(Originally Published on The Huffington Post on 4/18/2012)

I went to see filmmaker Lee Hirsch‘s new documentary, Bully, this past weekend, and even now, days later, I still find myself deeply affected. When I say that, I’m speaking not so much about the film (although it was beautifully made and completely moving) but to the extreme heartache I have felt since watching it. I started sobbing about 30 seconds into the movie and didn’t really stop until the following morning. I cried for the parents who have lost their children to bullying, I cried for the bullied subjects in the film, and I cried for myself, having gone through an amplified version of all of this years ago.

Yesterday, after reading reports of yet another 14-year-old queer kid being bullied to death in America, this time in Iowa, the feeling turned once again from sadness to anger. My own growing-up-gay-in-the-Midwest story reads like some sort of fucked-up textbook for how LGBT kids come into the world, how we maneuver through, and often how we go out. The torture I suffered at the hands of my peers as a closeted child and then as an out teenager is one that is shared by many in the community. In reality I was quite lucky to have survived back then, although I almost didn’t survive the years that followed.

I took in violence as a young man like a sponge takes up water. It came in many forms, but I always did the same thing with it: I absorbed it and made it part of me, every mean thing anyone ever called me believed, every punch thrown my way shaped into my being. I spent years reacting to other people’s hate in a variety of colorful ways, living out the disappointment of everyone who had ever known me in real time. I was driven by uncontrollable rage, crippling fear, and a sense of mourning for the person everyone else thought I should be but whom I knew I would never become. Over time I grew used to the abuse, said goodbye to my sweetness, and let the violence take me over.

Even as an adult I am still dealing with this very old idea about myself and a world that says that I am nothing; that I somehow deserve to taste blood in my mouth, because I am not actually a person; that I need to hide in order to stay alive. To this day, when I encounter homophobia, my first reaction is often to fight; sometimes the motivation is to protect myself or the man I love, but sometimes it’s because I just want to see that look of surprise on the face of some mouthy jock who didn’t expect this particular weak, pussy-faggot to be scrappy and fight back. I’ve spent countless hours in therapy working on this very thing, but having spent my formative years defending myself both physically and emotionally, it’s sometimes hard to turn that survival reflex off.

Just this past weekend, as we walked by a group of meathead bro-dudes with tribal tattoos and spray tans, one of them mocked what I had said to my boyfriend as we passed, only he did it in full-blown sissy voice. I stopped. My initial instinct was to pull my keys out of my pocket, throw them at the back of his head, and scream something insane at him as I charged them from behind, but I chose instead to tell my boyfriend about what I felt like doing, did my best to shrug it off, and we kept on walking in the opposite direction. A few years ago this would have ended very differently for both of us. It’s no surprise, though. Bullies have been driving sweet, gentle queer kids to anger and violence for ages.

No one should be made to feel in danger or tortured by others at any point in their life. This is not some “rite of passage.” I believe we have an immediate responsibility as a people to take care of our young, no matter what our individual beliefs are about sexual orientation or gender. I encourage you to watch Bully as a first step, and to seek out ways of getting involved in making a difference for young people (particularly LGBT youth and young adults) in your community. Saying “kids will be kids” and dismissing the violence is too easy. So long as we turn a blind eye to the people who need us most, we will continue to have their blood on our hands. Together we can stop this. Nothing is ever as hopeless as it seems.

Watch the Bully trailer:

For ideas on how you can help put an end to bullying, visit stopbullying.gov.

For a youth help line, visit 121help.me.

I almost died four years ago this week, and tomorrow is the fourth anniversary of my younger brother Landon saving my life.

After a 16 year battle with drugs and alcohol I was taken over completely in 2007 and it nearly killed me. I locked myself in my house and began to smoke rock cocaine and drink vodka around the clock. I rarely left. This went on for months and I spent $67,000.00 on my addiction during that final year. I overdosed on two occasions, and I was headed for death. I wish I could say I was so messed up that it didn’t register, but it did. I knew what I was doing this time; I just didn’t care. No one could stop me.

On March 22nd, 2008 someone did manage to stop me, though. My little brother Landon burst into my living room with his wife Ashley unannounced to “get me help”. I had passed my lowest point weeks before and was spiraling toward the end by the time they got there. My entire junky setup was on display in front of me and there it was; the truth. ALL of it. There was a thick layer of cocaine smoke in the air and I remember yelling out something like “Don’t come in here if you’re pregnant” to my sister-in-law. I was in a state.

I looked like a dying man because I was a dying man. Ashley looked afraid when she saw me. My brother did, too. This made me feel afraid, and in that moment, my sweet brother’s fear and love and hopes for my future somehow reached me. He took me by the arm and put me in the car and we went to the hospital. When we got there he had to use force to get me to go in but he managed to get me into the building, admitted, and the rest is history.

The past four years have been the most wonderful gift. I have come back to myself, back to this world, back to my family; and I’ve found love and joy that I would have never found had I not made it through. There are still moments when who I was before shows up in my present day, but I am not afraid of that person. He was a person, too. A very sick, sad person who needed help.

The truth of my story is hard sometimes. I certainly wish I hadn’t done many of the things I did during my addicted years, but I am empowered by that same, scary truth. I am not ashamed of having overcome the circumstances of my life, and I am proud to be here today as a result of hard work and the goodness of others who have given me the opportunity to start over.

I saved my little brother’s life when we were young boys, and he returned the favor when we were grown men. Now, years later, I am still moved by his bravery. To stand up to me like that in my darkest hour; to come find me when I had shut him out; to physically maneuver me toward safety; that must have all been so scary…but he did it, and I am here today as a result.

Thank you, little brother, for showing up when I needed you. You got there just in time.

…and thank you to everyone who loved me then, who loves and cares about me now, and who keeps reminding me of just how lucky I am to be here. This world is beautiful because of you.

xo,
Logan

(Originally Published on The Huffington Post on 2/28/2012)

A recent study led by researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health has found that one in 10 children faces an elevated risk of sexual, physical, and psychological abuse due to gender nonconformity (meaning kids whose interests, pretend play, and activity choices before the age of 11 fall outside the bounds of those typically expressed by their assigned sex). As a result of the abuse, many will suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) by young adulthood, which can lead to a smörgåsbord of risky behaviors such as drug abuse, promiscuity, and self-harm, as well as producing physical symptoms such as chronic pain and cardiovascular problems.

Having been born one of these gender-nonconforming kids many years ago, I know firsthand the experience described in the study. These new findings suggest that even if I had not been birthed into a fundamentalist Christian cult, my parents would still have had their work cut out for them with regard to keeping me safe. (I plan to add this new info to my ever-growing parental forgiveness file as soon as I finish writing this.) Sad as it may be, from the moment I took my first breath, I was something of a moving target in this world.

