Timeless

I'm feeling a lot like Counselor Troi in the Star Trek: TNG episode, "The Survivors." In this episode, the comely counselor is plagued by a music box melody that eventually drives her temporarily insane. It is later revealed that the music was placed in her mind by an alien posing as a very old man trying to hold onto the past. At this very moment, I am at work listening to the CD playlist compiled by my boss and I feel a lot like Counselor Troi... but with cooler clothes and without the fake accent.

My boss doesn't have any music that was released after the year 2000, and the worst part is seeing him picking from his CD collection every morning. Who still has CDs in this millennium? I've got a little saying: It's MP3 or it's not for me! I just don't see why I have to listen to Renee Olstead's rendition of Midnight at the Oasis fifty times a day. Who the hell is Renee Olstead, anyway? Do you get my point?

Watching him decide which CDs to put in the machine is a lot like watching a witch dust off the ingredients in her cupboard as she decides whether to put the eye of newt into her cauldron that she's using to make a deadly potion.

If there's one thing that a gay man needs to be wary of, it's being stuck in the past. This actually applies to straight people as well, but it's sadder when it happens to a gay man. We've all seen examples of this in men who sport 70s porn star mustaches or Members Only jackets. I see it a lot in the naked pictures of personals ads. There's one where a man is standing in his shower, half covered by maroon chiffon ruffly shower curtains. In my boss' case, it's the music he chooses to play at work.

I think that people cling these remnants of the past because it's familiar and comfortable. It's a security blanket that ultimately won't protect them from the world as it's swept by the winds of change. Before they know it, they'll be forty seven years old and walking like an Egyptian when they hear music playing at a club. My friend Joe disagrees, believing that gay men hang on to the past because they completely lose track of what's new and how things change. He even offered some possible reasons as to why my boss still puts CDs in the stereo instead of letting me hook my mp3 player into it:

A) he's unaware that things have changed
2) he's unable to adapt any longer

C) he can try to change with the times but he looks ridiculous. (Joe is referring to my 48 year old boss' daily use of a faux hawk)

Whatever his reasons are, the fact is that I shouldn't worry about what I can't control. All I can do is make sure that I don't end up that way. And yes, the music is still playing.