Limerent Lad A life unloved is a life unlived.

Taking Inventory

I owe you all (all, what, four of you who read this thing?) an explanation for the lack of posts recently. Perhaps you've seen on HuffPo or some other news source, but Cornell has suffered a veritable epidemic of suicides in the past month. There have been 3 bridge jumpers and the rumor mill keeps churning about two incidents that occurred in dorm rooms and thus were easier to keep quiet. Needless to say, the mood here is simultaneously tense and somber.

As deeply as I have been depressed -- and that's pretty damn deep -- I have never had even a fleeting desire to harm myself in any way, and I can't understand that impulse in the least. I wish I could have been there for my fellow Cornellians, to talk or cry with, or just to give them the hug that might have kept them with us. It's times like this when I begin to understand what helplessness feels like, when things are so far beyond my control that I have to sit back and say "Damn. Life."

I guess I want to ask, though I'm afraid to: have you ever had suicidal thoughts? If so, what helped you? We as a campus are searching for answers about how we can be better neighbors and concerned friends, and I don't know where to begin. It's especially difficult because I know how anti-social depression can make one. When I have a particularly bad bout, I don't even want to answer the phone when my grandparents call, and I usually talk to them every day. I guess I just don't know where to start. None of us do when faced with circumstances like this. I just wish everybody could climb inside my heart.

Friday Style: Flexible Love

Whoever named this design sure knew how to get it featured on Limerent Lad. I mean, c'mon, it's got love in its name! And, incidentally, I love it. Think of all the wasted cardboard we throw away every day -- we could make thousands of these things! When I have my own apartment to furnish, this is most definitely on my list of items to purchase. Click on the link to see video of it in action: Flexible Love.

Thursday Style: Mens Accessories

This week we had our first glimpse of spring's bright sun, which means it's time for a new pair of Aviators! I have a flashy red pair around here somewhere, but in case you need to make a purchase, here's the spiffiest pair I could find on Amazon. Can't pull off Aviators? Sure you can. Everybody looks cool in Aviators.

Assorted Thoughts

• I think Billy Collins is very much overrated. Two-term poet laureate? Give me a break.
• Booked my flight down South for Spring Break today. Interviewing with an attorney and hopefully Blue Cross Blue Shield as well. It's really frustrating and disheartening when I see so many people around me getting jobs when I work so much harder than they do. I know that's an awful thing to say, and I'm not bitter, I just hate being reminded that our outcomes are so predetermined by who we know and what country clubs our parents belong to.
• When I do find a job and settle down somewhere, I'm going to look for some real voice lessons. Having never had any training, I think I could love what I do with my voice even more with a little work. And maybe that'll be an avenue for finding other talented musicians who want to collaborate, instead of just singing in my shower.
• I am no good at all at living by myself. I need a roommate. Or a husband. Preferably the latter, though people say it takes time to cultivate those sorts of things. Bah.
• The health of my Baby Crocus plant seems directly tied to the amount of time I get to talk to the HCG.
• I'm so hungry that I'm shaking with weakness. I think this is a bad sign. Two bananas and a carton of cherry tomatoes throughout the day should be enough to sustain someone, no? I'm so bad at living.

Thoughts on Democracy

I'm performing this weekend in an English staging of Jean-Jacques Rousseau's comic opera The Cunning Man, and it has inspired me to look back over some of his writings on political theory. Of course there's that famous opening line "Man was born free, but he is everywhere in chains." Rousseau's main argument was that political society as it existed in his time was a fraudulent social contract, and that the introduction of private property and social organization took us away from a time when human life was happy and free. Inequality, he claimed, was codified and sustained by the apparatus of government in ways detrimental to all.

I'm amazed at how true his words ring centuries later. The only difference is that now, with government being so expansive, its inequality-perpetuating systems influence many more aspects of life. I'm not an enemy of big government, but an enemy of any government that functions the way ours does in society. We subsidize meat and grain production so that we can make nutritionally vapid fast food available to low-income families. We fight wars that so deplete our coffers that we can't adequately fund public education. We are held hostage by multi-national corporations to the extent that we can't invest in alternative energy or provide working universal healthcare. The whole point of the social contract is that by consenting to it we are all made better. It's clear to me that there are many Americans who are not being made better by our society, and that is intensely depressing.

Mo’Nique: Smug or Deserving?

There's been some backlash from Mo'Nique's acceptance speech at the Oscars, with some commentators criticizing her speech as self-important and haughty. The main argument is that with her line thanking the academy for recognizing "the performance and not the politics," she was saying that her performance was clearly the best. Maybe I'm just too trusting of people, but I didn't interpret any malice in that comment. I thought she was commenting on the fact that she didn't campaign for the award the way some of the Hollywood elite would have had her do. Additionally, she won the award for portraying a character that's a politically unpopular stereotype, the welfare-dependent black mother. For the Academy to find something worthwhile in a figure so many would disdain really is admirable, and I think she was right to praise them for setting aside the politics of her character. In all, I found her presentation Sunday night rather touching, aligning herself with Hattie McDaniel by wearing a magnolia in her hair and acknowledging the kinds of sacrifices that black actresses have made for decades in her stead. Here's hoping everybody cuts Mo'Nique some slack, and that she continues to break down barriers for other actresses the way McDaniel did for her so long ago.

Hunk of the Month

Head on over to the Boys page to get a look at Brandon Stoughton, Limerent Lad's Hunk of the Month. Here's a sneak preview:

Under Construction

Welcome to Limerent Lad, your up and coming source for all kinds of things: reviews of movies, literature, and music; boys, boys, and more boys; original poetry and/or short stories; clothing/decorating/artistic style guides; the blog of one delightfully energetic -- and devilishly handsome -- gay boy navigating the world. Thanks for stopping in, and look for more content soon!