NOT a gay martha stewart

I once watched a film in which an older, Father Time-esque gay gentleman attested to a younger gay man who was suffering through the throws of a self-esteem crisis that it’s “o-kay to be gay and average.” I remembered thinking, “Well, that is very reassuring. You can just be gay and live the rest of your life as ‘Fred down at the dry-cleaners.’” Gone are the pressures to be the next Oscar Wilde and having to maintain a sparkling wit and a peppy and overly-expressive theatrical repertoire. You can go through life and not have to paint the ceiling of a chapel (with well placed, homoerotic depictions of biblical characters, no less!) It’s alright to stay home and watch Nightline and not conquer a country with elephants, design the new fall line, write your recollections of a troubled and closeted youth, make Quiche Loraine and porscutto melon balls for eighty-nine of your closest friends or mix illegal substances and dance the night away in a Go-Go cage. You’re free! Free to be the you you’ve always wanted to be with no limitations, expectations or hindrances. Or, are you, really… It seems like since the emergence of this new, trendy, Fab Five saturated gay culture, there’s more pressure placed upon us little mos. I, for one, have a very full schedule keeping up with my own, stylist-free life. I read the magazines, I’m hip, but it’s hard to remember to “zhush” your sleeves and to wear coordinating socks when I still get detergent spots on my tee-shirts. Now, it seems, I am to remember to activate the product before I put it in my hair, talk my stressed-out girlfriend through another messy breakup, (with the guy I assured her was Mr. Wrong-ish from the beginning) be fabulous at and the life of every social event, work-out, get a pedicure and a fake tan, and still remember to water the Boston Fern and put the cat out! It’s as if the personalities of Martha Stewart and Truman Capote merged and fire bombed the pop culture. But, who am I to judge. I just figure I’m not the only person to feel this way. Maybe I’m just a gay activist at heart. The one and only one to turn this imaging problem around. The one to put gay individualism back on the map and reinvent what it means to be a homosexual American, and… Oh, gotta go. Apricot and rosemary popovers are done…