Latest / The Wisdom Trust Podcast for Gay Men 50+ / Still Becoming, Still Notorious: Gay Life After 60 with M Sebastian Araujo

Transcript

Still Becoming, Still Notorious: Gay Life After 60 with M Sebastian Araujo · The Wisdom Trust Podcast for Gay Men 50+

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Wisdom Craft and Lauren Crawford.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: This podcast is for gay men over 50 who says there's more to this stage of life than we've been taught.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: Connection, meaning, honesty, and possibility.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: Each episode is a conversation with a thoughtful gay man who's navigating the deeper questions that often emerge in the second half of life.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: Aging, identity, purpose, belonging, reinvention, community, life, and living consciously.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: These are not conversations about decline, they are conversations about becoming.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: I'm glad you're here.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: Hello and welcome back to another issue of the Wisdom Trust.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: And today we are with M.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: Sebastian Arajo, who is a wonderful, colorful individual who says in his bio that I asked for that his life is way too long to put into words that would take too many lives, too many vices and bibulettes to list here.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm actually going to hand it over to you, my friend, to give us a little bit of a description of who you are and you're a very fascinating character.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: So I look forward to how you're going to share your story in the next few minutes.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, thank you.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: And thank you for inviting me to do this.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: I think the work that you're doing is really wonderful.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, giving voice to people that sometimes the world doesn't always give voice to in their own voice is kind of groovy.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: So I guess if I just sort of describe myself in one word, I would like to think it's notorious, but I think it's probably more, I'm more of a dilettante.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_01: I'm someone who didn't like or wasn't interested, probably really wasn't interested in my childhood, childhood things.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_01: So I just couldn't wait to be an adult.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_01: So kind of at the age of 14, I bailed out of childhood intentionally and just moved on and decided I didn't need all the usual stuff that people need.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_01: So as soon as I could get my shit together, and I'm a New Yorker, so occasionally certain words pop out.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_01: So I do I do apologize for that.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_01: You know, as soon as I could get it together, I just hit New York City, and that was the end of it.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: And my whole life opened up.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_01: At the age of 18, I was out of high school, my first year at Parsons, and I was studying art, falling in love.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: All amidst the AIDS crisis.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, this was 1983, you know.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: So this whole new world was opening up for me amid this tragic moment that was just beginning.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_01: So I sort of landed on my feet and just never stopped running.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you didn't land on your ass, so that's a good thing.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: No, that happened when I moved to Vermont when I turned 50.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um, that that might be the turning point in a minute.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: So tell us a little bit about this young gay man in in the big NYC.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: Like I can't even imagine I'm a small town boy, you know, Canada, all that stuff.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: So that must have been stupendously, you know, expansive in terms of what you got to see, experience, and do.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: Well, it was.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I grew up in East Hampton, New York, so yeah, uh, you know, so it wasn't like it was that big of a jump, but I was on my own and doing it.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I remember I moved into Manhattan.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I started going to school and I was commuting for a while, like the first, probably the first four months.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_01: I was commuting, I was going to class three times a day, uh, three times a week, and so and then I was going home.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_01: And and I think I probably had like maybe$5,000 in the bank, which at that point was a seemed like a lot of money, but it really wasn't.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know what I was thinking, but that was what I had sort of squirreled away in my last two years of high school to specifically move to New York.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_01: And so it was, it was kind of like all of the dreams and all of the ideas that you ever had as a kid were there.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it was like it was like a pinball machine.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_01: And one was young and relatively pretty and and sort of fitting into the vibe of the moment.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, I mean, I I was going to school downtown New York.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: I was spending a lot of time in the West and the East village when it was still the West and the East village, and it was, you know, the whole gay revolution was rooted, but it was blooming, you know.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, there was sex everywhere.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_01: There was just like men, very friendly men, everywhere.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, there was that too.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_01: And then one Friday, I was on my way home for the weekend, and I saw this guy standing on the train tracks.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_01: It was October, uh, it was October, uh late October.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I remember he was wearing a black leather coat with these wraparound Yoko Wono sunglasses and this incredible auburn hair that went down to his back.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_01: And he looked at me and I looked at him, and it was the weirdest thing because I just knew that I would know him the rest of my life.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_01: And 40 years later, I still do, and he is my partner of all of those years.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_01: So, and I remember he gave me a box, he was going to visit his parents in Southampton.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_01: He gave me a box of chocolates with his business number on it and said, you know, call me next week.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_01: And I've always been magnesium deficient, so I adore chocolate.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_01: So I was like eating these chocolates on my way home.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_01: I ate the whole box, and it was a big box of truffles.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_01: And so I'm like, wow.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: So I call him the week later and I picked him up at work, and I realized not only was the chocolate amazing, but he made the chocolate.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_01: He's a pastry chef.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so that was the game changer.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_01: That was it, and he still makes not as much, but he still makes amazing pastry.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_01: He's retired now, so the pastry thing comes, but it's it's not the same.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_01: Anyway, so you know, so we sort of began that adventure together.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_01: And he's a few years older than me, just less than 10, but he'd lived in New York long enough so he sort of knew the lay of the land.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, and his first thing was okay, we need to live in Greenwich Village.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: If that's, you know, it's your first time in New York.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_01: We you need we need to live in Greenwich Village if we're gonna do this.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_01: And so we did.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: We moved to 10th Street, and it was like this whole world opened up, you know.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: And of course, I got the job of I worked for a couple of places, gallery in Soho, and that was really cool.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_01: But then I started then I got the job of my dreams as a fashion freak.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: I went to work as a I started off doing window display at Barney's New York and sort of worked my way up the corporate ladder.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_01: So it was very glamorous amid this catastrophe.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know, juxtaposing juxtaposing these two realities, right?
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_01: And and it was such, and I don't know, maybe it was me, maybe it was the environment or the people that I trucked with and worked with.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_01: But it was like, oh, okay, act up as having me as having a act up as having a moment at Times Square at 10 o'clock in the morning.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_01: So I would just call the night before and tell them at work that I needed to come in at noon.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_01: And it was like, oh, and I would tell them why, and oh, okay.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_01: And it's this corporation that I work for, and I'm like, you know, look, I'm I'm and you know, and I may be late because they're going to be arresting people for doing this sit-down in Times Square.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, so I might not get there till two, and they were like, Yeah, okay, don't worry about they loved you.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_01: Well, they did, but they uh but it was also part of the moment.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know, it was like everyone was aware of what was going on, and and and it was tough, it was really horrifying.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_01: But somehow, amid all of this, you know, now that when I think about it, I feel almost like I was in some sort of Fellini movie.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: Because, you know, it was like this tragic comedy and this romance, and and it was more than just my romance with my partner or other men, it was my romance with myself and with New York, you know, because suddenly it's like it's like this gay kid's wet dream to be working and doing and being a part of all these things and meeting all these amazing people, and then here you are, you know.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um Sex in the City fiction, you you were living that.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know, it's like I remember when Sex in the City came on, I watched an episode of it, and I thought, no, no, no, no, no.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: No, because you know something about that show?
