When I first came out of the closet, I went to a party alone. I was so nervous, my hands shook as I placed a quarter in the parking meter. Here, however, I made a friend who was in a play. This one invited me to another party, where I met a girl who was moving out her apartment in Highland Park. When I moved to the faraway neighborhood, I made some friends at a local coffee shop. One who led me to museums and restaurants and introduced me to other friends and crushes. One who worked in a bar. The bartender was handsome, and their partner was beguiling. They told me I looked like Liv Tyler. We ate spaghetti at the Chateau Marmont, and I watched them make out. One day, I thought, I will love someone like that. After dinner, there was never really anywhere to go. The bartender, Ka, saw how I ached for the perfect day, the perfect moment, the perfect party. For everything to come together like beads on a bracelet and just, exist. We used to love a thing called Paradiso, but then the girl who held it together moved to Woodstock. Eventually, Ka acquiesced and asked me and their partner, Michi, the question that had already been written in invisible ink, the question we had been asking them to ask with our bright faces. Did we want to create a party of our own at their place, our watering hole? Yes. Yes. Yes. It was already pretty and Moroccan-ish, and our friends liked to sit outside and drink Amaro and smoke cigarettes. We jotted down ideas on a napkin. It could be a sailor-ish theme - All Hands On Deck! - no, too corny. Eventually, we settled on something that felt genderless & elastic enough to grow with us. “Bathwater,” like don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. Don’t let the little jewels of life become too see-through. Focus on the small, dark, special things. The things that glisten. Adore your children. Adore your elders. Adore your inner child. Baby’s home. Today, we have hosted twelve gatherings together. Slow-dancing. Eating chewy red licorice. Listening to psychedelic records from Portugal. Feeling like kids on a school trip to Spain, standing in an abandoned church. Introducing ourselves to each other. Last Sunday, we held our very night of performance art. I leaned on the bar in a velvet dress and watched songs and poems lovingly prepared and plugged in over the course of several hours, with a lover on the left and on the right a childhood friend, Lily. It was so surreal. It was packed, and everyone was listening. Thank you for being here. One whole big year.
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& a baby sister in the audience 🤗
It really is a kind of Paradise