dance hall days

me and my crew circa 1979...
we called ourselves the vee dubs. actually it was vwsc etc. the virginia woolf secret club.. we got together, read gay classics from the likes of virginia woolf, vita sackville west, kerouac, ginsberg, burroughs, doris lessing, and others while we drank cheap wine and envisioned our lives elsewhere. paris. london. or maybe athens, georgia (home of the b-52's). note the plastic key ring on my belt loop. that was one of our trademarks. keys were very chic in gay men's culture then. if you wore them on your right or left was a signal of top/bottom.

we intensely wanted to be just like a street gang. we saw "warriors" and were enamored. but we were queer. not tough at all. at least not kick ass. but we could turn a phrase like there was no tomorrow.

“The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn, like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes "Awww!” Jack Kerouac

sometimes it only takes a song(or 4) to whisk me back to my "mad ones" days. and for me these are some of those songs. i just hear any of these songs.. the riffs... those vocals... the bass lines...and i'm transported back for a minute or two. i can almost hear the bassline of blondie's rapture in the making. and there are definitely connections to chic and vaughn mason and their roller boogie magic.


it wasn't all about cocktails and drugs (thought they were plentful) as much as it was about the groove. the internship. about testing our limits and spreading our wings. trying new flavors and surfing the scene. saying "yes" to pleasure. urban. hip. downtown. uptown. alternative. they were called clubs because we belonged there..

go ahead and have some fun.. i did! try it out...