Is it not ironic that millions and millions of American heterosexual teenagers more than over a half century ago fell in love under the spell of Johnny Mathis's love songs? I was one of them, and today I begin each day listening to him sing his magical songs on YouTube while I drink two cups of coffee with milk (ratio: 1: 1) to wake up. I, like most of you, have spent much of my free time listening to enchanting love songs. Someone once asked me if I had a hobby. I paused for a few moments, then replied, ""Yes, I do have a hobby. My hobby is collecting beauty--beautiful music, beautiful memories, beautiful sunsets, and the like." I think the best single singer of my lifetime, male or female, is Johnny Mathis, who is still alive and performing as I write this. Remember "Chances Are," "The Twelth of Never," "Wonderful, Wonderful" among countless others? The irony of which I spoke? Johnny is gay.
Copyright 2020 Tod Howard Hawks
A graduate of Andover and Columbia College, Columbia university, Tod Howard Hawks has been a poet, a novelist, and a human-rights advocate his entire adult life.