Though I have identified as a cisgender male my whole life, as a kid I always enjoyed playing with dolls, making jewelry, singing, acting, and dancing — all things considered “girly” by society and, at the very least, by the mean kids I grew up around in rural Nebraska. I gravitated toward girls my own age back then, not because I wanted to be one of them but because they were nice to me, and we had the most in common. The other boys took note of these similarities, and they teased me relentlessly.

I was a sweet, sensitive kid who didn’t like sports, which made me the target of much bullying and harassment from kids my own age all the way until college… but this isn’t breaking news. Everybody already knows that we faggy kids get our asses kicked as we grow up, and most of us don’t need a Harvard study to tell us what the long-term effects of that abuse are, because we are still living them out to this day. But hey, it gets better, right?

I can’t tell you how many times in my life I have heard the argument that people turn gay as a result of being sexually abused as children. As a survivor of extensive early-childhood sexual abuse myself, I have always found this to be the most disturbing of all attempts by others to pathologize and discredit my adult sexuality. This theory basically states that the man who raped me when I was a child has now somehow programmed my sexuality for the rest of my life, that the violence I repeatedly endured as a young boy is now the filter for all the love I have received since, or will ever receive. This is just simply not the case. I rejected this archaic notion long ago, and I am always surprised when otherwise thinking people haven’t already done so as well.

What I find most interesting about this new study is their assessment that boys who acted outside gender norms faced three times the risk of sexual abuse over their conforming counterparts, and that both nonconforming men and women showed rates of PTSD almost double those considered “normal.” This means that not only was I three times as likely to get assaulted as a “girly” 7-year-old than if I had been a “butch” kid, but also that I have had the pleasure of being twice as likely to feel traumatized in the years since. Instead of assuming I am gay because I was abused, doesn’t it seem at least three times more likely that I was abused because I was gay? To me, this is a no-brainer, but it’s relieving to have this new science back up what I have been saying for years.

If you are the parent of a gender-nonconforming child, please understand how important your role is in your child’s survival. You will need to be three times as alert, three times as cautious, and three times as accepting to counteract what you (and they) are up against. Love them into overtime. They are going to need it.

For the rest of you who feel compelled to take action, I suggest that you consider mentoring and/or fostering LGBT and gender-nonconforming children and young adults who are being bounced around in the local system where you live. You have the power to change someone’s life simply by being that safe space for them, whether it’s in your classroom or your living room. If you can’t commit time to a foster care or mentorship program, find a queer youth organization and write a check.

We can no longer just sit around and tell these kids that “it gets better,” cross our fingers, and hope that it does. We have to find ways of actually making it better now. The time has come for us to demand better from our schools, from our community leaders, and from each other. Dietrich Bonhoeffer is quoted as having said, “The test of the morality of a society is what it does for its children,” and I, for one, agree with him.

Can you guess which one is me?

(Originally Published on The Huffington Post on 2/22/2012)

As individuals in a marginalized group, we are often all placed together into a single pot by society. In this case, I am referring to the queer pot (but this happens around race, gender, age, religion, class — you name it). All of us, as members of the LGBT community, with all our differences, have this one thing in common: we are the minority. There is something about all of us that is unlike much of the rest of the world, and much of the rest of the world’s reaction to that difference can be painful, isolating, and dangerous.

Frequently, members of the greater community become fixated on our sexuality or gender expression, and they try to lump us together, assign us roles within our designated letter of the acronym, and dehumanize us in the process. One would hope this outer pressure would be enough to bring us together as LGBT people, that we would unite and become stronger in numbers and build a community so organized and powerful that our being a minority no longer mattered. Sadly, this has not been my experience as a man-loving man, nor in my work with gay organizations, nor as an out artist in the entertainment industry.

Being a public figure in the queer community is tough. You have to have pretty thick skin to tolerate the external homophobia that comes at you as a result of increased visibility, but I think I was raised to expect this, so it’s never a big shock when it happens. I know the world wants to see me dead on some level, or at least see me stop being such a “goddamn fag,” so it doesn’t surprise me when that pressure arrives. I recognize it coming a mile away and have learned methods of processing the external hate in such a way that it no longer hurts me. I have not, however, found or been able to develop a way of moving through the crab mentality of my own community without injury.

For those of you who have not heard this saying before, “crab mentality” (also known as “crabs in the barrel,” or “crabs in the bucket”) refers to the metaphor of a pot of live crabs about to be killed. Individually, the crabs could escape from the pot without any trouble, but when they are all in the pot together, they grab at each other in a pointless domination game that prevents any of them from escaping, thus ensuring their collective demise. When related to human behavior in social movements, the term is most commonly used in association with a short-sighted, non-constructive approach instead of a unified, long-term, productive mentality. As an openly gay musician, I have experienced this problem mostly via the gay press. Certainly, I’ve received my fair share of nasty emails and messages from people online and in person over the 10-plus years I’ve been doing this, as well, but there’s a distinctive sting that comes from someone in the queer media pulling me and my people back into the pot, and I believe that action trickles down into our culture and leaks out into our community consciousness from there.

In 2009, just as my record From Pillar to Post for The Dandy Warhols was about to be released, a major LGBT magazine in the U.K. (which shall remain nameless purely out of my not wanting to promote their shitty rag on The Huffington Post) ran a story on me that called me a fat, ugly, “ginger bear,” stating at one point in the article that “Logan Lynn is proof that some music is best listened to with your eyes closed.” I remember standing in the bookstore with my friend, reading it and remarking on how strange the feeling of being made fun of in print was.

I had gotten bad reviews before, but that’s not what this was. This particular gay male writer had actually enjoyed the record; he just didn’t like my fat, ugly, “ginger bear” body, and he proceeded to tell the rest of the queer community of Europe in glossy, major-magazine print that they shouldn’t, either. What was the point of that? What about my face had made this writer be so cruel? I did my best not to internalize this new form of bullying, bought all the copies of the magazine wherever I went the rest of the month to minimize the local damage (something I had seen Carrie Bradshaw do on Sex and the City once), and counted the days until the next issue came out. This experience left me wounded, in spite of my attempts at not internalizing it, and the effects of this writer’s “review” remained with me for years.

I started working with Portland’s LGBT community center in 2010 and have noticed this all-too-familiar crab mentality playing out on the local level here, as well. I fear this may be the nature of queer culture and media these days. Sensationalized “news” pitting community members against the organizations working to help them, reporters all seeking out gossip for sound bites instead of facts for real stories, editors infusing the personal opinions of publishers into their political reporting, papers highlighting advertisers instead of readers to secure funding — the list goes on and on, and more often than not, the keepers of our community voice have their own agendas they are pushing.