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_01: First of all, it's totally unreal.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_01: And secondly, I really don't like it when women are portrayed as having to use their pussies to pay the rent.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_01: And a good friend of mine who is Romanian, she was she came to New York and we met through some mutual friends, and she was all crazy about sex in the city.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_01: And I said to her, uh-uh, no, that's not it.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_01: I said, I'm gonna show, I'm gonna give you a list of movies to watch, and when you're back in Brussels in school, I want you to send me an email after you watch a few of them and tell me what you think.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_01: So I turned around to Joan Crawford, I turned around to Betty Davis because I wanted her to see women who had power.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: Power, yeah.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_01: And if and if they were using their sex, it wasn't just to pay the rent, it was to take over the corporation.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_00: So that's a wonderful, you know, gay feminist analysis.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_00: That's great.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I've also been a diehard feminist since I was a child.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: I was raised, my father died when I was very young, and my mother raised four of us, pretty much on her own.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: So I never knew that women didn't plow forward and create worlds and really stand up for themselves.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_01: I had no idea that that didn't exist.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_01: That was a that was an awakening that I came to probably in my 20s when I started to meet women who didn't live that way.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: 1976, being dragged to New York City with my mother and a couple of her friends because they didn't ratify the ERA again.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_01: So all of these women showed up in Times Square to protest this.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, and and I just remember thinking, right, so this is what women do when they don't get what they want, they make a lot of noise and they demand change.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, so I I guess I'm a feminist, but I I kind of feel like I'm not even a feminist.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_01: I just believe that there is no difference, you know, and and it surprises me that people think there is.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and it's so interesting because it speaks to the impact the environment you you're in has on us.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_00: And and and subconsciously, that just plays out through our lives.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes we're not understanding why are there why are these narratives in my life and some of some of them that to be more negative than positive, right?
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_00: The other thing I want to circle back to is you on uh like it, I just have this movie scene, like you on this, you know, the train platform, and you see this dude.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_00: And like to me, that's just a movie scene that's so beautiful and elegant, and and there you you you live that, right?
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_00: I think a lot of us gay men fantasize about having a moment like that.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_00: So kudos to you that you actually had it, and then 40 years later you're still together.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: Beautiful, and it was really like that, you know.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I remember seeing him, and then so you take a train and then you switch to an express train like 30 minutes into it, and the first train is really full.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_01: So there were lots of people between us, but you know, once in a while I'd catch his eye, he'd catch mine.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_01: And then when you switch trains, most of those people are gone.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_01: So I didn't see him because there's a train that goes to the North Fork and a train that goes to the South Fork.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_01: And it was the early train on Friday because you know, the people that wanted to get out of town before rush hour.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_01: And so it was that early train.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_01: So I remember thinking, okay, well, I guess he's on the northbound train.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_01: And then there he was again when we when we got on the train, because the doors open on both sides, and he hopped on the other side from where I hopped on.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_01: And and as fate would have it, there was only two seats that no one was sitting in, and they were right next to each other.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_00: And love blossomed.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_00: That was a no-brainer.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, of course.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_00: That's so great.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, love it, love it.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_00: So amazing.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_00: So you've you're having this beautiful job, you're you're you're being this activist, you know, you're you're living your 20s and your 30s and probably into your 40s.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_00: And then so what what what starts to happen at at this sort of juncture of midlife, you know, maybe in your 50s or whatever, is was there a pivot, uh a sort of a shift that may have occurred?
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_01: Well, there was.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_01: In my 30s, everything was still wound up in this amazing thing.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_01: And then kind of my late 30s, things began to shift.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_01: The activism thing turned into anger, and and it got very intense and borderline violent.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_01: And again, I understood all of it and and I appreciated and I respect everything that happened because I know how necessary it was.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_01: But for me, it started to get a little too male.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, and a little too specifically Caucasian male.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_01: And this is when guys started getting buzz cuts and started wearing jack boots and act up t-shirts and and jeans with chains, and and and you know, and it just started to get a little too for me, a little too intense.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_01: So I was there a safe, did you feel unsafe in that, in that, in that those environs, or not unsafe, but I just didn't think for me that that was the way that I wanted to be because those things were encompassing every moment of your life at that point.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I lived right in the West Village, the heart of the, I mean, every single day there was something going on around AIDS.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_01: And and I, you know, I totally supported it and I believed in it, but it was almost like, okay, I need to shift.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_01: And and I remember we shifted, we moved from that apartment to Gramercy Park.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_01: And also my career had really sort of taken on a whole new world of its own.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: And I began to do a lot of things that required a lot more focus and energy.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_01: So there was that kind of a change in my work life, and and so, and and our relationship had become a marriage, even though it wasn't sanctioned legally yet.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, so so our energy shifted in many different ways, and and then in my late 30s, I got my own diagnosis.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_01: And at that point, protease inhibitors were still on the sketchboard, and so I was working, I was in Japan opening a store, and I got pneumonia and flew back like early because I was so sick.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_01: And I thought, okay, this is it.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I'm done.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_01: I'm totally done.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I didn't know what to do at the time.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_01: There wasn't really an HIV clinic anywhere in the world.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_01: It was all that was just beginning.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: So while I had a great doctor, people probably, especially younger people, if you're listening to this, you may not fully appreciate what Sebastian is sharing here.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_00: Like there was this window where there was just nothing.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_00: And the society, there was like a an echo chamber of nothingness, you know, the the the silence was deafening around the issue.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_01: And when there was something coming from the media or from the White House, it was very rude and outrageous.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, the president of the United States, Ronald Reagan, when a reporter from the New York Times raised her hand and asked him about what they were calling it the gay cancer at this point, because that's how Carposy's sarcoma was the symptom.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: So she asked him about it and he said, I don't have it.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_01: And then he turned to the two people standing, do you have and they all just laughed it off on national television, like eight o'clock news.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_01: That was his broadcast, that was his comment, you know, and there was no compassion, no, we're looking into it, nothing other than I don't have it.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: And then he looked to whoever it was, the Secretary of State, and I forget who the other person was, and they all just like, ah, no, we don't have it.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_01: And it was like, wow.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_01: And I remember the woman, because the cam, they showed the reporter, and she was just, she sort of sat back in her chair, like, did I just hear that?
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_01: Did I just see what I saw?
