This piece is on the Huffington Post today.

If you’re in the market for a little ego boost, I highly recommend a Palm Springs happy hour.

Last weekend, my partner and I, along with my in-laws and our friends Nicole and Joe, went to a bar that features live jazz music in Palm Springs. This in itself should have been entertainment enough. The music was great, and the venue was very retro Rat Pack. But there was a little something extra.

Now, if you know anything about Palm Springs, it is populated primarily by two groups: gays and greys. A trendy retirement spot, Palm Springs is the Miami Beach of California, so chock full of 70-year-olds that the average driving speed is about 11 miles an hour. And since the area has tons of classic architecture with many 50’s modern homes, and a lot of Hollywood history since almost every movie star of the golden age owned a home here, gay folk have flocked to it like flies to a bug zapper.

This makes for a sedate yet fashionable atmosphere that – whether you like to dine at 4:30 or 10:00 p.m. – can be highly appealing. Especially, it seems, if you go to a jazz happy hour.

Our visit began innocently enough. We selected a table in the back, ordered a drink and began to enjoy the jazzy yet mellow sounds of the Mack Killian Trio. The waitress was a very friendly woman who was a dead ringer for Cate Blanchett. What a nice, dignified crowd, I thought, as the six of us clinked glasses and congratulated ourselves on our sophisticated musical taste.

But within minutes, the atmosphere began to change. The mellow sounds of the Mack Killian Trio started to morph into something far creepier: the wedding band sounds of the drunk and lascivious. The trio kicked into a high-energy Huey Lewis and the News number (what Huey Lewis has to do with jazz is still unclear)…and within moments, the postage stamp-sized dance floor was filled with more sexy cougars than a Real Housewives of Sun City episode.

A sixtysomething blond in all white who looked like Suzanne Somers in a cancer wig began dancing alone, performing a number that blended Romanian gypsy moves, interpretive dance and an invisible stripper pole. Nicole decided her name was “Snow”.

An 80-year-old Bob Barker lookalike stepped onto the floor with – I’m not kidding – the biggest wad of cash I’ve ever seen, strategically placed inside one pants pocket so that it was visible to virtually anyone who glanced up from their Chivas. Perhaps unsurprisingly, every time he stepped onto the dance floor, it was with a different, highly captivated woman.

A seventyish woman whose face had been pulled so tight that her eyes were now catlike slits lurched onto the dance floor – and then realized she had overshot her mark (the ladies room, which was about ten feet to the right and somewhat hard to miss, since it was framed by enough makeup mirror light bulbs to illuminate a Broadway stage). She was holding a sharp object of indeterminate origin, which I presumed she would use to release the pressure in her over-collagened clown lips.

But although all these patrons were highly entertaining – we had stumbled, it seemed, into a strip club for senior sluts – they were not the “little something extra” of which I speak. That came when it was time for a bathroom break.

As I excused myself and headed for the men’s room at the front of the bar, I realized that – thanks to the burgeoning crowd – there was now little more than an eighteen-inch wide passage through the crowd. What should have been a simple, fifty foot trek to pass through the long, narrow main room now became a gauntlet.

Hordes of sexed up septuagenarian females threw their chests out (and in a couple of cases, their backs), rubbed their thighs and coyly fingered the curls of their Eva Gabor Autumn Sonatas as they drooled over the fresh meat passing through their midst. About 20 years younger than the youngest of them, I was obviously the May to their December, and romance was in the air, or at least in their suppositories.

I was alternately amused, horrified, and titillated. Amused that they thought I was straight. Horrified that they thought they could get me. Titillated that this many women in one room actually wanted to try.

After fortifying myself with a few splashes of cold water, I closed my eyes and plunged back through the crowd as this pack of prowling cougars strained at the bars of their cages. I arrived back at our table just in time to see a sixtysomething woman – wearing supertight green jeans and sporting a shade of red hair rarely found outside a Twizzlers factory – join the fun on the dance floor.

Twizzlers appeared to have just inhaled a small mountain of meth. She began dancing frantically right in front of me, rotating her artificial hips furiously as – I am not exaggerating – she slapped her ass like she was riding Seabiscuit. She whirled around, giving me a better perspective on her equestrian abilities as she teetered perilously on her Candies.

For a finale, she did the splits, one slingback sliding into the leg of our table and knocking over our drinks.

“Annnnd, we’re out!” I said to those assembled as I stood up and marched to the front door to give the valet my keys.

Oh, don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t upset. I’ll definitely be back. The music was good. The martinis were tasty. And the crowd, although disturbingly horny, was definitely memorable.

I just need to bring a big wad of twenties. Then I can drive those women right over the edge.

This essay was just featured on The Advocate. You can read it here.

http://www.advocate.com/News/Daily_News/2011/06/30/Little_Pink_Lies/

This is a piece I just did for the It Gets Better Project.

If you’re not familiar with it, it’s a website designed to reassure gay kids that – although they may feel ostracized now – their lives WILL get better.

Yeah, it gets better.

But what about when some armored tank with ears is escorting you, face first, into your locker or a ditch? Or some charm-challenged cheerleader who can barely spell D-E-F-E-N-S-E goes on the offense on Facebook? Is it really a crapload of comfort to have people tell you that, as ADULTS, their lives got better?

Oh, it’s absolutely true –once you get out of high school, or in some cases college, things just about always turn around. In fact, most bullies, once they grow up, end up realizing what jagholes they were (or they score a mug shot for selling meth from an ice cream truck, but at that point it’s pretty clear which of you is the winner, here).

But a few years from now is like a freaking lifetime, right?

Before it gets better, you’ve gotta live through this year. This month. This. Rotten. Day. And I’m guessing you’re more concerned about how you can handle your life RIGHT NOW.

I certainly was when I was your age. And unfortunately, I didn’t have any tips on how to handle it. You wanna know how I coped? Have you ever seen the old TV series (or the movie) Bewitched, about the woman who was a witch married to a mortal? Well, at home, alone in the basement of our house, I would pretend to be her mother, Endora.

Yeah, I pretended to be a 60-year-old female witch. Shut up. I didn’t say it made sense. But you can only pretend to be sick and stay home from school so many times; eventually, you run out of diseases. And this helped me deal with the pantsing, the threats, the humiliation that made my childhood so relentlessly miserable. Swathed in a bedspread (which was my approximation of the caftans Endora wore – hey, when you’re eight, you gotta improvise), I would close my eyes, envision a better life, and try to cast magical spells.

Believe it or not, that helped when I was a little kid. But when I was 14, or 16, I couldn’t exactly run home and wrap a bedspread around me. So I had to find new ways to deal.

Some worked; some didn’t. And I want to share the ones that did, so you can have an easier time of it than I had. Because your life can get better now.

#1)  Accept the haters.

You could be Oprah Winfrey, saving the world and tossing free Pontiacs from your private jet, and still some people will hate you. That’s life.

But accepting that is harder than you might think. Being unliked can make you feel like a big, fat failure. But the moment you understand that some people are just insecure, that some thrive on debasing others in order to elevate themselves, that you can’t win the hearts of people whose hearts are closed, you will have less judgment on yourself.  And you should, because it’s NOT ABOUT YOU. They have their own drama going on.

This was a tough one for me, because I’m a people pleaser. But the moment I accepted that I was never gonna win over about 30% of the people in my world, I immediately became 30% happier. Screw the people who don’t see how awesome you are.

#2)  Have a big mouth.

If you’re being harassed, be it physically or verbally or via Facebook/text/etc., tell someone. Tell your parents. Tell your principal or counselor or your favorite teacher. Tell anyone in a position of power. Don’t be ashamed.

And if the first person you tell doesn’t do anything, tell someone else.

When I was a kid, nobody sued the school. Nobody got the principal fired. We had no choice but to take it, and then apologize to the bully for making him hit us.

But now, you have resources. You can file a complaint. You can get the police involved. You can threaten legal action. This may not make you any more popular, but it probably won’t make you any less, because at the very least, people will be afraid to tangle with you.

#3)  Carry a Big Stick.

Turning the other cheek is an inspirational notion. If you’re Jesus. As spiritually evolved as it may be to silently bless someone’s fist as it heads for your face, it’s not exactly the most effective deterrent.

Bullies are only brave because you’re not. The minute you stand up to them, 99% of them back down. And the 1% that don’t should be reported – see #2 – before they end up selling meth from an ice cream truck.

Self-defense courses like Karate, Aikido, etc., are a powerful deterrent to violence, because as soon as a bully sees that you can protect your ass, he’s highly unlikely to tangle with you. Bullies prey on the weak, the defenseless, the fabulous – not the kid who can be standing with his or her foot on their face in 2.5 seconds.

Of course, bodily contact isn’t for everyone. My idea of hand-to-hand combat as a kid involved two G.I. Joes and some highly inappropriate battle moves. If you’re not comfortable taking self-defense training (or you don’t have a school near you), there’s another option.

There was a guy in my middle school who routinely tried to pick fights with me, and I didn’t know what to do. Doing his homework had worked – but only for a while – and I was running out of options. So I tried something my sister’s boyfriend, who was a cop, had told us to do if we were ever abducted.

The next time he tried to get me to fight him, during gym class, I went apes***. Right there, on the soccer field, I started screaming. And carrying on. Acting like I’d lost my freaking mind.

This can be surprisingly effective. It not only makes them think that you’re insane and therefore potentially dangerous, but it draws a lot of attention to them. Bullies don’t like public attention when they’re not in control of it.

I had to do this a couple more times to assure him that I was indeed mad, bad and dangerous to know, but it worked. He never tangled with me again. And there was something liberating about expressing all that pent-up rage.

#4)  Carry a big computer.

Cyberbullying is not only super passive-aggressive, it’s super stupid. People leave a digital footprint everywhere they go on the internet, and every snotty/threatening thing some bully posts or sends you can be copied and filed away forever.

If somebody is emailing or texting you mean notes, or posting reputation-smearing comments on Facebook, or setting up a website designed to demean you, YOU HAVE PROOF. Don’t give them the satisfaction of responding to it – that only fans the flames and can be used against you. Just save everything – the texts, emails, screenshots of web pages, etc. Print them out. Then block their phone number and email address, and report the offender to the school – and, if necessary, the police.

The punishment can be severe – expulsion from school, jail time, lawsuits against the family of the bully, etc. You have the power to do far more damage to them than they could ever do to you.

#5)  Find Your Posse.

Feeling comfortable in your skin is all about finding the people who recognize how amazing you are. And they’re out there.

I was a total band nerd. And while playing the trumpet didn’t do that much for my popularity in school as a whole, it gave me a place to be myself. It was a safe space, where I could let my inner superstar run free and bond with other kids who shared my passion. You’d be surprised how much acceptance you can get from guys who play the clarinet and girls who play the tuba.

There are arts and academics and sports organizations within your school. And, often, gay/straight alliances that bring together allies from both worlds. Find the one that makes your heart sing. And you’ll find your posse. It may not make you prom queen, but it will make you happy.

Finally, if you try all these tips and still feel alone, or hopeless, know that there is always someone to turn to. The Trevor Project’s hotline is open 24 hours a day. 1-866-4-U-TREVOR.  Call it. Or go online to find out how they can help.

www.thetrevorproject.org

I hope these tips make your life a little easier – today. Because even though it will get better as you get older, why wait? Make it get better now.

I’ve been writing articles for CNN, The Advocate and the Huffington Post. I’ll link to them here once they’re up on those respective sites!