Dateline, July 14th 2022 Bastille Day
Marking the passing of 37 years of making the acquaintance of this man, Mr. Denmark, @Lars Christian Matthiesen. By turns and for all these years, my close friend, intimate partner, confidante, muse, and existential touchstone.
I turn 70 on July 25th. For over half of my life Lars has been a part of it. He’s the equivalent of an emotional institution. And now he is the main character of my upcoming book, “Finding Lars: Tell Me Your Secrets…” The book tells the story of Lars’ and my relationship for over three decades, with an emphasis on the last three years, 2020, 2021, and 2022, during the heart of the Pandemic, during Lars’ declining years, and during my both declining and awakening years.
Written in the epistolary storytelling form, using written and pictorial forms of communication between Lars and I, the book tells the history of our relationship, the memories, the goings-ons, the adventures between us (and Lars’ many others), the sex, the lies, how the threads of our Nordic roots, his Danish my Swedish/Danish, were intertwined in our relationship, but it also provides a provocative insight into the sometimes shocking discoveries we made about each other and ourselves when we told each other our secrets!
And then there are those ever present, sobering truths in the relationship – including the not-so-inconsequential impact of Lars’ emotional temperament and the social and familial arrangements he has made in life.
Sometimes amusing, sometimes heartbreaking, always thought provoking, Finding Lars tells the story with love and affection about how we navigated the Pandemic, human foibles, age-related challenges, and the practicalities of a late in life relationship.
The book’s release date is tentatively scheduled for mid-September, 2022.