Laid Bare: Essays and Observations

by Judson, Tom

  And, so, every year towards the end of September, as my teeth sink into the crystallized outer shell of the season’s first striated melocreme, I hop into my confectionary Time Machine and find myself whisked back to ten happy days in Montana. There the sky is always big, the candy corn crop is plentiful and, from time to time, rattlesnakes have been observed.

  We Shall Come Rejoicing

  While out driving the other day I passed a farmer mowing the hay in his field. Mounted on the side of the tractor was a contraption that pivots to stand upright for transport or lowers flat, perpendicular to the tractor, to cut the hay. It consists of two rows of teeth that shuttle back and forth. Basically, it works on the same principle as an electric carving knife, albeit one of Jurassic proportions.

  Once the hay is cut it must dry in the field for a few days before it can be raked and baled. Green (or wet) hay can spontaneously combust in the barn, and that’s not particularly desirable among farmers.

  How do I know this arcane agrariana? Growing up, our house sat on the corner of my paternal grandparents’ dairy farm and bringing in the hay was one of the seasonal chores that the grandsons helped with. There are several cuttings during the growing season, but I remember helping only during July and August. I suppose I was in school the other times.

  At 200 acres our family farm was small, and provided a mean existence for my grandparents. There were no hired hands, so the labors of us kids were essential to making sure the lofts were filled to feed the cows during the frigid northeast winters.

  Cutting and raking are one-man jobs, done with a tractor and a machine, so I rarely came on the scene until it was time to bale the hay and take it to the barn. Pa drove the green John Deere tractor, which towed the bailing machine (in my mind’s eye it’s red, which would have made it a McCormick), which, in turn, pulled the hay wagon. That’s where my cousins and I were stationed.

  On our farm we made rectangular bales; not the round behemoths seen nowadays. The lines of raked hay were fed into the bailer where the hay was formed into bales and tied with twine. From there, the bales came shooting out of the machine--high into the air, like human cannonballs at the circus--to land with a thud on the floor of the hay wagon. Presuming none of us got in the path of the oncoming projectiles, the bales were dragged to the back of the wagon and stacked neatly in rows. This continued until the floor of the wagon was covered, and then still longer until the piled rows of hay bales towered high above the ground, held in place only by a rear support and the ingenuity of the stacking system.

  As our convoy bumped and jostled its way back and forth through the field under the baking July sun, it occasionally roused a spray of grasshoppers from their resting place in the hay rows. Bob-whites would complain and scurry as the cacophonous caravan came near, and once I recall a pheasant scolding us as we approached her nest.

  We boys had an enormous mayonnaise jar filled with iced-tea back with us on the wagon, but Pa refreshed himself with a curious concoction called “Switchel”. Switchel (also served in a mayonnaise jar) is a particularly foul-tasting libation whose main ingredient is cider vinegar. There’s a little honey thrown in for good measure, but, although Pa swore by it, a swig of it would leave us boys gagging.

  We didn’t leave the field for lunch—that would waste too much time. Gram always knew just when the sound of adolescent stomach-grumbling would be at its peak and would arrive in the battered old Rambler station wagon with potato chips, pickles, a loaf of Wonder Bread and a batch of egg salad in—of course—a mayonnaise jar. The sun, arcing across the sky, told us our break was really just a pause and we needed to finish up lunch and get back to the job. We’d wolf down our sandwiches and Gram would putter back to the house in the Rambler.

  Idyllic? I hated every minute.

  My cousins lived and breathed farming, but I didn’t want to waste my summer vacations bringing in hay. There were books to be read and lakes to be swum in and—most of all—old movies on T.V. to be watched. The fights my Dad and I had over me helping out on the farm were awesome. I remember him yelling once that I “read too many books!” (Translation: My son’s a faggot.)

  Of course, I always lost those battles and wound up on the hay wagon, broiling in the sun, hayseeds torturing me down the back of my t-shirt, sweat soaking me through and through, being nearly knocked unconscious by the errant catapulting bale and trying to keep my balance as the wagon bounced over the uneven fields. All the while knowing that there was a Norma Shearer picture on the Million Dollar Movie that would probably never be shown again!

  Boy, was I a stooge.

  Looking back now, I think my protestations were an essential part of the experience; maybe if I had gone along willingly the memories wouldn’t be as strong, the remembered sensations not nearly as vivid. By hating every moment, I experienced every moment.

  I don’t picture those days in the tans and sepias of old photos. No, I see the late 1960s in the super-saturated hues of 8mm Kodachrome home movies. The sweet corn presented proudly to the camera at the picnic after finishing in the field is lemony and lush. The scarf covering the pink rollers in my aunt’s hair is turquoise and diaphanous. The picture is a little blurry and the action is sped up just a little, like we’re all rushing to fit as much fun as we can into our too-brief summer vacation.

  I don’t think Dad was right that I read too much. But, I’m dearly glad I always lost the battle and got to spend a few hot July days bouncing along on the back of an old hay wagon.

