I'm Always Touched By Your Presence, Dear in Things That I'm Grateful For

I’m not sick anymore, which is good because I’m going on vacation this weekend. I’m going to a small little beach resort on the coast. I reasoned that I needed a vacation from my vacation due to the obnoxious nature of my little brother.

But his visit started my brain going down trails of thought that it really didn’t need to go down. It coincided with a weird, sudden flow of people from California trying to follow me on social media. In response, I clamped down hard on not really posting anything because whenever people start showing an interest in me, my first instinct is to withdraw.

But then I heard the news that Robert Patrick had passed away.

Robert Patrick was a playwright from the 1960s and 70s who started Off-Off-Broadway and created some of the first gay plays performed in New York City. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Patrick_(playwright)

I met him doing performance art in a small bar in Los Angeles while I was in college. He was one of the most amazing human beings I’ve ever met in my life. He was in his mid-70’s when we met, and I remember him telling me I need to keep creating. By that time, in my head, I had ceased to become an artist and, being in university, was now an academic. He dismissed it easily and said, “If you ever truly stop expressing yourself, it’ll pour out of you anyway. Control the flow. That’s art.”

He was always chatting with my on Facebook, asking about the group of artists I’d befriended in Bangkok, worrying about my depression in Northern California, and always telling me to get my feelings out.

He loved to tell stories about working with Sam Shepard, Lily Tomlin, Jack Wrangler and Harvey Fierstein… and his theories about Marilyn Monroe, the impact of all the amazing artists that came into his life (“you too! I heard the song you created for Dave”, he was referring to a piece of music I composed for my friend’s performance).

I need to recharge and then charge ahead.