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_00: And so of course she saw what's going on today, she would be like, That was like minor.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: But anyway, I digress.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, yeah, right.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_01: Coming from the right.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_01: Although this current president, I have to say, somehow he's left HIV alone.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, which I'm really happy about.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_01: But he, you know, I think, and part of that may be because he is part of that generation that saw what was happening.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: And even though he's a turd, he was aware of it happening.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_01: And at that time, I don't ever remember because you would have heard, because he was such a voice in New York, you would have heard if he was anti-gay, you know, and and he didn't, he never seems like he was, yeah, which is kind of weird, but yeah, yeah.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_00: We don't we don't need to go down that pathway to brought that up.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_00: No, but but so so you're diagnosed, and and there's there's no protocol for treatment and stuff.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_00: So, how did you navigate that?
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_01: So, how I navigated it was we had been talking about moving out of New York City, and so we'd been looking in San Francisco, we'd been looking around in different places, and we went and visited a few places because my diagnosis happened and I had this pneumonia thing, but then I got much better and I was okay.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_01: So we sort of kicked around a few ideas, and then we had I got a job in San Francisco, and Joe was going to open a pastry shop there.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_01: And so we started, we started getting ready for the westward move, and then kind of midway through the process, we were having dinner one night, and Joe said to me, I just I don't know if I can do this.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, Okay.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_01: He's yeah, he said, you know, he said, My family, there's so many relatives that are older, and the next five or ten years is going to be their time.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: And I just feel like I don't know if I can live on the other side of the country.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_01: And although I was close to my mother, I don't really have that connection to a place and a family.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_01: And Joe's family's lived in Southampton, New York for over 200 years.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, like even the house that we inherited was his parents' house, you know.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_01: So it's that kind of a thing, you know.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: You like, and I never had that experience.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: So what do you say when the person you care the most about tells you something like that?
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: Forget about San Francisco, that's not gonna not gonna happen right now.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_01: So we decided to move to Southampton, which, you know, was was even though it was part of New York and there were a lot of New Yorkers there, it wasn't like a year-round New York place.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_01: So, and Joe's family at that point, there were probably about well, there were well over a hundred cousins and aunts and uncles.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, it's one of those old Irish Catholic families where everyone's a lawyer and and you know, and they work really hard and they have businesses everywhere, and and they're all charming, educated people.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_01: So uh they became this large family of mine as well.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_01: So it was kind of fabulous for you know living there.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_01: And and then 9-11 happened, and suddenly everyone that was in New York City that had any place in anywhere on the east end of Long Island picked up sticks and moved, and I would have done the same thing, I'm sure.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_01: So of course, that drove up real estate prices, it created this whole other drama, and suddenly the Hamptons or Southampton became like, you know, like the upper east side of Manhattan, and it was way overpopulated, etc.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: So we started thinking, okay, what are we gonna do?
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and where are we going to are we gonna stay?
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_01: Do we wanna stay?
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_01: You know, because there's a certain part of New York and New Yorkers that I love, and then there's a certain part of like these prussy rich queens who were only buying investment properties.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_01: And when they move into town, it's kind of over.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: You know, yeah, and I'm seeing the same thing in the eastern townships here in Quebec.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I see people moving out from Montreal who are really funky and interesting, and now I'm starting to see that next level that are buying.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Real estate and driving the prices up and then reselling it.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like gay men.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_01: Pew.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_01: But it's a certain category.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it's not the interesting ones.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_01: It's not the interesting ones.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_01: They're only in it for the I and I get it.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I have no problem with people having their life and making money.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we all need it.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, but there is a certain like smell that happens of privilege.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm just not into that.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you're the style guy for sure.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, and I I still believe and still really look for the kids that other people overlook.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_01: Because I think that those stories are usually more interesting.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_01: And I have to believe, and this is my naive American brain, but I have to believe that in the end everything works out okay.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_01: Even if it's horrifying.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_01: We grow from it, we learn from it.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_01: Even if we don't think we do, we do.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_01: Because I know in my own life I have.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_01: And everyone that I share my world with has.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I love that as a pivot point.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_00: So you were, you know, diagnosed, living, got God sick, got healthier.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sure there were variables in there at certain points, but uh and then moving around.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_00: So so when when you land in this new ultimate destination and your lives have changed considerably, what would it like moving out of the New York kind of thing, how did that impact you?
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_00: Like, was there a certain freedom that it brought?
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_00: Did you were you able to like leave some stuff and and sort of open up to other things?
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I began to.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't really, because it was so New York still.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like the majority of people, including a lot of Joe's family, either lived in Manhattan or had gone to school there or had moved there and then moved back.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_01: So my and and I was doing freelance work in Manhattan.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, so I was spending two days a week and uh, you know, staying at my friend Trixie's loft.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, so I was I was constantly there.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_01: So for like the first five year, first four years of living there, I was back and forth so much that it was beautiful and wonderful, but it really wasn't until I moved to Vermont that everything shifted.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I really felt so Vermont is this big, big shift, I guess, the big pivot, right?
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_00: So you're kind of leaving this stuff.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_00: So what did that how did that land?
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_01: How did that um so so what happened was we split from Southampton and we sold everything we owned and we bought a little cottage on Cape Cod in Provincetown.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_01: And that was wonderful for four years, five years or so.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_01: It was, you know, all the kids that fell off the bus and kind of couldn't live anywhere else.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_01: And then suddenly the New York Times started running articles about how fabulous the real estate was on the eastern end of Cape Cod.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_01: Because look, you can buy an 1840s house for$100,000.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_01: So boom, everyone from New York started coming to Provincetown and buying places.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_01: They're following you.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_01: So we were like, oh God, oh God.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_01: So we stayed for a few more years.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: And then exactly 10 years ago, everything in town doubled in price in less than a less than a year.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_01: So if a house was 200,000, it suddenly went up to 500,000.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: And they started conduit everything.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what brought in the melee of those people that, you know, that remember that old Grey Poopon commercial?
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_01: Pardon me, do you have any, you know, the neighbor sticking the hand out the window?
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_01: That's what it turned into.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_01: And so we were like, oh, okay, this is happening again.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_01: Really close friends of ours, about a dozen people left Cape Cod, left Provincetown, and moved to Vermont.
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_01: And eight of them we always spent Thanksgiving with.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: Four of them are Canadian.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_01: So we would have a Canadian Thanksgiving and an American Thanksgiving all at the same time.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_01: And there would always be about 30 people at this party.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_01: And so the person who always hosted it called everyone and said, Why don't you come up for the weekend?
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like on Wednesday and stay till Sunday.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: And she has this big old house, you know, we'll just all camp out, blah, blah, blah.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_01: And we did, and it was great.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_02: Nice.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: And as soon as we got home, Joe said, I've been looking at some real estate in Vermont.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, oh God, what is this?
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_01: What is this going to be like?
