Posted by Lex Konrad in Snaps | Apr 13, 2007
View from a Midtown high-rise, 6:30AM Easter Sunday
From the ruins, lonely and inexplicable as the sphinx, rose the Empire State Building and, just as it had been a tradition of mine to climb to the Plaza Roof to take leave of the beautiful city, extending as far as eyes could reach, so now I went to the roof of the last and most magnificent of towers. Then I understood — everything was explained: I had discovered the crowning error of the city, its Pandora’s box. Full of vaunting pride the New Yorker had climbed here and seen with dismay what he had never suspected, that the city was not the endless succession of canyons that he had supposed but that it had limits — from the tallest structure he saw for the first time that it faded out into the country on all sides, into an expanse of green and blue that alone was limitless. And with the awful realization that New York was a city after all and not a universe, the whole shining edifice that he had reared in his imagination came crashing to the ground.
-F. Scott Fitzgerald
Posted by Lex Konrad in Dispatches | Apr 10, 2007
“I just want to love everyone — and be loved by everyone.”
It’s not what she said but how she said it, choking back tears, her voice quavering, her expression a mixture of joy and sorrow. We were at Viviane’s apartment. Leslie was sitting on the floor, legs crossed, and someone — I think it was Rachel — was comforting her. This was the most… authentic thing I’d heard anyone say in ages. Here, at last, a moment of truth, of genuine vulnerability.
We were in the right place: if anyone would understand, it would be our fellow perverts. And yet it’s funny how even those of us who live on the fringe find it difficult to express our hopes, our fears, our doubts. Maybe it’s the boundless energy of the city. We all try to be bigger than ourselves.
She wore a sheer evening gown, under which she wore only pasties and a thong. Resort wear. We were still processing what happened during that magic week. We were still adjusting to the quotidian flow of life in the civilian world. Our minds struggled with the dialectic: freedom versus restraint, pleasure versus obligation. I should have known emotions would run high.
My own moment of truth wouldn’t arrive until months later at a downtown orgy. But that night, at Viviane’s, all I could do was gaze upon my fiancée, thinking she’s too kind, too gentle, too good-natured for this world. I was afraid. People out here, in the world beyond the gates, go about their business with teeth bared and knives drawn.
The evening hours found us at a lounge on the Upper East Side, in the company of a Latin girl and a friend of hers. I wasn’t hot for the Latin girl but all was well. I rather enjoy spending time with friendly Homo sapiens. People cast sidelong glances at Les. We laughed. A bouncer approached: “Yo man, your girl’s gotta cover up.” We canceled our order and left, but not before Les mooned the establishment, her gesture evoking memories of our encounter with that stripper in Vegas. (“You want to see an asshole?” our companion had said to the middle-aged man who’d insulted her. “I’ll show you an asshole!” She made good on her threat, flashing the rooftop of the Palms.)
“Civilians,” I said, shaking my head. “You were the most exciting thing to happen to that place all year.” The previous night’s party notwithstanding, our efforts at bringing some of our newfound freedoms home with us had yielded mixed results. For one, there was too much commuting involved. And my swingdar was anything but reliable. I’d never been less enthused about being back in New York.
We found an agreeable place on the wiggity West Side, where Leslie’s outfit drew compliments rather than complaints, and after awhile people seemed to forget there was anything unusual about us at all. This is how it ought to be, I thought.
Perhaps there was hope for us yet.
Posted by Lex Konrad in Snaps | Apr 05, 2007
FDR Drive at Sunrise, 2007
Spring means party season is here. Finally. This winter was dreadfully dull. Now everything seems stuck on fast forward — one social engagement blends seamlessly into the next. When I close my eyes my mind replays the hazy bits and pieces of recent sexual encounters. It all makes my head spin… in a good way, I think. And when things get a little too hectic at least I can sit back and enjoy the sunrise on the ride home.
Posted by Lex Konrad in Dispatches | Jul 05, 2006
Coke whores notwithstanding, it’s not as if New Yorkers are cold or soulless or anything dramatic like that. It’s just that, in a city of endless diversions, no one can concentrate on anyone or anything for long.
Some have it worse than others. Like the girl with the cast on her arm. She keeps reaching into her purse for her cell phone and surreptitiously checking text messages from some phone stalker. I catch her doing it, then she apologizes, and then, minutes later, she does it again.
Remember the good old days, when people didn’t drag their virtual pals with them everywhere? Neither do I. Seems rather quaint now, like something out of A Prairie Home Companion.
