If they could see me now...

Oh, the abuse started young. Here I am as a little tyke sailor.

Yes, I had very big hair, and was heavily into all clothes black. This was my junior year of high school. I had just returned from California, where I had attended my friend Joy’s prom. Having missed my own prom, I managed to get myself invited to the senior ball; this is the night of the senior ball. I went with my friend Tracy MacFarland, which I’ve probably just misspelled. I think I may have cooked stir-fry for them, but I can’t recall.

This was taken my freshman year at Penn State. I was so excited to be someplace new! These are the flower gardens on the western periphery of the HUB lawn. Two years later, when my grandfather died, he asked that his ashes be returned to Pennsylvania (he had lived in the Scranton area, in Old Forge, as a child). Because he had always loved gardening and flowers, I scattered his ashes among these flowers on a windy November day.

I took this self-portrait as a sophomore at Penn State. I was coming out of one dark period; I had survived three months of homelessness and was finally secure in a nice townhouse, and I had survived coming to terms with my identity and a couple of schmucks I dated off the bat. Little did I know the wonderful summer ahead would be followed by a long, dark winter. The poor grades I received while homeless resulted in my having to quit the scholar’s program and drop out of school for a year and live on a converted porch (in other words, a porch with glass windows, but no heat in the winter or air conditioning in the summer).

I grew out my hair very long... the next thing you know, Nirvana and Pearl Jam come busting out of Seattle and officially deal the eighties a death blow: for once I was on the vanguard of fashion! I really enjoyed having long hair. All of my women friends were upset when I shaved my head; they had grown accustomed to playing with my hair at social events. A typical Friday night for me consisted of going to a party and falling asleep on some couch while three or four girlfriends caressed my scalp and combed my hair with their fingers. During the summer, the hair was wonderful... I learned that if I pulled it back in a ponytail, it wouldn’t get into my clam chowder and my neck would stay cool. However, it took so damned long to dry in the winter... I just had to go low maintenance and cut it all off.

These are some experimental double exposure shots inspired by Joni Mitchell’s photography for the Night Ride Home project. These are actual double exposures, not computer manipulations. The one on the bottom is particularly important to me because of the song “On The Willows” from Godspell, which is still my favorite experience in the theatre. I was one of the two tenors who sang harmony on that number... it’s a beautiful, moving piece during one of the show’s sadder moments. The song is about the exiled Israelites in the Babylonian Empire. Or was it Persian? I forget (I think my memory is that they had been captured by the Bablonian Empire and then later freed by the Persians, but it's all a foggy mist in my mind). As a sort of gypsy, I have always felt somewhat of an exile, and this song really touched that part of my soul which has always been an outsider.

This is an artsy-fartsy beefcake shot of me for those of you who are curious as to just how physically fit I like to keep my body. The health club is a ritual to me! This was taken by Philadelphia photographer and artist, Brian Petro. We shot this on the other side of Tussey Mountain at an old forge.

And for those of you looking for nudie shots... sorry, Charlie! First of all, seeing me naked is really pretty anticlimactic. Second, this is a Penn State web page, and them sorta shenanigans ain’t ’loud here. Wanna see me naked? Here’s an idea: date me for a while! Better yet, get a real life.