Man Up! (13 page)

And so started my career as a Straight ’n’ Narrows standout. It turned out to be even better than I’d imagined. At my first meeting, I landed a killer monologue about a five-year-old kid whose deadbeat mom was a hardcore pot addict. I have to say, I was impressed with just how cutting-edge this group of community crusaders actually was.

Just when I thought it couldn’t get any better, Aubrey’s mom clapped her hands and announced, “All right, my little thespian soldiers. It’s time for Total Eclipse!”

The room exploded with excitement. I whispered to Aubrey through a mouthful of Pizza Hut Meat Lover’s, “Hey, what’s Total Eclipse?”

“Omigosh, Ross, it’s the absolute best performance piece! I play the Girl, and the rest of you represent temptations that we teens all face on a daily basis. You each wear a
T-shirt
with a different danger written on it, like LSD or PCP or Shoplifting or whatever. It’s all set to that song “Total Eclipse of the Heart,” and you all dance around in a circle, each enticing me to dance with you, symbolizing the—”

“Okay, I get it, Aubrey,” I interrupted her. “I’m in.”

The only T-shirt left was Sex, which was actually fine with me. As an artist, I’m always looking to stretch myself (and in this case, I was also stretching the size Small T-shirt over my XL body). I was still a virgin, so it wasn’t like I could pull from life experience. Instead, my inspiration came from a strange mix of what I imagined sexy to be, from the sweet, innocent chemistry between Jasmine and Aladdin to the trashy, softcore heavy petting I’d seen on late-night Cinemax.

Attempting to describe a dance this visceral is like trying to describe color to the blind, but I’ll try: Imagine about fifteen teenage kids in a circle with Aubrey in the middle. As “Total Eclipse of the Heart” began to play, we each swayed like seaweed in the ocean, slowly back and forth. We took turns approaching Aubrey, who valiantly fought against the onslaught of our advances, our hands grabbing at thin air, our bodies spinning in a lustful frenzy.

First Cigarettes tried to burn her, but she courageously pushed him away. Then Gossip attempted to whisper an unfounded rumor into her ear, but she’d have no part of it. That was my cue. I approached her like an animal in heat. My hungry arms were outstretched, and my hips were suggestively undulating, shamelessly dry humping the air.

It’s fair to say that my steamy character Sex totally eclipsed the inexperienced real me. To really express the push and pull of addiction, I lifted Aubrey into the air a la Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey in
Dirty Dancing
. Granted, I could lift her only a few inches off the ground (I’ve always had the upper body strength of a four-year-old girl), but still, it was quite a moment.

In the months that followed, we took our show on the road and performed in countless gymnasiums across the state. My career with the Straight ’n’ Narrows came to a screeching halt, though, when my secret, hard-livin’ past finally caught up with me.

It happened at a local high school in the midst of yet another flawless, crowd-pleasing Total Eclipse routine. I was twirling with passion in my sweat-drenched, skin-tight, threadbare T-shirt featuring iron-on letters that spelled
S-E-X
across my heaving man boobs. After my turn trying to seduce Aubrey, I looked out into the audience and saw a face that somehow seemed familiar.

He seemed to know me, too. We locked eyes, but I couldn’t place him.
Wait,
I thought.
Do I sit next to him in Driver’s Ed? Or is he the kid who bags groceries at Food Pavilion? Wait, what’s he doing now? Is he flipping me off? No, he’s just brushing his greasy bangs away from his—OH MY FUCKING GOD IT’S DEALER DUDE!

Any possibility that he perhaps didn’t recognize me flew right out the gymnasium window when he suddenly stared me right in my guilty face and blatantly started smoking a phantom joint like some marijuana-mad mime. Busted!

And as if it wasn’t bad enough that my less-than-sterling life choices could possibly mess up my future, I had just messed up the choreography!

The very next day I respectfully resigned from the Straight ’n’ Narrows, making up some flimsy excuse. I couldn’t risk my unsavory past rearing its ugly head to possibly taint this amazing anti-drug group with a drug-​​
related
scandal. So I quietly folded up my Sex T-shirt, placed it in a plastic Food Pavilion grocery sack, and left it on Aubrey’s front porch—along with my teenage passion for philanthropic dance.