It’s been said we despise in others those qualities we truly despise in ourselves. When, the very next night, I catch myself doing the very same thing—to my parents, no less—I realize that I too suffer from the New Yorker’s attention deficit disorder. I’ve become, in a sense, a social cripple, hobbling from one trivial interaction to the next, always off balance, unable or unwilling (I don’t know which) to steady myself in the moment.
But back to the girl. The cast frames her pert breasts nicely, exaggerating her cleavage. All the same, her arm must look ridiculous when she’s being done from behind, hanging there limply or else swaying to and fro. I fixate on this image and sort of chuckle to myself while she prattles on.
And so I ask her: “What’s it like being a cripple?”
As if I didn’t already know.
Posted by Lex Konrad in Opinions | Jun 22, 2006
As many of you may already know, the Exotic Erotic Ball (& Expo) came and went last weekend. Les and I had been excited about attending until about two weeks beforehand, when it became clear the organizers weren’t very, um, organized. It didn’t help that my and Viviane’s polite inquiries concerning VIP/press passes met with utter indifference—way to reach out to the community guys!
Les and I chose to spend our night elsewhere. Others were less fortunate, but every cloud has a silver lining: people’s frustrating EEB experiences made for some funny and trenchant observations. We’ll begin with Dacia’s incisive post mortem:
But anyway – the Exotic Erotic Ball. Speaking of awesome – it really wasn’t. Being immersed in my little bubble of people who are highly critical of the sex industry while also loving and embracing parts of it in a rabidly idealistic way, I forgot that there are lots of people who aren’t totally jaded by it and are in awe of porn stars and whatnot. We call these people “civilians†in a slightly derisive tone – (the royal) we are not very nice. There wasn’t dress code to the evening, so people like me were dressed to the nines, but there were also many, many dudes wandering around in tank tops and shorts. Not to mention the high numbers of people in Halloween costumes – and not in a fetishy way, either. Peculiar and sort of amusing.
What was not sort of amusing, but probably something I’m going to have to get used to (diva-on-the-rise alert), was the way that said civilians acted around me and mine – there was lots of “stealthy†photo taking. Dude – I can see you, especially when you are dressed like a viking and the flash on your camera goes off when you are pointing it at me, and it is only polite to ask “Can I take a picture of you?†This is a little thing called objectification – and I felt it cut me like a creepy knife last night.
Dacia’s right on here. Reading sex blogs and such, it’s easy to forget that the porn world—and the average rabid porn fan—isn’t as (to put it delicately) liberated and sex-positive as we might like. I have nothing against porn conventions per se, but when your event caters to compulsive wankers rather than hedonists you’re going to end up with a room full of shut-ins and creeps. A New York Press article on the Expo paints a vivid portrait of the kind of people I’m talking about:
... A swarm of eager men gathered around the booth, flush from being so close to their favorite girls, and feeling safe in their sympathetic community. In that, it wasn’t unlike a Star Trek convention, or perhaps a Harry Potter book signing.
Whether it was the expo or the ball itself, the same people were in attendance. The men who bought tickets looked like they worked out too much or not at all, and wandered around in tight packs with their camera phones ready to fire. The women came with their hair dyed and their bodies modified, and their tattooed boyfriends stayed close by. Wherever they came from, not enough of them showed up.
At the ball on Saturday night, maybe a thousand people were there, made smaller by the voluminous, empty space in Pier 94 that echoed around them. ... The crowd surrounding the main stage was subdued, and many of them came to the costume ball without any costume. With no mob to get lost in, people refused to abandon their inhibitions. Instead, most were content to remain mere spectators, searching for anybody they could stare at.
Yikes. On a lighter note, Joe Brandi takes the prize for the funniest writeup:
I arrived Sat night at approximatley 9:30 PM and left at close to 2 AM out of boredom. The most exciting part of the night was watching some drunk guy with maskara and a pot belly get slapped in the head by a guy who knew that the drunk wouldnt slap back, then having KSEX’s Wankus with stripped pants on looking like a Ice Cream man stand in between and trying to get the guy who wasnt going to do anything anyway to walk away.
I basically stayed for the time I did waiting for something to happen….anything! After 3-4 hours I decided to leave and go to a regular bar. When its 12:00 on a Sat night and people are leaving who flew in from California to go back to their hotel rooms you know it sucks.
At the end of the New York Press article, someone opines that perhaps New Yorkers are “weird about sex.” It sure doesn’t seem that way from where I sit: I know of at least four other sex-themed events that were taking place on the very same night as the Exotic Erotic Ball.
Nevertheless, I do hope the organizers learn from their mistakes and give it another try next year. Maybe next time they’ll get to know the locals first.
