| September 1999
Amahl e-mails that I am courageous. She says I am often disheartened because I dare to question what others accept as Truth and Absolute. Still others believe that I am merely a drama queen.
I say I am a courageous drama queen!
I'm on a plane to Chicago. Writing. Next to me sits a delightful young Mongolian woman. She speaks timidly and without much volume. She is so fragile that I worry for her well being here in America- where everything is loud and large. Will she be trampled? I'm somewhat relieved when she says that her studies are nearly over and that in less than a year she'll be forced to return to Mongolia.
We began talking when I offered her the banana on my breakfast tray. In turn she offered some of her cantaloupe. We both declined politely.
By now all the anticipatory chatter that filled the cabin upon takeoff has subsided. It is quiet up here. We may as well have crashed and died, everything still save for the ambient hums and drones of the fans and the engines. Metal through the atmosphere.
Turbulence!
Many dreams lately. Violence and hysteria. Hidden hostility. The dreams make me question my own mental soundness. What crimes am I capable of committing? What molester lurks within me? What serial killer? What thief? I know there is a darkness inside of me that exists within all of us. A balance of good and evil, if you will. And I can only believe in the goodness when I have acknowledged the malady. How can I believe in one and not the other?
I believe in possibility.
Yesterday Jackie laid out a blanket in the grass, under the apple tree, and we lay on it as Mom-Suzie watered her cherished plants and flowers. The sun was setting but it was still unusually warm. I could smell the coolness coming. Jackie and I flipped through the pages of a National Geographic magazine while we ate cantaloupe. We were lazy, relaxed. I mentioned that being in the yard, the smell of the cantaloupe, and the sound of the water reminded me of childhood summers in Iran, in the Assyrian matas. Both women agreed reflectively. We have in common, if nothing else, our memories of Iran.
The Tehrani, Shirazi, Tabrizi moments.
Recently at work, two women sitting at one of my tables asked if I am Greek, which happens all the time.
'No. I just look Greek.'
"Are you Italian?"
'No, but I look Italian,' I quipped and we laughed.
"Well, I've never said this to anyone," one of the women ventured, "but you have amazing features. You're very handsome."
She said this warmly, earnestly, reassuringly.
I was deeply touched and flattered.
Funny, when a woman delivers a complement it is usually charming, ingenuous, and flattering. But when a man delivers the same complement it is almost questionable…
Now my Mongolian friend opens the shade to her window and only utters one word, "Nice." I agree without words. What are words anyway? I have loved without them before. (Luis) I can communicate without them again. Minutes later she draws the shade and rests her head back, closing her eyes. I watch her, eternally peaceful, almost smiling in the shadows. I feel close to her. After all, we have gone through the ceremonious offering of our fruit to each other! I cannot imagine her being angry, or disgruntled. I cannot imagine her shouting, fighting. Peace seems to have etched itself permanently on her countenance for the world to see, for me to covet.
There is goodness in the world, at least from up here, in metal through sky. I believe in us human beings.
My neck and shoulders ache, as they have for years. There is an incurable callous that bulges on the middle finger of my right hand, undoubtedly from handwriting my diary. A muscle of sorts, if you will- one that I have flexed routinely for eleven years now… I desire a massage, human touch. Everyone loves a massage, except for my mother. How different she and I are. How grimly different. When you touch her she winces and tightens up like a fortress of steel. Touch me and I melt into a pool of passion and rippling energy. Into waves of longing. She? Into riptides of rejection and refusal of tenderness, intimacy.
Yet, the similarities are many and unavoidable, as much as I wish it were otherwise. Most our similarities are camouflaged. Some I honor and celebrate. Others I abhor and reject; first in her, then in myself. It is always easier to blame. It almost feels right to take the blame with ones own intrepid and guilty hands and superimpose it onto the parent, to transfer the blame like money, the injustices, the incomprehension, one's very own mistakes in life, the darkness that is universal.
The subtleties are like elephants in my life, taking very much room.