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_01: A little house on the prairie.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_01: Because I got it.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_01: It was pretty, but I thought, uh, I know I can't live in Vermont.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I can't wear Birkenstocks.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_01: That's just not me.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_01: And so we drove up.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: And then we came up for another Thanksgiving.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_01: And as I always tell people, if you don't want to move to Vermont, never come for Thanksgiving.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know what it is, but there's something about the holiday of Thanksgiving in the whole month of November.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: It's snowy, but it's not freezing.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_01: Everywhere you look looks like a painting, like a great landscape painting of autumn, still, even though a lot of the leaves are gone.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_01: There's just something magical about it.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it's not really cold yet.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_01: You drive down the street and you see smoke coming out of an old house chimney.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, so it's it's quite, quite beautiful.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_01: And then we came to this house that we live in now.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I remember it snowed like six inches.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: So we had to snowshoe up the driveway because it wasn't plowed.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: And the well, we live so far north, the realtor is Canadian that sold us our house.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_01: That's how far north we are in Vermont.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_01: So we snowshoot up the driveway.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_01: Halfway up the driveway, there was an empty plateau where you could like turn your car around and then go up to the further road.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_01: And I just remember looking at these enormous hemlock trees and thinking, I don't know why, but I know we have to live here.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_00: Beautiful, beautiful.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_00: Just a little aside, there's a reboot of Little House on the Prairie.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_00: You just mentioned that in one of your comments there.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_00: So anyway, so here you land in Vermont.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_00: You you're you're in this picturesque sitting, and it's like, okay, we're gonna live here.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_00: What did that open up for you?
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_01: Well, it opened up nature in a way that I have never experienced nature before.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_01: I've gardened most of my life.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I was born in the Arizona Desert, but quickly came back to the East Coast where my mother's family lived.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_01: And we always lived near the ocean.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_01: And so I was used to that whole thing.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_01: And and then so it shifted.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_01: It shifted a lot.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I didn't realize I was agoraphobic until I moved into a densely forested forest.
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_01: Then I realized suddenly it's not that I don't like people, I just like really living in the forest.
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I didn't think I would.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_01: I thought I would hate it.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_01: That first winter I thought I was gonna go crazy.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_01: I just couldn't cope.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_01: The snow and the trees and the quiet.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_01: What was that?
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_01: And then it shifted, and like this magical energy just took over.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_01: And uh it's we've been discussing again, you know, because life changes, I'm having my knee replaced next month, things shift, you know, in your body, you you're aging, and how much how much longer do you want to trudge across 500 feet of three feet of snow to get firewood every other day and all of that stuff?
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_01: And how much longer can you?
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_01: But then when I think about it, I just think, well, where else is there?
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_01: I know I've been around the world, I know there are other places, but where is else is there right now that I want to be?
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_00: Well, to me, just hearing this, it's like, you know, the city boy with all of all of the uh trappings, I'll use that word, of a fairly interesting life that's very much urbane or urban.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_00: And all of a sudden you're you're in this forested reality.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: And what it sounds like is that nature just kind of embraced you somehow and and and held you, and you just surrendered to her beautiful holding or something.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I think for me, it's really the first time that I've ever interacted with nature.
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_01: As in really just going, and we have a brook with three w uh six waterfalls and three swimming holes.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, just going in the middle of the night, you know, taking just a small hand old handheld flashlight, and just because it's a little secure to sometimes getting down to the brook, and just going naked, and you like it, you know, you make you wake up because it's really warm and it's three o'clock in the morning.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, so I just barefoot find my way down, and it's probably about three or four hundred feet down this slope to get into the brook, and then you know, I just find myself with my feet on the bottom and the water like probably a foot over my head, and I count to 10, and the water's freezing cold, and then I just get up and lay on the grass in the dark and look at the trees and hear everything, you know, hear the bears, hear everything wandering around in the dark with me, and I've never had that experience before.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and it there's something kind of reaffirming about it, especially right now when again everything is feeling upside down.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's like being surrounded by these really old hundred-year-old big trees, you feel that it's almost like I can feel them growing, even though they grow incredibly slow.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's like I can feel the energy of them.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_00: It's really powerful.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_00: It's you know, the whole thing about trees.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_00: I know during COVID when I started, you know, a lot of us started going for walks, right?
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_00: And where I was living in Ottawa, there's, you know, it's it's urban, obviously where I was, but there's a lot of a lot of old trees, not like here on Vancouver Island, but I remember I started to develop a real appreciation for them and feeling that that what you're talking about, that feeling that energy.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_00: And now I kind of understand these people, and I'm now one of them, who who has a connection to the forest, to trees.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_00: And where I live, I'm I'm sort of downtown Victoria, British Columbia.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_00: And there's so much old growth that they've they're really strict here about not cutting down trees when there's development, right?
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_00: And and it is so peaceful, even just doing a neighborhood walk, let alone going out on a hike in the forest, right?
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_00: I love the wisdom of trees.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_00: I love the energy that they convey.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_00: They're soothing, they speak to us if we let them.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_00: You know, there's something really, really, and that's just one aspect of nature.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_00: Water is a whole other thing, right?
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_00: But I love that.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_00: I so love that for you.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's like the continuation, like me not having a generation upon generation of a family living in the same place.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_01: I got that from Joe's family, which gives you a sense of space and time that's very different.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_01: And and then you're surrounded by these trees that have been here and up and look, you see all the generations and the rings around them, you know, the different size of the same tree.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_01: So, and and luckily, this land was separated once a hundred years ago into three parcels, and then 50 years ago it was separated into two parcels.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_01: So it was never really farmed or nothing was cut down.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_01: Only the places where the houses are.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_01: And even that, I mean, my house, as you can see, made of logs, so they cut down 104 trees, 104 hemlock trees, which sounds like a lot of trees to me when she said that.
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, oh my god, that's a lot of trees.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_01: Afterwards, I remember just going for this long hike up the hill by myself.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_01: While the real while Joe and the realtor were talking because he's really good with the money thing, they were talking about that.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_01: And I just wandered up and I saw hundreds of trees, and I thought, okay.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_01: So, and there's also something about this house because the plateau that they cleared to put the house on was where these trees came from.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_01: So even though they cut them and they use the wood, it just feels like it belongs here, you know.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_01: So, yeah, so that and the people that we that built the house that we bought it from really had a connection to building, they built the house themselves.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_01: So it's a little odd in some places because they were learning as they went.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_01: And they were Canadian.
• 35:23
  SPEAKER_01: So my neighbor who helped them do it, whenever there's like a weird glitch in the wall or something, he calls it the Canadian connection.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_01: Because you know, it's like slightly off because they were doing it in centimeters and he was doing it in inches, so then like so they had to wedge things in occasionally.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_01: So you know, so it's this interesting thing.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_00: Enjoying the podcast?
• 35:46
  SPEAKER_00: Find more wisdom trust content at school, s k o l dot com slash the dash wisdom dash trust slash about.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_00: That's our primary community page.
