Rules of Engagement (And Detachment)

I’ve been away from the blog lately.  It’s been a heavy week.  Haggling with the publishers over the marketing of 85A hasn’t been the least of it, but that’s sorting itself out now.  To counterbalance stress, I’ve been taking a lot of time to meditate, work out, read the Tao Te Ching, and go to Prospect Park.

Plus, as I was telling someone yesterday, my blog’s been having a bit of a content crisis.

I mean, I could blog in real-time about current events but I don’t want this to be a news blog.

- Sure, I could go on about how it’d be a crime if the Arizona governor didn’t veto the new anti-immigrant bill, not to mention the birther bill that’s reared its ugly head.

- I could comment extensively on how Sue Lowden, the GOP’s senatorial candidate in Nevada, so confidently counseled Nevadans to barter chickens if they can’t afford health insurance!

- I could applaud Sherrod Brown and Ted Kaufman’s proposal to break up the banks, as well as Jon Stewart and his gospel choir crooning to Bernie Goldberg and Fox News, “Go Fuck Yourselves!”

- I could hold forth on how I agree with Newt Gingrich that calling someone militant is not an insult (shit, look at me!) and that students who don’t want to be in high school should be allowed to leave at an earlier age to go to work.

But, like I told my friend, I don’t want the news to take up more than 45% of this blog.

I’d like the catalysts for my posts to come more from the inside than outside.  Otherwise, my blog would be nothing more than an extension of The Huffington Post, which is doing a good enough job on its own, thank you.  One of the good things about engaging so much with the news of the world is that you never run out of things to write about.  The danger is that it can so quickly devolve into soulless rants.

Plus there’s enough going on right at home for me to blog about…

Julius proposed.  I accepted.

Now, we were already engaged.  We’d already talked about it like it was a done-deal.  But those conversations went something like this: “Wanna?” – “Yeah, you?” – “Yeah.” – “Okay.”

Also, last week, I did something different and actually logged on to Facebook.  I saw that my relationship status read “In a Relationship.”  But I’m more than “In a Relationship.”  So I looked for “Domestic Partnership.”  But my only options were “Single,” “Engaged,” and “Married.”  I selected “Engaged” as Julius was walking by in his underwear.  He said, “You’re more than just engaged.”  So I selected “Married” and sang in falsetto: “We don’t need no piece of paper from the city hall…”

Julius actually got on his knee on Saturday night, though.  That’s one thing that we gays still have to figure out when it comes to marriage.  Which one is supposed to pop the question?

There was no ring.  I don’t want one.  Not even at the wedding.  I’m more than happy with the pewter one I bought years ago on Bleecker Street for $12.  (See headline pic.)

On Sunday, I rented “The Ick Factor” episode of Sex and The City, where Miranda proposes to Steve over beers.  I wanted Julius to see it so I could show him the kind of wedding I want.  Two words: NO FRILLS – just like Miranda and Steve’s wedding.  Shopping for a quick wedding dress on her lunch hour, Miranda tells the shop assistant: “No, I told you, no white, no ivory, nothing that says virginal.  I have a child.  The jig is up.”  In front of a few friends, they get married in a community garden and later have people come for drinks at a bistro.  Classic!

Somehow Julius missed the point.  He started talking formal wear, endless guest lists, banquet halls…

“No!” I implored him, “Just simple.  Sim-ple.  Repeat after me.  Sim-”

“But, Kyle, it’s a proclamation of our love!  Don’t you want to make it special.”

“Getting married is special enough!”

“No!” he said, “Look at Shah Jahan. He built the Taj Mahal as a monument to his bride.”

“That’s a mausoleum!” I roared, “She was already dead!  And he had two other wives besides her.  See what I mean?  Complicated!  That’s not what I’m going for!”

“But you’re not the only one getting married here.”

“Okay, you got a point,” I said, “But if I leave the wedding concept to you, you might as well plan for my post-nuptial mausoleum or rubber room too since I’ll be ending up in one or the other.”

We were at a standstill.

But at dinner last night, I had a proposition of my own.

“Okay,” I said, “You know how you’re more Shah Jahan and I’m more Miranda?  Check this out.  We do the actual wedding my way.  Okay, stay with me now!  We go wherever it’s legal, find a judge.  Okay?  Mike Levine will be my best man.  You choose yours.  We tie the knot.  We have people over later, maybe even a couple weeks later, who knows?  Then we honeymoon in India.  And we crown the occasion by going to the Taj Mahal.  Huh!  Huh!  Is that extravagant enough for you?”

He took a beat to contemplate the Taj Mahal and the mystical haze surrounding it.  “Okay!” he cheered.  Then he took another beat and said, “But can I at least send out engraved invitations?”

That much I gave him.

We haven’t set a date.  If I have my way, we’ll do it on the fly.  Love is love, regardless.

This morning, he told me he had a dream that our cat Marquez was walking across an interior design store, where all these harried gay designers were running around in a tizzy.  Julius said that he noticed that Marquez had Indian food stuck to his leg.

“What do you think that means?” he asked me.

I said, “Well, Marquez probably represented me since you always say that he’s just like me…you know – temperamental, particular, doesn’t like to be hassled.  And the Indian food probably has something to do with the Taj Mahal.  But I’m telling you right now, those futzy design queens aren’t coming anywhere near my wedding!”