But these make me think of grandeur, and how easily we lose our power, our miniscule identities, when we are placed in an airport, in a mass. We become instantly small, our magic vanishing in a sweltering sea of bodies. Our unique faces become suddenly anonymous, mundane, unrecognizable.
In these last few years, as my twenties take on momentum, I have come to feel increasingly miniscule and powerless, and the world expands and encompasses my shrinking ego, my singular dream of glory. Is it natural to become so soberly powerless over one's own teenage fantasies of grandeur? Or am I willingly giving up my place and my right to something greater? Have I lost the dream out of weakness, and was the dream in the first place childish and unrealistic? Haven't I felt the relief of overcoming myself, my need for fame, my dependence on impossibility? Have I finally relinquished the fiery dream and allowed a cooler smoky reality to place its mediocre kiss on the crestfallen face of my life?
Well now, it must be the altitude making me delirious and lightheaded. And thank god for delirium, for words, for height, and creativity, playfulness. Places one would not normally have occasion to visit unless a little intoxicated by life.
Been here a week, living out of my suitcase, in a dream, looking out from the palm of a giant who holds me in a fantasy, altitudes of emotion I might suddenly fall from and break my bones into a crystalline mess of cherished memories. I belong to no schedule, no person, no pattern.
It is the twentieth of September and I'm back in Marin. Home. So much happened, but the struggle at the moment is to write about the experience with an objective heart and not trip into fits if nostalgia.
I arrived at O'Hare on a gorgeous Chicago afternoon feeling lively and remarkably fresh. The weather was neither hot nor humid. Brandon and Laura were gracious and accommodating. They treated me like a king. That first night we went to Halsted, to Sidetrack, which has grown into a mall of men and video screens. I was most impressed with the additions, the exposed brick and soft lighting, the massive trees planted indoors. But the men were the same- feigning indifference; while in San Francisco everyone smiles and is friendly. Men approach you and strike up conversations, hand you their card, urge you to call.
Ashur would arrive from Canada the next morning, and it seemed that Brandon and Laura were more excited about his arrival than I. "Are you nervous?" Brandon asked playfully, glowing in the light under which we sipped our drinks.
'No. Why? Should I be? This is not a tryst. We are friends,' I said, downplaying my growing anxiety.
"But what if he's good-looking?" was Laura's argument.
'I'm open,' I smirked.
The next morning Brandon took me to the apartment where Ashur would be staying, off of Devon, a street crowded with memories for me. Ashur was waiting outside for us. Sadly, that moment and all that it possessed is lost, but I do recall Brandon teasing, "Ah-oh. He's hot. You guys are gonna fuck!"
It was strange to finally see the face I had tried to visualize over the telephone so many times. He looked exactly, yet nothing as I had pictured him. We hugged and kissed, all around us sun, trees, squirrels scampering, brick facades, and empty windows. My Chicago surrounded me everywhere I went and it reeled on steel axles.
Ashur immediately noticed my painted toenails and liked them. I told him my mother had helped me paint them and we laughed. I opened the front door of Brandon's car for him.
The voice I had heard for weeks on the telephone was now in the car making easy conversation with Brandon. I liked that Ashur was talkative and personable.
After the three of us had breakfast in Andersonville Brandon set off to work and Ashur and I wandered the city. We ended up walking to Boy's Town, where after a long trek we settled down for cocktails at Roscoe's.
It was here that we got to sit across a small round table and get a better look at each other. It felt as though I was looking across at a relative, if not my long lost brother. Ashur had the signature Assyrian eyebrows, so thick and so black, the long lashes that curl magically, the aquiline nose, the small mouth, the tragic profile of a statue, the same gestures, the movements, every ingredient that has survived, though we've lived apart and alone.
He said, "You're a serious person, aren't you?" He didn't ask it. He stated it, and he was right.
It would be reconfirmed throughout my stay that I am indeed a serious young man; and that it is only my sense of humor that saves me from being outright grave!
Ashur asked the questions, trying to extricate some vital information or clue that might open his eyes to my personality, my intentions, and it was when he apologized for being forward that I understood his.
