The "Mary Ann" Explanation...
While generally informative, the "explanation" part is only needed by my Facebook folks. :-)
Books are an integral part of my life. I'm not intending to be mean by this, but in my deepest parts I don't quite consider someone above the age of 8 who doesn't know how to read to be quite human. I had a post graduate reading level in 7th grade. Half of my heroes are fictional characters.
The Tales of the City series, written by Armistead Maupin, is probably the most read and most important piece of Gay literature in the last 50 years. I would also venture to say it ranks very high in modern contemporary American literature.
Written during the 1970s and 80s, and originally serialized - Mark Twain like - in the San Francisco Chronicle, Tales of the City chronicles the twisting lives of several residents of all ages and orientations in and around 28 Barbary Lane in San Francisco. Due to its original serialized nature Maupin could, and did, incorporate current events in his writing and used the story, somewhat, to comment on the events of the day. Far from dating the series into irrelevancy, it anchors the story and, sometimes to our shame, proves to us that, for some things that matter, we still have a lot of work to do as a society.
Reading the series is seen as a rite of passage for Gay people just coming out. Indeed, the series can help them. Maupin penned the most important letter in Gay history as part of the series - Letter to Mama - where Michael "Mouse" Tolliver comes out to his parents. Hundreds of Gay kids, including one of my own students at SUNY Morrsiville twenty years ago - photocopied that letter and sent it to their parents. I still 25 years later have trouble reading it without crying.
From a personal standpoint Tales of the City went a good way toward teaching me how to be Gay. Even in the early 90s there really wasn't a lot of role models in central NY. There was a time, just after I came out, when I tried to act like I thought Gay guys should act - campy. It was an utter disaster. In fact, I have friends who met me just after I came out, after I settled down who've actually said to me that they're glad they didn't know me back then. It was painful for all concerned. Maupin helped teach me that being Gay was who you are, not what you do, and because of that there are people now who do a double-take when they learn I'm Gay because, I don't "act Gay" (whatever that means). I, on the other hand, claim that I can't have more than a half hour conversation with anyone without them figuring out I'm Gay because I'll mention my old boyfriends and current dates as blithely as any straight boy. And I expect, and demand, that such an admission will be taken in the same light.
Maupin also taught me I didn't need to "ghetto" myself. Further Tales of the City in particular, explores the magnificent relationship between Brian & Mary Ann, and Michael & Jon, showing me that it didn't matter if my friends were Gay or straight, just that we all loved one another.
The series ended with Sure of You in the late 80s, having been the very first piece of fiction that dealt with the AIDS catastrophe. Indeed, as Sure of You ended, Jon had died, and Michael was Positive, looking at his last days. That's exactly how it was in the late '80s.
Twenty years later Maupin surprisingly came back with Michael Tolliver Lives! Michael was not dead, and now he was Armistead Maupin's vehicle for exploring what it meant to be an aging Gay man in the 21st century - a lesson that, like it or not, I needed to learn as well. And suddenly friends who I'd not seen in twenty years - Mouse, Mary Ann, Brian, and, bless her pot smoking, tranny heart, dear, dear Mrs. Madrigal - were back! I read and cried through the book twice as it explored in depth the themes of aging and "logical" (as opposed to "biological") families.
* * *
Today while copying and repairing databases I was also updating a couple of things on Goodreads.com. I ended up looking at the Recommendations when Mary Ann in Autumn caught my eye - or rather the book cover design did. What was this?
Oh my gods! Oh my gods!! Ohmygods!! Completely under my radar, last year, Maupin had released the 8th book in Tales of the City: Mary Ann in Autumn. Again, friends who had helped me grow up in the early 90s were now here helping me grow old in the teens. Making a beeline for the Harvard Coop, I found it and started it immediately at Wagamamas.
That may have turned out to be a small mistake because more than once my eyes watered on reading or remembering something along with the characters so many years ago, or laughing right out loud as Maupin managed to show the universality of life - that things are the same everywhere no matter that that "where" was Boston or San Francisco.
Leaving his workplace with [the dog] just after four, [Ben] drove to the Whole Foods on Potreo Hill and shopped for dinner (Michael, like many others, had always called this market "Whole Paycheck," which was certainly true enough, but Ben couldn't resist the scope if its organic inventory.)
And now, making sure that I cannot die for another two years, I've learned that Maupin is currently working, and will release in 2014, The Days of Anna Madrigal.
And so now, if you'll excuse me, we had a very busy, but largely successful week at HQ with a rather big project that was taking up an overwhelming part of my waking life. I'm going to make some more tea and spend the night with my old friends from San Francisco.
