Greetings from the western foothills of Vermont's beautiful Green Mountains!
Some of you are probably wondering, "What's a handsome man of color like me living in the second-whitest state [after Maine] in the U.S.?"
And the most rural state in the Northeast?
Simply put, I love the slower, more peaceful pace of living here. After 41 years of enduring the big-city rat race -- first in my native, always-running-on-high-octane New York City, then in amazingly goofy (and OUTRAGEOUSLY expensive) San Francisco -- I needed to make a change to life in the slow lane for my own peace of mind.
But once a city kid, always a city kid and when I do get the occasional urge to taste the big-city life again, it's only a 2 1/2 to 3-hour drive north to Montreal.
As you can see from my photograph, I'm a very unique individual. I'm a "Black Indian," a proud melange of Creole and Cherokee. Indeed, a lot of people in the Burlington area have stopped me on the street to say how closely I resemble the late "punk-funk" star Rick James. I enjoy the compliment (And there ARE times when I wish I could play the guitar and bust into a dead-on "Super Freak" impersonation on karaoke night), but I'm much more mellow than "Slick Rick," God rest his soul.
Originally raised a Roman
holic, I've been a practicing Pagan since 1984, following both Wiccan and Native American traditions.
-- that wonderful and precious gift from God that makes life worth living -- knows no limits. And thus, my capacity to love freely, joyfully and honestly likewise also knows no limits.
The same can be said for my cultural tastes. As a part-time DJ who hosts a local smooth-jazz radio program in the Barre/Montpelier area, I enjoy nearly all kinds of music: From rock & roll to rhythm & blues to funk & soul; from jazz to New Age to classical; from disco to techno to trance. A longtime Grateful Dead fan, I'm especially drawn to the evolving "jam band" scene (Phish, String Cheese Incident, Stangefolk, etc.).
I enjoy a good movie from time to time, whether the latest Hollywood blockbuster or the newest film on the independent "art house" circuit. I don't watch as much TV entertainment as I used to, though -- and what TV entertainment I do watch is mainly on the Canadian channels (Oh, the joy of living near the Canadian border! Okay, I admit it: I'm a "Canadophile" -- I have a French-Canadian ex-boyfriend).
I'm a sports fan, enjoying baseball, ice hockey and especially international spectaculars such as the Olympics and the World Cup soccer tournament.
I'm also quite outspoken in my views on politics, culture and events in the news -- I write a weekly Internet blog on those topics that is updated every Monday (BP rules don't allow me to list the Web address of my blog here, but I can relay it to you privately, if you wish).
And, yes, I'll admit to two "guilty pleasures" of trash culture -- "The Jerry Springer Show" and the crazy circus that is Vince McMahon's World Wrestling Entertainment.
Having come of age during the heyday of the Haight-Ashbury "flower children" in the late '60s and of wild-and-woolly Greenwich Village gay scene of the early-to-mid '70s, I'm deep down, in my heart-of-hearts, still something of a "lavender hippie" after all these years. Although I long ago stopped wearing flowers in my hair (Not an easy thing to do with dreadlocks), I still live by the flower children's credo of "We Are All One" -- a credo that was indeed inspired by God.
So feel free to drop me an e-line at any time. I'd love to hear from you.
Blessed Be,
Skeeter