You think I never would’ve touched the stuff again. But I did. Oh, I’m almost positive that I should just stop here and save myself any further embarrassment. But for you, dear reader, I will tell this story.

Most people will assure you that it’s not possible to overdose on marijuana. Even bona fide doctors with training and fancy medical degrees will say so. But let me tell you, I’ve been there.

It was Thanksgiving weekend of 2003. I had returned from college to spend the holiday back in my hometown, but it was certainly no vacation. My mother was down in Seattle at a special cancer hospital where my father was slowly dying. Fun story already, huh? Don’t worry, it gets funnier in a bit. Stay with me.

One night, I found myself all alone in the big, empty house I had grown up in. God, what a sucky time. This Thanksgiving it was hard for me to feel thankful at all. It was hard to feel anything. I just wanted to escape.

I called my brother. “Eric, do you have any pot? I just wanna, like, zone out for a bit.”

He got it. He was under the same stress I was. “Sorry. I don’t have any weed, bro. But I have some pot butter in the freezer that’ll do the trick. I could bring that over.”

Pot butter? The idea of getting high by simply snacking on something scrumptious sounded exactly like the perfect cure for the moment, even if it was in the form of fattening butter. This was no time to think of my waistline; I just wanted to get wasted. “How soon can you be here?”

God bless my brother. About ten minutes later he came bursting through the front door. Before I knew it, he had sliced off a Paula Deen–sized portion of the pot butter, melted it in the microwave, and poured it over a piece of toast. “Eat this and you’ll feel great in about twenty minutes.”

Eventually, my brother left, informing me on his way out that he had put the remaining pot butter in the fridge in case I wanted any more. Trust me, I didn’t want any more. In about three minutes, I was tripping my ever-lovin’ nards off. I’d never been high like this before. It was fun, but scary, but fun. But scary. So I did what I always do when I’m scared: I called one of my best friends, Lisa.

Lisa still lived in our hometown and came over right away. By the time she arrived, I had calmed myself down and was in a warm and fuzzy place. Seeing how blissfully high I was, she immediately wanted in on the action. “Fire up the toaster, I want some of that!”

I did exactly as I had seen my brother do and made Lisa a delicious slice of pot-buttered bread. She made a face when she took the first bite. “Ugh! It tastes like a skunk wiped its butt on this.”

In no time at all, we were laughing and smiling so much, our faces hurt. At one point, we laughed so hard that we began coughing, and I had to leave the room to get us both some water. When I returned just a few moments later, I found Lisa staring straight ahead with eyes like those creepy dolls that blink. She was as quiet as a stoned little mouse and she had two fingers on her neck, checking her pulse.

Still smiling, but confused, I asked, “Are you okay, honey bunny?”

She responded in the most serious tone I’d ever heard from anyone in my entire life. “I think my heart’s going to explode.”

“Oh, sweetie. Stop it,” I said, trying to calm her. “Your heart is not going to explode.”

“Ross, you don’t understand.” She was insistent, fanning herself with her hands to keep from crying. “While you were in the kitchen getting water, I was looking at a magazine and I swear to God, everyone in the magazine was looking back at me and now I’m freaking out. I’m not an expert or anything, but the pot butter must have mixed with my birth control or something and, I’m telling you, it’s going to make my heart explode. I need you to call an ambulance.”

I tried to reason with her. “Lisa, you’re not even making sense! I am not calling an ambulance.”

She got right in my face. “Ross, I’m not fucking around. I’m asking you as a friend. Please call a motherfucking ambulance!”

I should’ve just wrapped her up in a blanket and sang a soothing Enya song, but she had just used the F word twice in ten seconds. She’d never done that before, and it chilled me to the bone. Against my better judgment, I dialed 911.

“Nine-one-one, what’s your emergency?” The operator was already freaking me out.

“Um, I’m visiting from college and have been superstressed out, so my best friend and I did some pot to relax. It was very
The Big Chill
, you know? And now we’re kinda, I don’t know…her heart might be exploding? So can we get, like, an ambulance or whatever? And is it possible to request that they don’t turn on their sirens, ’cuz I mean it’s like ten o’clock at night and I don’t want to bother my neighbors, you know?”

