption and loss, even if the new site begins to achieve the things it can.

One thing I’m fixed on, Morning and Evening Prayer will stand on their own, without commercial interference; no one will have to change anything to get the same prayers we’ve always offered, the same way we’ve always done it.

I just want to open a new door, called The Community.

It will require risk-taking and money. I doubt that the great Episcopal philanthropists will beat a path to my door. It will be my job to organize us properly, as a non-profit religious society that owns a for-profit, taxpaying business. We have to comply with the law and we want to.

It seems more likely we’ll turn to small donors than big foundations, though I don’t want to ask our members to pay for my grandiosity.

It’s a risk, just like coming out seems to be, like admitting “I’m an addict” always is; like baptism is, and discipleship. What if Jesus isn’t the Savior of the World?

That’s the least risk of all, though. I know better. My entire life of 60 years teaches me that You Can’t Go Wrong with Jesus™.

So okay, we blow up the sites and build an online cathedral.

If I have to, I’ll beg in the streets for That Boy and his Little Girl. They’re going to eat, come hell or food stamps. They both like pasta, so what the heck; I can make it 89 different ways.

Human beings are nothing if we never learn to take a risk. And Jesus is the closest thing you’ll ever find to a sure bet.++

(http://ths355.edublogs.org/)

Leslie Jordan

“What you guys got goin’ here’s a cult of macho.”

— Newly Gay cop to his ex-basketball star lover in an upcoming novel.

Last night I watched a video on Netflix, “My Trip Down the Pink Carpet,” the Emmy-winning actor Leslie Jordan’s one man show a few years ago in Atlanta. I’d never heard of the man but I do recommend it; not belly-laugh funny but very amusing, and it does have a point many people can identify with, of how his life changed when he came out of rehab, forced to confront his worst fears. He was born nelly, so he flounces around the stage all night, but you can see he’s too good an actor not to have played Straight parts his entire career. So what was he afraid of? Being despised (or beaten up) by Straight men, though he’s obviously completely attracted to them too. His rehab counselor puts him into an all-Straight male AA group.

In the course of the show he talks about being fascinated, but completely repulsed, by Truman Capote, Paul Lynde and Charles Nelson Reilly. The fascination I could understand – they were fascinating people – but not the repulsion.

He also talks about having a terrible problem with “internal homophobia.” In that way he’s like most Gay men, especially the older ones, though millions of Gay youth struggle with it still, usually for religious/family reasons. Go to hell, Jerry Falwell, straight to hell.

I made a decision in my youth that I would never be attracted to Straight men, much less hit on them, but learn to find what is attractive and masculine about Gay men. I don’t want Straight guys, never have. Why would I want a guy who doesn’t want me? What a waste of time.

If we define masculinity as an exclusively heterosexual trait, Gay men always come up short. This leads to depression and self-destructive behavior like drinking and drugging. Jordan says that when he was forced into rehab, “They took away my medicine!”

Yet millions of Gay men have been heterosexually married and fathered children. So obviously the ability to stick it to a female is not the defining characteristic of masculinity. Instead, courage, responsibility and self-reliance are the hallmarks.

We need as Gay men to develop much more support within our own culture for masculine Gay guys. We’re far and away the majority. Look at how many of us have served in the military. Look at all the Gay cops. Look at all the Gay dads and granddads.

But here’s the real proof, right where we live: look at the “cult of macho” in Gay porn.

We may need to confont the queens about their aggressiveness when they try calling everyone they know “girl.” It’s a putdown, and that’s why they said it. They should be ashamed.

The culture of camp has its good points. It’s occasionally funny and entertaining. But it tries to drag all Gay men down according to outdated heterosexual definitions. It contributes markedly to internalized homophobia, the #1 psychological problem in our community.

If we’re surrounded by preachers and politicians who proclaim we’re sinful and disordered, why are the campy crowd reinforcing that message? Why are they doing it to themselves as well?

We don’t need bitchiness that tears us down. We need to fight back against our real enemies in the streets, in the workplace and at the ballot box.

Experts are always telling us that human sexuality exists on a spectrum. For men, much of it seems to depend on the timing and degree of the testosterone rush during gestation. All fetuses start out female; that’s what every man has nipples. John Wayne used to be female.