I had not seriously considered his amorous motives and had been somewhat blind. His very apology was flirtation.
I liked him a lot and he had not in the least bit seemed manipulative or tactless, but I waited out the moments because when it comes to romance and sexuality I revert to what is considered a "heterosexist" manner of courtship. I have not yet learned what it is I must do or when I must do it to succeed in a man-to-man relationship. All I knew is that I was not going to jump into what might have proved disastrous.
After drinks, and while it was still daylight out, we hailed a taxi and were quite flattered when it made a u-turn, mounting the sidewalk to usher us back to Roger's Park. "What service!" Ashur exclaimed when we got in.
My brother Bell had promised me the use of his Jeep, but was not yet home when we got to my father's. So, while we waited we had tea with Lena and dad. Things went smoothly, though I had held my breath the entire time. Dad looked well; he had not grayed entirely, which I appreciated. Only his speech was a bit slurred. Was he drinking again or was this an effect of the stroke? Is one better than the other?
I wondered if dad suspected Ashur of being a homosexual and if he wondered silently what my relationship to him might be. The hour passed pleasantly enough.
That evening I cruised in my brother's Jeep with the top down, down Devon to meet Ashur. Leisurely I drove through the crowded street filled with women in Saris and men rolling worry beads as they conversed on sidewalk benches, and remembered the days when I had been a denizen of the same neighborhood. So many signs, shops, colors, sounds. Again I felt part of the city I fled years ago.
Walid's basement apartment was filled with smoke and I could barely take a breath when I entered. He greeted me at the door and spoke Assyrian in such a manner that I could barely understand his accent. The others called him Walida. He was campy and effeminate, and danced around the small dark apartment like a loose woman, throwing her hair about, shaking her body seductively. Ashur explained that Walida was androgynous because her body lacks testosterone and produces excesses of estrogen. Her breasts were almost fully developed and I wondered how she ever survived a single day without ridicule. In fact, only once and fleetingly did Walida mention having attempted suicide in her youth. She said that her brother repeatedly threatened to kill her when they were younger.
Looking around the apartment filled me with sadness for her and for all of us, even as she twirled to Arabic music with a tablecloth wrapped haphazardly around her waist. The floor was bare- no carpeting, no rug, no wood, only ugly brown linoleum curled up in places with age. The walls were of fake wood paneling, occasionally disrupted by a tacky picture. The furniture grotesquely oversized. The bathroom a disgrace. But Walida herself had a heart of gold and the smile of a sacred and golden child!
I met a few straight Assyrians as well, who were open minded and weren't ashamed to be seen on the street with us. One such person was Nadia, a beautiful young woman who had only recently immigrated to the States and missed Baghdad terribly. She put her hand out, touched my face gently, and said, Eeleh dooshah. (He's honey.) She made me blush. I assured her that things would get better for her in time, promising this with all my heart.
Michael, whom we called Misha, was tall, slim, and effeminate. He moved and spoke like a woman who had nothing to fear in life, nothing to lose, and everything to offer her lovers. He spoke with ishtav (appetite,) gesticulating freely with fingers, hands, arms, body, smoking leisurely, blowing out his smoke lazily. He made me want to write stories and shoot photographs. When I told him that he reminded me of one of my mother's good friends, Flonda, he laughed in his raspy way and began to call himself this. He dubbed me Googoosh, the famous Iranian singer. Misha took a photograph off of Walida's refrigerator door. It was a picture of himself in drag. He proceeded to tell me fantastic stories about his experiences in the city, excursions, adventures fit for books and movies.
He said that one Halloween, after a long night of partying in a revealing white dress, which he had designed and sewn himself and which he'd worn with a jewel-studded bra and feathery heels, he had stepped onto a balcony overlooking the street. Below a woman and her child passed, but not before the little girl had noticed Misha, pointed and exclaimed, "Look mama, an angel!" I could just imagine Misha, wrapped in white fabric and feathers, himself swarthy, waxed, makeup now faded, smoking endless chains of cigarettes, laughing without giving away that he was by no means a heavenly angel, but an Assyrian drag queen!
