Soggy with nostalgia

So I’m assuming you’ve read this post by my Spouse, Kip. It’s about the six bright young things in comics known collectively as Pants Press. But it’s also about our gang when we were bright young things—well, specifically me, Amy, Barry and Paul. Let’s call us the Haberdashery, my favorite of the names that Scott foisted upon us.

My gang back in the day: Amy, Barry and Paul

This post of Kip’s has got me ruminating. God, I remember phone conversations with Barry, each of us determined to be published by 25 years of age. Ha! And I also remember when Paul, and then Amy, put aside cartooning for other pursuits. (Paul used to cartoon like this, and this was a typical Amy drawing.)

But what it most got me to thinking about was how we all met. Funny, I actually have been requested to recount how I met various people a few times the past couple of months, Barry and Kip included. With the people I meet these days, it‘s a pretty simple path—introductions usually begin via websites and email. Back then it seemed all so much more convoluted and subject to happenstance.

First, for me, there was Amy. We met while attending Rumson Country Day School, a posh preppy school that was my warm-up for boarding school. We Did Not Fit In, so eventually formed a team and discovered all that we had in common. And, according to Amy, I gave us one more thing to have in common, by introducing her to the wide world of comic books.

Fast forward a few years. I’m in college, so is Amy. We were dabbling in mini-comics at this point. I train from Pittsburgh, where I’m going to school, to Jersey City, where Amy is living at the time. Soon after I arrive, we train into NYC to attend a comic book convention. There’s someone she wants me to meet (several someones, actually) but primarily she wants me to meet Scott McCloud, the cartoonist who does Zot!, a comic we both bought regularly.

Having just recovered from mono and being fairly train-lagged, I don’t remember much of that Con. Except that I spelled Scott at some point, so he could use the restroom, I bought a page of Destroy! at a college discount (Scott’s idea) and, for some reason, Will Eisner touched my cheek (I think I had just done a fan-girl gush at him). And I only really remember the whole watching Scott’s table bit because Amy likes to recount that moment of glory of when I was Scott McCloud for a few minutes. I do remember Amy seemed disappointed that a few people hadn’t made it, some people she’d met at Scott’s table during previous conventions.

Move ahead a couple of years. I have graduated college and Amy was about to transfer to another one out in Portland, Oregon. We have decided to go to the Chicago Con with those people she’d met around Scott’s table. In preparation for this, Amy and I were going to spend the weekend with one of them in Manhattan to help them produce, collate and staple their anthology mag, Event Horizon. At the very, very last minute, Amy announced that she couldn’t go to Manhattan because she needed to help her mother with her catering business. She insisted that I still go to help and then promptly phoned the one in Manhattan and handed me the phone so we could work out the details. And that was my introduction to Barry.

Barry was to meet my train from Jersey at Penn Station. Not convinced that we were able to describe ourselves succinctly enough (or that we were that interesting looking) we told each other what distinctive clothing we would be wearing. I also agreed to carry my stuffed Gund lion. For the life of me, I can’t remeber what Barry wore that was distinctive. I want to say a top hat, but as I am generally overfond of the idea of Barry in a top hat, I don’t trust that thought.

What I still find striking to this day is the descrepancy between Barry’s voice and his appearance. His voice is soft, lilting, what some would describe as effeminate—certainly most phone solicitors address him as “Ma’am” when he picks up the phone.

We actually circled each other a couple of times in Penn Station, unsure if we were us. On my part, my confusion was based on the fact that Barry looked like a thug. He appeared more likely to lead a motorcycle gang and smash beer cans on his forehead than to produce sensitive brushworked cartoons.

Go to his blog, and scroll down til you hit the last figure in the right hand column, right below the Tony Krushner quote and above the site meter icon. That’s Barry, except his hair isn’t usually under such tight control. It was particularly wild that day and his beard and mustache were scraggly and of ill repute.