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_00: Our primary podcast page is wisdom trust50.com slash conversations.
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_00: On YouTube you can find us youtube.com slash at the wisdom trust five oh.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_00: We have a number of other socials where you can find us Substack, Wisdom Trust website, Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_00: All of those are in the show notes where you're listening or watching.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_00: If this conversation has you wondering what you want from your own next chapter, I also offer individual coaching for gay men over 50.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_00: We work together to clarify what matters now and turn that into some practical steps for you for the next stage.
• 36:48
  SPEAKER_00: You can book a free next chapter clarity session through the link in the show notes.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_00: It's next dash chapter-clarity dot l-or-en-d c dot chatgpt dot site.
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_00: Again, it's in the show notes.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_00: And we're gonna explore together whether working together would be useful for you going forward.
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_00: Hope you enjoy the rest of the podcast.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_00: So tell tell us where, you know, at this stage in your life, you've you said you've got some knee stuff going on, you're kind of debating whether you're gonna stay in that location or moving that.
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_00: How at this stage in these wisdom years?
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_00: So what what are the what are the essentials for for Sebastian right now?
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_01: So after moving to Vermont and settling in for a year or two, I was hosting a radio show in Burlington for five years.
• 37:48
  SPEAKER_01: And while doing that, I got involved with the HIV and gay community in Burlington.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_01: And so, and while doing that, I started volunteering, and now I'm a patient advocate at UUVM, which is the University of Vermont Medical Center, and it is the largest HIV thing in New England, and you know, and so we do so we created a patient advisory group, and and we interface with students, we are all public, as the face of people that are HIV positive.
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_01: And every time there's a new diagnosis, we work with that person to make sure that they have everything that they need or desire.
• 38:30
  SPEAKER_01: And so that that became like that knowledge, that well of knowledge and activism.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_01: Well, activism is always needed, and it's really important to keep HIV in the forefront of people's thinkings, especially governments and science and insurance companies worst, you know.
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_01: But so for me, I sort of feel like okay, I've survived it now for three decades, almost four decades.
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_01: So that's one of the gifts that I have being a survivor.
• 39:01
  SPEAKER_01: And it's because it's very easy to fall into survivor's guilt because you've survived and other people haven't.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_01: But for me, I realized that I needed to not get into the guilty part about living, but turn that guilt into proactive behavior.
• 39:18
  SPEAKER_01: And so by opening up and really getting involved, I mean, we go to high schools, we do presentations, and and so uh, you know, so so for me, that's a really important thing.
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_01: And going forward into the future, I just see myself as doing more of that work when needed or when asked.
• 39:41
  SPEAKER_01: You know, so so it's it's it's it's been a it's been an interesting journey, but it's far from over.
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_01: You know.
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I love about that is you know, part of the the the thrust behind creating the wisdom trust was there there are elders out there in the gay world, right?
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_00: But there aren't a lot of them that are really visible, like people like yourself who are doing this amazing work all the time.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm so glad that that we're able to share this because I think it can be inspirational for people around how how we can show up at this stage in our lives.
• 40:18
  SPEAKER_00: Like maybe our the paid career is over, or or maybe I'm looking for some piecemeal, you know, stuff.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_00: And there's so many wonderful opportunities to, as you're doing, you know, work and inform and and and and up level.
• 40:33
  SPEAKER_00: It really speaks to this eldership that I want to create a more of a platform for that so that people are seeing and hearing stories that really, really matter, you know.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_00: So thank you for for I know I think well, thank you.
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and and I agree with you.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_01: And when we talked about your project originally, I remember thinking you're absolutely right.
• 40:55
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's not that gay people are ignored because we all know we're not.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_01: And when they do ignore us, we make sure they know we're here.
• 41:03
  SPEAKER_01: And that's as it should be everywhere in the world.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_01: But it's it's almost like like women, older women, all of the, you know, it's like older people do tend to disappear.
• 41:14
  SPEAKER_01: Historically, people don't, we don't, you know, uh, and I think I think a lot of it has to do with the idea of mortality, you know.
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_01: Go to a museum, you don't see old people on walls in museums, you know.
• 41:27
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, there's no artist that paint, I mean, Rembrandt, yeah, but that's it.
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_01: That doesn't say a lot about art, you know, because there are millions of artists.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_01: Very, very few paint old people.
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_01: They, or if they do, they're always these very grand people, you know.
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_01: So, so we don't see ourselves projected, you know.
• 41:48
  SPEAKER_01: It was kind of like large-size people suddenly popped up a few years ago in movies, and we started seeing them have sex on films, and now they're sort of dissipating again, you know, because the market trends are shifting.
• 42:01
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm someone who totally was engrossed in that world of style and the skinny and the next game and all of that.
• 42:08
  SPEAKER_01: So I know, and that's never going to change.
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_01: That will never change because none of us want to admit that we're mortal.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_01: That's the end of it.
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't, no one does.
• 42:17
  SPEAKER_01: So when you see someone who's older, you sort of think, ooh, and then you look, and then, but if you look again, and if you get to know that person, you realize and you think, oh, why was I so weird about this?
• 42:29
  SPEAKER_01: This person's fabulous.
• 42:30
  SPEAKER_01: Like I remember once when I was in my 30s, I got cruised by some.
• 42:36
  SPEAKER_01: I was, I'm sorry, my late 20s, I got cruised by someone who was an older guy.
• 42:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 42:42
  SPEAKER_01: And he was really sexy.
• 42:45
  SPEAKER_01: And we had the most amazing physical relationship for a couple of weeks.
• 42:51
  SPEAKER_01: He was in New York for a few weeks, and boy, was it fabulous.
• 42:55
  SPEAKER_01: And he was probably 80.
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_01: He never told me how old he was, but he was probably 80 now that I think about it.
• 43:02
  SPEAKER_01: And and I remember after that thinking, wow, so this guy was still vital, still beautiful, still very physically fit and passionate, but you know, like most people would just not even, you know, and and we all had those moments when we were younger, when we saw that older gay guy at the bar, and like, oh, I don't want to be that age and going to a bar, you know?
• 43:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 43:28
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 43:28
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like And you know what's really like for me anyway, and I can only speak to my journey.
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_00: I always envisioned myself, I've been single most of my life, but I always envisioned that that relationship being with a younger man.
• 43:41
  SPEAKER_00: And now at 60, I'll be turning 61 in a few days.
• 43:45
  SPEAKER_00: I love guys my age and and older.
• 43:48
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like, how did that shift happen and where did that come from?
• 43:52
  SPEAKER_00: And and I also think it's interesting, like the obsession we have with youth and the denial of our mortality, as you were saying.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_00: How many men in general, gay men in particular, are now like hitting the gym hard.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_00: And you, you know, you see on these Facebook groups.