Then the rush comes at a certain point of development, turning us male. (Of course there are other variations too; transgenderism, chromosomal irregularities, etc.)

We need to learn to support each other, wherever we are on the scale. And to do that without elevating Straightness and diminishing Gayness, like the preachers and pols do.

We can see the presence of Gay masculinity all around us. I prefer it to Straight masculinity, especially of the “Dumb and Dumber” kind. Gay masculinity feels to me like the best kind a guy can have: intelligent and sensitive, butch and competitive. (Millions of Straight men have those qualities too.)

If professional sports are the current definition of American masculinity, look at all the professional athletes we have – and the hundreds of amateur Gay sports leagues that have been successful all over the country. We play sports. Lesbians are almost expected to; Gay men play too. I’m thrilled we have so many guys working out and taking care of their bodies, even if the camp crowd insists on its “gym bunny” epithet. What could be a more tired cliché?

I’m not the butchest guy in the world, but I did play my sport decades longer than my Straight brothers did.

The academic world needs fewer historical analyses of camp culture and more beginning explorations of masculine Gay men. We need role models, in the media and real life.

As Leslie Jordan proved again in his show, we can all use a laugh, even at our own expense. The world will always watch a Capote or a Lynde, as long as he’s fascinating.

But we don’t need the mean, homophobic aspects of camp. Being Gay doesn’t mean you’re a girl; it means you occupy a certain spot on the human spectrum.

We’re all normal. And we need to learn to get along.

What happened to Leslie Jordan when he joined that all Straight guy AA group? They welcomed him with open arms.

If they can do that for us, can’t we do that for each other? Or does Jerry Falwell keep winning from hell?++

Jerry Smith of the Washington Redskins, Dave Kopay's first lover. (© Bettmann/Corbis)

Glimpse of a harbor in midcoast Maine.

Peter’s dog Julius has complained to my dog Luke that I don’t post here anymore. Julius is half-blind and I didn’t think he was that literary these days. But here we go, if only to get that silly dog off my back.

I haven’t posted because, uh, I have a relationship now, and it’s nobody’s business but his and mine.

I’m not going to tell you all the ins and outs. I’m not going to say why I think he’s a wonderful fellow. Some things are too important to be published or broadcast – even though the entire world is now making videos of their every move. I don’t care that you’re at Starbucks on 5th Avenue; I don’t care that you’re now friends with Joe Schmoe.

And there’s no reason you need to know that, uh, my boyfriend’s name means “manly” in Greek.

I don’t mind talking about him; I’m proud to talk about him, but only to my closest friends and only in person.

Only when I need to, because he weighs on my mind in a good way. Like “how the hell can I make sense of this?” Sometimes everyone asks that question.

But it should be said in person, not over the internet, and only to the closest of friends, because conversation is a sacrament that takes place live and one-time-only.

It’s like the theater that way; come and get it now, because it will never happen this way again.

You are that important to me, that I told you what’s really on my mind, while we sit here shooting the breeze.

As my friend you let me say anything I want; I like that in you.

When I got home from visiting That Man, I couldn’t wait to see my friends.

I didn’t say anything horribly profound, but they knew that something major had happened, and they cared about it. They didn’t press me for details; they listened to what I said, and tried to respond.

I don’t know that they were spectacular listeners or responders, but they did their best, because they know I don’t talk often about what’s really going on. Partly that’s because they’re so full of themselves! – but I love that too.

Tell me all about it. I like seeing how your mind works.

Privacy is important because there are some things we don’t want the world to know. It’s also important because conversation is live theater, one time only, get it or go home.

The internet has done wonderful things to connect people better than ever before. But it’s no substitute for dinner with your close friends.

And that’s why I think we ought to preserve the distinction between conversation and writing, or what people now call blogging. If I say it to your face, you’re important to me.

If I say it online, it’s just out there somewhere. And I’m not saying anything about my guy online; he deserves to live in peace.

This is rather different, I admit, from columns I used to publish in my newspaper when my husband got sick. We lived public lives and were very well known in the community. When he got sick it was hard to cope with that, and sometimes I wrote about what we went through. My impression was that people followed pretty avidly; we had 10,000 friends and they wanted to know what was happening.

