An American Lion

Bachelors leave their bachelor pads and run with the bulls

The bachelor pad as a metaphor for never having to hold yourself accountable for not being an adult:

In 2008, the unemployment rate for men ages 20 to 34 in New York State was 7.4 percent. The countrywide average was 7.7 percent, while the state average for women in the same age range was 6.1 percent, according to the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics. (Numbers for 2009 are not yet available.)

Bachelors have been walloped, but many are taking their lumps and moving on.

Until a year ago, Jason Brooks, 36, a host of the short-lived MTVshow “Trailer Fabulous,” a solo artist and the singer in a band called Rehab, paid $5,000 a month for a 2,000-square-foot TriBeCa loft that he shared with his wife. Before that, he paid $3,500 a month for an apartment in a doorman building in the Financial District.

Now, says Mr. Brooks, whose stage name is Brooks Buford, he pays $1,600 a month for a tiny studio in SoHo.

“It’s such a bizarre shift from where I was to where I am now,” said Mr. Brooks, who is now divorced. “I catch myself trying to make excuses for this place. Like before anyone comes up, I’m like, ‘Yeah, it’s like an airplane cabin.’ ”

Mr. Brooks, who says he lives off royalties from his past music career, also worked in information technology until he was laid off about a year ago.

In his old married apartment in the financial district, he said, two walls were devoted to shelves showcasing his vast sneaker collection. In his new single-again apartment, shared with a pug puppy called Brooks Junior, he needs a penlight to help him excavate footwear from the mountain of clothing jammed into his small closet — though he says it’s only one-eighth of what he owned in more prosperous times.

In still another past-life apartment, back in Atlanta, where Mr. Brooks is from, a grove of plastic trees surrounded his bed. In SoHo, he has a photomural of a forest stapled to the wall.

That’s nice. Grumble, grumble, grumble.

I suppose my bitterness is getting in the way, but bachelor pads are juvenile and ridiculous because I never got to have one. Four ex-wives, four children, and an incompatible lifestyle for me meant no bachelor pad. No where to put my collection of pornographic teakettles (they either have male and female organs placed on them or delicate European or Chinese detail paintings on the sides), no where to put my suits of armor (I own fifteen full sets), and no where to put my vast collection of miniature cars.

In the Eighties, I tried to have a bachelor pad, but my ex-wife was a freak show stumbling backwards on heels, so the judge awarded me custody of the children. This was done despite the fact that I showed up to court in a tuxedo, spats, a leopard-skin hat, with a bottle of brandy under my arm and a Times Square hooker holding my briefcase. No bachelor pad for me—I had to get a four bedroom loft near the financial district.

Anyway, allow me to sneer for a bit, and I’ll be fine.