• 44:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I I applaud them because that's a good thing, but until it's not a good thing, right?
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_00: Until it's like hard for narcissism and all of that stuff.
• 44:18
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, too much, too much.
• 44:20
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, I just find it interesting.
• 44:23
  SPEAKER_00: Like the whole aging thing to me is fascinating.
• 44:26
  SPEAKER_00: Just fascinating.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I think like women, there's no real great examples.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and someone said to me the other day, well, what about Jane Fonda?
• 44:37
  SPEAKER_01: I said, honey, Jane Fonda has had her face done.
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_01: She has, and she's never pretended she didn't, you know, and and I I I think there's nothing wrong with working on your body, even surgically, as long as it doesn't get crazy.
• 44:51
  SPEAKER_01: And even if it does get crazy, then I say go full Monty.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_01: You know, if you're gonna if you're gonna become addicted to getting your face done, I want it to look like Picasso was your surgeon.
• 45:01
  SPEAKER_01: I don't want it to just be like a bit of that, don't we?
• 45:03
  SPEAKER_00: In our popularity.
• 45:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, of course.
• 45:05
  SPEAKER_01: And gay men too.
• 45:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 45:07
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, my my friend Jerry, when he turned 50, he had his eyes done.
• 45:11
  SPEAKER_01: So after you get your eyes done, they're like swollen like lime, like oranges.
• 45:15
  SPEAKER_01: And it looked like someone hit him.
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_01: So he took a photograph and he, and this is when we were printing photos.
• 45:21
  SPEAKER_01: He took a photo and he had like 30 of them printed.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_01: And that year for Christmas, he made a Christmas card because he said, I know that's what everyone wanted to see what I looked like that first day after surgery.
• 45:31
  SPEAKER_01: No one wanted to see how great I looked.
• 45:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 45:35
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, and and and back to your point, we that's what it is.
• 45:39
  SPEAKER_01: We don't have that environment.
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_01: And and also I think because up until the 1970s, gay people weren't part of mainstream in that way, and we weren't supposed to educate people, including one another.
• 45:57
  SPEAKER_01: That's what they kept doing with us, they kept separating us.
• 45:59
  SPEAKER_01: But what happened was we created our own community in the 20th century and really locked into it post-World War II.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_01: And so we started to support one another and realize and create places and spaces.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, like in New York City, there's a the oldest gay bar that I know of, it's called The Monster on Christopher Street.
• 46:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so my friend Nora said to me the last time I was there, she said, Hey, do you want to go to do you want to go to tea dance?
• 46:25
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, I'm not tea dancing, so do you want to go dancing?
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, dancing, where?
• 46:32
  SPEAKER_01: And she said, The monster.
• 46:35
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, Nora, I don't know if I mean I'm I was 59, and I said to Nora, I don't know if a 59-year-old queen like me wants to go to the monster.
• 46:43
  SPEAKER_01: I remember seeing she said, No, no, no, on Sundays.
• 46:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, Really?
• 46:48
  SPEAKER_01: She said, Oh, yeah, yeah, Lady Bunny comes at 4 p.m.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_01: And from 4 to 6, it's old disco music and everyone's RA's.
• 46:55
  SPEAKER_01: Nice.
• 46:56
  SPEAKER_01: And so we went, and it was like the bar was really quiet.
• 47:00
  SPEAKER_01: There was someone upstairs playing the piano and a couple of drunks, and then suddenly, like the downstairs, it's this tiny little dump of a bar, was full of people.
• 47:09
  SPEAKER_01: And here comes Lady Bunny and she's playing disco music.
• 47:12
  SPEAKER_01: And so for two hours, everyone was just dancing and pouring sweat.
• 47:16
  SPEAKER_01: And then exactly at 5:58, she turned on the light and everyone went home.
• 47:21
  SPEAKER_01: And Nora and I went out to dinner, and it was like, wow, she said, I know, right?
• 47:26
  SPEAKER_01: And Nora was one of those people I used to stay out till four in the morning with.
• 47:30
  SPEAKER_01: So she said, Yeah, no one does that anymore.
• 47:33
  SPEAKER_01: They go on Sunday at 4 p.m.
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 47:36
  SPEAKER_00: So, so I just want to talk a little bit about, you know, the whole leveling up thing.
• 47:42
  SPEAKER_00: So, this I think is, you know, we were sort of break broaching this topic when we were talking about aging and and having some sort of mentorship role models, whatever you want to call that.
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what does eldership look like more in a more public kind of way?
• 47:56
  SPEAKER_00: How are you at this stage?
• 47:58
  SPEAKER_00: So you're doing this amazing work and such.
• 48:00
  SPEAKER_00: So how are you leveling like because it's an ongoing journey that you're on, right?
• 48:05
  SPEAKER_00: And you're clearly uh still very active and engaged.
• 48:10
  SPEAKER_00: So, what does that look like for you in terms of self-care, you know, continuing to expand who you are, all of that?
• 48:20
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I think I think continuing to expand, for me, it's really important to learn things that I didn't know anything about.
• 48:29
  SPEAKER_01: And it can be anything.
• 48:31
  SPEAKER_01: A friend of mine just sent me this really kooky, funny book that was printed in the 1950s, The History of Bathrooms.
• 48:38
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it can be something as weird as that, where suddenly I'll just know why everything was created in a bathroom, or getting involved, getting involved in local politics, becoming a part of our state representative's posse, or the lieutenant governor.
• 48:55
  SPEAKER_01: I volunteered in his office a couple of times during his last administration because I wanted to see how that machinery worked, but I also wanted to show up as a very colorful queen in his office because it was an okay environment to do that in.
• 49:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I wanted to make sure that that that energy was part of it.
• 49:17
  SPEAKER_01: So I think, I think for me, the most important, you know, I never wanted to be one of those people, and I don't think I will become one, that retired.
• 49:28
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, and just sort of, I mean, I've been around the world, I've traveled, and I probably will do more of that.
• 49:35
  SPEAKER_01: At the moment, I'm not feeling the need to do that.
• 49:38
  SPEAKER_01: The world feels people just feel too at swords point.
• 49:41
  SPEAKER_01: Not even in a bad way.
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_01: Everyone just feels like we're all feeling this global whatever it is.
• 49:46
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm kind of, you know, like Canada, Vermont, Quebec, Vermont.
• 49:52
  SPEAKER_01: That's right now my my travel span.
• 49:55
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, you know, but even there, it's like in the eastern townships.
• 49:59
  SPEAKER_01: I've noticed the last few years, some real flamers from Montreal have been moving there.
• 50:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so because it's more expensive in Montreal than it used to be.
• 50:09
  SPEAKER_01: And I get that.
• 50:09
  SPEAKER_01: And also, do you want to still, you know, do you want to live in an apartment when you can live in a little house and be in a, you know, and and be able to go swimming outside your door, all that kind of stuff.
