So You Got Dumped By Your Boyfriend...

Let's not bother with why he did it, or how much you didn't deserve it. Let's put aside your feelings for a second, and all the countless times you'll be revisiting the moment he told you "we're through," as well as the many, many happy and complex moments you shared before.

What's important is: you've been dumped.

What do you do now? Well, in my opinion, there are a few ways to go about this. Please note: all of these suggestions assume that he is legitimately through with you. If you truly, truly believe that he's going to come back, then godspeed. Go back and get that guy!

For the rest of you, or those of you who felt the way I described in the last paragraph, chased him, got shot down, and came back to this blog... here we go:


1. Cut Him Off.
This is of course the cleanest way to go about a post-breakup situation. He is dead to you. Unfriend him on Facebook. Delete his phone number. Set everything he ever got you aflame. Cut off his friends who weren't your friends. Beg your friends who weren't his friends to cut him off similarly.

While this is the cleanest option, it's also the most difficult to pull off, in my opinion. You will find yourself going back on your decision. Or you'll find him going crazy and trying to get you back to talk to.

Or, maybe, you're one of the few people who can cut him loose like a hangnail and move on. If so, congrats! You're a better man than I.


2. Push Him To the Limit.
Oh shit. You did that stupid "Let's totes be friends!" thang. You idiot. You stupid fucking moron. I've done this no less than ten times in my dating career.

Okay. So now you're stuck occasionally texting him. Sometimes calling him. Working out with him from time-to-time. And you're all smiles and howdy-dos... until he leaves and you explode in tears and beat your pillows like they're oncoming attackers.

Well, fine. It's time to push him to the limit. Chances are, every time you get a fresh dose of searing love-pain, you pull back from him. You delete him on Facebook, only to add him again. You delete his phone number, but have it written down on a card somewhere. You find ways to crash into him when you're out.

Go ahead and keep this tomfoolery up. You can't cut him off, and so now it's his job to do the cutting. I assure you, soon enough, he won't be able to deal with your flip-flopping flim-flammery. He'll cut you off, you'll experience the heartbreak you've been avoiding, and life will go on. 


3. Engage Your Kill Switch.
Inside each of us, there is a time- and pain-sensitive Kill Switch. For each of us, that period of time, and that threshold of pain is different. But the outcome is the same: when you reach a certain consecutive period of god-awful heartbreak, the switch will throw, and you'll... suddenly... feel... nothing.

I know, because it's happened to me many times. One day you'll roll out of bed, having not slept more than five minutes the night previous. You'll go to the bathroom and jump in the shower. You'll step out and... find yourself thinking of something else. Whether it's pizza, another cute guy, or a friend you haven't called in a while, it'll be a complete change in mental direction for you.

At first you may be tentative. Is that really it? Are you over him? Did it really happen that suddenly? Yes. Because we can only suffer for so long, friends. You can only hold your hand over a stove top for so long before the entire limb falls off.



So - what does all of this mean? It means, no matter what path you take, sooner or later you WILL be over him. This is to comfort you when all those friends you repeat your woes to day in and day out finally throw up your hands in frustration. Anyone who tells you to "just cut him off" doesn't get it. That's fine. That's why they're most likely never going to be a couples counselor.

You have a right to your pain and heartbreak. You have a right to try and get over him in any way you can (so long as he isn't physically hurt in the process... I have to throw that in there). It'll be rough. It'll suck. You'll cry a lot. You might puke, or lose twenty pounds from not eating.

Breakups are messy and they suck, it's true. Just rest assured that, one day, whether he cuts you off, you cut him off, or you cut yourself loose from him, you will be free. You WILL move on.

Love,
Justin Luke
www.JustinLukeNYC.com

My Open Letter to Cardinal Timothy Dolan and the Catholic Church

I was going to write this in the comment section of Cardinal Dolan's most recent vitriolic blog post on contraception. I figured it had the better chance of seeing the light of day right here...

---

Dear Cardinal Dolan,

Until recently, I never knew you existed. I wish I still didn't.

My acquaintance with you all began when I first got to know you. It wasn't very long ago. You appeared on my television, a wide, Christian smile, that cute Santa-like face. You seemed so benevolent. So at peace. Then you opened your ignorant, hate-filled mouth. And it all went downhill. How could someone smile so wide and say such terrible things? Be such a bully to people who never picked a fight with him? I assumed you wouldn't go very far and that I should just ignore you grandstanding behind your bully pulpit.

Until, a month ago, the church elevated you to the position of Cardinal. Which scared me even more: it meant your holy higher-ups actually agreed with everything you were saying.

