Ciao, Bello

Hi! Thanks for stopping by! And thanks for the messages on Twitter!

Starting my new column in two weeks! Been in Italy for nearly a year and getting ready to start MEN I'VE HAD again. In the meantime, hope you catch up on some old columns that were originally published on Gaywired.com

Love you more than cake,

Alex

Anthony Robbins once said, "your life changes the moment you make a new, congruent, and committed decision."

At one point in the not so recent history, I had a series of dates with a guy who worked as a courier. Not the kind that rush around Hollywood on bikes and never bathe. No, Nicholas was an international man of mystery. He would report to the airport with little more than a backpack containing a few changes of clothes and passport and then meet his point person to retrieve a package. His tickets were hugely discounted or in some cases free.

Companies use travel couriers because sometimes it's cheaper for a courier company to have a person check freight through as luggage than it is for them to ship freight as air cargo. Nicholas would hop a plane and travel to far and exotic lands. After delivering the goods, he was free to enjoy his trip.

I always assumed Nicholas was in truth an exotic, high-end drug mule, but apparently his job is very real. You can actually sign up to be a part of a service and as long as your schedule is flexible, you can fly off to any destination a package needs to go to.

Two weeks ago I decided to leave Los Angeles. In two days, I'm moving to Italy on a one way ticket, thanks to the International Association of Air Travel Couriers.

After having lunch with Ryanne, I went home and stared at the walls of my rented home of eight years. Furniture, paintings, photographs, and dishes stared at me, mocking me as if to say, "Oh yeah, Peter Pan? What about us?"

Just as I was about to consider lighting a match or praying for an earthquake, Julie called. She and her girlfriend broke up for good - like for real this time- and she asked, "Do you know of anyone looking for a roommate?"

I asked how she felt about taking over a furnished home and she started weeping. That was taken care of and everybody won.

Later that night, I discovered a website called Couch Surfing which is like a combination of Craigslist and Facebook for international travel. You sign-up, make a profile and then review profiles of people who are willing to loan you their couch during your travels.

You can read reviews of people who have previously stayed with the local and decide if you might be a good fit and if they might be a potential rapist. It also led me to the idea of combining Manhunt and Westside Rentals, where older men can shop for desperate younger men.

I've already made friends with ten people in Rome, Florence and Venice. Now I plan on sleeping my way all over Italy, one futon at a time.

The past few days has been all about bagging clothes, loading my car, and dumping them in those yellow donation bins scattered around the city. Every time I place a bag inside, I feel a pang of sadness, that is equally matched by a rush of exhilaration. Physically purging my life, one bag at a time.

It's like shedding skin. Do I keep the t-shirt that Christopher left after our last time together or give it to the homeless? Do I hold on to the outfit I wore on my first date with Adam the First? Do I dump the socks I wore for the Malibu triathlon?

I'm renting a storage facility in North Hollywood where I moved my bike, journals, old televisions and other crap that I should have just donated to GoodWill but didn't want to just leave in the house for Julie to rifle through. Every day I make a trip and place another small load of my Hollywood life inside, locking it away like a tomb or a pyramid. Call it a rent-a-mausoleum.

I've been so wrapped up in getting things wrapped up that I haven't even had time to tell all my friends and posting, "moving to Italy" as a Facebook update just seems like a really bad idea. I can just imagine an intervention being staged via comments. And I don't want to see all the "like this" thumbs up icons and read "ten of your friends like this."

I have nothing here. Nothing is holding me. I'm not dating anyone. I have no job. No family. I will certainly miss seeing Ryanne, Jen, Kitty, Joe, Autumn, and Julie every day, but I need to find... something. Great love. Great sex. Great travels and adventures.

I'm excited to start a new life in Italy. I'm excited about traveling from town to town until I decide where I will stay put. Maybe I'll sell gelato at a tiny corner in Venice. Or maybe I'll work in a bed and breakfast in Milan. Jobs I wouldn't consider in a million years in West Hollywood suddenly seem romantic and beautiful in Europe.

When I moved to Los Angeles nearly ten years ago, I arrived with big hopes and big dreams. They've changed over the years, sometimes morphing into brilliance I could never have fathomed. And in some cases, they have been heartbreakingly devastating.

