My Gay Pride

I'm proud that when I was a child I went to go see WITHOUT YOU I'M NOTHING, the screen adaptation of Sandra Bernhard one woman show with my best friend at the Beverly Center and being the youngest people in the theatre BY FAR.

I'm proud that I was that hip...and that if I represent any guard, it's the old guard. The literate, classy, witty and wise gays. Not the pectoral gays. Not the botox gays. Not the sch-mays (as in gay, schmay). However, I am VERY proud to represent the gays who like Chimay. I mean, who doesn't love a little bit of belgian beer to take the edge off once in a while with a clove cigarette and a smoky eye.

I'm proud that I know who Justin V. Bond is and that I went to see V a couple of months ago in LA. The gays who were at that performance...those are MY gays.

I'm proud that I was bullied as a kid and I lived to tell the story. And to spew some real shit on the horned, toad with a pus-filled asshole that is homophobia.

I'm proud that I'm pretty, angry, clever, delicious, fiery and articulate.

I'm proud that I've got the body and the brains. Because my chest is ironic. My quads are symbols of satire. My core muscles have multiple layers of meaning. My biceps are social commentary of the times we live in. My P90-triple x body is not what it seems.

I'm proud to be a Downey-raised, East Village gay who's now living in LA and listens to KCRW, goes to MoCA, LACMA and gets lost in the art, in the music...and stays tapped in.

I'm proud to be a member of the family of Oscar Wilde, Michaelangelo, Armistead Maupin, Edward Albee, Tony Kushner, Alexander McQueen, Tom Ford, and all of those cultural fathers who have given birth to beauty, art and culture that have made this world a more accepting, far-reaching, bigger, and better place.

I'm proud to be an artist and a someone who comments on everything. I'm proud to have something to say. Something to believe in. And something to fight for.

So if I end up going down to LA Gay Pride 2011 in West Hollywood today, that is my own personal private parade that I will be marching in.