These hidden agendas get picked up by the people receiving the message and spread like a virus from there, disguised as the community’s voice, but it’s not actually the community’s voice anymore; it’s just some asshole who wants you to buy what they are selling, some king crab with more influence than you who doesn’t want you to see the big world outside the crab pot. This is why it is so important for us to be the keepers of our own stories, and why LGBT organizations that help to facilitate a more unified community are vital to the ongoing progress of our movement.

If you don’t like how your story is being told, disengage from the ones telling it and find ways to tell it yourself. They are everywhere! If you are an advertiser, get to know the content of the media outlets you support with your marketing dollars. Do you agree with how they are portraying your community? If not, find media outlets that are more in line with your values — or get the word out about your business through partnerships with nonprofits and resource centers doing the work you actually want your dollars to support.

I challenge the local, national, and international queer press to step back and look at the bigger picture. I suggest that you work harder to be journalists instead of just lazily stirring the pot we have been placed in by those who would do us harm. Empowering the LGBT community and our allies rather than being the evil media crab claw that pulls us down to our collective demise will no doubt serve you better in the end. Some of us are actually still paying close attention to what you print, and we can tell the difference between the two.

(Originally published on The Huffington Post on 2/14/2012)

My mom has been taking a Tao Te Ching class recently, and she posted the following quotation from William Martin’s book A Path and a Practice on her Facebook page today, which struck me:

So we become silent. We stop looking for approval. We cease taking offense at the opinions of others. We no longer complicate our thinking or our lives. We do not seek the spotlight but instead become a simple part of all that is. We can be loved or shunned, make a profit or suffer a loss, be honored or disgraced, and never lose the treasure of our being.

OK. Yes. That sounds amazing. But… how?!

We become silent.

How is one ever truly silent? I’m not talking about staying quiet or not using my voice for an extended period of time, but actually finding a completely still place within where there is only me — no sound, nothing. Where has that place gone? Much of the time the noise I battle in my own life is an inner static. I just can’t ever seem to shut up about me, about you, about my boyfriend, about my job, about my dog, about music, about the government, about money, about the queer community, about what total strangers are doing at the store — and this is all happening inside my head all day long, 365 days a year. It’s exhausting, and moreover, it’s loud.

We stop looking for approval.

I have basically spent my entire life up to this point doing this and only this, attempting to accomplish it in a variety of ways over the years, with mixed results. I realized very early on that I was different and that my particular kind of different was not the type that most people around me took kindly to, so I started figuring out ways of getting people to value my existence externally, and I just never stopped doing that. I have looked for approval from my friends, family, God, record labels, men — you name it. I chased a professional dream down a path that has led me to here and now, in this very moment, still seeking your approval, hoping that what I write is good enough for you, that my thoughts are interesting enough, and worrying that you might not think I’m worth anything once you know how desperately I need you to think I am.

We cease taking offense at the opinions of others.

This part truly offends me. I will not legitimize it with words.

We no longer complicate our thinking or our lives.

I spend hours every day over-thinking things. From the small stuff to the big stuff, my inner thought process of choice has always been circular, and it leaves me dizzy and paralyzed much of the time. The stories I create in my head to help explain the unexplainable or more difficult parts of my life cause me to react, and my reaction to the reaction is to try and figure out what caused me to react in the first place. It’s in a loop, and it’s endless.

We do not seek the spotlight but instead become a simple part of all that is.

All my life I have been notoriously attention-seeking, which I’m sure is a direct result of my not feeling worthy as a kid or feeling like I had to act like someone else in order to be liked, but the truth about me is that I am actually very shy. Anyone who knows me in real life already knows this, yet there is something inside me that is constantly pushing me toward the spotlight. My boyfriend recently said to me “It’s like you are always talking out into the world, but then you are shocked when the world talks back,” and I think he’s right. There’s something in me that needs to be seen and valued, but I am just as uncomfortable receiving either now as I ever have been.

We can be loved or shunned, make a profit or suffer a loss, be honored or disgraced, and never lose the treasure of our being.

I struggle with this. I think mostly because I am still trying as a 32-year-old man to get to a place inside where I actually do treasure my own being. That reads sadder than it sounded in my head, but growing up gay in the bigoted Church of Christ didn’t help me develop self-worth as a child, and I spent over 20 years being internally cruel as a result of God’s “plan for my life,” so it understandably takes some time to do… or undo. Whichever it is, I am still working on it.

My mother is very wise (much wiser than she fancies herself), and we have spoken about this many times over the years. She thinks the only way I will come to a place of accepting what is unacceptable is by working to rid myself of this feeling I have of separateness from the rest of the world, something I’ve guarded fiercely over the years as a central means of my own self-protection. She says this process of letting go involves coming face to face with the impermanence of everything; accepting that the world is always changing and that I cannot stop it; sitting with fears, and letting myself truly accept the inevitabilities of my human experience instead of spending all of my energy on trying to fit everything into the story I continue to craft for myself.

This storytelling has no doubt forever been at the root of my misery, feeding lines to my suffering and choking out the realness of my life, my love, my time with all of you, my humanity. What am I still so afraid of? Hasn’t the worst come and gone already, or is there more to come? What would happen if I just decided right now that there is nothing to fear; that no matter what happens to me or the people I love, we will be fine; that everything is perfect and just as it should be, no matter how the story plays out?

I hope I get there sooner than later, and I’ll be sure to let you know when I do. In the meantime, deep breaths…

(Originally published on The Huffington Post on 2/2/2012)

As you probably have heard, the Washington State Senate passed a marriage equality bill Wednesday night, clearing the way for a vote in the House, which looks poised to legalize unions for same-sex couples throughout the state. This means that if I walk out of my house in Portland, Ore. and drive across the I-5 bridge to Vancouver, Wash. (less than five miles away from my front door), I am now considered equal to my heterosexual counterparts and can legally marry the man I love, but once I drive back over that bridge to my house in the state I pay taxes to, I become a second-class citizen once again and cannot.

Well, fuck that, Oregon — and fuck that, America! How can people hate me and my love so much? All my life I have just wanted to be myself. I have wished for others to respect me as a human being in return for respecting them, but instead, I have been made to feel like something less than by my country, by my fellow man and, once again, just moments ago, by my home state.

I smell freedom across the I-5 bridge to Washington, and I want it. I deserve it. I am thrilled for my brothers and sisters in our neighboring state, but being able to see equality now just over the river has added insult to injury. Equality is mine to have as a citizen of this country and is, quite frankly, no one else’s to give. Marriage discrimination, as with any form of discrimination, is truly a cancer on our society. It destroys everything we work so hard to protect, and it weakens us. It strips away our freedom and is just plain un-American.