Thanks to the absurd anger and almost infantile reaction of you and your robed brothers to both women's use of their own bodies, and the existence and love of homosexuals, I have lost ALL faith in the Catholic Church. I was once a weekly church-going, donation-basket-tipping, strongly devout Catholic. Now I refuse to set foot in a church. And why? How was I driven away so quickly? Easy, really.

I was raised on a diet of Turn the Other Cheek and Love Thy Neighbor As Thyself.

Not Thou Shalt Expect Control Over Women's Vaginas and Uteri. Not Thou Shalt Love All Neighbors Unless They Are Gay. Not Thou Shalt Expect Everyone To Say "Merry Christmas" In December, Lest They Be The Devil Incarnate.

Once upon a time, the Catholic church meant something good in my mind. You brought peace and hope, you took care of the poor and the destitute. Now, in the past year, you have transformed right in front of my face.

The Catholic Church has turned into a cross between a mean, vicious bully, and a whining infant. You throw your heft around to get your way, and then stomp and cry and snivel when you don't get exactly what you want.

A few months ago, you fought that you had a right to NOT pay for your female students' and employee's contraception. And so the Obama White House went ahead and said "Okay, Catholic Church, that's fine. The insurance companies will pay."

Then what happened? Was that enough for you? No. You stomped and moaned and continue to cry that suddenly it's NOT about the money. It's about something else.

And that something else makes me sicker than anything else you do: The Freedom of Religion. This has become a catch-all excuse for you to demand ridiculous things and expect even worse. Let me tell it to you plainly: FREEDOM does not mean the right to take away someone else's FREEDOM.

Religious Freedom, you say, should spare you from granting gays the right to marry. Too bad that's actually TAKING AWAY the freedom of gays to marry.

Religious Freedom, you say, should spare you from having to give your employees, regardless of their religion, contraceptive support. Too bad that takes away THEIR freedom to receive contraception and protection that should be given to all humans.

Religious Freedom disgusts me. It's hypocritical, evil, rude, unkind, and, dare I say it, anti-Christian.

I am sick and tired of seeing you get on television and spew hate, demand control, and assert your dominance over people - those who are members of your flock, and those who are not. When did the Catholic church turn into the devil? When did it think that the best use of its power was to take away the power of other people?

It's disgusting and shameful. It's hypocritical and infantile. I used to see Catholicism as a source of peace. Now, for me, it's an endless source of fury.

STOP hating. STOP discriminating. And STOP playing the victim in order to make other people YOUR victims.

You said in your post: "We’d prefer to concentrate on the noble tasks of healing the sick, teaching our youth, and helping the poor, all now in jeopardy due to this bureaucratic intrusion into the internal life of the church."

Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. You can still do all those things. Especially since the insurance companies are paying to keep your employees' vaginas healthy. But you're too busy whining and crying and stomping as you fight the natural progress of humanity to drag us kicking and screaming back to the past when you had the world in your hands.

You have all the money you ever did (especially since our taxes help to pay for those huge churches you have everywhere, you being tax-exempt and all).

So put it to good use. Go on the air to preach love of your fellow neighbor - regardless of who he or she is or loves or what she does in privacy. Jesus protected Mary Magdalene, one of the most famous prostitutes in history. You can't even abide by two men who want to get married and spend the rest of their lives together.

What went wrong? What turned you so sour?

I haven't the slightest idea. I just hope that, someday, you'll find your way back to light. Because, right now, you have a lot more in common with the Satan you condemn, than the God you revere.

- Justin Luke
JustinLukeNYC.com

Don't Be A Broke Bitch: A Gay Boy's Guide to Finance

Money is a funny thing. Just kidding. It's a very fucking serious thing. Living here in one of the most expensive cities in the world, I totally get that. It basically costs money just to walk out of your apartment. And forget about the price of actually DOING something. Getting food? Getting drunk? Getting laid? ALL OF IT COSTS MONEY.

So that sucks, right? It would be awesome if everything were free, or if we were rich. Some of us, I suppose, are. But then there's the rest of us.

Listen up bitches. I'm all about being young and having fun. But I'm gonna play Papa Justin for a few minutes and give you a few important tips. Let ME think about your future, so you don't have to.


SAVE SAVE SAVE
My mother raised me with a continuous fear of being poor, and homeless. This may have been slightly cruel, but it was also effective. I now have a VERY large saving account. It wasn't always that way - I've been aggressively saving money since I was in college. Just a little bit here and there. As my salary and income increased, so did my savings.

Saving money is boring, I'll admit it. I'd much rather go out and buy video games. But you know what? There's a nice feeling that comes with a sense of security. If I lost my job, I have enough in my savings to live income-free for a year or more. And that's assuming ZERO income, which I would never allow myself to live with.


