I Am What I Am, John Barrowman [smart ebook reader .txt] 📗

everyday stuff and more stuff that ends up on all dining-room tables.

Dominating these main living areas – along with my 52-inch Sony flat-screen TV, which I have to admit is on most of the day – is big, bold, bursting-with-colour art by Steve Walker and bright pop images by Burton Morris. My dear friend in LA, Brett Vinovitch, introduced me to these artists.6 Brett used to work for Andy Warhol and he knows his hues from his values better than most.

Currently above the fireplace is an oil painting by Paul Kenton, which captures in its broad strokes and blurs of colour the kinetic energy of New York’s Times Square. On its left is a painting of a Tutsi woman warrior that Scott bought for me for my birthday while in South Africa, and on the right is an original artwork depicting some very fit baseball players by the Abercrombie & Fitch artist Mark Beard. Below the mantel sit my gran, Murn’s, two Wally Dogs – or ‘Wally Dugs’, as they’re known in Glasgow. (‘Wally’ is slang for ‘made with china’. Use in a sentence? You could drink from ‘wally cups’ if you lived in a ‘wally close’.7)

Another thing that struck me from your feedback was that lots of you wanted to know my perspective on aspects of love and life from under a celebrity spotlight. You don’t necessarily want to know what I think about big global issues,8 but you do want to know my opinions on what matters to me. That’s why inside this book, among other things, you’ll find my insights about being Captain Jack, about being a talent-show judge, about being a family man, a gay man, a brother, a son, and a lover.

And that’s why I’ve invited you into my home: to give you an opportunity to spend time with me in a more intimate setting, listening to some Barrowman table talk and learning more about my personal escapades and professional experiences from the past couple of years. So, please, join me at my table. I’ve made dinner9 and I have lots of terrific table talk to dish.

CHAPTER TWO

‘WE ARE WHAT WE ARE’

★

‘From scenes like these, old Scotia’s grandeur springs, That makes her lov’d at home, rever’d abroad: Princes and lords are but the breath of kings, “An honest man’s the noblest work of God.”’

Robert Burns, ‘The Cotter’s Saturday Night’

‘Skinny Malinky long legs, big banana feet, Went tae the pictures, an’ couldnae get a seat. When the picture started, Skinny Malinky farted, Skinny Malinky long legs, big banana feet.’

‘Wee Jimmy’

Twelve things I’ve learned from my parents

1 Don’t go to bed angry (but if you do, wake up first and make the coffee).

2 Don’t let anyone make you feel bad about yourself (that’s your mother’s job).1

3 Take responsibility for your actions (especially if you’ve been caught red-handed).

4 To love another person is to see the face of God (or the Face of Boe, depending on your beliefs).2

5 You always have room for dessert (there’s a special section in your stomach).

6 You always have time to read (there’s a special section of your brain that melts if you don’t).

7 Laugh every day (especially at yourself).

8 Speak up for yourself (especially if you have something to say).

9 Speak up for others (especially if they can’t).

10 It doesn’t take much to be kind (if it does, time for you to be off to that remote island).

11 Where e’er ye be let yer wind gang free (just ask David Tennant, who was once trapped in the TARDIS with me when I followed this advice).

12 Always have a party piece (‘Skinny Malinky’ doesn’t count).

When we were growing up, my dad was perpetually late. Never for work or anything business-related, but if it involved a family outing, we’d all be sitting waiting in the car, crisp and clean and ready to go, and my dad would be nowhere to be found. My brother, Andrew, would already be unbuttoning his collar and untucking his shirt from his trousers; Carole would be ten pages into the emergency book she’d hidden under the seat; and like a pinball I’d be bouncing from the front to the back to the side of the car and again from the front to the back to the side – ping!

‘Has anyone seen your dad?’ my mum would inevitably ask.

‘He’s cleaning the garage,’ one of us would inevitably say.

The genesis of the phrase is from early in our childhoods in Scotland. It was a Sunday morning, and my mum was expected to be singing with the choir at the Church of Christ in East Kilbride within the hour. Carole, Andrew and I were decked out in our ‘itchy clothes’ and had all clambered into the car, when my dad spotted something out of place in the garage, something he had to change, clean or repair at that precise moment.

We did not make it to the church on time.

Throughout my childhood, and even today, this was our response whenever we were waiting for my dad.

‘Where’s your father?’

‘Cleaning the garage.’

My dad even has a recurring dream about his chronic lateness, which stems from a real-life incident that occurred in America. As you may know, in the mid seventies, my family, including my gran, Murn, emigrated to the US. One summer, we were all travelling back to Scotland for a visit. (For our first few years living in the States, we went back to Scotland fairly regularly, especially so my dad could see his brothers and his parents.) This particular trip home, the entire family was waiting in a hired limo, which was ready to take us to O’Hare Airport in Chicago for an evening flight to Prestwick. We were already cutting it a bit too fine in terms of getting there on time.

‘Where’s your dad?’

In unison: ‘Cleaning the garage.’

Fifteen minutes later, my dad emerged from the house after having double-checked for the fourth and fifth time that every light was out, every plug unplugged, every switch in the off position. The