“Ma’am,” the 911 operator told me flatly, “that’s up to the driver’s discretion.”

Maybe it’s because I was stoned out of my mind, but I swear before I even hung up the phone, I could hear an ambulance barreling into the driveway with sirens wailing like a dying Tyrannosaurus rex. The next thing I knew, we were in the back of the ambulance, still parked in front of my parents’ house. I was kind of relieved. At least now there were medical professionals attending to Lisa, and things had settled down a bit. Then suddenly, out of nowhere, Lisa sat up and declared, “Oh my God, this is what it’s like to die.”

We all looked at her, and then at each other. She continued, “Yes, I get it now. Oh. My. God.”

Holy shit, she was really beginning to lose it. Her delusional epiphany was building momentum at an alarming rate. “Oh dear God, I’m dying. Tell my parents I love them. Everything makes so much sense now. I never really thought
Seinfeld
was funny before, but now I get it.
I fucking get it! I fucking get
Seinfeld
!
  ”

Up to that point, I thought maybe calling an ambulance was overreacting. At that moment, I realized perhaps I’d made the right call.

As the ambulance pulled away with Lisa strapped in the back and me buckled in the front passenger seat, I turned to the driver and asked, “Is Lisa gonna die?”

“No,” he responded sweetly. “She’ll be just fine.”

“Oh good.” I was glad Lisa was going to live. “Am I going to die?”

“No, you’re not dying, either.”

Everything was spinning, my heart was beating overtime, and I was beginning to sweat profusely. “Are you sure? Because I really feel like I might be dying. My heart is beating super-hard.”

The driver, keeping his eyes on the road and his left hand on the steering wheel, grabbed my wrist with his right hand and checked my pulse.

“Ted,” he yelled to the medic tending to Lisa, “we’ve got another one!”

They rushed a mumbling Lisa and me into the emergency room in matching wheelchairs and booked us into a shared room. It was like a trauma slumber party. They gave us both something to calm us down and hooked us up to IVs filled with fluids. A nurse came in and asked me to sign something. I was confused. “Is this for my insurance?”

“No, it’s for me,” the nurse shamelessly replied. “Can you make it out to Nancy? I love you on
Leno
 !”

Are you fucking kidding me? But I signed it anyway. Sometimes I’m just too nice.

Eventually, after Lisa had thrown up all over her hospital gown and I had eaten three servings of butterscotch pudding from the cafeteria, the doctor came into our room. “Okay, guys,” he said in a patronizing tone, checking his clipboard, “you’ll feel better soon.”

I could feel his judgment. How dare he? I mean, we were good kids. We had just made a stupid mistake. I spoke up. “You know what, Doctor? We’re good kids. We just made a stupid mistake.”

He paused at the door and looked back at us, over his glasses and down his nose like a cliché doctor character from a lame after-school special. “Yes, and that’s why we don’t do drugs.”

As he left the room, Lisa and I looked at each other with shame, but then slowly began to chuckle. Even then, hooked up to EKGs and IVs, we just couldn’t help ourselves.

We took a cab home and slept about ten hours that night. In the morning, Lisa and I could barely face each other, the humiliation hanging in the air as thick as the scent of vomit wafting from her hair. Like soldiers who had survived battle together, we now shared an unspoken bond that was even stronger than before. There was nothing more to say. We just hugged (I held my breath).

I knew I had to come clean when my mom finally got home from spending the night at the hospital in Seattle with my father. I knew if my mother forgave me, I could forgive myself. That’s what parents do for us, right? I spent most of the day looking out the living room window for her blue Chevy Malibu to round the corner. When she finally arrived, I greeted her at the front door, ready to unload my tawdry tale of tainted toast.

She uncharacteristically slammed the door behind her. “I’m done!” she screamed, clearly exhausted and at her breaking point. “I am so sick and tired of it all. If I hear one more thing about a fucking hospital, I swear, I’m gonna punch someone in the goddamn face!”

I discreetly covered the hospital bracelet I’d purposely kept around my wrist in hopes of enhancing the story that I’d so looked forward to telling her. As she stormed through the house swearing like a sailor, I thought to myself,
Well, I guess it can wait. She can just read all about it in my book one day.