YOU CAN'T TOUCH THAT
How did I save all the money I've put away? Simple. I snuck it away from me behind my back. I set up an ING bank account online. I programmed it to tip-toe into my checking account at Citibank once a week and pull out a chunk of money. In the beginning it was $50 a week. Then it was $100 a week. Now it's $500 a week.

I then treated the account like it didn't exist. If my checking account was low leading up to my next paycheck, then I lived with it. I cut corners. The rule was simple: I am NOT allowed to touch my savings. Done.

Try it. Even if you're having $10 deducted a week, it's still something. It's still a start.


SMART CREDIT
A lot of people are in disgusting amounts of debt. That's terrible and I'm sorry they have to face it. For me, my debt is always controlled, and intentional. Essentially, I only charge for what I can pay. My credit card bills are always paid in full. In fact, thanks to digital checking, I often pay down numbers on my credit card the second they appear.

The only time I charge for MORE than I can afford is when the credit card lets me. For example, my favorite credit card is my BEST BUY one. When I make a multi-thousand dollar purchase, it allows me to pay down the charge, interest free, for anywhere from 18-32 months. Again - the catch is that I actually pay it down. I look at the total months, and the total charge, and divide it to see EXACTLY how much I need to pay a month in order to avoid interest.

Listen boys, if you're bad with credit STOP BUYING SHIT. Interest is the biggest sucker of them all. You're paying money (and potentially lots of it) for absolutely NOTHING. Spare yourself. Pay with a debit card. Live according to your actual income, and not your ideal income.


$1,000 AIN'T ENOUGH
Somewhere there's an article that I read that says an astounding majority of Americans would need to BORROW BEG OR STEAL just to get $1,000 if they suddenly needed it for an emergency. This is bad. This is very, very bad. You never know where your life might lead you.

So get that $1,000... but do NOT stop there.

You should have AT LEAST $1,000 saved away in a bank account somewhere. Start now if you don't have it. And then just keep on going.


GO FOR DEALS
This city is full of open bars, cover-free parties, giveaways, and freebies. You just have to look for them. I never miss an open bar when I'm going out. If you don't have the cash to afford drinks at the bar, drink at home first, and then have one at the bar.

Again, it's nice to live lavishly, but it can lead to ruin.


IT COULD HAPPEN TO YOU
And now I go the fear route, like my mother did with me. Listen, fellas. You're NOT impervious. Go watch the documentary MAXED OUT. Credit and debt is a serious fucking thing. You could end up 40 and homeless (hard to imagine when you're 21 and living the life... but you should).

My father was once a very wealthy man. Then he and my mother got divorced and he went on a spending binge. Now he is bankrupt, living on food stamps and in government housing. I take him out to meals and cut him monthly checks to help. Looking at my Dad ten years ago I never expected this. But it's very real, and a terrible way to live. Trust me: I watch him trying to survive every day.

Listen boys, I don't mean to be a killjoy. But, since I'm probably the oldest gay you know (or near-to-the-oldest) I feel this is my responsibility.

• Open a savings account.
• Deposit in it weekly.
• Avoid debt.
• Use debit.
• Live like you earn, not like you wish.

Just... do it for Papa Justin, mmkay?

xo Justin Luke
JustinLukeNYC.com

Singing AND Stripping with Gorgeous Gay, Anthony Triolo!

Anthony Triolo is a name you probably haven't heard yet, but it's one you'll be hearing soon enough. Just take a look at him! And then listen to him!

Because it's one thing to be gorgeous. It's another thing to have a good starting pop sensibility. And it's another thing to be gay. Throw all of those into a single person and you've got Wet Dream Material.

Check out these EXCLUSIVE photos of Anthony Triolo stripping down to a very neon under-outfit, and then listen to his new single AVATAR (not officially sanctioned by the billion-dollar blockbuster movie, thank God) at the bottom of this post.

And if you wanna support an up-and-coming artist (and really, you should) grab an official copy of AVATAR on the iTunes store right HERE.

xo Justin Luke
JustinLukeNYC.com

Gay Boy Derek Allen Watson Strips Down! (NSFW)

Working in nightlife, I come in contact with very, very beautiful people very, very often. One such friend is the beyond-words-gorgeous Derek Allen Watson. You've seen him on the covers of NEXT and INK'D. You've seen him out and about at the clubs and bars. I see him at my events, and at my gym.

Now you can see him naked. Thanks to his most recent photo shoot with superstar photographer, Rick Day.

Enjoy! Warning: pubes and ass lie below. Don't say I didn't warn you.

xo JL
JustinLukeNYC.com

Wanna see more of Derek, including additional skin? It's all on his website. Stop on by.