We are entering into a political vortex this year, with campaigns and agendas flying by every which way. I encourage you to stay focused on equality. Keep fighting to be yourself. Demand respect as a human being, and in return, respect others. Do not let your country make you feel less than any longer, because you are not. You are exactly who you are supposed to be, and don’t let the state of Oregon or any other bigots who “aren’t ready” for marriage equality tell you otherwise.

This is your country, and your love is just as beautiful as anyone else’s love. The end.

We are going to win this. All of us. Any day now…

To get involved in the LGBT community where you live, click here. Change starts with you.

(Originally Published on The Huffington Post – 1/25/2012)

I grew up in a house without pets and never had any animal friends, so I didn’t know that I liked them until I was an adult. When I was in my early 20s I met a small Australian Border Collie named Isabel. She was a ginger like me and took to me right off the bat. I was resistant to her love at first, as I had grown up thinking dogs were dirty and smelly and ate their own poop (which they sometimes are and generally do). Isabel peed on my brand-new, silver, Prada sneakers the first time we met, so it was a rocky start, but she was persistent, and she adored me to no end. Eventually, the feeling was mutual, and I relished how easy it was to interact with another living being on such a basic level. I didn’t mind how dirty and smelly she was because she was such a good listener. I could tell she really was glad I was there when we were hanging out, and she didn’t want anything from me other than for me to spend time with her. We were kindred spirits (aside from the dirty, smelly bit), but Isabel was not my dog, and when I moved out of the house I was staying at with her human, we didn’t see much of each other again.

A few years later, another close friend got a hamster-sized teacup Pomeranian puppy named Dutch (who was also a ginger beast), but my friend was traveling a lot, and this new baby was a particular brand of high maintenance that wasn’t a great fit for her. When he was just 3 months old, he was kidnapped from the front yard by neighbor kids, and it took nearly three weeks for a private investigator to locate him. Whatever happened to him during this experience left the poor dear a bit fearful and needy, which I could really relate to at the time, so I offered myself up as the official dogsitter and brought him home with me.

I had never been around such a tiny creature before. He was so quiet and sweet. All this dog wanted to do was be held and reassured that everything was fine now, which I was happy to do for him. In some way I am sure I was doing this for us both, or we for each other. Our bond was strong and fast, and when my friend came home from her travels, I had a long talk with her about how her newborn dog and I had fallen in love and probably needed to just stay together. I said I would be happy to keep him for her if she was still feeling stressed about his needs. I think she could tell that I also had needs in the moment, namely something to look after, love, and be loved by. After much consideration she agreed that, with all the travel, it might be better for him to stay with me. I burst into tears and thanked her, my heart suddenly unbroken. Dutch spent the night with her that evening, and the next day he came to stay with me permanently.

I was living in a place that didn’t allow dogs back then, but I figured that because he never made a sound, it would be fine. Of course, I was wrong. The little devil found his voice while I was at work one day just after his first birthday, and my landlord busted me for having him. We moved out shortly thereafter, into a place where he could be free to speak when he wanted, and where I didn’t have to smuggle him out to do his business three times a day. This place had a yard, and he was so happy there. I spent hours upon hours watching him run around in circles amongst the trees. He was so energetic at that age, and I was thrilled that I had suddenly been thrust into motherhood. He went everywhere with me, and it was the first time in my life that I felt like I had a purpose, something to get out of bed for in the morning. Keeping this cute thing happy and alive kept me feeling happy and alive, and I promised Dutch (and myself) that from that moment on, nothing bad was going to happen to him again.

In 2005 my world fell apart, and I relapsed into a severe addiction that I had been struggling with since my teens. For the next two years I was actively using, and my world got progressively worse, as did Dutch’s world (which I was responsible for). I was sick, far too sick to take care of myself, much less this small creature who needed so much. Of all the things I regret about my years of being unwell on drugs, this is the one I have the hardest time accepting.

Over the course of the very last few months before I got clean, I lost all control, and Dutch was left alone many times. I would stay up for days, then sleep for days, during which time he was on his own in the house — going hours without food, finding himself with no choice but to use the bathroom indoors (something he knew was wrong and I’m sure was terribly traumatic for him), and receiving no affection from the only person he had in his life. There were times when I could hear him crying in the other room, but I was so far gone that I could not (or would not) move. These are the cries that haunt me in my sleep to this day. There were instances when I just left him alone in the house for days, with an open bag of food and a handful of giant bowls of water. These are the names of failures I will have strapped to my back forever.

It’s awful that I hurt so many people during my unfortunate years, but the neglect and meanness suffered by this small, innocent creature who had grown to trust me after being so terribly hurt by humans is something I will never forgive myself for. I was supposed to protect him, not forget about him. I was supposed to love him, not yell at him for crying. I had terrible people around me at the time, so he had terrible people around him at the time. He needed me so badly then, and I had completely failed him. Luckily, my dear friend came and rescued him before this went on for too long. She loved him up the whole time I was in the hospital and looked after him until I was worthy of being his parent again. I have spent every minute of every day in the four years since trying to make it up to him, and I will continue to do this until his time on this Earth is through.

After we were reunited it took some time for Dutch to get to know Mommy again. I was different now — clearer. I’m sure this change in energy was scary to him, as the change in energy had been when I relapsed. I pushed through my deep shame over having been unfit and tried every way that I could to let him know I was back, that I was sorry, and that it was safe to relax now (again). Eventually, he began to trust that I was me. I watched as his guard fell and rejoiced as his spirit came back, bringing pieces of mine back with it. His graciousness and big, deep love touched me and gave me new hope for the world at a time when I really needed some. It was a beautiful gift and taught me a lifetime’s worth of lessons about forgiveness and compassion. And so, an 8-pound holy terror became my most treasured teacher.

Over the next few years we toured all over the U.S. together, and he was there with me when no one else was around. He was my connection to the outside world while I was on the road, always eager to get me out of the tour bus or hotel room so that he could mark his territory in as many places as I would allow. I got to spend most of my time with the little dude in tow, and it made the loneliness of touring not so lonely. He made me laugh, he got me in trouble with hotel staff, he made me proud, and he let me dress him up in all kinds of ridiculous outfits. It was perfect.

Dutch is 10 now, and he is officially an old man. It remains clear to me that he is much wiser than I will ever be, and much more evolved. A couple of weeks ago he started drinking water compulsively and was acting kind of freaked out. He began having accidents indoors (something he rarely does), and he wasn’t taking treats (something he never does). He just wanted more and more water. His thirst was unquenchable. My boyfriend and I have taken him to the vet a couple of times in the weeks since, and I have called the emergency dog nurse at least 100 times in between my own attempts at Internet diagnosing him. This past weekend we did extensive blood work on him after he was acting very strange and not moving at all. The results came back today, and he has diabetes, so he will need shots of insulin every day for the rest of his life.