A
s proud as I am of the person I’ve become, I also must acknowledge that I’m a complete and total failure. Sure, I’ve managed to cross off a few amazing items from my bucket list, but there is one item that, barring a small miracle or a major change in the rules for the Winter Olympic Games, shall forever remain on that list, glaring at me in all its annoyingly unfulfilled glory.

I’m like those Nerds candies that were my absolute favorite when I was a kid. The best flavor of Nerds were the ones that were Green Apple on the outside, but slowly dissolved in your mouth to reveal a hidden coating of Sour Red Cherry flavor on the inside. Sure, my personal outer coating may appear to be that of a well-rounded ball of happy-go-plucky positivity, but if you took the time to really delve deep into my psyche, you’d discover that inside me lives a tortured and embittered should-have-been Gold Medal–winning figure skater.

Wow! Total shocker, right? The gay guy loves figure skating! Whodathunk? Pick your jaw up from the floor and deal with it.

Figure skating! There is absolutely nothing more graceful than someone seemingly floating across the ice, alternating between flying through the air and spinning over and over and over again without vomiting on themselves. It’s the perfect balance of athleticism and artistry.

I used to daydream about skating like that. And, oh, how my daydreams felt so real. I could almost feel it—the wind whipping my impossibly shiny hair as I spun through the air, the crowd leaping to their feet as I safely landed on mine. My purple-cotton-poly-blend pantsuit with matching chiffon cape, although flatteringly formfitting, would allow me full range of motion to express my innermost emotions on the ice. And, oh, how I would! The dazzled crowd would be on the edges of their seats and on the verge of tears as I dramatically ripped off my cape at the climactic crescendo of my signature performance music—the
Dawson’s Creek
theme song, of course.

Yes, I always felt
certain
that I had that virtuoso skating ability living within me, just waiting to pop out like confetti or that scary baby monster thing in
Alien
. So when I finally did try figure skating for the first time, I was convinced that I would step onto the ice and instinctively glide effortlessly around the rink. I mean, sure it would take a few minutes before my first triple toe loop—that was understandable—but I knew without a doubt I’d finish my first lesson with a perfectly executed death spiral.

Well, it didn’t exactly turn out like that. I never achieved a perfect death spiral during that first lesson, but I did very nearly spiral to my death. Instead of exploding onto the figure skating scene like some sort of red hot ingénue, I remained frozen in my skates, my legs wobbling like Bambi in that scene when he first learned to walk. It became suddenly clear that ice skating involved much more than just smiles, spandex, and sequins. It also took sweat, strength, and surprisingly sturdy ankles. Sadly, I had none of the above. I spent most of my first lesson facedown on the ice and faced with some cold, hard facts.

Although black and blue after my one and only attempt at figure skating, what hurt the most was the knowledge that as much as my mind could envision it, my body just wouldn’t allow my inner gift to flourish. I felt like a marionette with severed strings, or one of those delusional people on
American Idol
who think they can sing but obviously can’t. As frustrated as I was then, however, my love for the sport has never wavered and I have come to terms with—and even learned to love—my role as a mere spectator.

I don’t want to brag or anything, but I was into figure skating way before it was cool. You know, before the entire world became interested in the sport during the gory glory days of the Tanya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan tragedy. What a wonderful game changer that was! Sure, Nancy’s knee and Tonya’s freedom were both sacrificed, but it was a magical time that finally brought figure skating into the mainstream. The whole thing was like a soap opera on skates. The crime! The video footage! The “will they or won’t they compete on the ice” cliffhangers! And, the best of all, the so-bad-they’re-good made-for-TV movies that followed! For a gay kid with a love of both figure skating and drama, it was almost too much.

