I Like To Be...Part 4
Finally!
Possibly I'm deluding myself, but there must be somebody out there who wants to see how this developed. Unfortunately I'm not entirely sure I can remember.
Basically, I saw many of my New Haven friends. For my final year there, I was a Resident Graduate Affiliate to one of the constituents of Yale College, and in my time at Yale I probably made more undergraduate than graduate friends. There could be many reasons for this: my own immaturity is one obvious explanation, although I prefer the supposition that undergrads were (except the lunatic and / or lazy) more interesting than the grads, who all generally pretended that they were more interesting than their work but on further inspection proved not to be (and quite a few of them were lunatic too, although I think that's an occupational hazard in academia).
The point being that, on occasion, I worked in the college buttery, where I introduced to a grateful population the concept of a 'chip butty.' And it was - quite seriously - one of the highlights of my year to return and find that they've named the chip butty after me; i.e. you order it with my surname. Kinda like a Waldorf Salad, but much better.
Let me repeat: they named a sandwich after me!!
How many other people have been so greatly honored? Although thinking about it, there are at least two cocktails I drink named after friends of mine. I'll publish those soon.
Scooting forward a bit, let me pick up to a coffee with Graham, who is particuarly interesting in my life because I was his first gay kiss. What's most interesting about this is that he went and acquired a girlfriend about two weeks later. The girlfriend is now ex-, but Graham, who is one of the most level-headed and fundamentally sorted undergrads I know, just does not come across as a closet case. We had a long coffee and a long chat, and he asked about my progress, if 'progress' is the right word here, to being out; and I told him it was a long journey of leaving people in tears at railway stations and waking up one day to the fact that, although women were lovely and wonderful and probably great to live with, the inescapable fact was that I just would much rather hug guys.
(Before I forget, my mother earlier this evening referred to that earth-shaking event when 'the Angel Gabriel came out to the Virgin Mary' - the sort of thing you fear the Anglican Church is about to promulgate any day now. But then, my mother also spoke of a 'log cabbage.' I'm beginning to worry. But I digress).
Graham, in short, is one of those taciturn guys who is a delight to know better, all thoughts about his kissing aside. Although that moment was one of those genuinely unexpected pleasures when the world does a loop-the-loop.
Pressing on, Monday evening was my highlight of the whole trip and - as my dissertation advisor had buggered off abroad on his jet-set lifestyle - pretty much the purpose of the exercise. It was the first-ever read-through of my new play with people whose brilliance borders on genius.
Many of you know this, but those who don't should know that I write plays, and the last two completed scripts have been books for musicals. The first, The Last of the Great Romantics, is (imho) very good (words by me, music by Stephen Rodgers PhD) and any interested parties should just ask. The second is called Bi and it was this we read. It now occurs to me that I've written myself into a corner, because I don't want to blow my own trumpet...but suffice to say that I had a great time, mainly thanks to the actors involved. It was a moment of great if surreal pleasure to hear my straight friend Chris reel off a list of slang terms for 'gay' before concluding with the vehement I. Like. Cock.
The plot, since you ask, concerns a guy (Chris) brought out by a guy (Luke) who then falls for an old female friend (Caro) and goes back in again. There's a bit more to it than that, of course, but that's the hook on which all else hangs.
My parents have been pre-emptively banned from ever seeing this show. Somehow I don't think that assuring them that practically none of it is autobiographical (which is true) is going to compensate for the jokes. Although as I once used the word 'fellatio' in a YDN column, who knows?
And after everyone had gone home, Chris plus The Guy sat up and vigorously put the knife into Hellhouse, Midwest Protestantism and the President, with all of which I'll take some issue some other time. There was a deeply lovely moment when Chris, shaking his head in the style of someone who's been defying Fate for the last six years but who has now tragically accepted reality, sighed and asked rhetorically 'can anyone doubt that Bush will go down in history as one of our worst presidents?'
Actually yes, one can. Quite easily, in fact. But if you go to school at Yale, chances are you won't ever have heard the argument made (I except my friend Max, the most articulate and entertaining Republican on the YDN list).
Another time. And eventually Chris went and The Guy stayed and...well, in the end I wrote a song called Morning in America, which just goes to show something or other.