I know that my sweet boy has officially entered into his final act on this planet, though it is almost too painful to really look at. All of this regret is on the surface again, and a feeling of wanting to make sure he is comfortable and happy for the rest of his days is front and center. If I could speak Dog for a few minutes, I would tell him how much I love him and how very much he means to me; I would find Dog words to make him know how special he is, and how much I will miss him when he is gone; I would let him know what’s going on with his body now so that he isn’t afraid during the treatment, and I would explain why he isn’t in trouble for going potty in the house since he’s been sick, so that he could stop feeling bad about it; I would thank him for trusting me all of these years, and for letting me earn that trust back when it was broken; I would ask him to trust me once again through his being sick, and I would let him know that I will be here with him every day until the end so he doesn’t worry.

A couple of years back I had a dream in which a woman with long hair gave Dutch to me in a basket. He was miniature, like when he was a baby, and he had a full coat of hair. The woman said to me, “He will be your guide in life and through death,” and then handed me the basket. At the time I didn’t think much of it other than that it had been a creepy dream, but as I look back at our years together, it takes on new meaning. Dutch really did come into my life at a time when I needed something to tether me to this planet. He waited until I was well to get sick himself, and my guess is that he will wait to die until I am ready for him to go. He has been my guide in many ways through these years and is now set to teach me this last lesson, the hardest lesson. I can’t look away like I have done in the past around death, and I don’t want to.

Our experience together, this relationship as living creatures who care about each other, has been one of the most beautiful things I’ve had the pleasure of being a part of in my lifetime. It is a great honor to be with this small creature now in his final years. I will be present with him through this new process of illness so that I might learn to be present with others through theirs. I will love him and make myself vulnerable to being hurt by his departure until he is gone. I will not pull away. I will come closer. I will try not to fear his passing before it comes, and when it arrives, I will greet it with open eyes. I will be brave in the face of death so that he can be, too. I will hold him as he goes, and I will send his spirit off onto his next adventure, thanking him for staying with me for this time during mine and wishing him well on his journey. I will remember the good days, and I will feel grateful that we had so many together… and I will love other animals in his memory, always bringing the lessons I learn from them into my relationships with people.

My advice to all of you is this: go to the animal shelter in your town and adopt a creature of your own. Your spirit guide is probably waiting there for you.

Now watch this video of Dutch doing his ridiculous trick:

Photo credit: Xilia Faye

I’ve been releasing acoustic versions of new songs every few weeks since December and let another one out this evening. It’s called “The Tree You Named After Me” and is yet another collaboration with teenage pop phenom Noah Daniel Wood on guitar & David Appaloosa (from Portland indiepop boyband The Hugs) recording and quick mixing the whole thing for us.

Have a listen:

Click the album cover below to download “The Tree You Named After Me” from Logan Lynn’s “Everything You Touch Turns To Gold” for zero dollars on Bandcamp!

(Originally Published on The Huffington Post – 1/10/2012)

I spent my 20s in complete solitude. Even when I was in relationship or around friends, I was impossible to reach and might as well have been by myself. It was a decade spent mostly alone, and I think there were many times when I felt like this was just how life was going to play out. I watched as my little brother married his high-school sweetheart, and in the 10 years since, I’ve had the great pleasure of holding their babies as they joined us in the world. Loving these beautiful creatures has in many ways made my own as-of-yet-unrealized dream of building a family an easier pill to swallow — but I have always hoped that some great love would make its way to me, as well.

In October 2010, after spending the better part of two years in single-man lockdown mode recovering from a long-winded, ugly breakup, I went to celebrate my 31st birthday with my dear friend at a local Portland patisserie. We sat and chatted about life for a while, and then I noticed this man walk through the door and sit at a table just to the right of the dessert counter. He was wearing a tight, white, v-neck t-shirt, and I found myself unable to stop staring at him. It may have been his big arms, his dark chest hair, his thick-framed Dita glasses, his pretty face — I’m not sure — but something clicked in that moment.

At one point my friend stepped out to take a call, and I took that as my cue to undress him with my mind and get down to fantasy business. (I’m not a sex maniac, but I had sworn off men and had been celibate for over a year, and my fantasy life had become both really involved and easily accessible during that time). So I imagined us getting freaky on the dessert counter until my friend’s return jolted me back to my sad, clothed, birthday reality. From across the room, I kept hearing my pretend boyfriend laughing this enormous, joyful, shameless laugh with his friend, and I tried not to stare. As we were leaving, I pointed out my exotic find to my friend and said, “I gotta get me one like that,” which, in retrospect, is a bit crass and actually isn’t all that romantic-sounding, but I figure the story’s no good if I don’t just tell it like it happened, and that’s how it happened. It may not have been poetry, but it came from a very real place.

Over the next two months I thought about this mystery man a lot, which was not a common thing for me to do when it came to random people from coffee shops whom I had never spoken to. Often, the thoughts were naked ones, but sometimes they were not. At times I was awake when he was there; other times he would appear in my dreams. What had happened to me there amongst the candy and cakes? I couldn’t figure out if I had been possessed or if I was just really horny from swearing off sex. Maybe I just needed to get manhandled on a dessert counter somewhere. Either way, I hoped I would run into him again and promised myself that I would speak to him if I did.

One afternoon in early December I looked up from my desk at Portland’s Q Center, and there he was, standing in the door of my office, picking up promotional materials for an event he was holding there. He told me his name. I introduced myself but could not stop looking down at my feet. We shook hands. His were soft but strong — like they were in my dream. I’m sure I turned all sorts of red in the face, and I remember being kind of frozen there for a minute. I came off as rude and uninterested, and he went to talk with my colleague across the hall. Once again, I found myself compelled to stare at him, completely drawn in by his presence, his look, his chemicals, but I was somehow rendered unable to speak or be friendly.

When he left I probed my colleagues for details about who this most recent star of my rich fantasy life actually was in the real world. After hearing only good reviews from the handful of people I asked, I decided to attend the event he was hosting. I was determined to push through the shyness and try talking to him again when it was over, and I would try even harder not to come off like a total dick this time. Out of nowhere, at the end of the event, he came up to me and asked if I’d like to grab a coffee with him sometime. (I later found out that my colleague had let him in on my having expressed interest, so the miracle-love-story factor here is a little diminished, but it was a magical moment nonetheless.) I said yes and had him call my phone so that I could save his number.