At the bars Misha refused to let me buy drinks and insisted on paying. He said I was a guest and was not allowed to break tradition. He winked at me from across tables, through smoke and chatter, turning his gorgeous head to observe the rooms, surveying men but with a bored countenance. He used words like kheyee (my life) and habibi (my darling,) and took long confident strides in tailored black slacks.
Ushi was older than all of us, a large man, whom everyone called Mother. When he wasn't doing flawless impersonations of the stereotypical Assyrian grandmother he was sneering at the world and making biting remarks about the state of affairs. He was constantly making fun of the world we had each known- the loud, graceless world of the Assyrian family.
Youkhana was quiet and shy, flashing smiles at me whenever I happened to look into his direction. There were moments when I had to abruptly turn away because as the night wore on I sensed he was attempting to communicate something that was a little more than friendly.
George was the baby. First time I met him he wore glasses and hospital scrubs, carrying a hefty pile of paperwork. Charts and things. He seemed intelligent, sweet, fun, but dashed my attraction when he said he hated the hair on his body and later showed up wearing light colored contact lenses. I wondered if these were serious attempts at Westernizing himself to the point of unrecognition. I know that we, as people without a territory our own, living now outside the Middle East, in European and English-speaking host countries, have to continuously struggle to acclimate to the ways and traditions as defined by predominantly White societies. But to do this to the extreme, to deny our natural and physical attributes and to try and alter them speaks of racial shame that Assyrians would never admit to.
Even in my own family I have heard members say things about other Assyrians like, "So-and-so is dark. He's not attractive." Or, "So-and-so has such pretty white skin."
I think we ought to take precaution in matters of color and identity, in becoming Americanized- whether we were born here or not. Instead of changing to conform to others' standards why can't we be the influence that inspires that standard to become something else, something more? We have this power.
I waited and waited but the serious moment never arrived, the laughter never subsided long enough so that I may have gotten a glimpse into the experiences, the lessons, the tragedies, and the glories of what it may mean to be Assyrian and queer in America.
My new friends seemed beyond all that. There was an unspoken understanding between them- that what had occurred up to that point had no importance and there was no reason to dwell. Instead they laughed, danced, smoked.
There were so many questions I wanted to ask. What steps had led them to the present? What could we learn from each other and how much of this information could we hand down to our own children? Will we ever find ourselves inspired and strengthened by each other or will we remain divided, scattered, fragmented?
Just where are we headed as queer Assyrians?
Back at the old apartment my brother's room, the one we used to share as teens, was always dark, the shades pulled down and yellowed from cigarette smoke. There were cobwebs swinging in the corners of the ceiling. Stains on the carpet, empty cups, overflowing ashtrays, signs of defeat. Signs that someone has given up on light, air, life.
The nights that I stayed there I lay in bed without burring my face into the smoky pillow, without sighing, without allowing my body to sink into downy comforts that were absent, but lay still, staring at the dark ceiling, trying to conjure the young boy I had left behind, in the darkness of memory. I was certain he was still there. I tried to find him, reach for him, but found I had lost him to age and too many pages.
I looked out the ground level window that opened to the sidewalk where Indian children, Black children, Pakistani and Assyrian children noisily played, where cars lined the narrow side street as far as the eye could see, where dirt overwhelmed grass. I heard voices from the past and images began to form of a time when I used to think everything was eternal because my own desperation was so great and unmoving. Now, at twenty-six I know better. All things change, but that change is not guaranteed to happen on its own. It needs our help.
Still, there is so much missing.
One afternoon we were to go for Persian food as a family. It was to be my gift to them. I felt proud. Lena had fixed her hair and dressed. Even Bell was going with us. But dad was ornery, foulmouthed like he used to get when drunk. He complained about his pants- they were too long, or too short; I don't remember. He swore, staggered. No one had warned me he was drinking again. I did not know. But then again I was living in a dream, the kind where you do not see, do not feel, cannot run. In my father's home I was not human because to have been human in the company of my father was to be overdramatic, hyperemotional, wild with anger and with pity for him and for myself.
There were places in the small apartment I did not dare look.
My face held no expression. I held my breath.
And dressed.
When I walked into the kitchen I caught my father drinking vodka right out of the bottle. Guzzling. And suddenly, quite by accident, I was no longer twenty-six, but sixteen! I stood transfixed in the moment, a sensation of falling from the sky rippled through my body. Here finally was the boy I had come to find, to rescue, to reclaim out of the dilapidating past. In the dream, a motionless and soundproof world, I stepped back without my father seeing or hearing me.
My heart raced.
There were so many places in the apartment I did not dare look, closet doors I did not open, drawers I did not pull, eyes I never looked too deeply into. When I kissed my father it was momentary and mechanical. When I touched him it was with hands that had lost feeling. When he touched me, as he used to when I was a child in love with him, I derived no pleasure, but sought flight. It was like my skin had lost its memory.
These were not my father's hands but stumps of a stranger who had single-handedly destroyed not only the precious bond between a father and his son, but his own life, body, and mind.
'You're not allowed to have dinner with us,' a voice older and calmer than my own passed my lips. 'I'm not going anywhere with you like this. If you'd like I'll bring you something back from the restaurant.' He did not speak. Lena and Bell stood silently by. And I said nothing more.
I spent ten intimate years watching my father sink deeper into the bottle. I could not spare another minute of it. We did not scream this time, we did not fight, we did not throw things at each other. We were like two soldiers who had once fought in the same futile war, but on different sides; two men who no longer had the energy to fear, resent, or loath each other.
Lena would not go without dad. She politely declined my insistence. It would be just Bell and I.
Over dinner we talked about writing, of all things. Earlier I had stumbled upon a manuscript of a novel my brother was secretly working on and read it. Some of it had actually been good. I had read on with amazement that my own brother was pursuing the same dream as I without even knowing it. Bell was pleased to hear I am going to be published in two anthologies. We smoked, drank, talked. Bell had doogh- Iranian yogurt with soda and dill. I had a beer.
Although my brother and I bonded on this topic of writing we struggled to make conversation. We, as brothers, have nothing in common, except maybe our mixed feelings for our father. We are different beings. Silence typically befalls us. Discomfort. A void.
It still hurts that I don't have a relationship with my only brother, and I continue to dream of having other siblings as though there were still a chance my mother might give birth to my soul mate, and relieve me of this destiny that belongs to an only child.
I would prefer to have been an only child than brother to a man I do not understand and cannot reach.
We left the restaurant in Bell's Jeep and the streets passed my window while I sat paralyzed with longing, strangely unafraid to enter my father's home, unafraid to face him, unafraid to face my own demons. Bravado accompanied me everywhere.
I showered, changed, and stood waiting outside the apartment for a taxi to take me to Walida's basement apartment. I wore black slacks and a gray dress shirt, fairy dust sparkling in my hair. I felt out of place on Damen, not as the shy and insecure teen, but a confident and handsome young man in his mid twenties. The driver was a chatty young Pakistani.
"Are you going to a party?" he asked almost as soon as I got into his cab.
I answered with little enthusiasm, still troubled by the events of the day, 'No. I'm just meeting some friends for drinks. I'm visiting from out of town.'
"Well, you look very nice," said the young driver.
I thanked him for the complement.
"If you don't believe me just look in the mirror," he added.
He offered me a cigarette and I gave him one of mine instead because they are rare and the paper is as sweet as honey. We talked some more and he told me his story, growing up in Pakistan, immigrating to Chicago, driving a taxi for a living.
When we pulled up to Walida's place he finally introduced himself and invited me to his apartment, "I live a couple buildings down from where I picked you up. Since you're from out of town maybe you want to come over and use my e-mail." He told me his address and said I could ring his bell and go up any time I wanted.
One night, at Brandon's uncle's gallery, when Ashur was still in town, I kept asking friends, 'Don't Ashur and I look like brothers?' Finally Ashur pulled me aside, "So. Are we 'like brothers'?" There were people and paintings all around us, many colors, voices, lights, the sound of ice cubes in glasses and laughter. When I turned away I saw friends, loved ones. 'I wasn't suggesting that that is all I want, Ashur. I like you.' But we couldn't finish our conversation.
We would only resume another night when we were out with Misha, George, and others. Again Ashur took my hand, led me out of the loud bar and took me to a quiet annex, a dimly lit bar with tables and sofas. We sat at a small table, a candle between us, which I pushed aside.
I spoke frankly, 'Ashur, I think you're amazing, and if we lived in the same city I would fall in love with you.'
I remember his eyes, the lashes that entangled me in their wispy gaze. He said, "I've already fallen in love with you."
My mouth must have fallen to the ground and kicked about by passing feet because I could not find it and speak.
Finally, 'That is one of the most tender things anyone's ever said to me.'
We proceeded to list the reasons why we liked each other and why it was a good idea to hold off on sex.
There was a large window behind him and cars and people passed by. I found his eyes again, staring like a child into mine. They were brimming with light and enthusiasm.
'There is always the future, and who knows what is ahead for us. This is not an ending.' He held my hand. I lost the window, the cars, the pedestrians, and the entire city beyond.
Perhaps I should have said something else or something more, but my initial instinct was to be calm, reserved, and not surrender totally to the romance because I am so easily swept away as it is. I have drowned too many times. I smell of the sea. If you stumble upon my heart, happen to pick it up, and place it to your ear you'd hear the fury of the ocean, the sorrowful wind of the bay. I held myself when I should have kissed him. I held my breath and stayed near the shore where I could run and hide in the sand dunes and protect myself from his tidal whims, or worse yet, from my own surging foibles.
One-night stands are easy.
When George, Ushi, and I saw Ashur off at he airport I was deeply and silently mournful.
That week I devoted myself to giving Brandon the bachelor party he deserved. The rehearsal dinner was a good time as well. I refused to give the reading Laura asked me to give because it was so Catholic, so religious. Someone else read it. The wedding itself was beautiful.
One night, in Laura and Brandon's spare bedroom I finally wrote the toast I was to give at the reception.
Marriage is a decision
Fortunately love is spontaneous
Marriage is oftentimes serious
But love is frivolous
Marriage is an institution
Love is a playground
I always wonder why the phrase is:
So and so fell in love
Falling is such a painful and embarrassing thing
And honestly Brandon has not once complained about
Having fallen in love with Laura
But then again what is there to complain about
That Laura's eyes are bright
That her smile is contagious
That her beauty is disarming
I have a wild imagination
But I truly can't imagine
Anyone else sitting where
You are at this moment
Laura
I thank God it is you
And Brandon
Ten years ago in high school
If you'd told me I would be standing here
Making this toast
I would not have believed it
We were from totally different mentalities
But Brandon is an amazing person
Through you Brandon
I have met some great people and personalities
Diverse characters
It takes an amazing person
Such as yourself
To bring so many of us
Here
Together
Thank you Brandon for your
Friendship and steadfast brotherhood
And I added, 'I love you both.'
There were many handshakes, photos, kisses, hugs, dances, conversations. A dazzling night.
The next morning Brandon and Laura left for their honeymoon and Ashur returned. He had called a few nights before to tell me he was coming back to Chicago and I had been thrilled. He did not say he was coming for me, but that did not matter. He was returning and I would have another chance to see him, to hug him, to hold him, and to perhaps tell him all that I hadn't.
But would I?
There was a time when my imagination and my life had very little difference and much in common, but I find that as I age what I dream and what actually transpires are entirely disparate entities. Am I not as courageous as I once was to dream? Not as intuitive? Ashur came but I did not swim in the waves of passion. I was again collected, only painstakingly demonstrative. I held his hand on the sidewalk, kissed him on the lips, but only a peck.
