February 2004
« Posts tagged story by Pleasant Gehman
Review Of Pills, Thrills, Chills and Heartache — Flaunt Magazine
Issue 52, The “Spring Fashion Issue”
While the process of uploading/archiving/formatting my site to WordPress is—generally speaking—yawnsville territory, the occasional film strip I “re-visit” compensates for the pain-in-the-assery of it all : remembrances of whom was with me, where I was, the tilt-a-whirl of excitement I felt upon picking up the copy of Flaunt, in which this brief review (see: paragraph three) appeared…
Massive thanks and congratulations, B.B.: In five sentences, you target the subject matter with a marksman’s precision. Not only is this excerpt testament to a well-honed sense of verbal dexterity, but the analysis also exhibits a sophistication—namely, your ability to exude charm despite a frugal economy of language.
And thank you, Flaunt Magazine, for the elation (however fleeting). I don’t even have to close my eyes, and I’m there again: a 7-11 in Eagle Rock, bona-fide literary groupie Mark Ewert waiting in my grandmacamry while I made this pit stop to wherever it is he was staying. The A.C. in the store is cranked, my skin a menace of gooseflesh as I stand, feet planted so I’m facing the magazine rack. There’s a large expanse of glass behind the titles—does one call it a “window” if it’s never meant to be opened?—and on the other side of the freshly-Windexed surface that’s filling my lungs with a mildly toxic freon blue scent, dusk spreads itself across the asphalt sky, immense and in gasoline hues—a Molotov cocktail tossed onto the L.A. skyline. A thick copy of Flaunt is in my hands, Selma Blair on the trademark die-cut double cover, and it’s the moment just after I flipped past Omahyra’s “Quinceñara” editorial: the moment when my eyes landed on this review, confirming the validity of what I’d heard, and as I’m scanning the words, a feeling comes over me that’s an onslaught of stimuli: it’s like being on a float in a parade, the crowd cheering; it’s like tossing a fistful of lit firecrackers; it’s a warmth of validation crawling into me by the fingertips, a delirious warmth, a fix I hadn’t even known I was craving. It’s my own Sally Fields moment, an implicit understanding of the fickle undercurrent in her Oscar acceptance speech when she gushed: “You like me, right now, you like me!”
I grab the other two copies from the shelf and head towards the cashier, not giving a damn about the transitory nature of things.
I feel traces of it still: “You like me… You like me…”
“Right now, you like me!”
< a literary moment, a literary movement, abuse, abuse survivor, actress Pauely Perrette, adventures in the first person, adversaries, affirmation, Ali Liebegott, Ali Liebegott of The IHOP Papers, Alvin Orloff, Alvin Orloff from Manic D Press, Alvin Orloff of Manic D, Alyson Books, Alyson Publications, anthology, art versus artifice, author Ali Liebegott, author Alvin Orloff, author Charlie Jane, author Chris Kraus, author Dodie Bellamy, authors from CA, B.B., Bay Area legend Dodie Bellamy, Bay Area legend Kevin Killian, bohemians, boundary-blurring, brave, Britt Brown, Britt Brown of Flaunt magazine, Cara Bruce of Life's A Bitch Books, Charlie Anders, Charlie Jane, Cheers, Chris Kraus, collector's item, contributor Dennis Cooper, cool, cover model Selma Blair, covet, cruising, cruising memoirs, cult authors, cult classic, cult writers, Dennis Cooper, Dennis Cooper exclusive, depraved, disrobed, Dodie Bellamy, drugged-up, drugs, dyke dramas, edgy, edited by Clint Catalyst, edited by Michelle Tea, Eileen Myles, emotional, erotic, erotic chaos, excerpt from Turnskin by Clint Catalyst, exclusive story from Dennis Cooper, exclusive story from Eileen Myles, fact versus fiction, fake, Fashion, fashion magazine, faux, feminist, fiction in a non-fiction book, find, first person, first person account, first person narrative, Flaunt, Flaunt issue 52, flaunt magazine, Flaunt magazine's Spring Fashion issue, gay, go, good, Goth club, gritty, Gutterboys, Hell House, Horehound Stillpoint, hot, I, I Am So Smart by Charlie Anders, I Married An Earthling, id, ids, individual choice, individual voice, issue 52 of Flaunt, item to covet, item to find, J.T. Leroy, J.T. Leroy is a farce, J.T. Leroy is a sham, jayson elliot, L.A. underground, Lady Don't Be Panic, Lady Don't Be Panic by Pleasant Gehman, Laura Albert, Laura Albert is J.T. Leroy, LGBT interest, Liquid Sky by Eileen Myles, lit icon Chris Kraus, Manic D Press authors, Mark Ewert, memoir, Michelle Tea's story Paris: A Lie, moody, narcotic, ncis, neurotic, no longer in circulation, no longer in print, no wave, Omahya, out-of-print, Paris: A Lie, pauley p, pauley perrette, PCP, periodicals, Pills Thrills Chills and Heartache, Pleasant Gehman, po-mo, po-mo sexual, post-modern, punk, queer, queer not gay, queers versus gays, rad, rape, rape survivor, re-affirmation, real, recovery, S.F. underground, scatological, scene, secrets, secrets shared, Selma Blair, sexually-wayward, Shawna Kenney from Life's A Bitch books, Shawna Kenney of I Was A Teenage Dominatrix, Shiny Baubles by Shawna Kenney, shoplifting, sobriety, speed, spoken word artist Pauley Perrette, spoken word performer Pauley Perrette, story by J.T. Leroy, story by Laura Albert, story by Pleasant Gehman, story by Shawna Kenney, submission from Ali Liebegott, submission from Cara Bruce, submission from Dodie Bellamy, submission from Pauley Perrette, submission from Pleasant Gehman, the anthology Pills Thrills Chills and Heartache, the brave and depraved, the id, the individual, the lazy cross-dresser, the memoir, the San Francisco Bay, the story Cheers, Thea Hillman, transgressive literature, Trebor Healey, true, truth, Turnskin, underground icons, When To Be A Girl by J.T. Leroy, woozy, writer Cara Bruce, writer Shawna Kenney, written in the first person, xanax, xanax blackout >
