ANTEBELLUM BLOG: RICK CASTRO: DIARY- 9/8/2020-

9/9/20

RICK CASTRO: DIARY- 9/8/2020-

So This Is How The World Will End: by Rick Castro 9/8/2020

For the last couple of weeks I’ve been sequestered back in LA, (due to post penis surgery).

It’s eerie to spend most of the time alone where there are so many people around. Life during plague in the city is much harder than in the high desert, so I have found.

Like everybody else I have allot of time on my hands. However, I haven’t been a lump on a log, no, far from it. I’ve taken this time to spruce up me apartment. First off, I did a full deep cleaning, room by room. I then worked on finessing all the smaller items, like cleaning under the settee, and moving smaller items around so they all look just right. It’s become a pleasing experience. I’ve also taken to cooking in a day to day organized way.

I was toying with the idea of having a yard sale. Living in an apartment complex this would be a challenge. There is a front grass area that’s perfect to set up and spread out one’s wares, but I wouldn’t feel right unless I asked permission of the couple who live in the front unit #1, Judith & Mike. They’re an older couple, meaning my age. We get on well, so it probably wouldn’t be a problem. Surprisingly millennials are the one’s who always get testy. I never know how to engage with them. One millennial couple came to my doorstep to announce they were new in the building and if they could use my key for the laundry room. I suggested they contact the landlord. Somehow they’d never thought of this. They get put off so easily; a fragile lot are they.

BTW, the couple didn’t even last six months.

The other dilemma with a yard sale in an apartment complex is that everyone now knows what you own, and your taste. It would be impossible for me to not have items considered erotic & kinky. That’s just who I am, and what I have.

The last time I had a yard sale was when I moved here from West Hollywood over twenty years ago. Can you imagine? That yard sale was epic and took a few days, actually a few weeks. I initially had private sales in my tea garden where I would invite over special people to see the “collection.” For example, I had a good amount of designer clothing and costumes from working as a wardrobe stylist for fifteen years.

I invited my costumer friends to have first dibs, specifically Melody Barnett from Palace Costume Museum. For the most part she bought the entire rack, which included Vivianne Westwood, Yojhi Yamamoto and some great leather gear. She also purchased my collection of I Love Ricky hats, I designed in the early eighties.

my hat designs- I LOVE RICKY- circa 1984

After all the specialty items were sold, I then moved everything onto the sidewalk and let the local vultures, I mean neighbors, have at it. I have to say, my yard sale was an immediate hit. I didn’t have run of the mill pots & pans. I had an incredible collection of gay porn, fetish and kink items. I even sold my black cat Pyewackett’s balls, (as in testicles). I’d had them preserved in formaldehyde since he was neutered in 1992. I even had dildos for sale. Yes, I did.

I have an amusing memory I must share with you.… In the eighties and nineties West Hollywood was comprised of gays and Russians. They had migrated here during the fall of Communism, (the second time) somehow Santa Monica Boulevard became the American, Russian ghetto. The Russian grocery shops were amazing. I loved all the unique items, like blinis & caviar!

As you can imagine, they didn’t always get on with the gays, but somehow it worked itself out.

On the first day of my public yard sale this old world Russian lady in a babushka comes by checking out everything. By everything I mean all the gay porn. She even inquired about the black dildo. I told her five dollars. She purchases a few VHS tapes, and I’m telling you, they were hardcore. Does anyone remember Zeus Studios? She puts them in her little shopping bag, and happily off she goes. The following day she comes back escorting her Russian husband on crutches. They must have been in their seventies, if not eighties. Neither spoke a word of english. She would find all the gay and BDSM titles and bring them to him. His eyes would light up. She would then make a stack of items and announce, “how much?” Everything I showed them, they, ( more precisely he) wanted. Between the two of them they cleaned me out! At the end of the day the happy couple hobbled down Stanley Avenue in WeHo with a full box of Rick Castro’s most explicit porn and kink items. They even purchased the black dildo.

I hope they cleaned it before using, because I certainly didn’t.

So this is how the world will end.