038 - Coming Out as Bi
What started as a curiosity is now my fully-realized self. Thank you for accepting me as I truly am š
I am a New Yorker currently in Los Angeles.
I live in LA, but Iām based in NY.
I am a native New Yorker who feels like a born Californian.
Are you plainly seeing what took me so long to understand for myself? Is what I have been running from all these years as obvious to you as it is to me now?
Itās time to stop hiding. Itās time to start living.
I am ready to admit who I truly am. I am ready to introduce you to the real me.
I, Scott Rogowsky, am finally living my best lifeā¦ as an out and proud bicoastal man.
Iām bicoastal, and Iām spectacular.
MY PATH TO SELF-DISCOVERY
I was born in New York City, December 1984, and raised 15 miles north of the city in the town of Harrison, New York. 42 minutes by train to Grand Central on the New Haven Line; about an hour by car to Yankee Stadium or Shea, depending on traffic; home to the Harrison Donut Shop (until it was run out of town by Dunkinā).
I attended Harrison public schools until 6th grade when I was sent to a private high school in New York City.
Not just New York City ā THE BRONX!
Not just The Bronx ā RIVERDALE!
I went to college in Baltimore. Canāt say I rep Charm City too hard. It was fine for four years.
After college I bounced around Brooklyn for ten years ā NEW YORK CITYāS BROOKLYN ā and when HQ Trivia took off I moved to Manhattan ā MANHATTANāS NEW YORK CITY ā for brief spells in Nolita and Waverly Place before settling into East Tribeca / West Chinatown with a serious girlfriend.
And I mean, SERIOUS. I almost married her!
Instead, we broke up on New Yearās Day 2020.
Freshly single, still mourning Kobe, and haunted by nightmares of koala bears on fire,1 I moved into a Chelsea bachelor pad in February 2020, thinking things couldnāt POSSIBLY get any worseā¦
They got worse. Like, way worse.
With the pandemic raging and the thought of my local 16 Handles never reopening ā because HOW YOU GONNA LET PEOPLE JUST WALK UP AND YANK ON HANDLES NOW THAT WEāRE ALL POTENTIALLY CONTAGIOUS WITH THE PLAGUE? ā I moved back to my childhood home in Westchester (New York).
And then in April 2021, Lady Angeles came calling. I followed a job and a girl out to the Golden Shore, posting up in a furnished junior one-bed in Marina del Rey. Within two weeks of my arrival, the girl dumps me; within two months, the job dries up. I buy a Tesla on a seven-year payment plan and a pet hamster for $20 cash that I name Pippen (who, despite being dead for nearly two years now, is looking like the better investment). I spent the rest of the year in a state of semi-retirement, lounging poolside with a book or podcast when not on a beach walk or in a tennis lesson.
I also got hooked on porn.
But not the naked titty kindā¦
The measurements moving my needle were lot size, not cup. I was getting turned on by ADUs rather than BBWs. The only fuckfest that held my attention was the steadily increasing interest rate.
I was looking at properties.
For hours at a time, at all hours of day or night, Iād Zillow myself silly, indulging in my every kink from square foot fetishism to BDSM (Back Decks, Scenic Mountains). I was meeting strangers who seemed to accept me for who I am; brokers from Compass and Coldwell Banker who were the first people to tell me it was normal to think about domiciling in LA while maintaining residency in New York, who assured me I wasnāt a freak for secretly wishing to own in upstate NY while retaining a rental in LA.
With their support and my budding self-confidence, I flirted with some newly constructed townhouse condos in Culver. I considered a mid-century bungalow in the Palisades (since burned to the ground). Ultimately, I went into contract on the unit directly above me in the same building where I had been renting.
But I got fucked2 by Fannie Mae! Or was it Freddie Mac? Which oneās which? And whatās their deal anyway? Are they brother and sister? Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac Duberstein aka āThe Duberstein Kidsā? Or are āMaeā and āMacā their last names, and theyāre just, like, friends from camp or something?
Apparently after that condo collapse in Surfisde, Florida ā remember? One of the deadliest structural disasters in American history? 98 people killed? Many more severely injured? ā Fannie and Freddie got together and placed 1200 apartment complexes with deferred maintenance on their Exclusionary List (a āmortgage blacklistā preventing those looking to finance a home from securing a conventional loan). My complex was on the list.
I used the money that came back to me from escrow for first and last monthās rent on Quiz Daddyās, the vintage clothing store in Santa Monica I ran for two tremendously successful years. Financially successful, yes, thanks to my tenant-friendly family landlord who offered below-market rent and my sometimes 99.9% profit margin on inventory I had been accumulating since high school.