Books are an integral part of my life. I'm not intending to be mean by this, but in my deepest parts I don't quite consider someone above the age of 8 who doesn't know how to read to be quite human. I had a post graduate reading level in 7th grade. Half of my heroes are fictional characters.
The Tales of the City series, written by Armistead Maupin, is probably the most read and most important piece of Gay literature in the last 50 years. I would also venture to say it ranks very high in modern contemporary American literature.
Written during the 1970s and 80s, and originally serialized - Mark Twain like - in the San Francisco Chronicle, Tales of the City chronicles the twisting lives of several residents of all ages and orientations in and around 28 Barbary Lane in San Francisco. Due to its original serialized nature Maupin could, and did, incorporate current events in his writing and used the story, somewhat, to comment on the events of the day. Far from dating the series into irrelevancy, it anchors the story and, sometimes to our shame, proves to us that, for some things that matter, we still have a lot of work to do as a society.
Reading the series is seen as a rite of passage for Gay people just coming out. Indeed, the series can help them. Maupin penned the most important letter in Gay history as part of the series - Letter to Mama - where Michael "Mouse" Tolliver comes out to his parents. Hundreds of Gay kids, including one of my own students at SUNY Morrsiville twenty years ago - photocopied that letter and sent it to their parents. I still 25 years later have trouble reading it without crying.
From a personal standpoint Tales of the City went a good way toward teaching me how to be Gay. Even in the early 90s there really wasn't a lot of role models in central NY. There was a time, just after I came out, when I tried to act like I thought Gay guys should act - campy. It was an utter disaster. In fact, I have friends who met me just after I came out, after I settled down who've actually said to me that they're glad they didn't know me back then. It was painful for all concerned. Maupin helped teach me that being Gay was who you are, not what you do, and because of that there are people now who do a double-take when they learn I'm Gay because, I don't "act Gay" (whatever that means). I, on the other hand, claim that I can't have more than a half hour conversation with anyone without them figuring out I'm Gay because I'll mention my old boyfriends and current dates as blithely as any straight boy. And I expect, and demand, that such an admission will be taken in the same light.
Maupin also taught me I didn't need to "ghetto" myself. Further Tales of the City in particular, explores the magnificent relationship between Brian & Mary Ann, and Michael & Jon, showing me that it didn't matter if my friends were Gay or straight, just that we all loved one another.
The series ended with Sure of You in the late 80s, having been the very first piece of fiction that dealt with the AIDS catastrophe. Indeed, as Sure of You ended, Jon had died, and Michael was Positive, looking at his last days. That's exactly how it was in the late '80s.
Twenty years later Maupin surprisingly came back with Michael Tolliver Lives! Michael was not dead, and now he was Armistead Maupin's vehicle for exploring what it meant to be an aging Gay man in the 21st century - a lesson that, like it or not, I needed to learn as well. And suddenly friends who I'd not seen in twenty years - Mouse, Mary Ann, Brian, and, bless her pot smoking, tranny heart, dear, dear Mrs. Madrigal - were back! I read and cried through the book twice as it explored in depth the themes of aging and "logical" (as opposed to "biological") families.
* * *
Today while copying and repairing databases I was also updating a couple of things on Goodreads.com. I ended up looking at the Recommendations when Mary Ann in Autumn caught my eye - or rather the book cover design did. What was this?
Oh my gods! Oh my gods!! Ohmygods!! Completely under my radar, last year, Maupin had released the 8th book in Tales of the City: Mary Ann in Autumn. Again, friends who had helped me grow up in the early 90s were now here helping me grow old in the teens. Making a beeline for the Harvard Coop, I found it and started it immediately at Wagamamas.
That may have turned out to be a small mistake because more than once my eyes watered on reading or remembering something along with the characters so many years ago, or laughing right out loud as Maupin managed to show the universality of life - that things are the same everywhere no matter that that "where" was Boston or San Francisco.
Leaving his workplace with [the dog] just after four, [Ben] drove to the Whole Foods on Potreo Hill and shopped for dinner (Michael, like many others, had always called this market "Whole Paycheck," which was certainly true enough, but Ben couldn't resist the scope if its organic inventory.)
And now, making sure that I cannot die for another two years, I've learned that Maupin is currently working, and will release in 2014, The Days of Anna Madrigal.
And so now, if you'll excuse me, we had a very busy, but largely successful week at HQ with a rather big project that was taking up an overwhelming part of my waking life. I'm going to make some more tea and spend the night with my old friends from San Francisco.