As he was walking away, I noticed that it had not saved, and I said, “Wait! It didn’t work!” He turned and walked back over to me, still with those sweet eyes, still with that handsome face, and in a fleeting moment of sheer bravery, I let out the words, “How am I supposed to get you into my life if I don’t have your phone number?” My boldness made him smile. I entered the number again manually, saved it, and left the event feeling over the moon. To my surprise, he called me the next day to go to dinner instead of coffee, which we did the following evening. It was one of those nights where everything was easy and real. We talked about our lives, our families, our struggles, our deepest regrets, our hopes, our true selves; it was perfect. He gave me the most passionate kiss as he dropped me off that night, and we have been together ever since.

I’m not sure if our meeting was destiny or chance, as I am not sure I believe in either of those things, but I think I may have experienced what others for centuries have been referring to as “love at first sight” that day in the patisserie. I’m pretty sure I don’t believe in that, but it was like the minute I laid eyes on this man, I just knew he was going to change my life forever — and he has. I like to think that all those dreams and imagined escapades involving him in the months prior to our meeting were ways in which the universe was preparing me for the very real arrival of love and intimacy in my life. I might not have recognized either of them had I not already been turned on and tuned in on some level, and both might have frightened me had I not been practicing a bit on my own in advance of their arrival. It was some sort of cosmic conditioning process, and it left me brave and open enough for this man to occupy a space in my heart that no other man had prior.

Maybe the moral of this in-progress love story is that even the coldest hand can be warmed. I am living proof of this. I wake up every morning to a face on the pillow next to me that I hope I am lucky enough to get to roll over and look at for 100 more years. Something has come alive in me that was asleep before, and I will share that awakening with him forever, however our story builds out from here.

I believe that all of us deserve love and are fully capable of loving, no matter what our experience in and around relationships has been in the past. I continue to work on staying bold and listening to my dreams and fantasies when they are speaking to me. I am convinced that therein lies the roadmap to my bliss. My guess is that your bliss is trying to tell you something too, so pay attention. You never know when that patisserie door will open.

(Originally Published on The Huffington Post – 1/2/2012)

The first 12 years of my career were spent writing songs about loss and longing, so in some way I suppose I owe the fact that you are even reading this on The Huffington Post to my own unhappiness. Historically, I have felt most at home in heartbreak, both in art and in life. It’s largely what I knew growing up, so everything else felt foreign and wrong as an adult. For years, people being kind to me felt painful. I was terrified of anyone actually knowing me. It’s pretty fucked-up — and I still struggle with this. It’s a jagged part of my makeup that I will most likely be working on for the rest of my days.

I first learned about how sad the world can be when I was 7 years old, courtesy of a much older family “friend” who just couldn’t keep his hands off me. I won’t get into the specifics around the abuse suffered, but it was ongoing and horrible and went undetected for many years. The scars from this experience in my formative days have done just that: they formed me. They changed who I was and how I looked at the world, and they altered my sense of self at its core. All of this was complicated by the fact that I also happened to be a gay man born into a fundamentalist Christian home. It was a perfect storm for me to go completely apeshit, which I did.

I began experimenting with drugs and music around the same time, both before my 11th birthday. By 14 I was a full-blown, cigarette-smoking, drug-addicted alcoholic with headphones and a notebook who fancied himself a singer-songwriter. Those same old scars now rooted me on as I built an impenetrable wall of sadness and sound around myself. They gave me words and melodies to purge the feelings that could not be killed chemically, and I began seriously writing and recording music when I was 17. Those first songs would become my debut record, GLEE, which was released in 2000. At the time of its initial release, nobody knew what I was trying to do. I recall a lot of head scratching and people being really uncomfortable with the lyrical content, mostly, so I decided to take a break and focused solely on partying my brains out for the next five years.

In 2006, prompted by more unfortunate heartbreak of the drugged-out variety, I released a self-titled album, Logan Lynn, a mixture of songs from my debut and new material I had been working on. It was surprisingly well received, particularly by the queer community. I opened for The Presets and My Life with the Thrill Kill Kult at Folsom Street Fair for over 400,000 people and caught the attention of MTV‘s Logo network, which immediately started playing my videos. This was where things started to change for me. Suddenly I had over 100,000 folks in my online networks, had been nominated for some awards, and was getting a ton of press, for both my music and my party-boy lifestyle.

In 2007 I released the Feed Me to the Wolves E.P. and got signed to The Dandy Warhols-owned and operated Beat the World Records, with a distribution deal through Caroline/EMI. My music career was starting to peak, but my addictions had snowballed. I was freebasing 28 grams of cocaine a week and drinking gallons of vodka around the clock to balance it out. By the time I was admitted to rehab (for the fourth and, fingers crossed, final time) four years ago, I had suffered a partial stroke, had been fired by the Weinstein Company from an in-production reality show after over six months of invasive filming, was fired from the job said reality show was about, and lost my band, my friends, my partner, my dog, my house, and my words and had nothing left — nothing but that record deal and the scars.

So I used them to get myself well. I threw out the record I had been working on before rehab and started from scratch. In 2009 I released From Pillar to Post and did tons of interviews about getting clean as a way of holding myself publicly accountable. It was not the traditional way someone handles their breakout pop-music moment, but I needed to be honest about what was happening with me or I wasn’t going to be able to do it. The strange fame and recognition that came with the commercial success of that record and my suddenly being all over the TV freaked me the fuck out, and I no longer had chemicals to make it better. All I had was the truth, so I put it out there — all of it — not thinking about what it really meant for everyone to know everything about me. As a relatively shy, private person, afraid of being seen or known, this brand of overexposure didn’t set well at the time.

I was feeling pressured by my publicist, label, and collaborators to do more, say more, be more, go more places. I released a single to try to ease some of the professional pressure, but there was no break from the sadness, because now the sadness was fueling a business. I no longer owned myself or my words. I was taken back to that place from years before, feeling owned and ruined and hurt by the world. This was a new kind of heartbreak, however. It was the heartbreak of realizing that the thing that had always made me feel better had now become the very thing that was making me miserable. I did the only thing I knew how to do in that moment: I wrote songs and planned my escape. I was sick of being professionally sad and was just completely done with people relating to me on that level. In June 2010 I announced that I was going on an indefinite hiatus and released two in-progress records, I Killed Tomorrow Yesterday and Blood in the Water, myself, just months apart — no label, no PR campaign, no radio. I fired everyone around me and set off to explore a regular life, which I am pleased to report I found.

In the 18-plus months since, I have thrown myself into working full-time for LGBT rights at Portland’s Q Center. In being around people who truly care about my well-being and about humanity at large, I’ve realized that those scars from my early days are beautiful if you look at them just right. All of the heartbreak from the years is just part of my story, and my story is just getting started. I am not shaped by the experience of abuse and heartache any more than I am shaped by the experience of surviving them, and I am not driven by sadness any more than I am driven by joy — I just needed something joyful to write about.

