A very drunk, beautiful man talking to a man he is swapping spit with pulls away for a moment and says very seriously:
I had a salad on my way home from work.
And he went back to sucking on the other man’s neck.
Gasp!
Optimism
A man ten years my senior is new to the gay community and totally out and about ten times what I have ever managed to accomplish. I commented on how much more active he is he had this to say:
I figure the more I do, the more likely I am to meet the man of my dreams. :)
I started speaking to him online a while back as he was beginning to reach out online to talk to and meet other gay men. He is a father and has led his life until now as a straight married man. After just months of being totally out more or less, he has started going out multiple nights a week and making friends and meeting people like mad.
At first I chalked the comment up to the normal naiveté which people have to a degree when getting started in the gay world. I was like that to a degree when I first got started because everyone is friendly and honest and nice because we are all gay and are finding shelter and camaraderie together, right? Right?? Wrong. Turns out people in the gay world are just people like everyone else. There are beautiful, brilliant individuals who shine and there are others who are very not good and a great deal of people all over the spectrum in-between.
Statistically, a comment like the one he made is perfectly true. For a person like myself who does not generally enjoy going to the bar, bars are the last place I would go looking for someone to hang out with. But assuming I do go on the off chance there is someone there, there just may be someone like me who is there too. There may also be someone who is not like me and loves bars who is an awesome match that I may find there.
It all comes back to comfortability and drive. How driven am I to find the man of my dreams? Not very. Therefore there is very little drive for me to leave my comfort zone to find someone to share my life with. However, there are people in this world like my friend who are driven and excited by the idea of finding someone and they will go out and search out new places and groups and interactions which may lead them to “the one”. This is no less valid than my own choice to explore my own inner realm and to take life slowly.
I will openly admit that part of me is jealous of those people who are able to get up and go out to the bar and have fun with that experience. I love meeting new people and the bar is definitely one way of doing so. The problem is that I really just do not enjoy the bar. Now if only there were a way to get a lot of gay men together to eat… A food bar of sorts. Then I would be in heaven.
You Would Never Guess
I’m a bit of a disaster when it comes to being social. I’ve wanted to say this is an issue with the gay scene, but I honestly don’t think that is fair to he scene or myself. I think I would be just as disastrous were I not gay. I think some of the details would be slightly different, but I just don’t think the situation would be too far removed. I seem capable enough when it comes to chatting and small talk, but when it comes to the big stuff (like swapping numbers and hanging out with nee people) I think it is pretty safe to say that I have no clue what the hell is going on.
Most of the guys I know are great at socializing and making new friends. Scratch that, let us call them acquaintances. They meet new people, gab, chat, swap numbers, hang out, get involved in some light interpersonal drama and all is well in the universe. It seems like most of these connections are somewhat fleeting or lightweight though. While most people seem to water ski or snorkel through the social scene I tend to end up in diving bells way out at sea. It’s rare for me to find or make a new friend but when I do, they are almost always golden and part of my family. This has it’s advantages, lots and lots of them. And, though it is not a disadvantage to be able to forge such lasting bonds, I think it is possible I might be missing out on opportunities with people who are not quite as intense/neurotic/bizarre.
So let’s talk about contributing factors, shall we? Lets throw the two biggies right out there: I am retardedly insecure and I have trust issues. Hmm… it’s no wonder, really, how I could get backed into corners by my own demons of self defeat. I think I do a really good job of getting past them in the opening rounds of exchange, but as I am left to my own devices and my thoughts wander, my internal gaze inevitably falls upon my personal pandora’s box and things go downhill from there.
It really just comes down the qualms we have with various aspects of ourselves which I honestly think we all have deep (or not so deep) inside like weight, style, grooming, presentation, or personality. I think at any given time anyone has had doubts about one or all of these aspects of themselves. I just happen to allow myself to indulge in them quite a bit more often than I should and I don’t really quite know how to stop.
I know I am not alone here, but at the same time it seems like I am the only person who hasn’t figured out how to get past it? I don’t know! Any thoughts? More to come…
Summer
It’s officially summer in my book! Last night went to the Joss Stone concert at Red Butte Gardens above Salt Lake City. Great music, drinks, company. I love the concerts at Red Butte, all sorts of people pour in from all over the valley and it’s chill and fun. If you haven’t gone to one, I suggest you make some time this summer. Even if it’s for an artist you are not familiar with.