The difference between then and now is that I’m no longer leading the Gay community in that place (Columbus and Cincinnati, Ohio); I lead a different community now, for a different purpose (prayers from The Episcopal Church), and they don’t need or want to know everything that goes on with me. They’re interested in God, not in me, and I like that; I’m interested in God too.

It’s a much wider audience, not small and insular like Buckeye Gay people. Current Boyfriend’s healthy, not rolling around town in a wheelchair, so I clam up, I don’t care to say.

If we get married – if I move to where he lives – I will certainly make a big public announcement. I’ll be proud of it, because I’m proud of him. Marriage is a public event; that’s why there are announcements in newspapers, “John Doe commits his troth” – that is, his truth – “to Ron Roe.”

But it hasn’t happened yet, and I have nothing else to write about than Current Boyfriend, so Julius, you can just fuck off.

Stop yapping! Come up and snuggle.

The big difference between life online and where you actually live is that when you hug your pup, he can feel it; the same with Current Boyfriend. I want him to feel the difference.++

He knows I don't want to move to Maine, but he sends me these pictures to make it look idyllic.

The Taliban shot down a Chinook transport helicopter like this one, seen in Kabul in 2004. (S.Sabawoon/European Pressphoto Agency)

One of my Daily Office members, someone dear to us named Dinah W. Danby, offers us this prayer after the terrible helicopter crash yesterday in Afghanistan. Thirty Americans were killed – including 22 Navy SEALS from the elite unit that killed Osama Bin Laden – along with 7 Afghan commandos, whose lives matter too:

O God of peace, we pray for the souls of those who died in Afghanistan today, and for their families. We thank you for their courage, for their faithfulness to country, and for their dedication to the spirit of freedom. O God of mercy, bring this war to a swift and safe close, and bring all those who fight in wars around the world home in safety to their families. We ask this in the name of the Prince of Peace. Amen.

The Times has the story here.

I wrote back to Dinah:

It’s excellent.

Give me a day or two to think; maybe I’ll make it a permanent prayer on Tuesdays. Certainly what happened last night with that copter crash – Navy SEALS, a lot of them – needs our prayer. But you’ve written so broadly and well that I could be running this thing for the next year. Or two, or ten.

Sometimes people write and thank me for including the names of the dead [on the Daily Office websites]. I have mixed feelings about it. I am the son of a World War II veteran and you’d better believe that matters to me; my father was a POW in Nazi Germany. When he was finally liberated he weighed 85 pounds. A few years ago I met another WWII POW in Athens, Ohio, a retired professor; the first thing I asked him was “How much did you weigh?” He said, “87.” We bonded instantly.

But I also run the names to remind people, all this dying is happening in your name. They are kids, 19, 20, 30. They come from small towns; we don’t get soldiers from cities anymore. Kids join the Army because there aren’t any other jobs where they live.

If all the public does is watch TV (and that is all people do, I’m sorry to say) they don’t even remember these wars are going on. Thus my little headline, They Have Names.

Yet all I do is run the names of American soldiers, not the civilians; I guess those folks don’t have names. Not to us, anyway.

Yes, I honor our patriots. They’re worth our attention. But I want these wars over. So thank you, deeply, for saying that.

The debt ceiling wouldn’t have been such an issue if we weren’t running silent, trillion-dollar, pointless, interminable wars.

Don’t politicians get it? There isn’t any winning of wars anymore. We’re the only superpower; it’s not like a bunch of brass-buckled Bavarians are going to march out in perfect formation so we can have a stare-down or a firefight. All wars are guerrillas now, and an invading force cannot beat guerrillas. I’d have thought George Washington proved that, but no, off we go into the wild blue yonder.

The world needs a Savior in the worst way.

Josh

Down to the ledge, over the Atlantic Ocean.

His name is Andrew. He’s a former Roman monk. He has a daughter named Alissa. We’ve never even met, but when we do it’s going to get crazy.

He’s in Maine. His parents are there as well as his daughter. I’m in Indiana, 1300 miles away. It will take me three days just to drive there.

But I’m going. You can’t stop me. He’s pretty neat.