I’m reminded of a quotation by author Rachel Naomi Remen that my mother sent me with regard to this very thing:

Wounding and healing are not opposites. They’re part of the same thing. It is our wounds that enable us to be compassionate with the wounds of others. It is our limitations that make us kind to the limitations of other people. It is our loneliness that helps us to find other people, or to even know they’re alone with an illness. I think I have served people perfectly with parts of myself I used to be ashamed of.

Love has made a home in my life and songs these days, shining new light on old wounds, bringing with it new words and melodies. I hope love makes a home in your lives, too. We are all so much more than our scars.

As many of you probably already have heard, Seattle’s evangelical Mars Hill church has just set up shop in SE Portland. The story broke via the Portland Mercury last week and ignited a controversy which has been covered in the media (both local and national) ever since.

When anything notable that’s LGBT-related happens in this town I generally expect to get calls from newsrooms wanting official statements from Q Center about said goings-on. That’s part of our role as an organization, actually; to speak out and offer up a voice from the queer community. As Q Center‘s Public Relations Manager, this time-sensitive-race-to-press stuff lands on my desk – generally all at once and without warning. This was certainly the case this past week. At 4pm Thursday Fox News descended upon my office with TV cameras. The Oregonian and Just Out had both interviewed me about the church just before they arrived as well.

Here’s where this whole thing gets tricky:

I know that ultimately what comes out of my mouth in these initial unplanned moments matters much more than any of the well thought out words I will think to say in the days following…so I try my best to speak from the heart and stay focused on the issue at hand instead of my past experience or perceptions. I’m not gonna lie, though- This particular issue is hard to stay objective about…impossible, maybe…so I decided not to.

Instead of fighting to stay removed I dove headfirst into my personal experience. I thought about how different my relationship with my family, the church and the world is these days compared to when I was coming out as a teenager and I thought about how it was that we got from there to here. In the years since coming out I have been able to change the hearts and minds of the people in my life. The once conservative views alive in my family are no longer anywhere to be found. We live in a profoundly free, new world together; a world full of love and celebration of our differences. It’s really quite beautiful. Had you told me this would be the case with my loved ones when I was 14 and miserable I would have laughed in your face at the impossibility of it all.

When I think about how this change in our lives came to be there are many variables. The common factor is me, however. In getting to know me, in seeing what it means to be a gay person through my life, my parents and these anti-gay people around them have changed their minds. It has taken years…but eventually is so much better than never. There are educational opportunities in front of my face all the time. Sometimes I am the teacher, but I am ALWAYS the student. When I heard Mars Hill Pastor Tim Smith speak in this video (click HERE to watch) I knew this was one of those times. I invited them to come take a tour of Q Center and chat and they took me up on the offer.

This afternoon MH Pastor Tim Smith arrived at Q Center with his colleague and we (along with Barb and Paul) spent nearly 2 hours together, chatting first about our similarities to find common ground and then about our differences and what that means for the local LGBT community here in Portland now that they have arrived. It was a very respectful, civil afternoon. We spoke about what all we do at Q Center, about youth suicide, bullying, queer families, the local political landscape and the state of the LGBT community here in Portland and worldwide. They spoke, we listened. We spoke, they listened. We had “ah-ha!” moments, they had “ah-ha!” moments. It was really that simple. No screaming. No fighting. Just talking. I believe we all left today’s meeting with a better understanding of one another’s perspective and with a resolve to take this dialogue to the next level.

In discussing what that would look like initially, we have decided to gather a dozen people – 6 from the LGBT community and 6 from the Mars Hill/Evangelical Christian community – to meet and dive deeper into these discussions over the course of a period of time yet to be determined. This will be an opportunity for the hard questions to be asked, answered, cried about, talked over, etc in a safe space, with the end goal being that both sides walk away with a better understanding of the other. There is so much fear on both sides of this particular coin…and we often are most afraid of the unknown. My hope is that we can replace the fear with knowledge, swap out the misinformation with education. I have seen this happen in my immediate family and believe wholeheartedly that it can happen in the larger human family as well. We are all just people, after all.

Today was a victory for courage, compassion and kindness; for being heard and for listening to. I’ll keep you all posted as this develops. I have high hopes that something really good comes out of this bridge we started building today.

In the end, love wins. Always. You’ll see.

xo,

Logan

I was interviewed for The Accidental Bear about music, activism and a bunch of other stuff this week. You can check it out on their site HERE (complete with photos of me and my boyfriend) or just keep reading below for the full transcript.

From The Accidental Bear: (6/2/2011)

While hiking through a creek the other day I lifted up a rock and found a gem. Ok, no that’s a story, I just really enjoy analogies. Nonetheless, the gem that was brought to my attention is singer-song-writer-ginger-beard-acitivist Logan Lynn. When I found him, it just happens, he is on a little hiatus, charging up for whatever the future holds.

LL: On Logo again here shortly. My new video is premiering sometime later this month. The rest is going to unfold however it decides to unfold. I have a day job, dog and boyfriend. Life is simple and good. I’ve gone inward for the time being.

You may have heard about Paul V’s “Born This Way” blog in recent days as it has been featured on TV and all over the place in the media. My short essay was one of the 1st included when the site when live a couple months ago. You can check out the post HERE. They ended up using only one of the two photos talked about in the essay so I have included the other one as the main header image of this post. Good, gay times.

Here’s hoping we can all learn to love ourselves and be kind to one another. Now…spend a few hours getting to know this fantastic blog. It’s pretty special.

Love you all,

Logan

It’s sometimes hard for me to wrap my head around all the change that 2010 brought into my life. Nothing is as it was a year ago (Thank GAWD!) Time is amazing. I feel like the last 3 years in particular have changed me at my core, molding me into who I could and should have been years before had I just been brave enough to open my eyes. Forgiveness around this previous internal blindness is part of my journey as well but that’s a whole separate issue that isn’t ready for the world to hear about just yet. Rest assured: Daddy’s workin’ on it…

In July I made the decision to take a break from touring and proceeded to blow my musical career to bits and released what will be my final word (for now) with my record “I Killed Tomorrow Yesterday“. In retrospect I might have been able to handle things differently but at the time I felt like I needed to break everything in order to get away…so that’s what I did. All in all it was quite the spectacle. I have no regrets about making the decision I made but it’s funny to go back and read how upset I was at the time, knowing that less than half a year later it would all matter very little to me. The only regret I have is not taking steps to fix what was wrong sooner (which, as you can probably tell from the paragraph before this one, is a running theme these days).