Possibly I'm deluding myself, but there must be somebody out there who wants to see how this developed. Unfortunately I'm not entirely sure I can remember.
Basically, I saw many of my New Haven friends. For my final year there, I was a Resident Graduate Affiliate to one of the constituents of Yale College, and in my time at Yale I probably made more undergraduate than graduate friends. There could be many reasons for this: my own immaturity is one obvious explanation, although I prefer the supposition that undergrads were (except the lunatic and / or lazy) more interesting than the grads, who all generally pretended that they were more interesting than their work but on further inspection proved not to be (and quite a few of them were lunatic too, although I think that's an occupational hazard in academia).
The point being that, on occasion, I worked in the college buttery, where I introduced to a grateful population the concept of a 'chip butty.' And it was - quite seriously - one of the highlights of my year to return and find that they've named the chip butty after me; i.e. you order it with my surname. Kinda like a Waldorf Salad, but much better.
Let me repeat: they named a sandwich after me!!
How many other people have been so greatly honored? Although thinking about it, there are at least two cocktails I drink named after friends of mine. I'll publish those soon.
Scooting forward a bit, let me pick up to a coffee with Graham, who is particuarly interesting in my life because I was his first gay kiss. What's most interesting about this is that he went and acquired a girlfriend about two weeks later. The girlfriend is now ex-, but Graham, who is one of the most level-headed and fundamentally sorted undergrads I know, just does not come across as a closet case. We had a long coffee and a long chat, and he asked about my progress, if 'progress' is the right word here, to being out; and I told him it was a long journey of leaving people in tears at railway stations and waking up one day to the fact that, although women were lovely and wonderful and probably great to live with, the inescapable fact was that I just would much rather hug guys.
(Before I forget, my mother earlier this evening referred to that earth-shaking event when 'the Angel Gabriel came out to the Virgin Mary' - the sort of thing you fear the Anglican Church is about to promulgate any day now. But then, my mother also spoke of a 'log cabbage.' I'm beginning to worry. But I digress).
Graham, in short, is one of those taciturn guys who is a delight to know better, all thoughts about his kissing aside. Although that moment was one of those genuinely unexpected pleasures when the world does a loop-the-loop.
Pressing on, Monday evening was my highlight of the whole trip and - as my dissertation advisor had buggered off abroad on his jet-set lifestyle - pretty much the purpose of the exercise. It was the first-ever read-through of my new play with people whose brilliance borders on genius.
Many of you know this, but those who don't should know that I write plays, and the last two completed scripts have been books for musicals. The first, The Last of the Great Romantics, is (imho) very good (words by me, music by Stephen Rodgers PhD) and any interested parties should just ask. The second is called Bi and it was this we read. It now occurs to me that I've written myself into a corner, because I don't want to blow my own trumpet...but suffice to say that I had a great time, mainly thanks to the actors involved. It was a moment of great if surreal pleasure to hear my straight friend Chris reel off a list of slang terms for 'gay' before concluding with the vehement I. Like. Cock.
The plot, since you ask, concerns a guy (Chris) brought out by a guy (Luke) who then falls for an old female friend (Caro) and goes back in again. There's a bit more to it than that, of course, but that's the hook on which all else hangs.
My parents have been pre-emptively banned from ever seeing this show. Somehow I don't think that assuring them that practically none of it is autobiographical (which is true) is going to compensate for the jokes. Although as I once used the word 'fellatio' in a YDN column, who knows?
And after everyone had gone home, Chris plus The Guy sat up and vigorously put the knife into Hellhouse, Midwest Protestantism and the President, with all of which I'll take some issue some other time. There was a deeply lovely moment when Chris, shaking his head in the style of someone who's been defying Fate for the last six years but who has now tragically accepted reality, sighed and asked rhetorically 'can anyone doubt that Bush will go down in history as one of our worst presidents?'
Actually yes, one can. Quite easily, in fact. But if you go to school at Yale, chances are you won't ever have heard the argument made (I except my friend Max, the most articulate and entertaining Republican on the YDN list).
Another time. And eventually Chris went and The Guy stayed and...well, in the end I wrote a song called Morning in America, which just goes to show something or other.
posted by BoB at 2:01 PM
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