Month: September 2021

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I Was Incorrigible

Doorman at the Palace Hotel, San Francisco, March 1989

…even when I was using a film camera.

I lusted after this gentleman on the daily since I walked past the hotel on my way home from work.  He was always very friendly—bordering on flirtatious—so I finally got up the nerve to ask him out. He ever-so-politely turned me down.

I suppose I should also add the Palace Hotel to the list of venues from my previous post, although I never really frequented the place. It was one of those locales that had a reputation for a very low tolerance for menz gettin' busy in the restrooms, and arrests were commonplace. I happened to stop in for legitimate reasons once, and immediately understood why it was so popular—and so risky. The floors were a mirror-finish marble, and you could easily see everything going on in the stalls.

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Trade Center

Like many gay men of a certain age, I have my own salacious stories of the clandestine (and not-so-clandestine) venues that catered to this sort of activity in the 80s and 90s—albeit in San Francisco, not New York.

I can hear you now, "Do tell!"

• The Shaklee Building, 2nd Floor
• 255 Bush, 2nd Floor
• The Russ Building, 11th Floor
• Rincon Center, 1st Floor
• The Sir Francis Drake, Mezzanine (the only place I ever almost got busted)
• The Hyatt Regency, 2nd Floor…and of course, pretty much every public restroom on the shop level of the Embarcadero Center, of which the Hyatt was a part.

But like one of the contributors in the video above pointed out, after 9/11 all these buildings slammed shut to casual comings-and-goings. (Or should I say, comings-and-cummings.)

Some day I may go into greater detail regarding my adventures—and misadventures—my own Tales of the City as they were, but I'm in no hurry, as much as I'm sure you'd all like to read them. I don't want to shock my husband after all these years. I mean, he knows I was a slut when I was younger; I'm just not sure I want him to know how much of a slut I was…

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Disgusting

"Host Bodies."

And so, the Axlotl Tanks were created…

The Axlotl tanks were living organisms within the original Dune series of novels.

Axlotl tanks were the means by which the Bene Tleilax reproduce a living human being from the cells of a cadaver, producing type of clone called a ghola. These tanks were also used in the creation of genetically engineered assassins known as Face Dancers. Later in the series, the Axlotl tanks are engineered to replicate the spice Melange, previously only available on the desert planet Arrakis where it is created naturally as part of the life cycle of giant Sandworms.

The Bene Gesserit suspected that the Axlotl tanks were what remained of female Tleilaxu, since no Tleilaxu females had ever been seen. Moreover, the Reverend Mother Darwi Odrade, during the time of the Honored Matres, had declared to Tleilaxu Master Tylwyth Waff that neither she nor any of her sisters would become an Axlotl Tank. This remark elicited shock from the Master, a reaction that indicated that the Bene Gesserit suspicion was true, especially since he did not deny it.

Genetic information could be coded into those bred in Axlotl Tanks. As a result, the resulting organisms could be bred for certain aptitudes, skills, and reflexes.

Despite the revulsion Axlotl Tanks caused in many groups and cultures, by the time the Honored Matres had conquered the planets of the Old Imperium, the Bene Gesserit had adopted them for the creation of gholas to further their own cause.

I have a feeling Frank Herbert is either rolling over in his grave or laughing uncontrollably at his own prescience.

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Well, Damn.

That's what happens when you go poking around to get some tea.

I mean, it started innocently enough. I realized I hadn't seen a coworker in another department for a while and also noted he hadn't logged into our work chat app for months. He was still showing as an active employee, but I was wondering what was going on. Instead of doing the normal thing and just asking one of his colleagues—or going upstairs to see if he was actually around—I online stalked him, and that led me down the rabbit hole of despair.

I knew he was at least on track to get married last summer. Photos of him and his lovely bride are still online, but no updates on the wedding site since May. His Instagram was gone as well. That led to an outright name search on Google, and it led me to a multitude of "people finder" sites that post basic personal information—and of course a lot more, if you're willing to pony up some cash. I have never been willing to do that, and especially not for this guy, but out of curiosity on the same site where I found my coworker, I put in the name of a dear friend with whom I'd shared an apartment building in San Francisco and had moved to Palm Springs a few years ago. Rick suffered a fire just like we did, and he was absolutely verklempt that a portrait I'd done of him in drag (as Miss KC Dare) had been lost in the conflagration. We'd been in regular contact prior to the fire, but afterward it became spotty.

I'd tried reaching out a few times over the past 18 months, suggesting that I do a new (versus just a reproduction of the original) portrait using an entirely different photo. I never heard back from him. I finally called his cell about six months ago and was greeted by "this number has been disconnected."

That's never good.

I didn't know anyone else whom I could call to check on him, and quite frankly, with everything else that's happened during the intervening months, it fell off my radar completely.

Well today, after I'd filled in his name and did the search, it returned the usual name, address, age…with the addendum that their records indicated he was deceased June 2020.

Well fuck.

I'd known Rick since shortly after I moved to San Francisco (the first time) in 1986. I don't remember what brought the two of them together, but Rick and Dennis, my ex, became fast friends and partners in crime. Rick provided a lot of Dennis' care when he was stricken with AIDS and—working in healthcare as he was—helped him navigate the increasingly confusing hurdles he was faced with. A sweet, generous man who—despite an obscenely overstuffed closet (a girl can have too many dresses)—opened his home and heart to me while securing a place of my own the last time I moved back to The City.

RIP, Miss Dare. You are sorely missed, but I know we'll meet again.

"Don't be dismayed at goodbyes.
Goodbyes are necessary before you can meet again.
And meeting again, after moments—or lifetimes—is
Certain for those who are friends."

~ Richard Bach, The Messiah's Handbook