When all is said and done I am thankful for this past year. In addition to the professional changes which occurred I was single and lived alone the entire year. For the 1st time since I was a 23 year old moron I took time to be by myself, with myself…to figure out what the hell I was doing and what I needed to do to get to where I ultimately want to be. I’m not sure where this next year will take me but I know it will be on my terms. I figured out what kind of people I’m looking to have in my life and what kind of people I am not. I let painful things go and I did not follow them where they went. They left and I waved at them instead. I sat still in the discomfort of change and let it take over, let it do its thing. Now on the other side I am finding new people, new experiences, new ways of looking at the world. I am closer to free than I have ever been though I am, as ever, a work in progress.

I hope you all have a happy new year! Be who you are and don’t worry about what the world thinks. The world is most likely wrong about you anyhow.

xxLL

P.S. – Speaking of progress, below is a photo of my bald ass without a hat. That’s right. I’m coming out as a 31 year old bald man. Eat it up, popworld. Also: DUH. Why else would I have been wearing a hat in every photo and video ever taken of me since 2000???!!! I’ve been wearing a hat since I was 21 and have been bald this whole fucking time. Deal with it, gays. The shit’s real.

The reaction to my new record in the press has been really great so far. Lots of love from Europe again this time around! The latest installment is an interview I did with German Queer music and politics blog CATCH FIRE! They went live with it today alongside a free MP3 download of “Smoke Rings” (song 2 on “I Killed Tomorrow Yesterday“). You can read it via their site HERE or just keep reading below for the full transcript.

From CATCH FIRE: (11/2/2010)

“After going on US tour this summer, Logan Lynn, the winner of last year’s Queer Video Music Award, has announced in August that he would be taking an extended break from the music industry and leave “Beat The World Records”, a label founded and led by the Dandy Warhols. Instead he released his fourth record “I Killed Tomorrow Yesterday”, the follow-up to “From Pillar To Post” independently in August, donating 100% of his profits to Portland’s Q Center where he is currently working. What led the songwriter to all these decisions and how they influenced his life he explains in an interview I did with him via email during the last two weeks. I also posted “Smoke Rings”, another track from “I Killed Tomorrow Yesterday” right below this introduction – the track is the perfect background music for the following text. A second free song from the album called “Things Are Looking Up” can be found in one of October’s Music Tickers.

(DOWNLOAD “SMOKE RINGS” FREE BY CLICKING HERE!)

Catch Fire: What interests me first of all is the question if you’d consider your new album “I Killed Tomorrow Yesterday” a “conceptual album”. To me especially compared to the stuff you’ve done before it seems very consistent, as if the decision to do this kind of eighties-pop-influenced dance music may have been a very concious decision.

Catch Fire: Logan Lynn’s album “I Killed Tomorrow Yesterday” can be downloaded via Itunes. The physical release is slated for December 28th.”

Today is my birthday. In fact, I’m turning 31 while I type this. I can’t believe how old I used to think 31 was. As it turns out, it’s not very old at all. I suppose we can just add that to the enormous pile of things I’ve been completely wrong about in my years on this earth. As giant mistake piles go, it’s impressive.

Last year I wrote some super intense, late-night bullshit about turning 30 because I had worked myself up into a tizzy about where I was at in my life…and where I was headed. In the 12 months since, I have worked tirelessly to disintegrate the life I was upset about and as a result I think I’m actually going to enjoy my birthday this year.

Things are good for the first time in a really long time. Thanks for all the love, folks.

The end.

After over 7 years of living together and watching him do this trick I have never once been able to capture it on video. He always stops right as I begin to shoot. This time I had the camera in my hand and finally captured him in all his weird glory.

Just a quick FYI before you watch: I am not the one who did this to his hair. I left him with an old friend who I hadn’t seen in like 10 years while I was on tour and when I came back he looked like this (and had black mascara all over his face)!!! Anyway, send your angry animal abuse letters to her cuz it wasn’t me. My ass didn’t do it.

It’s been about 2 months since I broke my world apart and set off to build a new one. My advice to all of you is this: If you’re miserable, leave. If you don’t like the boat you’re in, poke holes in it & sink it to the bottom. The rest of the world awaits you.

Thanks so much for all of your generosity in giving to the Q Center by way of sales from my new record as well as non-musical donations made on my behalf over the past 6 weeks! It has been great to accomplish what I set out to do and I would not have been able to were it not for you!

In preparation for my big farewell show tomorrow (Friday, August 20th, 2010) at Mississippi Studios in Portland (where this whole crazy music thing began for me) Just Out Newsweekly ran a follow-up story today on their blog as part 2 to the interview they ran in this week’s paper. Check out today’s story HERE. You can also read the interview which ran in print in this past week’s paper HERE if ya wanna.

I really hope to see you at tomorrow’s show, friends! It’s going to be quite the spectacle. Tickets and info HERE. One last dance before I go…

For those of you who don’t like redirecting to other sites, you can read part 2 of my interview with Just Out below:

“In the current issue of Just Out, we sat down with Portland’s own Logan Lynn to discuss the recent announcement of his self-proclaimed “career suicide,” an indefinite hiatus from the music business. After a string of dates on the Pride circuit, tomorrow night’s show at Mississippi Studios marks the “farewell” performance for Lynn and his band, The Gentry, for the foreseeable future.

Logan Lynn and the Gentry will perform — in all likelihood sans boas or wigs — their “farewell” show on Friday night, August 20 at Mississippi Studios (3939 N. Mississippi). Show starts at 10 p.m. Matrimony and DJ Girlfriends support. Tickets are $9.50. Visit loganlynnmusic.com for more information and details on donating to Q Center in exchange for Lynn’s new, unfinished album, I Killed Tomorrow Yesterday.”

Last week I sat down with the editor of Portland Newsweekly Just Out (Amanda Schurr) to chat about my announced departure from my current life in Musicworld. A man has his reasons. If you care to know more, pick up a copy or keep reading below. To read the online version CLICK HERE or to download the PDF version of the 2 page ordeal, click the following two links: Page 34 – Page 35

I love how Just Out never twists my words or calls me fat and ugly. BEST. GAY. PAPER. EVER.

From Just Out: (8/6/2010)

“Will Work for Good : Portland pop dynamo Logan Lynn quits music, for now…

Logan Lynn and The Gentry give their “farewell” performance at 9 p.m. Friday, August 20 at Mississippi Studios (3939 N. Mississippi). Matrimony and DJ Girlfriends support. Tickets are $8. To listen to Lynn’s new, unfinished album, I Killed Tomorrow Yesterday, visit loganlynnmusic.com. Visit blogout.justout.com for the full interview with Just Out.”