Author Archives: Tin Man

Glee, Swingle Singers, Golliwog’s Cakewalk

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We watched the premiere of “Glee” last night. It was cute. It’s about a high school Spanish teacher (played by Broadway actor Matthew Morrison) who takes over the school’s glee club. Apparently there are going to be all sorts of theater guest stars when it officially premieres in September. It’s catnip for us gays.

I don’t know why they’re calling it a glee club; it’s really a show choir. This is a glee club. If this show gets popular, for the rest of my life I’m going to have to explain to people that when I was in the Virginia Glee Club we did not dance around in costumes and sing pop songs.

Much of the background music to this episode was provided by the Swingle Singers; one music clip recurred three or four times during the episode, and Matt and I both thought it sounded familiar and were racking our brains to figure out what it was. After the show ended, we spent the next 45 minutes furiously googling and finally figured out that it was “Golliwogg’s Cakewalk” from Debussy’s “Children’s Corner.” “Golliwogg’s Cakewalk” is a pretty racist name for a piece of music, but it was written 100 years ago by a Eurpoean, so what can you do. Here’s a clip of someone playing it.

Sands of Time

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This weekend it will be 10 years since I graduated from law school.

After graduating from law school, I: studied for and passed the New York Bar Exam, moved back to New Jersey, came out to my parents, had my heart broken, started a job in Hopewell, NJ, started a second part-time job at Barnes & Noble, moved to Princeton, NJ, rang in the new millennium, had a shitty roommate, moved in with a friend, studied for and passed the New Jersey Bar Exam, moved to Jersey City to work as a law clerk in Newark, had my heart broken again, started a blog, got a job as a lawyer, moved to another apartment in Jersey City, wrote a screenplay, did lots of dating, had my heart broken again, joined a chorus, met Matt and entered a long-term relationship, moved to Manhattan, got laid off, saw my brother get married, got a new job, moved twice more. And read lots of books and saw lots of movies and theater and TV.

It’s only lately that it feels like a long period of time has passed since 1999. Often in the past 10 years, I’ve felt like I’ve been living in post-Virginia time. (Virginia is where I spent most of the ’90s.) I’ve felt like I’m post-something and pre-something else, instead of in the midst of something. I feel like I’ve drifted through my life for the last 10 years and haven’t accomplished anything, and that I’ve been waiting for the next phase of my life to start.

The time is just slipping through my fingers like sand. I worry that several more 10-year chunks will pass, and one day I’ll wake up a decrepit old man with nothing to show for all the time that has gone by.