Back to Pat with Pat

My whole life I was called Pat. I hated the name and I hated the name Patrick as well. My middle name is James and I wanted to be P. James as I thought that would be better. But knowing I was named for my grandfather I decided to stick with Pat. I ran for Student Body Vice President in grammar school with the campaign slogan "Go to Bat with Pat." I thought "Go to Bat FOR Pat" was a bit much so I changed it, but once word got out I was going to vote for myself and not my opponent I lost by a landslide. It was the last ego/bit of confidence I would have for a while.

When my voice got deeper and my tone flatter I remember having difficulty getting people to understand me when I said my name. It always sounded like "POT" and I was forever getting "Tod?" asked back to me when I said my name on the phone. Yes, Tod. I still don't get it, but it happened often. This was turning from frustration/embarrassment into a hang up. One of my earliest.

I went through high school and college as Pat. I moved to Scotland and I was Pat. And to some affectionately (if not derogatorily?) , "Paddy." Once I got into banking back in San Francisco I felt that I was not being taken seriously enough. (Sadly by me, but I ignored that.) I thought the obvious solution was to buy some suits (a good suggestion by my mentor at the time) and change my name to Patrick. This was far easier to understand and it sounded solid. Patrick it was. Patrick it is. Never had the Tod problem again, but respect didn't come flooding in either. I was Patrick now and never thought any more of it.

Moved to LA for 12.5 years. Patrick. Moved to New York. Patrick.

For some time before my move to New York I was struggling. Having lost both my parents (who called me Pat) and getting older, I have found myself longing for some roots, some sort of touchstone of who I was or some return to what I thought I rejected. I never really felt like Patrick, but still lived in fear of pronouncing Pat since I am a mumbler. But nonetheless I have been slowly moving "Back to Pat with Pat." The pipe band in New York I joined introducing myself as Pat. Irish folk are the easiest to get to embrace this.

My family mostly calls me Pat and I am "Uncle Pat" to their kids. What to do with all the years and years of people who know me only as Patrick? It is hard to switch. I have a friend Sue who I think now is going by Susan. I know her as Sue. I guess if she asked me I would make the switch. Why is it so hard to comply with the "person who must be called" just because we don't initially know them that way?

I get from some: "Patrick is so much more solid." "You look so much more like a Patrick than a Pat." ( I would look so much more like a Jason if that is how they first met me.) People are inflexible initially with a name they only have to call, not be! If I were to have a sex change, this whole issue would be moot, but I would be farther from my roots still and the eyeliner would do my head in.

When I first met my brother-in-law he had a Renaissance Faire name which nearly killed my dad, but now we call him Jeff. A good choice as that is his name. He gave up the ren fair name and we just embraced that change happily. Hey Jeffrey! (Nah, he would never go for that.)

I like Pat because it is familiar and I feel that is who I am to people and with people. I am a guy you grew up with and not a Matthew, Christopher, Robert kind of guy. I guess I will grandfather in all the people who call me Patrick and allow it as I am sure I will grow affectionate of it as well, but I am thinking as I go forward I will be Pat again. It feels foreign to even say, but it was my original name and I want it back.

La Vie Quebec

This house where I am writing from the porch in photo below has been in Ashley's family for over 100 years.

Okay. In the tradition of my fickleness, I now want to take a French-Canadian lover, buy a house on a lake in Quebec and come up summer and winter from New York to live there and entertain. I now model my life after Julie and Cathy who have somewhat done that save for New York for them is Sausalito.

Now back to our normal programming:

I woke up in my LOVELY room in an old summer home with a view of the lake. Grandma's furniture and down comforter and lovely sheets. I am so signed on for all of this living.

We had great coffee out on the porch overlooking the lake and then I made eggs and toast. All the riveting, blog-worthy info one could want to read. Ash, Jan and I drove with baby Bodie to see the Gorge and suspension bridge. It was a lovey day out. We had lunch in Ayer's Cliff afterwards and headed home for a quick quiet moment of swimming in the lake in front of "our" house before having dinner at Kathy and Julie's place which is on another part of the lake.

At Cathy and Julie's drinks were served lakeside and then we were up at the house for a lovely meal and a "how do ya'll meet" stories. People, food, stories. I think that is about my idea of heaven. It was great.

What a great day out and now I will sleep like a king in my farmhouse bedroom that I love so much. And I found out this was patriarch Warren's room when he was a boy. Cool.

Man, Hat Out.

Manhatin has gone out of his gotham island comfort zone to visit friends, get all rural, and jump in a lake.



I got on my first plane in 8+ months and flew to Burlington, VT where I rented a car and drove to Quebec to meet my friend's Jan and Ashley and stay at Ashley's family's summer home in N. Hatley, Quebec, Canada.

I was told to take 91 and bring a bottle of Vodka. I got the vodka but never saw 91. I entered Quebec on 89 and was way ouest of where I was supposed to be. I called this a "beautiful mistake" as I got to drive through gorgeous wine county and lovely gorges, etc. It was stunning. And I am a sucker for red barns with silos and B & W cows. Love this part of the world.

Arrived only 1 hour late. What a lovely place! This home has been in the family for 100 years and overlooks Lake Massawippi. Warren and Laur were so welcoming and there were guest having cocktail hour out on the porch! It was the start of a summer by a lake that was spot on.



