Andrew J. Lederer

Just hung out with a friend, plotting ideas for various media and basically having a good time. At a certain point, I was mentioning the sloppy, frat-boy aesthetic of Reginald D. Hunter and John Gordillo's house (the one time I saw it) and my friend said (regarding Reg), "Well, you saw his place in Edinburgh, right?"

I said, "No," and he said, "You weren't at any of the parties?" and I said, "No," and he said, "Why?" and I said, "I wasn't invited."

Way to reopen old wounds. (See Party Week.)

Not yet told here is how, on the last Sunday of the fest, Reg, who by now knew I felt bad about missing the earlier party (or perhaps I should say an earlier party -- who knows how many they had?) said, "That just happened spontaneously. There may be another one tonight. I'll letcha know if there is."

Or maybe he said that the previous night. All I know is that on Sunday night, he saw me lurking expectantly and told me nothing was happening but he was going to some pizza place with some woman and I could come if I wanted.

I said I might come in a while and did go after a while but they weren't there.

Well, maybe they had been and gone but when I told him on Monday that I had gone and he wasn't there, he said something like, "I know," with a tone in his voice I hadn't heard before that seemed to suggest I'd been ditched.

But, if so, why? He had been so warm during the festival, putting his arm around me, sharing ideas, seeming like he could, maybe, be a new friend. Had I seemed too needy? Had the poor show I'd done the day he came to see me marked me as unworthy of his companionship?

Or maybe there was nothing to be invited to and no dismissive subtext. He hadn't had my contact information when there was fun to be had and now that he had it, there was no fun to share and that's just the way it ended up being.

But -- just a little while ago -- my friend's question had me asking these questions all over again. And feeling all the feelings.

With no answers (which, depending on what they would be, might be a good thing).


(Note to Claire Smith -- Enough overwrought, pitiable paranoia for you?)


By the way, my friend's point about Reg's Edinburgh place was that it was nice.

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