In case you’re an idiot who didn’t follow every second of the excitement back then, or you’re too young and haven’t done your homework (kids these days…), let me fill you in on what went down: In order to secure Tonya Harding a spot on the US Olympic team, her husband, Jeff Gillooly, hired a big, scary guy to whack Tonya’s biggest competition, Nancy Kerrigan, on the knee with a lead pipe (“WHY ME?!?!?”). I know it sounds like a game of Clue, but it really happened. What followed was a media shit storm the likes of which had never been seen before. This was
pre–O. J.
Simpson, pre–Michael Jackson molestation trial, pre–cat playing the piano on YouTube. It was
huge
. It was all anybody was talking about. It was nasty and tasteless. And, in my teenaged opinion, it was the most exciting thing that had ever happened. I was glued to the coverage 24/7.

All of this brouhaha built up to the day Nancy and Tonya finally skated at the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer, Norway, making an already thrilling event downright electrifying. I remember it like it was yesterday. Even though it was happening like nine time zones away, I was a nervous wreck. I remember frantically watching the clock in my seventh-grade Language Arts class and biting my nails, knowing that it was all happening right at that very moment. Lacking both logic and even one single ounce of human decency, my teacher wouldn’t allow us to skip that day’s chapter of
To Kill a Mockingbird
, even though I’d politely pointed out about fourteen times how easy it would be for us to just roll in the TV and watch, oh, I don’t know, actual
history in the making
?!? I mean, I’m sorry, but classic literature will always be here. Harding vs. Kerrigan only happened that day. Get your priorities straight, lady.

It may shock you to learn that I was solidly in Tonya’s corner. Yes, she was obviously guilty of orchestrating a violent attack on her biggest competitor and—almost as bad—had the most horrendous hair I’d ever seen, but I preferred her for two reasons. One, I like a little “trashy” in my women. Honey, a few bad highlights, permed bangs, and French-tipped acrylic nails never hurt anyone.

And two, Nancy had done something I could never forgive. Here’s a little figure skating history lesson, dear reader: It was the 1994 US National Figure Skating
Championships
—​six months prior to the Olympics—and Tonya Harding took first place. Nancy Kerrigan couldn’t compete that night because she was still healing from her unfortunate knee injury. Sure, they were the most talked-about women in the world at that time, but for me, they were overshadowed that night. I remember watching it in my parents’ living room, a bowl of Triscuits with a side of onion dip next to me, when I saw
her
. She may have been only thirteen years old and weighed about as much as the onion dip I’d devoured that night, but she took my breath away. Her name was Michelle Kwan, and she was undeniably the best figure skater I had ever seen. She soared with a weightless and effortless fluidity, like a sweet, romantic, otherworldly poem on the ice. I instantly became a faithful Kwanatonian and from that moment on have been loyal to my Kwan and Only.

Michelle Kwan’s performance was perfect. The kind of perfect you usually only experience listening to Justin Timberlake’s first solo album or ordering the all-you-can-eat soup-and-salad special at Olive Garden. But even though she took second place that night at the US Championships, the Olympic Committee decided to
instead
take pity on Nancy Kerrigan and send
her
to the Olympics, cruelly discarding my beloved Michelle. So, even though Michelle had rightfully earned a spot in the 1994 games, she never even got her chance to compete! In the words of
Full House
’s Stephanie Tanner, “How rude!”

And that—that
right
there—is why I chose to root for Tonya, a knee-bashing hillbilly nincompoop, over Classy Nancy. Sure, it wasn’t Nancy’s fault that my precious Michelle was thrown under the Zamboni, but I had to take it out on someone.

Anyway, my love for both Nancy and Tonya was on thin ice after I fell under the spell of the Kwan. Going forward, there was nothing that would get in my way of watching Michelle skate. I didn’t care if there were floods, famine, or a 50-percent-off sale—if she was on the ice skating, I was on the couch watching. That was why I freaked out so hard-core when, in my very early days as a correspondent on
The Tonight Show
, I got the assignment of a lifetime: covering the 2002 Winter Olympic Games in Salt Lake City. Holy shitballs, you guys. Do you know what this meant? I was going to be in the same city as the Kwan at the exact moment that she would, undoubtedly, win her first Olympic gold medal.

OMG. I had to meet her. Or, at the very least, if I couldn’t meet her, I had to use the time I had on-air on NBC to make sure that Michelle Kwan knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that I was her biggest fan on the face of the planet.