Laur made a beautiful meal and we dined indoors with 10 of us all around. 2 joined for dessert and we retired to the living room for chat and vino and tea and good craic!

I Can't Write a Title Tonight.

I went out this evening with my digital camera to film a New York street scene for the blog as I am feeling it is good to just go and out teach myself these things and try them out on you. I am going to face my fears of filmmaking with or without the sold out Flip Mino. I thought that I would be self-conscious talking to myself in the street walking with a digital camera. I was not. It was easy once I realized that it all just doesn't matter and no one really cares as they are too busy with their own lives to even notice a wink. I was right.

Then I saw two friends, Mark and Phil, on the Upper West Side. They told me our friend Bo died this morning. Simple as that. I am still so shocked by this news and this is where blogging gets funny for me. Something so personal, so sudden and so confusing and I work it out in cyberspace?

He died unexpectedly from a clot in his leg that was not even a thought a day or so ago. He was 39 and healthy and just the sweetest man. Dammit. So I was going to talk street scenes and now I am eulogizing. That is messed up. He was loving and crazy and full of the greatest take on life I have to say. He worked at the MAC counter at Macy's and was passionate about skin. MY skin. He came to my house a few months back and gave me a facial and told me to get Vitamin E oil. Quick! He gave me products.

I met Bo through our mutual friend Brad who is in Los Angeles and was so kind to hook me up with people for my arrival in NYC. I met Bo and his partner Andy almost immediately. I went up to their way cool rooftop apartment they just bought and moved into right when I got here in October. It breaks my heart to think about what Andy is going through right now. Just plucked right out of life. Just plucked.

I can't even believe I am doing this diary entry and he is not gone 24 hours. I used the shaving cream he gave me this weekend and was going to e-mail him to ask him what the other two jars were as I forgot and could not read what I wrote on the sticker. I was going to write him. I did not. Not yet. Too late.

The worst of this few hours aftermath was having to call Brad and tell him his partner in crime is gone. I so wish I could be there as I am sure it is going to be tough on him. This is true, painful, hole-deep and black-empty, loss.

If I had to air my thoughts I air them in tribute and I send Andy and the family wishes heartfelt and pure. It is almost like laying flowers by the telephone pole where the freak accident happened. Or writing on a memorial wall by the house. I use this here to do this same thing.

But I cannot yet miss or mourn someone I cannot see as gone. Bo. Your white shirts and your few day's growth. Your smile. I am not sure that it is not there. I am so sorry. So sorry.

Into the Dark Night

It is a dark night indeed as I write this. It is going to be a light morning if I don't get to bed soon.

Here I am just announcing I want to vlog and thinking about getting a Flip camera and Christopher Nolan shoots "The Dark Knight," the new Batman movie.

I went to a screening of it tonight and it is superb. It is an incredible achievement in large scale action filmmaking. I could not shoot one chase scene of it. He is an amazing director. I will not spoil it. My only issues were with length, one casting choice, and another motivational choice, but overall the whole thing is top notch. If you want a fright and a psychological thrill ride, go see "The Dark Knight."



Heath Ledger was to me like Kathy Bates was in "Misery" - so convincing in his madness that one could no longer see the actor behind the character. Amazing performance. He was really something especially when you think of his Ennis role in "Brokeback Mountain." So many major lights burn so bright and then must go out. I guess that was his story.

Another thing was that Chicago instead of New York stood in for Gotham. Chicago itself was a great character in this. I have to go see that city.

Come Up with a Really Good Title

My mentor. Doesn't he look like a mentor? In a good way.
A good mentor.

Fred Seibert. I am going to call him one of my mentors whether he accepts that or not. Unlike the rest of you, I have him to thank for me getting into blogging. And facing my cyberfears.

Aha, Fred Cybert!

Last I saw Fred was in LA. (I was introduced through my friend Kevin Kolde who has to be one of my best finds in the entertainment business!) Today I met him at his cool offices on Park Avenue South. This guy is kind of a giant (and I am aware he is reading this so I have to write carefully here) and is a founder of Next New Networks among many other accomplishments and fires and irons in them.

We chatted about, well, me and my new issues and he went on about blogging, content, mobile and life with choice. As always I was enlightened and frightened.

It was excellent. Last time he just told me to blog. When I would open my mouth he would say blog. And here I am blogging. This time I had talked to him about shooting digital video. He told me shoot my foot with my digital camera.



I now just do what he tells me.



Here is my first film Fred.

Train back to Reality

All good things must end or else they would just be things.

It was time for me to leave the sandy Never Neverland of Fire Island and the wonderful, warm hospitality of the Weinstein's to take the boat to the shuttle to the train to the subway back home. This, to me, is so novel and so East Coast or Euro. I loved it. There was no car involved in this trip.

I got back to the Upper West Side of Manhattan and went to the 79th Street Basin to meet my pal Jerry and his friends for Burgers and Beer. This place is right on the Hudson River and is so happening in the summer. The whole cast of Young Frankenstein on Broadway was at the tables next to us and I spied Megan Mullally and Andrea Martin hanging with the gypsies.





It was Jerry's birthday on the 4th of July and homemade cupcakes materialized and it was a lot of fun. I met many of these folks at Jerry's at New Year. It was good to see them in their summer gear.





I hobbled home on my heel spur and faced the night.