• 50:20
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, I guess, I guess for me it's it's really about keeping the momentum going.
• 50:26
  SPEAKER_01: Because uh an old friend of I had this friend who was this really, really old lady, and we worked together, she kind of looked like an ancient drag queen, and she used to say, you know, I'm like a shock.
• 50:38
  SPEAKER_01: If I stop moving, I die.
• 50:41
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if that's true because I never look, I never really was interested in sharks, but I love the way she used to say that.
• 50:47
  SPEAKER_01: If I if I don't learn, and when she finally did have to stop working for the company when she was well into her 80s, she started teaching life drawing classes at her, she was at her synagogue.
• 51:01
  SPEAKER_01: They had this ladies' art group.
• 51:03
  SPEAKER_01: So she said, you know, and she asked me if I would come and do it.
• 51:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I said to her, Oh, sure.
• 51:07
  SPEAKER_01: She said, because we can't get five, we can't get sexy young naked men.
• 51:10
  SPEAKER_01: She said, so so will you come and pose?
• 51:13
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, yeah.
• 51:14
  SPEAKER_01: She said, we pay well.
• 51:15
  SPEAKER_01: We pay$50 an hour plus lunch.
• 51:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I thought, oh, okay, I'll do it.
• 51:20
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and and and that's the thing, right?
• 51:23
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, the last thing I want people to say or think about me when I finally drop my clogs is, oh boy, he was boring.
• 51:32
  SPEAKER_01: Or or it was he still alive?
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_00: Hilarious.
• 51:37
  SPEAKER_00: That's amazing.
• 51:38
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 51:39
  SPEAKER_00: So a little bit of nude modeling.
• 51:42
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know, are you still doing that or was that a while ago?
• 51:46
  SPEAKER_01: Well, actually, when we first moved to Vermont, I helped create an art center here in an old abandoned church, and we had life drawing classes, and occasionally we all of us on the board had to pop in because we, you know, the people that were doing the live drawing classes needed some models.
• 52:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so yeah, so that's great.
• 52:04
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and how else, how else do you have fun?
• 52:09
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I think, well, I write a lot, and that's something I forgot that I could do.
• 52:14
  SPEAKER_01: So I write a ton, and I also became what I like to call as an as an antiquarian because I love antiques.
• 52:23
  SPEAKER_01: So I just completely submersed myself.
• 52:25
  SPEAKER_01: I do have a degree in history as well as design, so I just completely submersed myself into kind of into the things that I put aside in my 30s when I became really busy working in a professional capacity.
• 52:41
  SPEAKER_01: And I like I forgot I could draw, and I forgot I could paint, and I forgot I could write, even though I was doing it kind of, I was always working in visual stuff, but it wasn't coming out of me.
• 52:53
  SPEAKER_01: It was always for a reason.
• 52:55
  SPEAKER_01: So I think that's been a real save savior.
• 53:01
  SPEAKER_01: And that started kind of in COVID, you know, where I just started to pull these things out.
• 53:06
  SPEAKER_01: Or I was connecting again with people I haven't connected with in a long time who knew me back in those days.
• 53:12
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like some people that I went to school with and things like that.
• 53:16
  SPEAKER_01: We would bump into each other and and talk about why we weren't painting anymore, or or why they were and I wasn't.
• 53:24
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, yeah, I think I think that's the secret, or not, it's not a secret.
• 53:28
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's the trick.
• 53:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 53:30
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like when you're in your 20s or your 30s or your 40s or your 50s or my 60s now, I need to have a project.
• 53:38
  SPEAKER_00: So this this is this is where we're getting into the wisdom.
• 53:41
  SPEAKER_00: So, what is the sharing that you would like to to leave with the listener or viewer of this?
• 53:48
  SPEAKER_01: Go everywhere you want, do everything you want, have sex with everyone you want to, move, move in those circles, don't hesitate, you know, because they're all waiting for you.
• 54:02
  SPEAKER_01: And then you'll find that the world opens up and you find things about other people and yourself that you never thought you would find about anyone or anything.
• 54:14
  SPEAKER_01: But that's the thing.
• 54:15
  SPEAKER_01: It's like just do it when you're in your 20s or 30s or 40s and your 50s, do it all.
• 54:21
  SPEAKER_01: Because from that, you will suddenly have this amazing toolbox, not even a tool belt.
• 54:28
  SPEAKER_01: You'll have a toolbox of material, of abilities.
• 54:32
  SPEAKER_01: And what happened for me was I became this person that I didn't think I would become.
• 54:39
  SPEAKER_01: And aside from driving a car, which I'm disastrous at, everything else, I could rebuild something just now by looking at it because I've been through the processes of learning it and being able to decipher things.
• 54:52
  SPEAKER_01: So I feel like that's it.
• 54:55
  SPEAKER_01: It's not just a question of grabbing it, it's more than that.
• 54:58
  SPEAKER_01: It's really, if you're in a situation and that brass ring comes to you, grab it, hold on, but also get everything you can get out of the experience.
• 55:08
  SPEAKER_01: Don't just grab it because it's like$5,000 or something like that, because that's transitional.
• 55:14
  SPEAKER_01: None of that lasts.
• 55:16
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, trust me, I wish it did.
• 55:18
  SPEAKER_01: None of that lasts, but it's that's why it's so important to really lay the foundations in yourself and in other people and realize you don't do this alone.
• 55:28
  SPEAKER_01: And and it's important to find your tribe, whoever that tribe is.
• 55:34
  SPEAKER_01: And it can be a person that you can only talk to once a month or someone you can talk to every day.
• 55:39
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my god.
• 55:40
  SPEAKER_01: But find those people.
• 55:41
  SPEAKER_00: So good.
• 55:42
  SPEAKER_00: And and you know, that speaks to me on so many levels.
• 55:45
  SPEAKER_00: I for so long was this lone wolf guy, you know, and I know what that was about, like, you know, and and I figured it all out.
• 55:53
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of the last couple of years have been profoundly, you know, powerful in terms of my own enlightenment.
• 56:01
  SPEAKER_00: But this idea about finding that that connection, the community, you don't do this alone.
• 56:06
  SPEAKER_00: For those who are listening or watching, and you're you are a little bit isolated, and sometimes that that starts to happen unconsciously.
• 56:14
  SPEAKER_00: Like you can reach out, you can plug in.
• 56:16
  SPEAKER_00: If you're not already in the Wisdom Trust community, for example, go in there and start meeting these amazing guys like Sebastian and having conversations and and getting inspired.
• 56:26
  SPEAKER_00: Like watch these, watch these podcasts and listen to them.
• 56:29
  SPEAKER_00: You've said it so beautifully and sh and demonstrated it so beautifully.
