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I’m so grateful for the time we got to spend together over the last 18 years, and especially so much in the 18 months I’ve been back nearby.
You were the life of the party. I’ll never forget the way you lit up the room with your sparkling presence, warm smile, quick wit and frequent laughter. Brilliant and hilarious, your mind was on fire with ideas and humor.
You were an unsung genius—passionate, knowledgeable, discerning about art, literature, poetry, music, & film. You were talented & worked across mediums—drawing, music/sound art, acting in film & video, writing, performance, photocopy art & collage. I’m grateful to have a few of your drawings and songs. I wish we had so many more. I wish I had a recording of your speaking voice, your raspy, breathless, excited tone, your cute Jersey accent, your hearty laugh.
You were a gender-queer pioneer – bravely trans from middle school on in the early 90s, long before transgender became a household word. You never backed down in the face of harassment, proudly being yourself even when you got kicked out of school at 15 for your gender identity. You always lived on your own terms, rejecting the status quo, standing up for the freedom to be yourself, even when that meant distinguishing yourself from contemporary trends in trans communities by using he/him pronouns instead of she or they. You told me you wanted to expand the definition of masculine and feminine, not just exchange binary identities. Some people were baffled by the apparent contradiction that you were trans and straight/only dated women, but you explained that you simply worshipped women and the feminine, you wanted to completely live in that goddess energy, a philosophy I can totally get behind!
You were a loving partner to Sylvia, your late wife, who was a shy and gentle, kind, intelligent soul. I remember the early days of your relationship, how in love you were. You told me once that no matter what, you’d never abandon her. I remember the exact moment I got your text with a picture of beautiful newborn Martine in 2008, how you fell so madly in love with her, and told me that nothing else mattered now but her. You were such an amazing dad: devoted, patient, nurturing, and so much fun. When Sylvia died suddenly in 2014 from her lifelong health struggles, you were devastated, but toughed it out as a single dad, balancing parenting, your work as an x-ray tech, and art.
Props to your family for letting you go out in style —dressing you at your funeral in your finest black dress, jewelry and signature red lipstick, complete with lace fingerless gloves and a rainbow Pride flag draped over your casket. You looked so beautiful, then as always. When I thanked your sister Mayra for that choice, she said she knew that if she’d buried you in a suit, you’d haunt her for the rest of her life! So true. I’m so glad your family always loved and accepted you as you were. Your funeral was packed—you were, are, will always be loved by so many.
I’ve felt your presence since you’ve been gone a few times, in my cats’ intent staring at absolutely nothing on the ceiling in peaceful moments while I’m remembering you, in bizarre and funny objects out of place: one of your favorite objects in my apartment, inexplicably on the floor, and at your funeral—walking out after the most somber moment watching your mother say her final goodbyes…only to find a rogue toupee on the floor in the lobby! Your friends and I were quite certain that was your doing. Thanks for that laugh, and all the countless others you inspired. It feels good to remember you fully, to feel these waves of love, gratitude and appreciation for you washing over me.
I’m grateful Martine has your amazing family to care for her. She’s in the best possible hands, but no one can ever take your place. You were one of the most unique people I’ve ever met—so wild, creative and brave, with an incredibly tender, joyful, affectionate heart. You loved unconditionally, without judgment. You were born on Christmas Day, we joked you were “Raysus,” but you really had a saintly tolerance and love for humanity. To know you (truly) was to love you. I like what one of your friends wrote on your page, that you always showed “unyielding kindness and respect in the face of a brutal world.”
I’m so glad you went out on a high note, having just published an article in Bust Magazine, and joined an acting troupe: you were excited about art and life the last time we talked, just weeks ago. You were one of the smartest, coolest, funniest, most fun, and sweetest friends I’ve had the privilege to know. You blazed through this world like a shooting star. I’m glad I got to witness and love you for as long as I did. I promise to treasure your memory, and keep it alive.
Rest in peace, dear Ray of light
Always,
Kelly McKay
I lost my best friend of almost 30 yrs last week. We’ve been inseparable this whole time & he was everything to me & the only reason I didn’t grow up hating myself. He was a champion and defender of all queer and marginalized people. The streets are safer today because he was unafraid to walk them as his true self 24/7 since childhood, even when Newark was “the most dangerous city in America”. I’m glad he knew that.
It’s been like when the spaceship flies over you in Velvet Goldmine or like being best friends with your favorite cartoon. This amazing beautiful creature, not of this world, would just pop into my day and everything was magically transformed and exciting. He was both Roger & Jessica Rabbit. Our life together has been full of art and adventure & I’m eternally thankful to have grown up in 90s NYC with him at my side. It’s the best thing that has ever happened to me. I have so many random things about him and shenanigans we got into that keep coming to mind and want to share some with you but can’t seem to put them in any order
-I never called him Ray. He was Mona to me, short for Raymona inspired by the Throwing Muses “The Real Ramona”. The first time a man thought Ray was a woman, Ray told him his name was Raymona so that he would buy us drinks & the name stuck from when we were 16 to the present. This was at a Metrostylee show in Staten Island.
