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Sometimes I wish I could find the logical explanation to solve the great mystery behind the how and why my brain never seems to shut up. Maybe at last I'd be spared from spending ungodly hours trying to reason over the same unsolvable philosophical questions and would cease to clutter my head with a bunch of trivialities that in no way, shape or form contribute to my intellectual progress.
Unfortunately it is a fact! I'm neurotic, spastic and derisory. At least I have access to an incredible wealth of imagination and a highly creative database known as my own dementia - which by the way many members of my entourage have vicariously satisfyingly benefited from. I could of course make the necessary adjustments to stop living so much in my head, but the uniqueness of it would lose all its cache and my little Parisian ego would never forgive myself for becoming too pedestrian.
After all, as Descartes said, "I think, therefore I am." So what exactly am I busy always thinking about? Well, beside the daily mental grilling seminar attended by the usual suspects such as "Is there more to life than this?" "Why is this happening to me?" "Why does everything have to have an end?" and "How much longer do I have?" a new recruit just added itself to the "guess who's coming to dinner" riddle, namely "why can't I think straight?" - Or in more straight forward existentialist terms, "why am I gay?"
Because I had nothing else better to do, I dedicated my whole weekend cogitating over the question. Needless to say, a flurry of creative ideas came popping up in my head but none of them provided me with a solid sense of closure -- that immutable truth.
Sure, I considered the traditional metrics such as genetics, fashion trend, peer pressure and environmental circumstances, but it seemed too simplistic of an explanation for my complicated cranium to settle on so easily.
There I was again thinking "there's got to be more to it than this?"
Suddenly, it all came back to me - the pivotal catalyst that triggered the fatal team switch. As I mentally delivered - for effect of course -- my acceptance speech for my Emmy winning performance in my life story episode dubbed "how I met my gay self," one single word formed on my lips: MADONNA.
And no, I'm not referring to the secular virgin Madonna, mother of god, but to the "like a virgin" Madonna, goddess of pop - and mother of her own disciples Lourdes, Rocco and David. Yep, as far as I'm concerned, had it not been for the former material girl now turned Kabbalah devotee, I would have never put my own personal human face to this business of being gay and would have never come out to myself.
My sexual orientation metamorphosis happened gradually via a harassingly repetitive dream sequence. Right around the time I turned a quarter of a century, I also hit a milestone - I got the call! Every night as I retired to the privacy of my own bedroom for a good night sleep, she would consistently invite herself in to the nether region of my dreams.
There I was generously treating myself to all the things the real world seemingly didn't want to offer me when this Madonna clone - or so I thought - would surreptitiously disrupt the peaceful stream of my limitless imagination. It was like watching a suspenseful thriller and unexpectedly having a boatload of static fill your TV screen totally making you lose the thread of the story at the most crucial time.
Damn you Madonna! Where did she get the nerve to be so irresistibly sexy as to jeopardize my sexual integrity? I should have known she wasn't kosher the minute she started Vogue-ing her tushy!
"What are you looking at?" were the first words she would always sensually whisper to me. Hmmm, let me see ... how about a freaking smoking hot pop icon donning a sinfully erotic negligee and oozing with a seductively intimidating, hard-to-resist charisma striking a provocatively sexy pose on a big rotating round bed covered with red silk sheets?
The scenario was always the same: I was standing speechless with my feet firmly set on the ground paralyzed with fear and in complete awe. Madonna was on the bed with her hand stretched out toward me, and every time the bed would complete a singular rotation ritual and place the superstar once again in front of me, the swiveling electrical mechanism would then temporarily stop.
She would eye me seductively and I would stare nervously. As much as I knew she would probably chew me up, the situation completely convulsed me leaving me with the most delicious feeling. "Jump," she would continually implore, her arm extended in my direction as a pious offering. While my body was dementedly attracted to her, my mind kept resisting the temptation, vehemently struggling with the moral implication of it all.
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Ironically enough, back in those days, I was, perhaps, lamentably the biggest homophobe ever to walk on the surface of this earth. It wasn't so much that I had a profound hatred for all things gay, but it was just unflinchingly inconceivable that it could ever be part of my conservatively sheltered, Catholic-influenced cocoon. What can I say? I was absurdly ignorant. But you can certainly imagine the mental torture that this indecent, amoral, sexually-charged persistent dream would inflict upon my narrow-minded, tunnel-visioned self. I literally felt like I was punched in the brain.
I was tormented and extremely confused. I mean, let's be real -- how do you say NO to Madonna? She's certifiably the only one who can turn gay men straight and straight women gay!
"Jump Mona!" she would say again and again and again.
I wanted to jump so badly and completely capitulate. Evidently, I had an inkling of what was to come if I could somehow muster the strength to freaking jump on that sumptuously inviting bed, but I inexplicably would find myself physically crippled. Another spin and I'd miss my window of opportunity again. This masquerade would go on for a little while leaving me emotionally aggravated yet pleasantly overwhelmed with an intoxicating adrenaline rush. The anticipation of getting in bed with Madonna was as addictively euphoric as any sexual preliminaries can be.
Much to my regret, my lesbian Madonna dream would always end the same way.
As moments ticked by, I would eventually be randomly blessed with a momentous bolt of confidence and marshal all my courage to at last join Miss Ciccone on her temptation island. As soon as my hand finally grabbed hers the dream would brutally screech to a complete halt. I would then frantically wake up, neurotically gasping for air and frustratingly yearning for more.
Where the fuck was my ending? What happened to my "like a virgin touched for the very first time" sequence? I wanted a refund!
Needless to say, for a long while -at least until I finally resigned myself to coming to terms with my lesbianism - I was very much looking forward to falling asleep each night in hopes that Madonna would get into the groove and have her way with me.
Well ...she never did! But she certainly gave me more than four minutes to save my world and express myself. Yep, the material girl is the lucky star who opened my heart to a not so forbidden kind of love.
Missed the last Singled Out? Read it here.
