Invisible Stranger |
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Collecting Crises on Old Compton Street and Beyond
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Friday, October 29, 2004
Clothes-Lines
Over the weekend I spent a couple of hundred quid on a new leather jacket to replace the third-favourite one I've had for I can't remember how many years now (no, it's not this one – it'll take more than a twister in Kansas to part me with that particular piece of designer cowhide). Now, a Brando I most certainly am not, and the closest I ever come to being a Wild One is when someone nicks my Stella when I'm not looking, but as I schmoozed the Soho streets last night, I don't think I've ever before attracted so many admiring glances, at least not since I started shaving. Motorbike jacket, white tee, and faded blue jeans, it’s the classic nelly look, all mean, moody and Mary-magnificent, and the fact I'm too much of a weed to ride a Harley or a Suzuki is neither here nor there. For on Planet Gay, when all else fails, and when the DKNY's been dumped and the Diesel discarded, and you realise that Versace isn't fun or ironic anymore, but just that tiny bit naff, then there's always your reliable leather jacket, the gay world's equivalent of Coco's little black dress. It was a wrench throwing out the old one, but what really decided me was when I realised that our marriage had been merely one of cheap convenience, entered into purely so I could gain admission to those sort of sleazy perv-palaces I never could with my other swish and designer gear (not even when all the lights had been switched off, as seems to happen so very often in these places). So sadly it won't be joining my other sartorial souvenirs, those fashion mistakes and triumphs I'll probably never wear again (even if I could fit into them), but which I just can't bear to chuck out. Things like the silk sarong from Lamu island, the memory of a perfect African summer, and a look I was sporting years before Becks; my Eric's tee-shirt and my Trade flying jacket, the only two clubs ever to have me as a member and let me get up to the things I did; that raggedy old school tie together with the platforms and bell-bottomed jeans I wore at that time precisely because you weren't allowed to; the UNEP watch which stopped forever at exactly five minutes past midnight when my heart was broken for the very last time; and, of course, my hooded green pixie jacket with the tassel and the embroidered tattoo and the pixie boots to match (don't ask). Clothes maketh the man, so they say, and you really wouldn't want me to shop at Marks and Spencer's now, would you? Monday, October 25, 2004
The Waiting Game
If patience is a virtue then I'm Public Enemy Number One. I don't do queues, you see, and if my name isn't on the guest-list then don't expect me to turn up and grace some sorry little shindig with my strangeness. I've even been known to refuse to stand in line for the ATM when I was down to my last fiver in cash. And I once stormed out of a car bound for the South of France to take the train back home, after being informed at Dover we had to wait a further four hours to board the working-to-rule ferry. My, but I can be a proper tantrum-tosser of a Stranger when I want to be. And I like my coffee instant. (You might argue I could profitably use this enforced waiting time to read an improving book, admire the pretty flowers, or even achieve some state of Zen-like tranquillity, but I don't buy into that. As far as I'm concerned, books are to be read in bed, flowers are for funerals, and Zen is the name of a former flatmate's cat who used to pee a lot.) The very presence of a queue is, of course, a dead giveaway of managerial incompetence and indifference. Ask anyone who's camped out at Stansted overnight for the first flight to Fuengirola with just one check-in desk open, manned only an hour before boarding by Vapid Vera and her assistant, Cassie Couldn't-Care-Less. And don't even get me started on the perma-queue at the Islington branch of Borders which seems to have been there since Caxton was a lad. Call me Miss Picky-Perfectionist if you will, but for me nothing brings on the Violet-Elizabeths more than other people delaying this Control Freak of a Fairy by inefficiency. Or maybe it's just Other People, plain and simple, that I can't stand, and I'm nothing more than a stroppy and misanthropic Mary, after all. For it appears no-else minds standing, so many tin soldiers in line, happily striking up Spirit-of-the-Blitz conversations with people they'd normally walk widdershins round the Westway to avoid. But then, as Resident Alien George Mikes so accurately recorded years ago, even when alone an Englishman will always form an orderly queue of one. And it is in that one word, "orderly" where I suspect the problem lies, my ever so patient dears. I couldn't be orderly or ordered if I tried. I was out of step as a child, and I'm not intending to get into that particular line now and dance to someone else's drummer. The only regimentation I'll tolerate is a mucky video with randy and up-for-it squaddies, and if you find a round hole, well, just say the word and I'll bring along that square peg I always carry around with me. Petulant and contrary? You don't know the half of it. But then again, they do say that all good things come to he who waits. Which could probably be why I'm still bloody waiting. Friday, October 15, 2004
Swat
Of course, there's a plus side to all this sweetness and niceness lark, you know. — Bless, but Stranger is simply so nice isn't he? I always feel safe and secure when he's around. Oh my dear, I'd trust him with anything. — Oh, rather! That Stranger, well, he is just soooo sweet. He wouldn't hurt a fly. — Sppplaaaatt! — Er, what was that? — Dead fly. Thursday, October 14, 2004
Cat And Mouse
A friend recently revealed that until she'd got to know me she'd always found me somewhat intimidating, and regularly approached me with all the enthusiasm of Christian in the arena taking Tiddles his tea. And that was so silly, she said, as she slurped on her second sherry, because actually I'm really rather nice. (Sweet one week. Nice the next. If this carries on much longer then it'll be beatification by bedtime, and sainthood shortly after Sunday evening's Songs of Praise. ) I suppose I do have a bit of a reputation for having a loud line in put-downs, dropping acerbic acid-drops and lobbing coruscating comments like a third-rate Dorothy Parker knocking back the Absolut in her own Vicious Circle of one. And I am, after all, never knowingly underheard. It's a habit I should temper, learnt back in the bad old gays, when pre-emptive attack was the best form of defence against criticism and abuse. But like most wisecracking nellies, or Just Jack wannabes, beneath the bitchy badinage and brassy behaviour, the vitriol is strictly vanilla, and the sarcasm and barbed one-liners played largely for laughs. Honest, my dears, deep down I'm really just one big shy pussycat. Playing with my mice. Monday, October 04, 2004
Sour Grapes
Sweet. That's what he called me. Sweet. Now, handsome I can handle, cute I can cope with, and should you ever desire to describe me as "mad, bad and dangerous to know" then you'll get no denial from me. But sweet? Has there ever been a more saccharine, insipid, unthreatening and frankly vomit-inducing term of endearment as "sweet"? And no, I am not feeling bitter. Much. |