Saturday afternoon, I grabbed one of my last cups of coffee from my beloved Java Detour and sat on the patio watching all the young gay kids go by. I watched as the Abbey bartenders came in for their shots of espresso before their shifts in their tight black tank tops. I watched as couples strolled hand in hand and as random passersby would turn to check out the fresh meat that walked passed them. I imagine this must be what it is like to be a ghost. To be invisible and observe.

I've grown tired. Tired of fighting for everything. Tired of fighting for jobs. Fighting for what is rightfully due to me. Fighting for attention. And fighting for the right to marry when I can't even find good date material.

Last Tuesday, the Supreme Court ruled, upholding Prop 8 and that evening I joined thousands of others in West Hollywood to rally and scream.

I honestly felt like a poser. Like I should be there. I watched as couples stood, holding hands and carrying signs. Kissing. Hugging. But I couldn't help but feel like saying, 'We've been here before.'

Once the speeches were over, we took to the streets. When we arrived at Hollywood and Highland, I found Cooper, surrounded by a gaggle of boys. The Borg Queen surrounded by her clones.

Since I came into this column with Cooper, it is fitting that I should go out with him. With the lights of Graumann's Chinese Theater reflecting off his perfect skin, he ran up to me and jumped on me in the middle of the street.

"HOW GREAT IS THIS!?" he screamed like Mel Gibson rallying the troops to their death inBraveheart.

"It's great," I said. As I looked over his shoulder to his gays, I caught the eye of his new boyfriend. The child shot daggers at me. This is not how I wanted to do 'the big goodbye.'

I grabbed Cooper by the head, stared at his face and just said, "I have to go."

"You leaving already? It's just getting good!"

I couldn't hold back the tears, so I just hugged him and screamed into his ear (due to the loud crowd), "You know me. I always leave the party early."

I pushed him away and started walking away from the crowd, stomping my own path down Hollywood Blvd. It felt like I was doing a one man exodus. I stopped and turned around, momentarily struck by the fear that I would turn to a pillar of salt for looking back, but it was a picture perfect moment as thousands of gay men and women stood for what they wanted and what was rightfully theirs.

I watched as Cooper took the new boy's hand and led him into the crowd. It was only then that I was able to say to no one in particular, 'Goodbye.'

This morning I found myself at a coffee shop in Silver Lake. The gentleman in front of me turned around, pulling down his sunglasses (under his baseball cap, natch) and asked, "Where do I know you from?"

I used my go to answer, 'Well I do porn.' He then looked down at my crotch, as if my zipper was going to fall open, my penis slide out and say, 'Remember me in Lord of the Cock Ring? I was the top in the Mordor bukkake scene.'

He looked familiar too and I quickly realized the man in front of me was in fact, a closeted movie star, currently appearing in one of the biggest movies of the year.

We met at a party two years ago but ended up spending the entire night talking about theatre by a fire pit in the back yard of a mutual friend's Echo Park home.

I couldn't believe that I had forgotten that anecdote, even after seeing his movie for the second time recently. "Fire pit," I said.

"You think graham crackers are sad," he said, with a flash of remembrance.

I couldn't believe that he actually remembered that little piece of trivia (and for the record, I said that I thought Teddy Grahams were sad, because the little bears look too happy to eat them).

I reminded him of my name and he reminded me of his, which was cute and strange at the same time.

"So what are you doing now?" he asked.

"Moving to Italy in two days."

He did that thing where he said, "Why?" all disappointed like.

I didn't really have a good answer, other than, "I hate everything." I just shrugged and said, "The light is different in Italy."

We sat there and stared at each other. He took his coffee, smiled and said, "Well I hope you find what you're looking for. Ciao bello."

"That means 'goodbye beautiful,'" I said.

He smiled, nodded and as he walked out, he turned, saying, "We'll always have Teddy Grahams."

As I sit in my home, staring at the walls ( thankful they can ot talk), I'm reminded of all the great moments I've had here. But it's time for a change. It's time to go. Even Lauren Conrad left The Hills.

Sometimes you have to lose everything in order to find yourself.

My favorite spot in the entire world is a small bench in Bonaventure Cemetery in Savannah, Georgia. It's the grave of Conrad Aiken. He wanted a bench so that visitors could stop by and enjoy a drink of Madeira at his grave. The bench is inscribed with, "Give my love to the world," and "Cosmos Mariner—Destination Unknown."

Arrivederci!