  ALL WE OWE IOWA

  Well, the way Randy tells it, he had just picked up his mail and there among the bills was an envelope addressed to him from his grandfather. Seems Grandpa would give each of the grandkids a check for $250 when they got married. All the other cousins had gotten their loot by this point but Randy was still unmarried. Who can say what got into the old man, but he decided to send Randy his check in spite of him still being a bachelor.

  “How do you like that?” Randy said to Allen as they drove down the street in Allen’s red convertible. The thing is, Randy didn’t exactly consider himself “unmarried.” He and Allen had been together just a short time, but it felt like The Real Thing. So they went right to the bank where Randy cashed the check and handed $125 to Allen.

  “And I took it,” said Allen. “And I spent it. And I haven’t stopped spending since.”

  That check from Randy’s grandfather arrived in 1973 and, according to Randy, that’s when they were married. As far as the state of Iowa is concerned, however, Randy Van Syoc and Allen Coit Ransome are newlyweds who were legally married on August 26, 2009.

  Randy and Allen have been my friends for just a few short years but we’re as close as family. Our mutual friend Jeanine and I were the witnesses who signed the marriage license. But when their friend Ken, who officiated at the ceremony, asked who would stand for these two people, the entire crowd yelled, “We do!” and leapt to their feet.

  The ceremony took place on a boat that launched onto the Mississippi from Dubuque and in the middle of the ceremony, in addition to heckling the minister, Allen instructed the captain to veer a little away from the Illinois side and further into Iowa waters just to make sure the marriage was legal.

  All the trapping were there: the open bar; the cheese platters, the bacon-wrapped shrimp; the relatives meeting out-of-town friends for the first time. The usual. The atmosphere , though, was anything but; it felt historic and long, long overdue. Allen told me earlier in the day that he had been lying awake a few nights before the ceremony trying to come up with some appropriate vows.

  “And I started to get really mad. ‘Vows?’ What was left for me to promise? I realized after all these years that I had been cheated out of the chance to make vows as a young man when romance and love are fresh and making promises like that really means something.”

  Both of The Boys (as everyone calls them) injected a little politics into their vows but overall their words were touching and heartfelt. All the guests were in tears.
And in a moment that was so over the top it wouldn’t make it into the gooiest Lifetime movie, just as The Happy Couple exchanged rings a bald eagle swooped majestically down from the sky and made a U-turn past the bow of the boat before soaring back up above the water.

  After the ceremony and the hugs and the kisses and the laughter and the tears we all took the stairs to the upper deck. I stood in back of the boat looking out at the endless Mississip’ and couldn’t help thinking that, while it may have taken Allen and Randy thirty-six years to prove it, the world, and Old Man River are not, I say they are not, just rollin’ along.

  MY HUCKLEBERRY FRIENDS

  I had one of those Proustian sense memory moments at the gym this morning. As I rounded the 27-minute mark on the treadmill my iPod started playing the Sarah Vaughan swing waltz version of Henry Mancini’s “Moon River,” in which “Sassy” stretches out “moon” over 12—count ‘em—12 syllables. As the music played I experienced a cinematic dissolve back to 1994, shortly after Henry Mancini had died. I was an ardent fan and had been saddened to learn of his death. As a tribute my husband Bruce and I decided to throw a Henry Mancini Memorial Cocktail Party. It was Pride Week and the weather was fine. We knew there would be competing events on the weekend so we called the party for 6-9 PM on Wednesday evening and asked that our guests come dressed as characters from “Breakfast at Tiffany’s”, the original source of “Moon River”, one of my favorite songs.

  I made a 90-minute Mancini compilation tape that would play over and over on the auto-reverse deck in our living room. Bruce and I felt very sophisticated as we went to the restaurant supply store in the neighborhood to stock up on cheap stemware for the event; Mancini’s music was the essence of “cool” and we intended to have our soirée live up to his swinging tunes by offering nothing but martinis.

  Bruce wore his all-purpose red satin tux jacket for the party while I, sporting an orange flattop at the time, made a stunning Rusty Trawler in my white dinner jacket and black sunglasses with the lenses popped out. When our guests started to arrive we were pleased to find that everyone had gotten into the spirit of things and dressed for the occasion. A beret here, a taffeta party dress there, and much chunky costume jewelry on both sexes. We had dueling Holly Golightlys at one point but fortunately no blood was spilled. Jeffrey and Tim showed up in vintage suits and were chastised for their usual lateness by Kyle who brandished a martini in one of her gloved hands and a long cigarette holder in the other. Ann Magnuson was out of town and sent her brother, Bobby, as proxy. Even Steve Brown, the cynic’s cynic, only mentioned once or twice how ridiculous we all were. Bruce trolled the room with a pitcher of vodka while I followed behind armed with an eyedropper of vermouth. Between us our guests never wanted for their dry, extra-dry or parched martinis.