• 56:33
  SPEAKER_00: Like your life is is still unfolding.
• 56:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, because it is, you know.
• 56:40
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, uh I and and uh, you know, it's like, and I think about it, because I have a garden now and I grow stuff and just pick it and eat it.
• 56:49
  SPEAKER_01: And it feels very different than the lettuce that I buy at the grocery store because the energy is still, you know, and and that's the thing.
• 56:56
  SPEAKER_01: And I feel like I feel like until my eyes no longer open, intentionally open, not open, you know, I feel like I have an ob I used to feel like I had an obligation to other people.
• 57:08
  SPEAKER_01: Now I feel like I have an obligation to myself.
• 57:11
  SPEAKER_01: And that has been a real shift in my brain, is owning my own, sometimes even my own shit, the stuff that I've done wrong.
• 57:21
  SPEAKER_01: I learned how to deal with that and I learned how to own that, but now I've learned how to own like the whole pantheon, not just the stuff that has involved other people, you know, and it's really wonderful.
• 57:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that when you when we start to do that, and and I I, you know, like I mentioned earlier, the sick being 60, like I think there's a for me, there's just a shift.
• 57:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I think when that's and it may happen to other people at different times, but when you start to do that, that that inner owning kind of stuff or whatever, I think you start showing up for others in a more brilliant way because the inner stuff is more aligned, more reconciled.
• 58:02
  SPEAKER_00: And then so the outer outer stuff just becomes like the icing on the cake, as opposed to it being the cake and you're trying to like make it work, right?
• 58:10
  SPEAKER_01: Right, yeah, right.
• 58:11
  SPEAKER_01: And and give yourself permission to lose it and to fall apart and to realize that it's all okay.
• 58:18
  SPEAKER_01: It's all okay, you know, even on those days when all you can do is lay on the sofa and watch a movie.
• 58:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know, I mean, uh that's all part of it, and and it's and those days and those moments, and and then they're gone, you know.
• 58:33
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's the other thing that I've realized is 60 years was like that.
• 58:38
  SPEAKER_01: It was like, oh my god.
• 58:41
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, a friend of mine when I turned 60, she said to me, Oh my god, you're 60?
• 58:46
  SPEAKER_01: How old am I?
• 58:48
  SPEAKER_01: And I thought, you're right.
• 58:50
  SPEAKER_01: I understand exactly what you mean.
• 58:52
  SPEAKER_01: She said, you know, you're always the youngest person in our group.
• 58:54
  SPEAKER_01: And if you're 60, wow, how old am I?
• 58:57
  SPEAKER_01: And I thought, yeah, I know what you mean.
• 59:00
  SPEAKER_01: And that's it.
• 59:01
  SPEAKER_01: And and also I do think it's kind of important to hang out with people younger than yourself.
• 59:06
  SPEAKER_01: The same way I've always thought it was hang out important to hang out with people who are genetically different or biologically different than you, and occasionally ideology, ideological differences too are important to work.
• 59:21
  SPEAKER_01: Just because that's how you see, and that's how you see beyond all that shit.
• 59:26
  SPEAKER_01: And you realize we're all the same.
• 59:29
  SPEAKER_00: We're human behind those beliefs, yeah.
• 59:32
  SPEAKER_00: And we're all the same.
• 59:34
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my god.
• 59:35
  SPEAKER_00: That's it.
• 59:35
  SPEAKER_00: That's the perfect, perfect.
• 59:37
  SPEAKER_00: For me, that's the perfect way to wrap this up.
• 59:39
  SPEAKER_00: We're all the same.
• 59:40
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my god, so good, so good.
• 59:42
  SPEAKER_00: What I'd like to share is your Substack.
• 59:45
  SPEAKER_00: So you've mentioned you've gotten back into writing and and and I looked at some of your stuff.
• 59:50
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's it's great.
• 59:52
  SPEAKER_00: So we're just gonna put up here your your Substack candle.
• 59:56
  SPEAKER_00: So for those that are listening, it's substack.com slash at.
• 1:00:00
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm just gonna alphabet alphabetically read it so the spelling's right.
• 1:00:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 1:00:05
  SPEAKER_00: M-S-E-B-A-S-T-I-A-N.
• 1:00:08
  SPEAKER_00: So M Sebastian A-R-A-U-J-O Arajo.
• 1:00:14
  SPEAKER_00: So it's just the full name.
• 1:00:16
  SPEAKER_00: And if you want to read some of Sebastian's prose reflections, I encourage you to do so.
• 1:00:25
  SPEAKER_00: This has been really, really lovely, my friend.
• 1:00:27
  SPEAKER_00: I'm so grateful, happy that we were able to make this work.
• 1:00:31
  SPEAKER_01: Me too.
• 1:00:32
  SPEAKER_00: Uh really, really wonderful.
• 1:00:33
  SPEAKER_00: And I look forward to staying connected with you and and and hearing about your journeys.
• 1:00:39
  SPEAKER_00: I love the Canadian connection.
• 1:00:41
  SPEAKER_00: I've never been to Vermont, even though I lived in Ontario for years, but I know it's a gem of a of a part of that big United States.
• 1:00:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:00:51
  SPEAKER_01: I always remind people it was part of Quebec.
• 1:00:55
  SPEAKER_01: And it still feels like it is.
• 1:00:57
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, in fact, like our local market, there's Canadian money in the till because they take it, you know.
• 1:01:03
  SPEAKER_01: And we have a lot, two of my neighbors are they have summer houses here, but they are Canadians.
• 1:01:08
  SPEAKER_01: And yes, I know everyone we're doing our elbows up things still, but we do still have that thing, especially with the eastern townships, because there's a deep, a deep root.
• 1:01:19
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, there's I I don't know if you know this, but in Vermont, there's a library that you walk in the front door in Vermont and you walk out the back door in Canada.
• 1:01:28
  SPEAKER_01: So that's how connected it is.
• 1:01:30
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it looks just like the eastern townships.
• 1:01:32
  SPEAKER_01: The only difference is everyone is speaking French, and people always cringe when I say this.
• 1:01:39
  SPEAKER_01: I like the food more because I love French food.
• 1:01:41
  SPEAKER_01: So that's yeah, so it's great.
• 1:01:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't know what the future holds, but I know for right now this life is pretty wonderful.
• 1:01:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yay, yay.
• 1:01:53
  SPEAKER_00: Well, thank you again.
• 1:01:54
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 1:01:55
  SPEAKER_00: And I look forward, like I said, to continuing our our journey of getting to know each other.
• 1:02:00
  SPEAKER_00: I find you absolutely fascinating.
• 1:02:02
  SPEAKER_00: So have a wonderful rest of your day.
• 1:02:05
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, you too, and keep the good work up.
• 1:02:08
  SPEAKER_00: I will, for sure.
• 1:02:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, this is my project.