-when we were very young, the word trans didn’t exist in its current context yet and he called himself a Revolutionary Gender Evolutionary. Always way ahead of his time.
-He was deeply inspired by and identified as a riot grrrl. He credited the movement and specifically Bratmobile with inspiring him to be an artist and activist
-We were 15 the first time he took me to a gay bar and the Christopher St pier after a Lunachicks show at Tramps. He taught me what internalized homophobia was and helped me overcome it. He loved the piers and one time when Wigstock moved there we saw Ida Slapta pull a string of lit lightbulbs out of her butt during Gloria Estefan’s “Coming Out of the Dark”. Take me back!
-His drag name was Kim Gorda & he was currently working on a performance of Sylvia Plath’s “Lady Lazarus”. He was 19 or so when he made his debut at the legendary Trannyshack in San Francisco & would do PJ Harvey songs (before Juliette Lewis did it, he would tell you)
-He had a years long one-sided feud with Suzanne Vega that started when he tried to give her one of his microbraids and she wasn’t having it. It didn’t stop there because he confronted her a year later when we ran into her at an Elastica show 🤣
-He grew up in Ivy Hill in the same apartment buildings as Rah Digga in Newark
-He was such a hardcore Madonna fan from the beginning that at 8 yrs old he’d go to school with Madonna airbrushed down one side of his jeans
-One time we got in trouble for dancing too dirty with each other at the Soho Grand Hotel, one of our many Madonna moments
-His middle names really are Sugar Rocky, his dad is a boxer and named him after Sugar Ray Robinson and Rocky
-At 15 he was a regular of Disco 2000 at Limelight and often wore Daisy dukes, a camisole top, fake bruises, eyelashes on only one eye, and took a bear shaped lunch box full of oatmeal raisin cookies with him & the Club Kids adored him.
-One time at Limelight he entered the Hot Body Contest where people would strip for a prize of $50 and the final came down to Ray vs Amanda Lepore and they got into a battle of nudity & who had the most nerve & would go the furthest, the details of which I can’t write here
-Our favorite teenage pastime was prank calling Pat Robertson & the 700 Club and terrifying the fundamentalists and recording it
-He was really tough! One time someone got out of a car on Christopher St and tried to rob him and he fought off his would be robber and chased the car down the street beating the trunk with his purse until the car got too fast
-We were such hardcore Cure fans we once bum rushed the front door & security to get into a show we didn’t have tickets for and got away with it
-While I was working for Morrissey, I’d always bring Ray with me to his shows and Ray would go wild for “Shoplifters of the World Uniite” and outperform Morrissey. You know why that was his jam….
-Ray was a TERRIBLE driver and I can’t count how many times I was in a car that broke down with him but one time it broke down when we were at a Danzig show and we ended up hanging out with the band because of it. Glenn loved Ray instantly and thought he was hilarious and got a big kick out of signing Ray and his girlfriend Sylvia’s matching Misfits purses.
-Courtney Love chased Ray around Don Hills one night. She had been bragging about how expensive her extensions were & he said something shady to her about it instead of being impressed & that made her love him.
-We spent a night dancing with Ari Up and Lady Miss Kier that was a few teenage dreams come true at the same time
-He listened to the Red Aunts, Deee-Lite, Magnetic Fields, and Erykah Badu constantly
-A couple of years ago I lost him at a Salt N Pepa show & the next time I saw him was on stage dancing with Pepa during “Whatta Man” and he said “What about a man like me Pepa?” and she didn’t know what to do 🤣
-He named his daughter Martine Etienne after his cat Martin and St Etienne
-we always loved a good goth night and would lose our mind to christian death & would gag over photos of Rozz Williams
-He participated in one of the very first conferences about trans identity which was at Brown University
-He was a big fan of Rachel Whiteread’s sculptures and Wangechi Mutu’s collages
-He could recite an endless amount of Sylvia Plath from memory
-he loved voguing and singing with his daughter and teaching kids about music
-my favorite memory of all is when I got to go to the movie theater without him and see him on the big screen in Shortbus and embarrass myself by exclaiming “That’s my best friend!”. I always looked at him like he was on a movie screen and I always told him he would be so I wasn’t that surprised when the day came but I was crying with joy the entire time. A rare moment of justice in my eyes.
I wanted to share a little of his work. For such an accomplished person, he wasn’t big on self-promotion
John Cameron Mitchell wrote this character for Ray specifically and it was based on him. The dialogue is in part improvised by Ray (referring to Ray’s role in Shortbus)
© all images and files Ray Rivas, except as marked. Kelly McKay 2019