  The Stolichnaya flowed freely, the conversation increased steadily in both volume and hilarity and above it all Henry Mancini looked down approvingly from the framed studio publicity shot I had found in a junk store on 2nd Avenue. I cupped my hand to Bruce’s ear so he could hear me over the “Peter Gunn Theme” that blared from the speakers. “We did it, honey; this is the party from ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s’.” Bruce had to agree as he looked around the room at our wonderful friends drinking and laughing and Twisting to the music.

  At almost 9 o’clock on the dot in a moment of serendipity the tape reversed itself in the cassette deck and began to play the introduction to “Moon River.” As the plaintive harmonica started on the opening notes of the melody everyone in the room spontaneously chose partners and began to slow dance. With Bobby Magnuson in my arms I floated past our living room window and looked out to see the towers of the World Trade Center silhouetted against the pink-and-orange sunset. What a perfect world, I thought to myself.

  But that evening in June,1994 was only a brief respite from a world that was far from perfect. The AIDS crisis was in full swing and many of our friends—including several at our party—were beginning to show symptoms of the disease. The more effective drug cocktails were still more than a year away and the sense of fear was almost inescapable. But we managed to escape it that night as, dressed in our silly party clothes, we said goodbye and farewell to Henry Mancini.

  As I rode the treadmill this morning I thought back to that summer evening with a warm nostalgia that only the passage of a dozen years has made possible. Almost half the guests at our party had died by the end of the decade and the memory of them waltzing to “Moon River” makes me smile. But as I watch Tim and Jeffrey arguing over which of them will lead I see them start to disappear even as they waltz, leaving too soon just as they arrived late. Steve Brown sitting in the big chair, obstinately refusing to dance, dematerializes as he rolls his eyes in my direction. Suddenly I find myself dancing alone as Bobby Magnuson evaporates from my arms. And when I look across the room at Bruce, laughing as he steps on Kyle’s toes yet again, he simply fades away along with the final bars of the song..

  So many friends gone. But with Henry Mancini’s help they occasionally do unexpectedly reappear. Why, there they are now, just waitin’ ‘round the bend for Moon River and me.

  “…SO THAT WE MAY BRING YOU…”

  There was a time when entire families gathered in the soft glow of the cathode ray of a console television, hushing one another, as an announcer, in sober, stentorian tones, proclaimed, “Our regularly scheduled program will not be seen this evening so that we may bring you a Special Presentation in Living Color.”

  Of course, that brief announcement sometimes spelled disaster: The Watergate Hearings were broadcast from May through July, 1973, uncomfortably overlapping summer vacation, a span of time I had allocated to uninterrupted T.V. viewing.

  Suffice to say that the episodes of “The Match Game” that weren’t obliterated by summer sunspots were more often than not trammeled by Sam Ervin & Co. (I never watched the hearings unless John Dean was testifying—I found him strangely sexy and, even as a 12-year-old homo, I appreciated the steely resolve his wife exuded as she sat behind him in her tailored suits and bleached hair pulled tightly into a bun.)

  But, fortunately, a preempted program usually brought something truly special in its place. “Peter Pan” and “The Wizard of Oz” come to mind. Our entire extended family would traipse to my grandmother’s, as she possessed the only color television set in the clan.

  It seems that there were more preemptions during the holidays than at any other time of the year as the networks hauled out their variety shows and “spectaculars” as early Christmas gifts to the nation.

  My family devoured them all. Halfway through “Christmas With Ray Conniff and the Singers” my mother announced she was convinced that they were just mouthing along to the album. All four of us kids stampeded out of the living room and returned with the portable record player. After making sure the needle was flipped from 78 to LP we discovered that Mom was right: our scratchy copy of “Christmas With Ray Conniff and the Singers” synched up perfectly with the voices on T.V.

  Was this a good thing or not? Were the people on television sipping cocoa around a roaring fire displaying uncanny abilities or were we at home getting gypped? For that matter, were these photogenic men and women members of The Ray Conniff Singers at all? Mom had unwittingly opened a can of worms with her revelation and planted the seeds of skepticism in a young mind.

  Which only meant she had an even harder time trying to explain why Katie from “My Three Sons” was on “The King Family Christmas Special.” Did Robbie Douglas know his wife was leading this parallel life, that she had all these blond relatives and that she sang? And, most of all, what about their triplets? From my own experience I knew that fathers had little, if anything, to do with raising a family, so, who was watching all those kids? Try as I might, I couldn’t imagine Beverly Garland changing a diaper. My anxiety kept me from being able to fully enjoy the show.

  Most Holiday Spectaculars followed this basic variety show format, but, one night in 1964, a truly special Special premie
red on NBC; “Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer”, presented in something called “Animagic” was shown for the first time in what would become an uninterrupted 40-year run. Here was a holiday special for the whole family. Even little gay boys found something in it for them; something that only grew richer and more meaningful with the passing years. We understood exactly what Rudolph went through; who didn’t endure that kind of taunting from the other kids at school? But, it wasn’t Rudolph with whom budding queers most closely identified, for there among the elves—in a principal role—was one outright, glorious queen.

  Consider this dialogue from the choir practice scene in original script: