Tag: Merlyn

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Time by Merlyn

Time is still on my side and I try to live it without any fear of what comes next.

I believe that only thing that really matters for any human being is the time they spend on this earth and how they use it.

When my time is up and my life is over I know there will be a feeling of peace and understanding and acceptance of that ever comes next.

My first wife died three years ago along with most of my close friends from the first part of life. I have been lucky. I have never had anyone die that I was close to while they were still a part of my life. They just ran out of time.

Last Thursday a stock car racer I knew by the name of Dick Trickle, age seventy-one, died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound in a N.C., cemetery.

Trickle’s family said he had been suffering from pain that doctors couldn’t diagnose or stop, and that led him to commit suicide.

Dick Trickle was one of the best short-track drivers who ever lived, he won over a 1,000 races on small local tracks before he started racing in NASCAR at 48 years old an age when most drivers are thinking about retiring.

Trickle had a working cigarette lighter in every race car he drove so he could light up during the caution laps.
I will always remember sitting in a little restaurant and talking to Trickle outside a race track sometime in the 90s.
He was fighting a hangover holding a cup of coffee in one hand, smoking a cigarette and laughing about the party he had been to last night.

He drove out the cemetery that he wanted to be buried in called the cops and told them where to find his body, walked a little ways from his truck so no one had to deal with cleaning anything up, and he moved on.

He knew when his time was up and I know he ended his life without any fear of what comes next. That’s how he lived life when time was still on his side.

Time is still on my side and until the day that changes I plan on enjoying it.

About the Author

I’m a retired gay man now living in Denver Colorado with my partner Michael. I grew up in the Detroit area. Through the various kinds of work I have done I have seen most of the United States. I have been involved in technical and mechanical areas my whole life, all kinds of motors and computer systems. I like travel, searching for the unusual and enjoying life each day.

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Memorials by Merlyn

My life has been a series of what
I think of as turning the page, leaving the past behind and moving up to a new
level trying to learn more about life and how to be a better person.
The people I left behind were
and always will be a part of my life. I do hold a special place in my heart for
them and the time we shared together. I realize that they are not part of my
life now and would not even know the person that I’m today.
My way of keeping memorials
has been to make a word document, paste whatever I found out on line about
someone from my past and how and when they died, into a doc and saving it in a
folder called old docs with their name on it.
The last time I talked to my
Mother was in 1965, It was during one of the only times that I ever really needed
help, I talked to her and she told me I was on my own.  A year later when she called me  and told me she wanted me come over and fix
her car I told her no and she let me know if I did not come over right now I
would never be welcome again. I hung up. And I turned the page.
In 1996 I got on line and
looked up my father he died in 93 and is buried in a veteran’s cemetery near
Detroit. I did not go there the last time I was in Michigan.
When I looked up my mother the
only thing I able to find out was on a state of Michigan’s web site that said
the state was holding money from a life insurance policy waiting for someone to
claim it. She died in 1995. There were eight kids in my family and the last
time I checked no one had claimed it. That money would not bring anything good
into my life.
Bobby G was a friend of mine
He is the only friend that was still a part of my life when they died. I met
bobby on line on a men s social web site. He introduced me to Michael at a
coffee shop on a Monday morning when I was passing though Denver a year and a
half ago.
My way of saying goodbye to Bobby
was going on line, reading his profile and sending him a short message even
though I know no one will ever read it. I copied his profile, pasted it into
word and put it into my old docs folder. My message and his account will be
deleted after 90 days of inactively from the web site. But I have his Memorial.
Bobby left a will; he had a
lot of stuff that he wanted to give to his friends.
After his memorial service, his
son opened his apartment for people to come over and take anything they wanted.
Michael wanted a statue of two naked men wrestling. I was not going to take
anything. Bobbie’s son let us in and told us to please take anything we wanted.
Anything left was going to go to the goodwill.
I had been shopping for a new
vacuum cleaner the day before and right next to the front door was a newer yellow
vacuum cleaner. For the first time in my life it felt like it would be OK to
take something from someone who died. I know Bobby would be happy if he knew that
I had it. I will never see it or use it without thinking about him. It reminds
me that the people that really knew who Bobby was are better people today
because of him.
© 28 January 2013

About the Author

I’m a retired gay man now living in Denver Colorado with my partner Michael. I grew up in the Detroit area. Through the various kinds of work I have done I have seen most of the United States. I have been involved in technical and mechanical areas my whole life, all kinds of motors and computer systems. I like travel, searching for the unusual and enjoying life each day.

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SPECIAL EDITION: PRIDEFEST 2013

Today’s Special Edition presents stories by three authors. 

One Summer Afternoon 
by Ray S

“What are you doing, father?” It isn’t quite summer, but almost. And this afternoon the question was voiced by one of a couple of gay revelers passing by as I waited for the next #10 bus.

“Waiting,” I replied and then quickly added, “for the next bus.” Then it struck me, the title by which I had been addressed and then my prompt reply.

First, I am a father and today is the national holiday honoring fathers. Just coincidently Denver’s Gay Pride Sunday. There certainly are statistics establishing how many gay fathers there are. Guess this is our special day as well. One never knows who will turn up a father; do you?

Second, I thought after the boys passed by that the word “waiting” looms either ominously or in joyful anticipation for all of us, and in my case—for what or whatever the future may hold.

Besides the initial carnival character of the setting at Civic Center and then the Pride Parade, I was aware of the general ages of the celebrants. Don’t gay men grow beyond downy-faced Peter Pans that will never grow up or full-blown bronzed Adonises with such an abundance of self confidence and arrogance? This question was haunting and even more so after countless hours of observing the beautiful, bizarre, minimally-attired populous. Was this whole charade dedicated to the Fountain of Youth and the exciting discovery of carnality? Here is a parody of the song. “Old Soldiers never die,” etc. that goes “Old Trolls never die, they just fly away.” Is there nothing to look forward to besides a good book, getting fat from countless dinner parties, recounting lost opportunities with other disappointed brethren, indulging in the occasional gay porn DVD in the lone comfort of your bed, and on and on, so be it?

Then like the first blush of the sunrise my eyes were opened wonderfully to the real world of beautiful, crazy, happy, gay attendees of this huge street party celebrating many other positive aspects of the right to be who we are and equal to all the rest of the seemingly God’s chosen.

The exterior physicality has a way of transforming. The ultimate result is the chance for a real inner beauty to emerge, if it hasn’t been there already. The value of friendship, companionship and love beyond the flesh core. The truly life-sustaining elements of all GLBT relationships. And of course human nature will see to the sometimes overarching flesh thing.

Waiting one summer afternoon. Well just relax, breathe deeply, look around you, see the beauty and love in all of us, and eventually that bus will come.

© June
2013

About the Author

One Summer Afternoon
by Merlyn

Pride Sunday 2013 was the kind of summer day that will always be special. Michael and I walked in the Pride parade along with the color guard with Ray S; Cecil and Carl rode in a convertible  At the end of the parade Cecil and Carl joined us on the corner of Colfax and Broadway for awhile to watch the parade pass. We had fun looking at all of the people. Carl stood up and watched as the green Rolls Royce drove past that Cecil and he had ridden in last year.

We spent 8 hours helping out in the Prime Timers and The GLBT Center’s booths on Saturday and were planning on enjoying Sunday.

We would have to leave around 3 to go over to his daughters house for a father’s day dinner for Michael at 5pm.

After the Parade was over we had about a hour to walk around before Michael was supposed to work at his church’s booth. A storm went though with strong wind but no one cared. I was planning on checking out the four Prime Timers booths to help out if one of them needed help for a couple of hours.

Everything was under control so I decided to enjoy myself. I walked by Michaels booth he was wearing the red hat with flowers all over it, he was having a ball putting stickers on the people that went by. It was crowded and I was in the way, so I decided to walk around.

I saw a bench that was in the shade and sat down. I really enjoyed being able to sit on the bench and not do anything but watch and talk to some of the people that stopped for a break.

Two men in their 30s feel asleep in each other’s arms laying on the grass 20 feet away where I was sitting and no one cared. When I was in my 20s or 30s I could never have imagined a world where it would be OK to do the kind of things that seem so natural today.

We made it to dinner a few minutes late, had a real good time and came home around 9PM. We laid down to relax awhile before we watched the end of a movie we had started Saturday night. Both of us fell asleep, We woke up just in time to go down to and go to bed around midnight, but that’s another story about a different day.

© June 2013

About the Author

I’m a retired gay man now living in Denver Colorado with my partner Michael. I grew up in the Detroit area. Through the various kinds of work I have done I have seen most of the United States. I have been involved in technical and mechanical areas my whole life, all kinds of motors and computer systems. I like travel, searching for the unusual and enjoying life each day.

One Summer Afternoon 
by Phillip Hoyle

As a dedicated people watcher, I sat alone on a coffee shop patio watching the parade go by in front of me. The East Colfax show was endless, varied, noisy, quirky, clean, stylish, unwashed and in rags. With loud sirens blaring, Denver Fire Department trucks sped by. Cars stopped to parallel park; other vehicles impatiently continued up and down the street. I watched a never ending flow of people and automobiles loving what I saw. Then I thought of the parade I’d see on the following Sunday, the Parade for Denver PrideFest 2013.

I first attended PrideFest in 1999. I wanted to go but realized I might not get to do so since my son Mike and his wife Heather and their four young kids were staying at my apartment. They were slated to leave Sunday afternoon to return to western Colorado where they lived. Early that morning one of my granddaughters asked to go to the playground she remembered from an earlier trip. “We can’t,” I explained. “The playground is closed because a parade is lining up in the park.”

“A parade,” she responded with excited eyes. “We can get candy!”

I told her I didn’t know if they’d have candy, but there would be lots of clowns. We did go down to Colfax to watch the events, and the children got much more candy than they had ever gathered at a parade. Back then few children attended the parade, so the candy givers were quite excited to see the stair step youngsters seated in a row on the curb and quite generous with their portions. So I saw my first PrideFest parade through the eyes of my grandchildren who loved not just the candy but every minute of the spectacle. Together we saw floats, dykes on bikes, bands, drag queens, politicians, dancing boys, and leather men. I thought how differently the world presented itself to my grandchildren when compared with what it showed me or my children.

Pridefest 2000 added a new perspective for I was in love with a man who was dying from the ravages of HIV and his anti-AIDS medications. I was dedicating much of my time to be with him for doctor appointments, chemotherapy, clinic visits, yard work, and socializing. I wrote in my morning pages on Saturday that I was going to meet Tony and Roy the next day to see the parade no matter what Michael, my partner, wanted. I wrote: “I’m going to be at Marion and Colfax and cheer on the troops.” I did see the parade all the while knowing that the two men I had been deeply in love with both wanted too much to fit in. The first one wanted to fit in with the beautiful; and this one, Michael, with the ordinary. When Michael said he was just an ordinary guy, I suggested to him that he was just an ordinary Queer! The differences these men represented helped me realize how much I was thoroughly queer and queerly individual.

I don’t recall anything particular about PrideFest 2001—perhaps I didn’t attend it due to my too-recent loss of Michael to AIDS—but in 2002 Mike and Heather and kids were back visiting and my life was once again changing drastically. The plot was that we attended Buskerfest on Saturday and PrideFest on Sunday, the former as a family, the latter accompanied by my wild friend Dianne and her boyfriend Craig. The subtext of the story was that a man I had become obsessed with but had not yet spent any time with—Rafael—was now, just that weekend, entering the main stage of my interest. The family met my good friends Roy & Richard as well as Rafael, my new flame who was setting off Roman candles in me both Saturday and Sunday nights. I left him early Sunday and Monday mornings to rush home and make breakfast for my family. I don’t know if I even slept for three days. Again I was seeing my changing life through the eyes of my children and grandchildren, and my friends. I was extremely attentive to the grandkids at PrideFest where Kalo, then nine, disappeared. I spotted him sitting on a high vantage point watching the nearly nude mob of gay guys dancing. He saw me looking at him and smiled and waved. Still he watched. Oh my, I wondered, do we have another generation of queers in the making?

The next year, 2003, Kalo was back but without his parents. He was spending a week with me in an improvised urban survival art camp. Sunday featured PrideFest. This time, with me coping with my loss of Rafael to death a few months before, Kalo and I joined Roy and Richard and Tony to view the parade. We also spent time that day with a group of body-painting lesbians. I wondered at the child’s perspective but saw him be very mature around the girls, wide eyed during a drag show, and worldly wise in the way he reported all the things to his parents. Kalo also met my next partner, who did not choose to join us at the festival.

But in 2004, I announced to him—Jim—I’m going to the parade. He accompanied me.

In 2005, I met a long-time drag queen friend of Jim’s. He’d never mentioned he’d even seen drag shows let alone knew and really liked Scottie Carlisle, a long-time drag queen, once Empress of the Royal Court.

In 2006, I met the author of the first gay novel I ever read recalling how important that book was to my development as a gay man.

I don’t recall what happened in 2007.

In 2008, I was in the Rockies on retreat where I read my short story about the parade and PrideFest adventures of Miss Shinti, a white miniature French poodle. The week before I went on retreat, I had urged my friends Roy and Richard, “Make sure Jim goes to the parade. Call him. Insist.”

“Why?” Richard asked.

“Because I don’t want his condition to become terminal.”

“Huh?”

“He has CEATTG,” I informed him. Richard looked concerned. “Chronic Embarrassment At All Things Gay,” I clarified.

The 2009 parade brought me insight into pride, politics, and church. It also introduced me to parties surrounding the festival. I made a record of all these things with my new camera. For me, the highlight of the parade that year was the stilt-walking drag queen Nuclea Waste, festooned with multi-colored long balloons, surrounded with a consort of adoring Speedo-clad dancers, each in similar fashion but decorated monochromatically.

2010, and 2011 provided more insights into my own gay life. In 2012, I loved it when the walker-toting elder brigade from SAGE made their way down the street, and I got all teary-eyed when a group of young GLBTs reminded us not to forget about AIDS.

And now in 2013 I am at yet another PrideFest. I want to know more about my world and my gay self and am delighted that what I really appreciate this time is how much the festival attracts straight folk and how, beyond the extreme costumes and hype, the most queer thing there seems not queer at all: men holding hands with men, women holding hands with women, hand holding that seems not at all self-conscious. And many children are here with their parents. How I wish my own kids and grandkids were here this time. It all seems so normal, except that I never once hold hands with my partner. Drat. What’s wrong with me?

Oh well, Happy PrideFest 2013. What a wonderful summer afternoon.

© June
2013

About the Author

Phillip Hoyle lives in Denver and spends his time writing, painting, giving massages, and socializing. His massage practice funds his other activities that keep him busy with groups of writers and artists, and folk with pains. Following thirty-two years in church work, he now focuses on creating beauty and ministering to the clients in his practice. He volunteers at The Center leading “Telling Your Story.”
He also blogs at artandmorebyphilhoyle.blogspot.com

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Multi-racial by Merlyn


Some of the most
attractive people I have known are Multi-racial, but that doesn’t guarantee
they will have good looking kids. 
I used to know a white
girl that married a guy from somewhere in Asia. They had two girls. Even though
they both looked like their parents, one of them was gorgeous and the other one
was very unattractive.
One of the kids I went to
school with had an Indian father who was always drunk and a white mother and a bunch
of brothers and sisters.
I used to deliver the
Detroit Times newspaper to his house in the afternoon when I was a kid and we
were in the same grade.
The thing I remember the
most about him was that his father raised guinea pigs in a spotless new white
garage at the end their driveway. The walls were lined with shiny cages full of
guinea pigs; it was always spotless. I never noticed any odor when I was around
the garage. His father would be sitting in a chair drinking beer bossing his
kids around as they keep everything clean waiting for when I got there with the
paper.
On Saturday I would have
to go to the front door to collect the money for the paper. They lived in a
dirty little house that was falling apart. I would have to breathe though my
month the stench was so bad while waiting for her to count out the sixty cents
in change for the week’s paper. 
He grew up in one of the
worst home environments I can imagine, but he just seemed to have something
inside of him that helped him turn into one of the most popular kids in school.
The last time I saw him he was married had kids and lived in a nice new house. He still had that sparkle in his eyes.
I don’t think it matters
that much what race or races a person is. Some people will rise above any obstacle
and other people will have every break handed to them and will blow every opportunity
and be miserable all of their lives.
I try not pay attention to
what race people are, if I like them I tend to just see them as someone I like
and forget their race or multiracial background. 


© 14 April 2013 

About the Author

I’m a retired gay man now living in Denver Colorado with my partner Michael. I grew up in the Detroit area. Through the various kinds of work I have done I have seen most of the United States. I have been involved in technical and mechanical areas my whole life, all kinds of motors and computer systems. I like travel, searching for the unusual and enjoying life each day.

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House Cleaning by Merlyn

I did a mayor house cleaning 2 years ago when I left Portland. Almost everything that I hadn’t used in the three years before I left Portland I sold or gave away.

I live in a small studio apartment that’s easy to keep clean. I have a place for everything and don’t keep things I don’t need.

I can fix a whole meal and only have two or three things dirty that I wash right after we eat so there’s never anything dirty in the kitchen sink.

I use one coffee cup for coffee, tea and water and one wine glass.

I have never cared much about fashion; I wear something until it is dirty and then put it in the dirty clothes basket. So there’s never a pile of clothes that were only worn for an hour or so on the back of a chair.

I like a clean house. When something needs to be cleaned I clean it, but I don’t get carried away house cleaning.

About the Author

I’m a retired gay man now living in Denver Colorado with my partner Michael. I grew up in the Detroit area. Through the various kinds of work I have done I have seen most of the United States. I have been involved in technical and mechanical areas my whole life, all kinds of motors and computer systems. I like travel, searching for the unusual and enjoying life each day.

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The Facts by Merlyn

Americans live in a world where the facts don’t mean anything.

I have finally realized that people don’t want to know the facts about what is really happening in the world and choose to believe the lies they see on FOX and CNN.

When Iran, Germany, China, Russia, Asia times and Australian web sites all have the same story and that story isn’t even mentioned on American TV or web sites, I tend to believe the foreign news.

I’m not going to say anything about what is going on today in the real world because I don’t think anyone really wants to know about things that they can’t do anything about.
I used to spend hours every day looking for the FACTs.

For the last two years I have stopped looking at American TV news. I’m down to about 15 minutes a day reading the headlines on the foreign web sites.

About the Author

I’m a retired gay man now living in Denver Colorado with my partner Michael. I grew up in the Detroit area. Through the various kinds of work I have done I have seen most of the United States. I have been involved in technical and mechanical areas my whole life, all kinds of motors and computer systems. I like travel, searching for the unusual and enjoying life each day.

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Mirror Image by Merlyn

The Image I see when I look in a mirror has been changing my whole life but in my mind the person I feel like has only made a few changes.

For the first part of my life there was a young boy that had thought he had been able to put his past behind him. He did not have any fear of the future. I still like that Image.

Then there was a 34 year old guy that had finally put everything behind him and started over. I stayed 34 years old for the next 30 years. I loved that Image anything and everything was possible. I even looked good in the mirror.

Then something happened Life got boring, I started to feel like time was passing me by. I gained a lot of weight and the Image started to look like a fat old man. I don’t even like to think about that Image

I started to push myself to change it; I lost 60 lbs.

I moved out of a 28 year relationship that was not working anymore and I started over.

I like the Image I see today, I have some problems but I know I can fix them. My favorite number is 69 and I will be 69 years old for a whole year starting next month.

© 18 March 2013

About the Author



I’m a retired gay man now living in Denver Colorado with my partner Michael. I grew up in the Detroit area. Through the various kinds of work I have done I have seen most of the United States. I have been involved in technical and mechanical areas my whole life, all kinds of motors and computer systems. I like travel, searching for the unusual and enjoying life each day.














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Getting Caught by Merlyn

When I was a teenager, I got caught three times in one year having sex in the back seat of my car with two different girls in three different cities.

The first time I had parked in a farmer’s field around midnight. My girlfriend and I were in the back seat going at it when the car was suddenly full of light; someone was pounding on the windows shining his flashlight on us yelling, “Open up. Police.” The cop made us sit there in the back seat naked while he checked out our IDs while his partner was shining his flashlight on us. In this day and age the girl probably would have gone to jail, I was only 16 and she was in her 20s. They let us go with a warning not to trespass on posted land again.

The second time my new girlfriend and I were driving to a different parking spot when we got pulled over for sitting to close together. He checked my ID then told us if we needed to be that close together to find a parking spot. We drove to my favorite parking spot and we were going at it when the lights yelling and pounding started again.

This time they had us put our clothes then told me to find another city to park in, then let us go. We were both 17.

About a month later the same girlfriend and I were parked in a lover’s lane getting it on when a bunch of cop cars pulled in to the far side of the parking lot with their lights and sirens going. We finished doing what we were doing, got dressed climbed over the seat. Cleaned the steam off the car windows and started the motor, I was putting the car in gear when I saw a cop running towards us yelling at me to shut the motor off. Two other cops pulled a kid out from under my car. After they took him away the cop told me that they had raided a beer party and saw the guy run away but did not know where he was until I started the car. I wonder how many times the guy has told people the story about hiding under a car that was bouncing up and down while the cops were looking for him.

2/4/13

About the Author

I’m a retired gay man now living in Denver Colorado with my partner Michael. I grew up in the Detroit area. Through the various kinds of work I have done I have seen most of the United States. I have been involved in technical and mechanical areas my whole life, all kinds of motors and computer systems. I like travel, searching for the unusual and enjoying life each day.

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Goofy Tales by Merlyn

     This tale starts on a cold windy and snowy Friday night in Jan 1979. I was driving truck hauling meat out of Denver. To the east coast, there was a big storm passing east of Denver.
I had a load that wouldn’t be ready until 6 pm; around 5pm Colorado closed all of the main roads going east out of Denver.

     At 6 pm I went down to Curtis picked up my paper work, fueled the truck, hooked up to the loaded trailer and did the pre-trip inspection so the truck was ready to go when the roads opened. There wasn’t any reason to go thirty miles and sit in the truck waiting for the road to open so I went back home.

     I always liked to have some kind of music on when I was driving and there were so many places that you could not pick up anything that I would recorded my favorite radio station on tape while I was listening to the road reports, I would play the tapes when I got tired of listening to the tapes that I had owned.
Around 5 am they opened I 70 and I got out of Denver.

     A few weeks later I was on the last leg of an east coast run. I had made my last fuel stop in Omaha, ate a good meal, It was a beautiful clear moonless night, the road was dry and the sky was full of stars life was good. I was less than nine hours from being home and I was looking forward to having a good time in Denver before I left out again.

     It was around midnight when I pulled back onto westbound I 80. I only had to make one more stop at the scales entering CO for my port slip. Nebraska was one of the best states to drive across at night back then, I 80 was in good shape and late at night then the cops would see a bunch of trucks running together driving in single file doing around 72 -75 mph they would leave us alone and let us go about our business.

     I could hear a couple of drivers talking on the CB. One of them was telling a story, now being a good story-teller is a skill that carries a lot of weight on (CB) Channel 19.

     The driver that was doing the most talking was a good old southern boy with the kind of voice everyone likes to listen to. I caught up with them slowed down and fell in about a block or so behind them.
He was headed for Seattle I would be dropping south on I76. When you drive coast to coast it’s not unusual to meet someone and spend a day or more running together.

     We would spend the next 5 hours 350 mile with him doing most of the talking.
At some point I changed the tape in the radio, and someone came on the CB and asked me what station I was listening to. I told him it was a station in Denver. The CB was quiet for a while then someone came back on and he said he could not pick up anything but though he heard something about the roads being closed around Denver on my radio when I was talking. I decided to have some fun. I said I wasn’t paying attention it.
I waited a while backed up the tape turned the volume up and keyed the mike so everyone could hear them reporting about I 70 I 25 and I 76 being closed.

     You never know how many people are listening on a CB but all of a sudden we had 5 or 6 drivers talking about if the roads were going to be closed ahead maybe we should stop somewhere before we got stuck in a snow storm waiting for the roads to open.
As we went past an exit a cop turned on his blue lights for a second and told everyone to drive carefully when we got to the storm. He knew there wasn’t any storm ahead of us.

     Since I was the only one picking up the Denver station I was telling everyone that the snow was letting up on I 80 and I 76 and they may be open for a while before the worst part of the storm got there.

     Three of us turned onto south on I76 the weather was clear and nice, it was warm when we got to the CO scales. I waited until then to tell everyone about how I had recorded the radio station and we all had a good laugh.

About the Author

I’m a retired gay man now living in Denver Colorado with my partner Michael. I grew up in the Detroit area. Through the various kinds of work I have done I have seen most of the United States. I have been involved in technical and mechanical areas my whole life, all kinds of motors and computer systems. I like travel, searching for the unusual and enjoying life each day.

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Cooking by Merlyn

     I don’t like to clean up the mess In the kitchen when I cook so only fix food that doesn’t make a mess.

     If you open my refrigerator you may find a jar of peanut butter, some kind of butter, a package of sharp cheese, beer and loaf of bread in the freezer.

     I only cook two meals when I’m by myself.

#1
Take one slice of bread.
Put it in the toaster.
Cut a slice of cheese big enough to cover ½ of the slice of toast.
Wash the knife while the toast is toasting.

Put the toast on a piece of paper towel.
Add cheese.
Fold the toast over the cheese.
Leave the kitchen.
Toss paper towel.

#2
Open one can of hot Chile with beans.
Dump it the small blue bowl.
Add about ¼ cup of water to can rinse can and add water into the bowl.
Add a pinch of hot pepper and stir.
Put bowl in microwave push pizza wait 1 ½ min.

When I get tired of hearing the microwave beep I take bowl out 
Stir Chile push pizza button again.
When I get tired of hearing the microwave beep again I take bowl out and eat the Chile.
Wash bowl and spoon and leave kitchen.

   Any kind of food that I put in the oven will someday turn into a house full of smoke. I used to want something to eat so I would put something in the oven, get busy doing something and forget about the food,

     I learned a long time ago that I should never use the oven.
I only use the microwave and toaster.

     The first thing I do when I get a new refrigerator is buy a small carton of milk, place it on the center shelf and keep turning the temperature control colder until the milk freezes. Toss the milk. The beer will be ice cold but it will never freeze. It stays fresh until I want to drink it even if I’m out of town for a while.

     I like my kitchen to be clean with everything out of sight in its proper place.

     Michael’s a good cook and loves to make a big mess in his kitchen; he always asks me what I want to eat. He loves it when I ask him for something that he doesn’t know how to make just the way I want it. I do help him whenever he asks me to do something like cut up food but he is happiest when I leave him alone so he can concentrate on cooking two or three meals at a time.

About the Author

I’m a retired gay man now living in Denver Colorado with my partner Michael. I grew up in the Detroit area. Through the various kinds of work I have done I have seen most of the United States. I have been involved in technical and mechanical areas my whole life, all kinds of motors and computer systems. I like travel, searching for the unusual and enjoying life each day.