He hopes to be ordained a vocational deacon. He has the backing of his rector and his parish.

Tell me, should Joshua be married to a deacon? Damnrightheshould.

He’s a member of my Daily Office congregation. That’s like meeting a guy in church, exactly where we ought to meet each other.

Not in a Gay bar, not on a street corner, in church. I kind of like this guy; he’s very sweet.

I’m 60. He’s 55 or so. He needs some loving. I’ve got some on hand.

I need some loving too; he’s got a mountain of it right outside his house.

He lives in a small town on the coast, designated the prettiest place in America by Forbes.com.

They have lobsters and crabs and all kinds of fishes of the sea. The harbor’s right there; he looks down on it from his special ledge almost every night.

Did I mention the lobsters and crabs? If not, here we go again: lobsters and crabs!

He lives in a fishing village, and although it snows there every single day without any letup whatsoever from August to June (and do I need to say this, I do not care for cold), that’s where this boy lives. We’re here, it’s Maine, get used to it.

Very frightening. But kind of nice.

He’s very intense; so am I. We’re hoping we don’t beat each other senseless.

We’re hoping to sit on his ledge over the ocean, holding hands.

I could use your prayers over this; it sounds absurd, but it might work, you never know.

A boyfriend, at my age. What is he thinking of?

Uh, me. And why should he not?++

Andrew's prayer table. Could he possibly be more seductive?

Some of these folks might be interested…

The other day I told a friend that no one comes to this blog; I don’t publicize it, I simply write it for myself. Those are all pretty much true statements; sometimes I just need to get things out. This post is another example; I’ve got something on my mind that I want to understand, and since I live alone I have no one to talk to about it. I rather like living alone, except at times like this. (I could talk to the dog, but he thinks he’s a literary critic.)

I stayed up all night last night, polishing the final draft of my new novel. Believe me, that writing’s intended for an audience. I hope it finds one; I could really use for this book to be successful. I’m much better known now than I was when I finished my last one, and somehow I feel more assured when it comes time to flog it. I need the money, I already have an audience for other work, and I’m confident of my talent. Those things were less true when my first two books came out; today I’m well known in the Episcopal Church. They don’t all like me but I don’t need them to; name recognition is what drives book sales, and at the very least I have an original point of view. I’ll never be a star writer but I have the ability to entertain and sometimes to make people think.

The book is very long – I always do that – but it’s a fun read. The themes are kind of epic – I always do that too – but people who love to read are willing to engage any topic that interests them, as long as the writer hooks them from the start and keeps them coming back.

Of course I can’t evaluate how well I do that, but I’m thrilled to death with this work. You’ll laugh! You’ll cry! You’ll wonder, What’s that boy done now?

Getting this book done has been the major goal of my life – indeed, my spiritual vocation – for the last ten years. Even while I wrote another book, I’ve been working on this one, eating and sleeping with these characters. When I wrote “The End” a week or two ago, I even felt a kind of letdown; now what? It’s a great thing to achieve your big goal, but what happens to a quarterback the day after he wins the Super Bowl? I have advice for champions like that: do the same workout you did two days ago, just stick to your routine. A new goal will arise as this one starts to fade.

We’d all like to move from success to success, but life’s usually more like ups and downs. So live your life, love your friends, eat some good food and relax awhile. Trouble’s no doubt coming, but until it gets here, it hasn’t got here yet. Enjoy yourself.

I’ve spent the intervening time, from The End to now, polishing the manuscript and deepening it. I decided to change the name of the town where the action takes place; that meant lots of retyping. New details came to me, so I put those in. I collapsed several paragraphs, took out a bunch of commas, cut some stuff. The book’s now as good as I can make it at this time in my life.

(Flashback: I remember being petrified when I finally received copies of my first book in print. What if I didn’t like it? What if I found all kinds of mistakes? But I sat and read it, and thought, “It’s nearly perfect. I’m 99.9% pleased.” And I still am; haven’t read that book in a long while, but it sits happily on my shelf. It was the #1 Gay bestseller for awhile on Amazon and I still get small royalty checks. The second book bombed, but oh well. Maybe someone will rediscover it someday.)

Now here’s the really weird-but-good part. My fiction is congruent with my daily reality. I’m not reproducing the one in the other, but they go together; if I could make a chart of the writing and the living, it would look like a kid’s drawing of waves on the ocean.

It’s a happy book; I’m a happy guy for the most part. Of course I suffer sometimes like all Gay people do, and all human beings. I don’t pretend that everything’s all hunky-dory when it’s not. But in my other work, as That Darn Vicar™ on the Daily Office websites, I might spend all day trading love letters with excellent people all over the world. It’s a privilege, and it delights me.

Sometimes people write me with their hurts and I try to respond. I’m a social worker by trade, and it doesn’t bother me at all when people tell me their troubles. To me it’s an honor to get to hear them – and I become myself more and more in the process of exchanging with folks. If people didn’t trust me a little, and have some basis for trusting me, they’d never spill their guts to me. But they do.

(I’m also aware as a lay evangelist that my job’s easier than the ordained clergy’s. I don’t have to worry about a big old building or who’s putting how much in the collection plate. I don’t care what Old Mrs. Moneybags thinks of my liturgy, the pictures I choose or the captions I write. If I want to put up the Gay Lord’s Prayer for LGBT Pride Day, I do it. The most she can do is cancel her e-mail subscription, but I know I’m getting five more in the next 24 hours.)

(I knew an Old Mrs. Moneybags once; she was mean to my mother, and therefore deserving of contempt.)

As an author I realize how odd it must be to so many readers to run across a happy book. We’re all supposed to be into the Dark Side these days, but I wouldn’t give you 2¢ for it. I understand there will be people who reject what I write out of hand, and that’s okay with me. They’ll write reviews on Amazon, “It’s too idealized, the characters are too perfect. The plot is senseless and the writing style is juvenile.” I’ve gotten ones like that, followed by four that say, “I loved this thing!” So you win some and you lose some, big deal.

I’m not Pollyanna; this book deals with murder and oppression – just as the story of Christ does. So remember that title; Good News from Gay Guys. I think it’s catchy, but at any rate, it fits.

The only real question in my mind now is how to publish it. A good friend recommended a publisher and I sometimes fantasize about submitting the book to them. I’d have to buy Microsoft Word, because they assume that the entire world owns it, so it’s the only thing they’ll accept. I’ve used it before, but I don’t feel a need to make Bill Gates rich when there are better products available. Still, if that’s what it takes, the rules are the rules, and I don’t care. I’d have to spend two weeks reformatting everything, but so what. I believe God put me here to write this book. Not the others so much, but this one. So of course I’ll do what God says. Maybe he decided a long time ago to make Bill Gates rich, I dunno. Just doing my job here, Lord! Here I am, send me.

Like all Gospel writers I have an evangelical purpose, to support LGBTs and invite them back to church. Being Episcopalian, I’m not heavy-handed about it, or I wouldn’t have put so many jokes in. (Or as much sex, because that’s part of the good news too.) But you can see why I’d think this book is a big part of my vocation. I could just be fooling myself, but I do have a spiritual director and 1.5 million hits, so let me glide blissfully on.

I love what I do; I love who I am. I love all my friends and the people I’ve met. And now in my 60th year I am finally learning to apply God’s love personally to myself. I’ve been all about the abstraction before this, and not enough about the relationship.

But it’s a relationship book, so at last I will let myself be loved by God as just Josh.

I would guess that’s an issue for other Gay people, but maybe not. The great thing is that if we live long enough, we can all get the healing we need.

Love and healing are the same thing, so I write about love.

You can see why I’d be an okay person by now; doing all right.

I’ve still got the usual unfinished business of life – but two last points:

1. God says life doesn’t end; we’re here permanently.
2. I finished that book. It has all the message of Josh in it for anyone who wants to hear. I can’t make them hear – Jesus couldn’t either – but I can say my little word and feel good about it.

Now it’s a holiday weekend, Independence Day, freedom, liberation. It’s no coincidence at all that the book ends on the 4th of July, with fireworks and a band. “Kent stood on the pitcher’s mound, loving his life; he didn’t know how he got so lucky as to be born here.”

I’m grilling some chicken and making potato salad; feel free to drop by.++