But it was also successful in a truly non-corny, much more meaningful way, by becoming a pillar of the community; a place where Westsiders of a certain taste (90s-sports-logos meets Grateful-Dead-bootlegs) could meet and wax nostalgic about Shawn Kemp or John Kruk or Butch Trucks and Peakinā at the Beacon.
I fostered genuine friendships with my customers, several of whom became part of the Quiz Daddyās crew as part-time employees. I greeted fans from all corners of the country (and one or two from overseas) who were stoked to snap a selfie and cop some fresh threads from their favorite phone-based game show host.
I sold shirts to Ali McGraw, Geena Davis, Ethan Coen, Nikki Glaser, Raphael Saddiq, GaTa, Michael Gandolfini, Aaron Wiggins. I outfitted my friends in Yacht, Pink Talking Fish, and Wolves of Glendale, and I made the acquaintance of two other bands who stopped in for a shop ā and who later invited me to their gigs. Shoutout Eggy and Night Cap, you guys RAWK!
I met several lovely ladies with whom I experienced varying degrees of romantic attachment. One very memorable single mom from Montana invited me to join her and her Deadhead dad for drinks at a beachside bar in Venice. A couple hours later I watched with concerned bemusement as her very clearly alcoholic dad drove wildly drunk across the grass lawn of the Westminster Dog Parkās parking lot in which had immorally (if not illegally) parked.
But just as all good things must come to an end, my store had to come to an end. Because my store was a good thing. And all good things must come to an end.
Quiz Daddyās closed its doors on December 31, 2023. I moved out of my apartment on January 29, 2024. I put all my stuff from the store and the apartment into storage and drove with my dog Buscemi out to Austin for an exciting new job.
hin the first week, the job falls through. I drive back to LA with BuBu, drop my car with my buddy Mike, and fly to New York where I split time between my girlfriendās place in Brooklyn and my parentsā place in the āburbs. This worked pretty well until it didnāt ā the girl and I split at the end of October, and I moved fully back to Harrison, officially making me Childless and Alone in My Childhood Home at 40 Years Old with My Parents.
Truth be told, I loved every minute of it.
But I had to get back to LA to, letās just say, take care of some things.
I understand how one could interpret that cryptic phrasing as my hinting at having a sinister, perhaps even mafia-related reason for my return, but really what I needed to take care of was getting my stuff out of storage and selling my car.
My frat house roommate Aaron and his abfab wife Ari operate the guesthouse behind their beautiful home in Westdale3 as an AirBnb, which they made available for me to snag on a month-to-month basis. Truth be told, Iām loving every minute of it ā especially this very minute as I write to you under the string lights above the spacious outdoor patio, aurally ingesting smooth grooves from the Sonos and gastrically digesting the deliciousness Ari cooked up in honor of her neighbor Kevinās birthday.
While Kevin and his wife Melissaās two little girls joined Aaron and Ariās two kids on the newly acquired backyard deathtrap trampoline, the adults munched on fresh lettuces from the home garden and enjoyed a baked salmon sampler: two separate filets prepared with two different rubs (Cajun-Spiced & Dijonnaise).
Dessert was an ad hoc ice cream sundae concocted with Tillamook Salted Pretzel Caramel, fresh cut sweet mango, and the best cookies Iāve ever had from a gas station. Seriously, you guys. I donāt mean āthe best cookies Iāve ever had from a gas station,ā I mean āthe best cookies Iāve ever had,ā that just happen to be found in a gas station. ONLY IN LA, BABY!
Tomorrow I go back to New York for a week, to celebrate my momās 75th birthday and the Passover Seders.4 Then Iāll come back to LA for a couple of weeks before heading back to New York in May, at which pointā¦ Mexico City?
Hereās the thing (without Alec Baldwin): I love NY. I love LA. Iāll probably also love CDMX. Iāve crafted a nifty little lifestyle for myself where I can not only be anywhere ā in a major city or the middle of the woods, on either side of any pond ā but I can be happy anywhere. Truth be told, Iām loving every minute of all of it.
Wherever I go, there I am, and wherever I am is exactly where Iām supposed to be. I am grateful to have reached a state of being where I can be happy anywhere because Iām happy being with myself. My true self. My authentic self.
My bicoastal self.
Remember when Australia burned down?
At the time I thought of it as āgetting fucked,ā but in hindsight I couldnāt be more grateful that the MDR condo fell through.
You know Westdale! Everyone knows the Los Angeles neighborhood of Westdale! In the right armpit of the 405 and the 10 (right if looking at the map, left from the bodily POV of the 405 and the 10). Westdale!
šµ Seder haterās, get away, or my lead will spray šµ