Episode 76: The Queer Revolutionaries & My Childhood
MUSHROOMS (no, not that kind)!!! CHINESE MEDICINE!!! BUT I AM NOT A BEGGAR; I CAN HEAR YOU SAY!!! VIDEO GAMES AS A TOOL!!! ANXIETY!!! MACROBIOTICS!!! BEYOND MY WILDEST DREAMS!!! MY SOLD-OUT WORKSHOP!!! ECKHART TOLLE!!! A BIRD CALLED SNOW!! THE LITERAL SKELETON IN MY BASEMENT!!! & I was born into beautiful chaos. Into a city of lights, into a world of madness and intensity.
Excerpt from the show:
“So the end of this week was marked by a huge surge of energy that I absolutely needed to get everything for my event in order, from finding plates and silverware to gathering ingredients, gathering table decorations, yoga mats, blankets, candles, and incense, and creating a setlist. In a conversation I had with my mother a few days ago, I said, “how is it that I know exactly how to do this when I have never done this before,” and she reminded me that I had watched my stage-manager-of-a-mother do this for years of my life, that it ran in my blood. That running a workshop was like producing theatre mixed with catering. And that is exactly what it is to me. And my lord, does it come easily to me. My father and mother met working in avant-garde theatre for the Los Angeles Theatre Company, working with a theatre troupe called DAR A LUZ, organized and directed by the extraordinary genius Rezah Abdoh a first-generation Iranian immigrant and a visionary. My mother was his stage manager, and my father his sound designer. Rezah died of aids when I was one year old, and I do not remember him specifically, but I remember an essence, an energy of purity, of genius, of madness, and love. He blessed my life, as did my godfather, the ephemeral Mario, a queer black drag queen whose shamanic trickster energy would continue to guide and fill my life with love long after he passed as well. He predicted my birth weeks before my mother knew she was pregnant with me. I was born into beautiful chaos. Into a city of lights, into a world of madness and intensity. Their work continues to be taught in theatre courses at schools like Yale and lives on in the documentaries and books that came in the years to follow. I am a child of that genius and madness. I am divinely guided by them both. And by unusual and extraordinary parents, their friends, and loved ones.
I hope that in my life, whatever it is that I am doing, I will do it with an extra dose of unexpected and extraordinary magic. In honor of them all. Following in the footsteps of the queer revolutionaries, the tricksters, and the artists who were the first people ever to speak my name.
And if I am still and quiet for long enough, I swear I can hear them, reminding me of who I am. The reason I was sent here, to disrupt this world with a little madness, a little genius, a little magic, and a whole lot of love.”
