If you’ve not yet met David Goldman then simply go to any popular gay summer destination and take a quick look around. You are guaranteed to find him passed out some place where it is illegal to loiter. Facedown under a pier in Provincetown, leaning up against a cactus in the desert of Palm Springs, flopped over the back of a passing deer in the Fire Island Pines—these are all places Goldman has been discovered at various times throughout any given day, sedated by the over-consumption of sweet-tea vodka, which he frequently uses as a meal replacement.
According to numerous Twitter postings this past weekend, he was spotted all over Rehoboth Beach: sprawled across a bench outside a sandwich shop, on the lawn of the house he was staying in (and had keys too) and under a beach volleyball net where a local pee-wee girls team nearly had to cancel their game because they could not collectively drag him off the court. Eventually, a nearby snow cone vendor arrived on the scene. Like some good Samaritan rolling a beached whale back into the sea, she used her snow cone cart to plow him off the court and onto the sidelines. “I love your work,” Goldman mumbled, thanking the snow cone vendor for helping him do something he could not (i.e. move) and closed his eyes so his liver could begin making room in his blood system for his next “meal”.
My own sighting of Goldman passed out was at the local dance club, The Blue Moon. It was midnight, the club was at full capacity, and Goldman was lying in middle of the dance floor. “I fell,” he said when I saw him.
“Well, how long ago exactly?” I asked. You see, he looked very comfortable, curled up into a fetal position and had managed to make a small pillow out of a thick stack of cocktail napkins.
He shrugged his shoulders. “Jus’ like a minute or forty-five ago,” he said.
“You can’t just fall down in a club and stay on the ground,” I said.
“You can if you can’t get up,” he said.
“Goldman, get off the floor,” I said. “It can’t be comfortable down there, people are dancing all over you.”
“You don’t know my life,” he spat.
I picked him up by the arm and dragged him off the dance floor. Ten minutes later I returned to check up on him, but he had left the club, and was not seen again until the next morning, stumbling into the bedroom we were sharing for the weekend.
“Where were you?” I asked. “Did you go home with someone?” . . .
It was an hour or two before midnight, and Yara Sanchez was mistaking a sleazy Hell’s Kitchen bar for the checkout counter at a Shop ‘n Save: She ordered us a round of beverages while a very annoyed bartender awaited payment. Payment which Yara would supply in the form of coupons. Coupons she was presently cutting out of a magazine, using a nail clipper she kept in the cavernous bounds of her cleavage.
“Don’t worry about it,” she winked at me. “I totally got this round.” From her purse, she snatched another HX magazine (the premier guide to gay New York), immediately flipped to the back, and with her nail clipper, chopped along the dotted lines: “One Free Drink at Posh Bar”.
Having “paid” for our two drinks, she handed the bartender his tip, a third coupon. “You deserve it, you work hard,” Yara said as she snatched a few handfuls of cherries and lime wedges from the garnish tray and tossed them into Ziploc she kept in her bag. “I, like, love that you have snacks here!”
I sipped my vodka soda as Yara scanned the crowded room for my friends. She absolutely adored each and every one of them, and I suspected she “bought” me a drink hoping I would lead her to them. But alas, they had done what they always did when they were out and wanted to have a good time—walk away from me.
A month ago today, I was on my mother’s couch, finishing a tall pile of gingerbread man cookies for lunch, and starting on my dessert, a cherry cheesecake. Having forgotten a fork, and being too lazy to get up and get one, I reached over to the Christmas tree adjacent to the couch, snatched a candy cane from its branch, and used the hook to bring the cake from the plate to my mouth. I would have gladly cut out the middle man, and simply placed my face in the dessert, but I had company. My grandmother. Who stared at me in disgust from her wheel chair across the room. With each bite her disapproval of my vacation eating habits grew more and more audible. What at first started out as simple ‘tsk’ eventually crescendoed into full on screeches of pain right around the point I had devoured a Pac-Man-sized portion of the cake.
“If you are having one of your ‘senior moments’ I am going to have to ask mom to take you back to the home,” I informed her.
“I in pain watcheen you eateen like that!” she snapped.
“Well, deal. This is how I celebrate the holidays.”
“By eatin’ like a pregnant woman?”
“Yes, actually. It’s my way of sympathizing with Mary’s pre-birthing process.”
“Well, you are lookeen like a woman, gordo, that for sure… Espec’lly weeth those shoes you wearin’,” she said raising a penciled-in eyebrow at what were presently on my feet.
Every two months David C runs out of believable excuses and agrees to have dinner with me. “I already have dinner plans” is only believable if you don’t immediately hang up the phone and proceed to update your Facebook status to “David C is at home bored and hungry.”
I had my heart broken again recently, and I needed a friend. David C brought up my Facebook profile and noted the other 281 options I apparently had. But after weeding out my sister and all the unsolicited foreigners and hustlers whose friend requests I accepted so I could look more popular, all that was left were my bestees Glasser and Lawrence. And I had hoped to eat with someone who would offer me more comforting words than their standard “You should be used to it by now”. …
> From: Pookie345@email.com [PTOWN HOUSE OWNER I RENTED FROM]
> Sent: Mon 8/25/2008 4:38 PM
> To: Palacios, Adrian
> Subject: Franklin St.
>
> Adrian
>
> I am sorry to inform you that their will be no return of
> your security deposit. I rec’d a report from the person
> in charge of cleaning your unit this weekend and it was not
> good, I was told that the trash had not been put pout and
> their was over 3 bags of trash left behind, the place was in
> total disarray, from glasses, and condom wrappers under
> beds, to dishes left dirty, to the bathroom being filthy. I
> always allow for normal use, but this was beyond what i
> would consider “normal use”. My cleaning person
> spent an additional four hours cleaning the unit at $45.00
> per hour and charged me $20.00 to remove the trash, that
> should have been placed out side and also for pick up on the
> Wed, that you were their.
>
> I have to express my sorrow in sending this email, I have
> only kept/and or deducted an amount from only a few guests
> over my 6 years of ownership, sorry that you have become one
> of those guest.
>
> Feel free to express your concerns via email.
>
> Sincerely
>
> Pookie [PTOWN HOUSE OWNER]
I have become one of ”those” guests. THOSE guests. As if to say, I am no better than the trash that was neglected to have been placed outside as well as ”for pick up on the Wed, that you were their“. But I was not THEIR, Pookie… I was not THERE either. Yes, I laid down the deposit, but I got sick and had to stay home, miss my vacay, you knew this, I emailed you. No, this is the work of these people:
(continued from part 2: You remind me of someone who’s also ethnic.)
3. Would you like to replace your order?
Approximately ten years after I’d met Philip, I had known Matthew for three fateful seconds. It was in passing at a gay bar well over legal capacity. He was calling it a night, I was going for my fifth martini, and we crashed into one another, forced face to face by a turbulent ocean of impatient alcoholics. His eyes met my own and lingered. I have a rule about eyes. If they look at you for at least three whole seconds, they want you. Usually for love, sometimes for a quickie in the nearest bathroom stall—the formula’s results may vary depending on intoxicant level, but if it’s three whole seconds, of the Mississippi sort, you can consider yourself a wanted man, guaranteed. Matthew’s unblinking eyes clocked in at three and a quarter. He then stuffed his business card in my hand and asked, “What’s your phone number?”
“Shouldn’t we at least talk a little first?”
“Can’t. On my way out.” He whipped out his cell phone and waited for me to speak.
Has it really come to this? I thought. Has it really come to me being so desperate for the possibility of love I will give my number to a perfect stranger based on the fabricated rules of a staring contest? I sized him up. He was tall, muscular and clearly affluent given the business card with legitimate corporate logo. Yes, I thought, it has come to this. In three years, the only other people to ask for number have been my new doctor and the Pizza delivery guy. Our conversation consisted of me shouting my seven digits, and Matthew saying goodnight. And as quickly as our staring game had lasted, he was gone.
(continued from part 1: You can’t see inner beauty.)
2. You remind me of someone who’s also ethnic.
When I am unable to discern as to why a guy finds me appealing, I think back to the very first heart I ever broke. It was that of Philip Whiting III, a young, British textile heir I met during a nine-month vacation in London—or as the University of Pennsylvania comically referred to it: “a nine-month intensive study-abroad program in London.”
I chose London because I was not required to learn another language, thus providing me with additional time in which to find myself. And often I could be found dancing shirtless at gay clubs rolling on ecstasy. Such a lifestyle instantly turned me into one of those image-obsessed, self-absorbed party boys, and since Philip Whiting III thought that immensely charming, we embarked upon what was my first in a series of dysfunctional relationships that have each since contributed to the 42 piece, Louis Vuitton, emotional baggage set I wheel about today.
![SE_0520_OBAMA_COACH_05-20-07_OM5LLJ7[1].jpg](http://adrianpalacios.com/blog/SE_0520_OBAMA_COACH_05-20-07_OM5LLJ7[1].jpg)
After watching Michelle Obama’s brother, Craig Robinson, introduce her this evening, the first night of the Democratic convention, I’ve decided that it cannot continue to go unnoted that this man is gayer than a Care Bear. Even that pink one with the two hearts tatooed on it’s stomach. It was not a lisp which gave him away. His lisp was not so much present, as sensed. Sensed in that way something is being stifled and will explode if continued to be constrained, like boiling water’s steam on the verge of screeching from a tea pot. Fortunately, his speech writer eliminated as many words containing the letter "s" as they possibly could while keeping the speech’s grammar in tact. After calling Michelle to the stage, most likely known as "heyyy girl" in privacy of their home, this poor man no doubt retreated backstage to remove whatever bandage his dentist gave him to keep his tongue from sliding under his teeth.
In watching both the closing and opening cermeonies, I’ve decided Chinese made-for-TV children are too intense. They smile so hard I fear they will go blind. The one above, though cute, is clearly on the verge forcing her eyeballs to be shoved back into her face, lodging them in the rear of their sockets.
The one in the middle is not trying hard enough and therefore has clearly failed her people.