And that’s exactly what I did. Throughout the entire Winter Olympic Games, with every segment I shot and every live toss back to Jay Leno in the studio in Burbank, I would try to include an on-air message to my Michelle. Mind you, it was nothing supercreepy. Just something subtle like, “Oh, one more thing, Jay. I just want to say a big
hello
to the best figure skater in the entire world, Michelle Kwan. We’re in the same city, honey—let’s hang out!”

I kept waiting for the bigwigs at NBC to tell me to cut it out, but they never did. I think they thought my pathetic pseudostalker pleas were funny. I think they hoped, too, that perhaps Michelle would actually reach out in return and we could shoot an amazing segment where she and I actually met for the first time on air. Now
that
would be good television!

The highlight of my experience during the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City was also the low point. One of my
Tonight Show
producers surprised me on the day of the women’s figure skating long program competition with tickets to the big event. This was huge! Bigger than huge! This was the event where my Michelle would surely win her long-deserved gold medal, finally taking her rightful place among the ranks of the world’s best skaters. A monumental moment for her, certainly, but even bigger for me. It felt like Christmas plus birthday plus the last day of school multiplied by a bazillion.

On the day of the competition, I couldn’t even eat—
that
was how nervous I was to see her perform. I walked into the auditorium and immediately felt the energy. This was the Olympics. This mattered. The eyes of the world were focused on what was about to happen, and I was there to witness it all firsthand. As I took my seat and waited impatiently for the competition to start, the enormity and magnitude of the event hit me. How lucky was I? I knew for certain I’d tell my grandkids about this moment one day. Can’t you just picture it? I’d be in my rocking chair, wrapped in a cashmere shawl while sipping Ensure out of a wineglass. “Chillun, come gather ’round Pop Pop,” I’d mumble through my dentures and a Werther’s Original butterscotch candy. “I’m gonna tell you young-uns ’bout the legend of the Kwan and how I was there to see her golden moment…”

As the event began and the other skaters took their turns, I wasn’t worried. Call me biased, but this was no contest for the Kwan. I almost took a bathroom break when the USA’s Sarah Hughes took the ice. I mean, she was good and all, but she wasn’t even expected to medal. Even so, I decided to stay and support the home team.

That fucking Sarah Hughes. She was magical. She came out of nowhere and gave me chills, landing triple after triple after triple like some sort of beautiful figure skating phenom. As much as I hated to admit it, it was clear that this was a Kwan-caliber performance. The crowd was abuzz with shock and joy, counting the seconds down to the end of her program so they could erupt in applause and shower the ice rink below with roses and teddy bears. That fucking Sarah Hughes.

As magnificent as Sarah was, I wasn’t panicking. Michelle had this. All she had to do was not fall. That’s it—just give the ol’ Kwan razzle-dazzle, land her jumps, and she’d skate easily to the top of the medal podium.

To the roar of the crowd, Ms. Kwan stepped onto the rink looking even more radiant than usual. Her stunning crimson costume with gold detail was perfectly accented with her signature necklace, a Chinese good-luck charm her grandmother Yung Chun gave to her when she was just a ten-year-old girl (she never takes it off—look it up). The cheering audience went silent as Michelle took her place at the center of the ice.

As a selection from
Scheherazade
, the Russian symphonic suite by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, began to echo throughout the arena, Michelle began her program, gliding toward her first series of jumps. I held my breath as she launched herself into the air.
Boom!
She landed it!
Thank God.
I exhaled and wiped my sweaty palms on my jeans. I felt like one of those fantastically annoying stage moms who coach their daughter’s choreography from the audience at beauty pageants (God, I can’t wait to have a daughter).

Then it was time for more jumps.
Boom!
Landed them again! That’s my girl! As she rounded the far end of the rink and entered the last minutes of her performance, a wave of excitement replaced my nervousness as I realized she was actually going to do this. Just two more jumps and the gold was hers!

Boom.
That was when it happened.

To be honest, dear reader, if it was up to me, I’d just end the chapter right here. It’s just too painful for me to continue. I mean, I had to actually live through the experience once, and now you want me to relive it through the written word? How dare you? That’s asking a lot of a man. But ever a champion, Michelle would want me to rise above my own great pain to tell the tale of her Great Fall. And so I shall.