"The Poet's Corner..."

To have loved, to have been made happy thus,

What better fate has life in store for us?

ARTHUR SYMONS

"Same Gender Loving People - No. 4477"

"Love Is Life's Reason..."

Positive images of people like me... The truth of the matter is that we all need to see people like ourselves. So everyday, I'll post a photo, drawing or some other artwork that depicts Same Gender Loving People as what we are... Only Human.

"This Made Me Smile..."

"We Were Always There..."

"Selfie Love..."

"Selfie Love" - those beautiful, grainy, out-of-focus self-pics that capture the truth of true love..."

"The Things That Love Says..."

"The Imitation Of Life..."

"Triple Standard" is the story of a homophobic ex professional athlete who is forced to face the reality that he himself is gay. Edited for YouTube, see the full original version go to www.brandenblinn.com

"The Artist's Corner..."

"Cowboy"

Oil on canvas

Thomas Blackshear II

"The Truth About Today..."

Despite what some may think, today is not national BBQ day...

A little later this morning, my youngest son and I will visit the cemetery to clean and decorate my parents' graves.  My father was proud to have served our nation in WWII.  And despite having to serve in a racially segregated Navy, where his many talents went unrecognized simply because he was a Black man, he never expressed anything except patriotism, hope and faith in our country.  After the war he would go on to be very active in the veteran community and even served as the commander of his VFW post in the 1950s. 

Although at home, he rarely spoke of his wartime experiences in the Pacific theatre and of the death and dying and cruelty and inhumanity he had witnessed, I am most proud of two of the "war stories" he first shared with me when I was just 16 years old, because they spoke to his core belief that there is a basic good in all people.... 

"Colored sailors in the Pacific theatre"

Late in the war, having survived numerous battles at sea as the Americans fought their way across the Pacific, my father was finally given shore duty and was was stationed on the Island of Guam for some months.  On Guam, he and his detail of fellow "colored sailors" were responsible for guarding a naval supply depot. The Japanese had been pushed off the island just weeks before, but some of their men had been left behind and were surviving in the jungles that surrounded the base.

He said each night as the sentries would walk their posts, gunfire would ring out as the abandoned Japanese tried to steal food that for the Americans was so plentiful that rations were stacked on pallets on the beach. My father told me that whenever he was in charge of the watch, he instructed his men not to shoot at the Japanese, but instead to "keep walking and just let off a shot or two in the air so the officers know we're on our posts." He told me that those were his instructions to the men, because he said, “No man should have to die because he’s hungry!”

He also told me of once leading a patrol through the perimeter jungle and coming on a group of armed Japanese. Guns were leveled and a standoff ensued. Although what the Japanese were saying was unintelligible to my father and the other men, the leader of the Japanese motioned to my father’s feet and looking at his foe, my father knew how to end the standoff. He instructed all his men to lower their weapons and take off their shoes as he did just that. The Japanese were barefooted and their feet were covered in bleeding sores. The jungle is no place to be without shoes.

My father told his men to step back from their shoes, but some protested… And it was then that my father said, “These men have no shoes and we have them by the God-damned crate load on the base, give them your shoes!” Everyone took two steps back and the Japanese ran forward, snatched up the shoes and backed away into the jungle brush from which they had appeared. My father and his men finished their patrol and marched back to base as barefooted as the Japanese had been, but no man from either side had perished. Not a shot rang out in anger, for my father realized that these were men swept up in the tides of war just as he was... there was no need to kill over shoes.  It was no doubt apparent to all including the desperate Japanese that our victory was all but assured and the following year it was achieved with the dropping of two atomic bombs on the Japanese home islands.

My father (center) on Guam, early 1945

And so, with this I am reminded as I enjoy the freedoms that we take for granted... Freedom is not free! It's been bought through the ages with blood and treasure and with the greatest of sacrifices.  Yes, I'll enjoy a cookout this evening, but I'll also pause to remember those including my father and uncles whose service and sacrifice made such common enjoyments possible for us all.

Thank You Dad!

"The Artist's Corner..."

"Identities"

Acrylic on canvas

Steve Walker

"The Views To Love..."

"The Things That Love Says..."

I felt I had stepped into something big and splendid, as if I had been a caterpillar walking into the heart of a red rose. I felt prim and small and petty. Until then I had never known what love meant.

- William John Locke

"The Poet's Corner..."

"The Truth About Love..."

Love is a very difficult -- occupation. You got to work at it, man. It ain't a thing every Tom, Dick and Harry has got a true aptitude for.

- Tennessee Williams

"We Were Always There..."

"Selfie Love..."

"Selfie Love" - those beautiful, grainy, out-of-focus self-pics that capture the truth of true love..."

"A Little Sane Advice..."

"The Imitation Of Life..."

"The Artist's Corner..."

"Nino"

Oil on canvas

George William Clark

"The Views To Love..."

"The Truth About Love..."

To love is for the Soul to choose a companion, and travel with it along the perilous defiles and winding ways of life; mutually sustaining, when it is rugged with obstructions, and mutually rejoicing, when rich broad plains and sunny slopes make journeying delight.

- George Henry Lewes

"This Made Me Smile..."

This reminded me that there were some

good days to be remembered from my childhood.

"The Things That Love Says..."

Our love is about small days to build memories upon, simple adventures we experience together.

"We Were Always There..."

"Selfie Love..."

"Selfie Love" - those beautiful, grainy, out-of-focus self-pics that capture the truth of true love..."

"A Little Sane Advice..."

"Fuck waiting... Say that thing you've been wanting to say. Do that thing you've been wanting to do. Stop fucking waiting. Time runs out."

- You could lose it all in a second.

"The Imitation Of Life..."

This is perhaps my favorite scene from the original and still the best, 1970's "The Boys In The Band."  Although I would come of age more than 10 years later, in the midst of the AIDS crisis, this film poignantly reflects the loneliness, fear and anxiety that for the first 40 years of my life I believed would be my fate as a closeted gay man in deep denial of what I knew to be my truth.  In fact, although the film only alludes to a happy ending for Hank and Larry, it was enough to give me hope as I struggled with my own doubts about the nature of love and my hopes for any future happiness.  

I first saw this film on CBET-TV 9 out of Windsor, Ontario, Canada. It was one of many films that Canadian television bravely aired which would never even have been considered in the U.S. in the era in which I grew up.

"The Artist's Corner..."

"Model's Rest"

Oil on canvas

Randall Lake

"The Views To Love..."