I was not audible amidst the chaos and the chatter of the other Assyrian queens. So many times what I began to say was dismissed and forgotten. I was timid. But was I fragile? What did I seem like I was made of? Glass? Crystal? A diamond to be admired from a distance and not handled?
There was so much about Ashur to adore: His eyes, his expressions, his gestures, his joking and bantering, his mere energy. That night I decided to return to California sooner than planned. I was over stimulated, overwhelmed. I packed my bag in a hurry and Bell drove me to the airport. He said to call him when the plane landed. I never did.
On the flight home I was overcome by the strongest sense of loneliness. I was tired, and tired of being alone, traveling alone, living alone, of being so aware of being alone. Had Ashur awakened in me a longing for something more? But I had been so happy before, content with my life. I wrapped myself in a blanket and tried to sleep, occasionally falling from the sky into the darkness. My head was brimming with recollection. I had already begun to process all of it: Brandon, the wedding, Ashur and the other Assyrians, dad, Bell, the apartment, the many nights of laughter and drink, so much. Too much!
At moments, with the lights out and most other passengers dozing, I wanted to weep, to weep silently but profusely for all that I was leaving behind: That first afternoon with Ashur when the taxi had picked us up on the sidewalk, when we had talked the afternoon hours away; the morning when I was alone at Brandon and Laura's and the delivery service brought my wedding present to them and I signed for it and laughed; playful kisses from George, and laughing at the piano bar like children in church; the days when I had Bell's Jeep and driven it peacefully through Chicago smiling at strangers, enjoying the sun on my face. I missed every glance, every word, every laugh, every single expression, every fading moment.
I let go of dad and my brother, but not of the love I feel for them. From here, from the illusory and protective guise of distance I can safely celebrate my father, tell him about my love for him, hold him, thank him, and let him know that he has been the greatest father on this earth. In my imagination there is a place where everything is gold, including the elixir my father guzzles in the kitchen, in secrecy and in shame.
It's been days since I left Chicago, but images still haunt me, sounds follow me underneath each living moment that I spend recuperating from the carnival I lived and created. I am still returning from that world which would not exist without my doing. I take full responsibility for creating Chicago and the memory. It is my nature to perceive the world in this blinding light that burns permanent impressions on my spirit. Stories. Events. Illuminations. And that is not the end of it. I am not the only master and artist here. Life has its share of contributions to the drama and the surging canvas.
Yesterday I stumbled upon an e-mail that Jackie sent to her friend in Japan from my computer. In it she reveals things she has not told any one of us in the family, obviously protecting us. Something about the possibility of having MS.
Apparently there will be more tests to come. But I cannot approach her about the subject because she is away for a few days. And what would I say to her when she returns? I will not lose her. She is the one I love the most in the entire family. Jackie has not only been my aunt, but my sister and soul mate. God cannot take her from me. I entered her room last night and fell to her bed, praying and crying.
I talked to Shammi for the first time in weeks, if not months. She is still recovering from her breakup with Laura- a long and staggered process which she admits frightens and overtakes her. "I'm living in a fog," she confessed, her voice for the first time feeble. I wanted to reach through the wires and touch the flesh, kiss the friend. The date for her travels to Iraq is set. We wondered if we are merely dramatic and comfortable in the role of the victim, or if life really is this arduous. We didn't come up with a definite answer.
But we huddled like two white doves in the crevices of an ominous bridge in a dark city. Maybe this is why Shammi is leaving the country for a while. I don't know. I don't meddle. I don't question friends. I just support them. God, I'd be a terrible parent!
All I know is that Shammi has been feeling restless for some time here in the States and craves a connection with her roots that I find understandable. I feel the pull too, the need to see Iran again.
Tracy called. He has grown to be a friend. I talk to him more than I do to Paul, the Assyrian one. He was concerned when I told him about Jackie's recent medical scare. He said, "It must be a people of color thing. My mother didn't tell us she was ill for months. The same with Paul's mother. No one knew about her cancer for years! We care more about others than about ourselves. I'm seeing a therapist you know, because my job as a social worker requires it, and he asked me an interesting question the other afternoon: He said, 'How did you feel when your partner told you he was infected with HIV and that he may have infected you?' And I said I was more concerned with his well being than my own. And my therapist almost had a fit. He couldn't understand it. I was ready to drop him then and there, but I finally made him understand that it's a cultural thing."
