When my granddaughter came out, I was surprised that as a gay man I felt sad.

Things are different now. What a joy it is to see her fall in love the first time.

Had I wanted her to resign as a sexual being? Never to experience the intimacy of another’s body? Heart? Soul? Of course not.

It wasn’t about her. I grieved my expectations for her life.

I thought, “I want to protect you from the pain I have experienced.” But the truth is, I was more concerned about my pain than hers.

She recently wrote to me, “Grandpa, You talk about things people can’t talk about.” …

I went for a walk this morning as it was a cold, but rather calm sunny day. After being cooped up for a long-time due to the pandemic I knew I needed to take advantage of the good weather because it’s still winter in the Northeast, and it won’t start warming for months.

As I progress I notice my shadow. Instantly my mind takes me to one of the dark places in the deep recesses of consciousness. Watching my shadow walk, my mind wonders if I am being perceived as a female or male as I stride. Along with that follows the usual parade of gender related questions like Am I standing correctly? Or, do I swing my arms in the right way? …

“It is a disgrace to grow old through sheer carelessness before seeing what manner of man you may become by developing your bodily strength and beauty to their highest limit.” — Socrates

Various beliefs and cultural upbringings inform gender norms, but across the board, our views of the ‘ideal’ man share some provocative commonalities:
a broad-shouldered, three-legged specimen, with intelligence for days and an obnoxious sense of self.

“Oh, it’s like he’s been sculpted by the Greeks…” and exactly that he was.

A moment ago

Greco-Roman antiquity birthed not only the ability to measure, calculate, and critique man-made invention, but also man himself.

The male form would (and must) only conform to one desired image: poised, strong, and proud. But why did the belief originate that in order to be manly, men must be unbelievably muscular? …

I will admit that familial relationships are often the most complicated social entanglements that people have. For a myriad of safety, mental health, and logistical reasons, people aren’t often willing to fully disengage with their racist relatives.

Romantic relationships, on the other hand, have no such excuses. Romantic partners are the result of nothing more than personal choice, and a lot of Good People™ are choosing wrong.

Someone once told me that on a first-date they learned that the person they were with was explicitly racist, avidly anti-immigrant, and believed that people with disabilities shouldn’t be allowed to have children. Somehow, none of this ended the date prematurely. …

It’s common for the passage of time to reshape how stories are perceived. Moral progress happens, and suddenly a story gets turned on its head. The good guys were actually bad guys; the bad guys were in fact victims. For example, it’s hard to watch a John Wayne movie today without cringing at both the treatment of the Indians and the antiquated “hero” depiction of Wayne’s character. Similarly, the Knights Templar — or any “heroes” dramatized in stories of the Crusades — are now often seen as bloodthirsty antagonists by modern audiences.

When a complete role reversal occurs over time, it almost always happens with the hero, not the villain. The “bad guys” often switch to be viewed as the victims (as in the case with the Indians in John Wayne movies, or the Muslims in Crusade stories), but not the heroes. If a character is a villain, they are, almost as a rule, given villainous qualities that are inherently unredeemable by any amount of time passing. If an author has any sense of drama whatsoever, they will craft their villains to be conniving, greedy, violent, remorseless, unloving, etc. …

I recently had the honor of interviewing Elizabeth “Lizzy” Talbot, an intimacy coordinator and intimacy director for both film and stage, respectively. Her latest project, Bridgerton, has taken the world by storm and is projected to become the 5th most-watched Netflix original series. Bridgerton’s highly talked about sex scenes have been on everyone’s mind, but the relatively new role of intimacy coordinator is still largely unknown outside of the industry.

Below is our conversation about her role, challenges, and triumphs.

Why did you make the career change from fight choreography to intimacy director?

What I noticed when working with fight work is that there are so many protocols, rules, and technicalities about what you can do with fights. It’s all quite formulaic. Whereas when you’re working with intimacy, it’s quite different because there weren’t really any rules. It was kind of like a free for all. And you were often resting on the good graces of your partner. That was your safety net. …

Periods of unemployment are typically rough times in people’s lives and not just for material reasons.

In a culture where we all are taught to rely on work to find a sense of self-worth, it feels imperative to have an answer to the question: “What do you do?” And unemployment takes that answer away. It makes conversations awkward. It excludes.

(And if there’s one thing we humans all want, it’s to belong.)

While we can all get a healthy sense of pride from our achievements and while work is one of the places we can derive meaning from, making people’s worth or belonging dependent on their work situation is a perversion of the very concept of worth. …

When I went to school, there was this kid named Del who always got blamed for everything. There was nothing offensive about him, but he came from a poor family and the teachers knew it and always zeroed in on him. If anything ever went wrong, their first act was to corner Del and unleash a torrent of false accusations.

The various clubs in the school used to make students sell candy bars as fundraisers. The students were given these little cardboard lunchboxes that would hold the bars as well as the cash. …