cupcakes and the NFL

I can never really figure out where any thoughts emerge from in my mind. Lots of ideas and notions and desires and questions are always swirling around. Basically I live in a world of non-stop mental activity. And this includes sleep, where my nights are filled with vivid dreams -- so much so on weeknights that I have to nap on the weekends or I wouldn't get through life.

And I bring this up because I've been, for no apparent reason other than to give my mind something to gnaw on, wondering about my identity and my masculinity and I've realized that I've no hope but to always be queer. Last Sunday I ended up in a hotel room watching tv. I don't have tv at home bc I think it will mess up my mind. Funny right? How do you make a bigger mess out of the mess my head is already in? I see tv as a substance that should only be used recreationally.

Ok, so I ended up at the hotel bc the house lost power and I wasn't going to freeze my ass off and I had to get the car to the dealer in the morning so I couldn't head to the city and I also had this inexplicable burning desire to watch the Patriots play the Jets (although I found that I couldn't really root for either side since I don't care about either team).

After a much needed very hot shower and writing down my dreams in my dream journal I settled in to watch the game. And during a commercial interruption I found myself surfing channels and stumbled on the Cupcake Olympics (not really, it's Cup Cake Wars). Then I flipped between the NFL and the cup cake ladies. And I was almost more impressed by the cupcake wars.

I was thinking, would a real man watch cup cake wars? (openly? secretly?) and why do I give a shit about what anyone thinks of me?

It was then that my mind turned towards my brother's health, or rather illness, and I contemplated his masculinity and was thinking about the way that a person might get way too caught up in either femininity or masculinity and if that person isn't careful it could actually lead to some serious health problems. (I'll have to ask my brother for permission to discuss his particular situation before I can go on about that.) And even though I hate being vague and since my own brush with death was long ago and harder to directly correlate, I can say this: people who don't: watch what they eat, watch who they spend their time with, watch how they love themselves -- run the risk of becoming miserable.

For a long time I was a curmudgeon around baking and cooking. It was cool when the former wifey was doing all that, I got to sit back and eat a lot of delicious homemade food and had free access to the wife for other pursuits. But over the past five years of not having a wife I started to miss the food and the goodies (and the sex) and then I realized I could do something about the food and the goodies.

Now I make a killer chocolate cake that my roommate takes into the office for birthday parties. And everyone moans and oohs and aahs over it. So I'm almost glad I've been single and decided that in the absence of a wife I could start to kick some culinary ass in the kitchen.

And then my mind turned the corner and started to contemplate legacy. When all is said and done what do I want to be remembered for? I want to have been known for being loving, bold, strong, fun, fearless, and successful.

And after the cupcake wars ended and the Jets beat the Pats, I returned to Justice Hall (which I didn't think was as good as say: The Monstrous Regiment of Women or Letter of Mary) and then when I couldn't sleep (bc I'm really a night person) I turned on the tv (since it was there) and caught some of the Australian Open.

And the next week to keep my queer persona intact I baked cookies and watched a dvd on motor cross racing. And then I had the craziest fantasy. (You know when you're just sort of staring at the wall and you realize that a little movie is playing in your head?) I was thinking I'd like to bake something (a pie?) and enter it into a contest at a county fair later in the fall. Why not?

I don't have many regrets but I do wish I could've gotten myself together a little earlier in life so I could've entered a motor cross race one weekend and entered a bake off the next. And of course been happily married throughout.