All-American Boy

Has anyone heard of Steve Grand?

He's the Chicago-born gay singer that the media labeled "the first out gay country singer" back when his first music video for "All-American Boy" went viral in the summer of 2013. He never used the "country" label himself, although the song and video definitely had a bit of a country vibe to it. I was quite impressed by the video at the time. Part of that was Steve's looks of course. He is super hunky, with a near perfect physique (he used to model and his underwear pics are all over the internet). The other part, however, was that the song was actually damn catchy!

Then he released a second song, called "Stay." I liked that one even more! Super catchy, and I knew that this was a singer to watch. So when he started a Kickstarter campaign to fund his debut album, I made sure to contribute. The campaign was a record setter, surpassing his $81,000 goal in a single day and amassing a total of more than $300,000 by the time the campaign was closed. It was one of the most successful music campaigns in Kickstarter history.

It has taken awhile, but I have finally received my Kickstarter rewards, including a handwritten thank you note and a signed copy of the album itself! I am quite impressed with the album. And it turns out I haven't quite made the switch to country, as the album really is more of a rock album than anything else. Some songs have a bit of a country vibe, but others are straight forward rock, and one song in particular ("We Are the Night") is straight up Gaga-esque dance pop. It's pretty much Grand's "Born This Way."

So if you want to pick up an album full of great, catchy songs song by a gay dreamboat, I highly recommend All-American Boy :)

Here's the song "Stay", which I can't get enough of.

Cal's still here

Yep, I've definitely fallen off blogging again.

When I started this new blog I was all determined to start writing a lot more regularly. It didn't quite happen.

Perhaps one reason is, even though I was trying to move forward from the "All Mixed Up" version of Cal, over the past couple months I feel like I've sort of slid back into it. Once again the inner critic is becoming extremely vocal. The anxiety is rising. The ruminations growing. The career questions returning. The longing for my former relationship, which is now more than 2 years dead, resuming.

Maybe it's embarrassment? I want this to be the story of a guy who starts out hopelessly lost and confused, but gradually finds himself and builds the life of his dreams. I don't want it to be the story of a guy who keeps running in circles in his own mind, beating the same couple of issues to death over and over and over again.

At the same time, I know that what I should be aiming for in my writing is authenticity. Regardless of how frustrating and repetitive my issues are for me, they are still real.

The latest back slide was exacerbated by the guy that I've been going out with for the past month and a half or so. He's a really nice, cute guy who one might call a gaymer. We get along very well, have quite a number of things in common, and generally enjoy each others' company. However, over the past week I started to sense what could be a pulling away on his part. Knowing from past experience the consequences of ignoring such feelings, I decided to ask him at lunch over the weekend what his thoughts were about us. He told me he'd like to keep seeing each other for now, but he's not quite sure of our chemistry.

And there it is, that word that keeps sabotaging my most promising relationships. Chemistry was what my ex Ben cited as a problem, and it was also apparently something that Dean found lacking (in bed at least). The fact that this keeps happening leads me to two possibilities: 1) There is an epidemic among gay men of holding out for some elusive "feeling" at the expense of things like compatibility, similarity, etc. 2) There is something about me that is blocking guys from feeling chemistry with me.

Maybe it's my less-than-average sexual drive. Or maybe I'm still too guarded because of my bad experience (obviously that doesn't explain my ex, only the guys since). Or maybe it is just the luck of the draw. Whatever it is I'm afraid of getting trapped in a vicious cycle, where each subsequent failure makes me lose more hope, and thus have an even harder time connecting with romantic prospects. I've got to break the cycle somehow.

I've set up a phone consultation with a therapist based in San Francisco that specializes in gay male relationships. A lot of things on his website resonated with me. I know that a lot of my problems are in my head. By continuing to idealize my old relationship and allowing myself to lose hope, I'm setting myself up for failure. I've got to learn not to depend on finding someone. I've got to learn how to be happy on my own.

I'm reading a book called "Stumbling on Happiness" by Daniel Gilbert, a psychologist at Harvard. It's very interesting so far, though I'm not very far into it. Basically, it's about how human beings really aren't good about predicting what will make them happy.

I'd love to stumble in the right direction soon!