Although Tracy was making a valid cultural generalization and a serious point we could not help but laugh.
I have never asked Tracy and Paul how they were infected. I suppose it's because I know time will reveal the many shifting facts of the tale. I don't believe in interviewing or interrogating friends. Isn't it better to allow people to open up as a flower does to light, slowly?
Tracy speaks formally, beautifully, with a full-bodied voice that never tires of its own music. He is attractive and cultured. Yet he is disastrous. Breakables will break in his presence, cigarettes will burn holes in clothes, liquids will spill. But he has a heart of gold and although I would not trust my favorite crystal to his care, I would surely place my heart in his hands.
My maker on fated night
Sewed my limbs together
By candle light with
Homophobic thread
He was in a mischievous mood
So that when I move
To touch myself my
Seams creak with
Self-contempt
The following is a list I made in 1994, which I recently found tucked away in the pages of my diary:
1. Never be sorry unless you hurt someone.
2. Feel free to break plans and make better one.
3. Write letters.
4. Go to school.
5. Draw.
6. Want fame but don't get frustrated for dreaming.
7. Always keep the farm close to heart.
8. Remember you want to act. Act!
9. Be honest and straightforward with everyone.
10. Be bummed at times.
11. Never let someone you don't know make you angry.
12. Cry once in a while.
13. Read a lot
14. Spend more time pointing out the positive in people.
15. Remember you're a Leo.
16. Eat right.
17. Exercise.
18. Respect everything in you.
19. Impress.
20. Charm.
21. Conquer.
22. Keep track of money and how you spend it.
23. Know you're beautiful but don't depend on it.
24. Work hard.
25. Make something of your wonderful self.
26. Don't expect a lot.
27. Live.
28. Be bad and do stupid things. You're allowed.
29. Love God.
30. Forgive your father.
31. Go to sleep. You're tired.
I think of Jackie and worry for her. I pray for the first time in years but feel awkward for it. Does God see that I am a hypocrite and only come to him for others and not myself? Why do I pray when I am not a practicing Christian? Because He is in our lives whether we like it or not. Because Mom-Suzie believes in him devoutly and keeps Him near us, whether we happen to worship Him or not. So I pray. I pray for Jackie. I ask Him to take me instead because I have lived so many times, so deeply, while Jackie has yet to live for herself. Her entire life has been for others.
But I know there is no one listening. Praying is like writing in this journal. One speaks to his own conscience.
It is afternoon and mom naps in my bed. She crawled in only minutes ago with my permission and sank into the downy embrace of my comforter, smiling, the sun on her mouth. We laughed, then she drifted away. I write this next to her. Earlier we had our Turkish coffee while I told her about Brandon's wedding.
Decision is a funny thing whatever way you look at it. Whether we make it or life makes it for us there will always be that space underneath and above Decision in which lie doubt, whist, and speculation. One can never know if a decision is right or wrong. We do not have that power of knowing. Only after time and hard labor does the answer become only remotely clear to us.
I am constantly evading Decision and allowing life and time decide my fate. I move solely by power of emotion, not practicality. Feeling propels me. Intuition steers me. I am a leaf in the air, a feather spinning, a sheet of rice paper floating.
Ashur called earlier from work and we kept the conversation short, but funny, tender, wistful for each other.
'How are you?'
"Fine. I love you and miss you," he confessed easily but spoke quickly as if to say these things is taboo and one has to let them out hurriedly to lessen the shame of confession.
Funny that after all the loneliness, all the experimentation with my sexuality, trying to overcome fear and stigma, I would be given this new test of feeling, but long distance. Will the phone bill reveal the nature of these calls? Wistful dialogue: 2 minutes. Seems life is trying to keep me from anything easy and convenient.
But I don't mind
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