We eventually introduced ourselves and I found out that I looked much more butch than he was expecting as well. Plus he’d thought my stuffed lion was a dog. I barely had time wonder how many other dorks wander around Penn Station clutching stuffed animals before Barry herded me off to the Long Island trains so we could meet Paul. Barry spotted him as soon as we reached the platform, made sure Paul saw us, and then started to pull me away in the opposite direction. I remember the odd confluence of emotions passing over Paul’s face: amusement, annoyance and (I think) delight that Barry was doing something so Barry-like.

Barry finally let Paul catch up and introductions were made, but before we left the station they made me open the portfolio I was carrying and show them what I‘ve done comics-wise. They made noises and gestures of approval, and then we went off to the subway.

And spent the weekend not producing the next Event Horizon as they both still had things left to draw. It was all very fun though. Barry and I stayed up late talking about sex and sexuality, the morals of society, and an anecdote Barry told about one of my future, yet-to-be-met husband’s best men, Phil. Apparently, Phil had a habit of calling out “Come in naked!” whenever someone knocked on his door. Well, one day, Barry did—thus curing Phil of that particular greeting.

Much of that weekend summed up my soon-to-be friendship with Barry. The talks we had, the sharing of art techniques (at this point Barry was using black Letraset Graphic Tape to create his borders—madness, I tell you, madness!) as well my ending up doing all the dirty dishes in return for being fed. Also, there was the event of Barry disposing of the grease from the bacon he’d just cooked by opening a window and pouring the pan leavings into the alley some three stories below. When I expressed my dismay, he assured me it was all right, that he and the people he shared the apartment with did it all the time to deter the nefarious nighttime activities that went on in that same alley. Over the years, I’ve learned how Barry likes to elaborate on the events of everyday life, seeing how much he can get away with before confessing. Now, I did see in the alley evidence of the events Barry described, but now I would know to question if they truly dumped their grease like that, or if he did it just to shock me.

Kip, Paul and Barry.

I didn’t really to get to know Paul that well that weekend. We actually got better acquainted after Barry (and Kip) moved to Boston, then Amherst, Massachusetts. I used to drive up from New Jersey various weekends, sometimes picking up Paul from a train station along the way. We got a chance to talk and gossip before entering the social fray, which would still often focus around meeting with Scott and now Ivy. In fact, it felt like Kip and Barry were following Scott and Ivy for a bit—first Boston (where they didn’t actually live, though Ivy was working at a museum there) and then Amherst.

Scott and Ivy at a Chinese restaurant in Boston.

I actually ended up sharing a house with Barry, Paul and a few others in Amherst for a couple of years (and Kip, with whom I was also sharing a bed at this point). One of my favorite things we did as a house was taking turns reading aloud from The Lord of the Rings. Whereas Kip continues to rave about Barry doing a Wallace Shawn impression for Gandalf, I was always fond of Paul’s rendition of Frodo and Sam as Kermit the Frog and Fozzie Bear.

From left to right: Emily Care Boss, Kip, me, Matt Schlotte, Charles Seaton, Paul, Barry, Sarah Kahn, Brad Rosman and Chelsea. Missing: Scott Diberardino.

Oh, how did I meet Kip? (And what did he look like back then?) Well, the way I remember it, we met on the day of the Gay Pride march in NYC, I think in 1990. I was made an honorary Obie so that I could march with Kip and Barry and the other Oberlin alumni, who were accepting of we three bi’s. It was to be a few years before Kip and I embarked on our romantic relationship; at the time, we were both embroiled in our own separate tormented and doomed love affairs. Though Kip did do something very gallant for me that day: As the parade broke up and we started to go, I suddenly remembered that my backpack was still in the trunk of the convertible full of drag queens, who’d been kind enough to let me stow it there for the march. Kip immediately charged after the car and retrieved my bag. I was very relieved, as we’d stopped by Forbidden Planet before the march, and it was loaded with comic books.