morp

In my county growing up, the split middle school into 7th, 8th, and 9th grades, and high school was 10th, 11th, and 12th grade. This was due to overcrowding (though both schools had at least a dozen trailers -- they didn't even attempt to call them mobile or temporary classrooms). At the end of middle school, we had an awards ceremony and a small unoffical promotion type deal -- not a minigraduation, but some sort of acknolwedgment of moving up to the other building across town. And we also had a dance.

This dance was called a MORP. As in, prom spelled backwards. At the time, I thought it was some known tradition being introduced to me. Years later, I've yet to meet anyone who ever attended or knew of a morp, so I'm guessing it was something conceived by the middle school dance committee. But it stuck in my head, so whenever I'm discussing "alternative proms", I automatically call them "Morp"'s.

Last night I DJed a Morp -- the lgbt community center hosted a prom for the youth. I was a last minute replacement, and despite me having to bring my own equipment, it wasn't too big of a hassle. I even found a parking space half a block from the arts center.

The kids were fun and cute, but suffered from the same afflictions that the folks at the gig last weekend and the folks at the LCCP gig in the winter -- too interactive. I don't mind trying to accomadate some requests, but I prefer they be in a form like a piece of paper. I hate people trying to talk to me while I'm working, and also their response when I tell them "no I don't have that song". Or at least not with me. I guess I hate the idea that people are telling me how to do my job, which is always a pet peeve. I hate that people think being a DJ is easy, or that I'm not paying attention or that I don't know what I'm doing or that THEY know a better way to do it. I gave them very little attitude though, since after all, they're kids.

A few of them totally endeared themselves to me. They had a voting for prom king and queen. Except there was four categories -- male queen, male king, female queen, female king. And the girl who won the category of "male queen" was absolutely beautiful and charming and charasmastic and her alter ego was "Whitney" so she asked that I play a Whitney song when she wins, "because I know I'm going to win this, honey, and I really really want to!" I was happy to help the experience.

There were also two young extremely handsome latino boys who came up and requested meringue music. Then Madonna. Then Missy Elliot. Then one of them said, "uh, my friend across the courtyard, uh, he wanted me to ask you if you were gay." I smiled politely and say, "yeah. yeah, I'm bisexual." They nodded and said oh, okay. Then he said "are you single?" I'm sure I blushed outwardly, because my first thought was flattery but also alarms since I'm sure these kids were 17 or 18. So I said "No, I'm not." Which isn't a lie, but I wasn't sure I wanted to discuss my open relationship with them.

All in all, the evening went very smoothly, we left the building at 10:15 (much earlier than expected) I packed the car, drove my friends home, got home, showered, and was in bed asleep by the time MelRo called at 11:30 to tell me she arrived safely. I'm sorry I missed to talking to her, but I'm not sorry I was asleep

am I not Mr. Leather?

Despite the initial minor setback of not everyone in our party being 21, we managed to make it into the Leather Market anyway (give it up for out-of-state IDs and lackadaisical leathermen). I had a nice time browsing the products and the other browsers -- there were far too many hard bodies for my personal taste, but it was still rather, um, stimulating to be around more naked flesh than usual. At one point my mouth was only 2 inches from the shirtless back of a heavy top (we was wearing the left armband) and I had to restrain myself from licking it. Which probably wouldn't have been the worst thing ever, but I didn't want to be summarily dismissed and rejected, nor did I want my licking to be a check my ass couldn't cash, so to speak. In other words, I didn't want to get my wish since I doubt I could truly handle it. At least not now, and not from him, random stranger muscled heavy top. But probably from someone else.

So I was walking around feeling near flushed from all the products and people and ideas floating around when the crowd party and there was freakysparks and Dominatrix Friend, which apparantly put me over the edge of fully-flushed. Having my cheeks pinched probably didn't help, but I didn't really mind.

So Riley, Vanessa and I reached our saturation point and left to forage for food and sit down. On the way to KFC I passed an old friend from college. I'll call him John because that's his name and I can't remember his last name and there are 28634992 thousand John's. He didn't make eye contact with me and obviously didn't recognize me. My throat closed up and I was unable to stop him and say hi and go through the rigamarole of coming out to him right there on the street -- I was too hungry for that. But then I kicked myself repeatedly afterwards, because I'd been thinking of him randomly lately and I don't know where he lives (if he's even permanently in Chicago) and as mentioned above, I don't know his full name. I'm sure if I think on things hard enough, I can recall it. Or maybe even turn on my old computer and find some old e-mails somewhere.

Anyway, the point is I hate this part of transitioning because I can be shy and panicky enough, I don't need the added the pressure of having to come out on the street without knowing how they'll respond