MAD @ GOD

Thursday's Kiss

2011-08-01T14:37:00.000-04:00

There wasn't one.
Haha.

Riverside Stroll

2011-07-31T19:52:00.002-04:00

Didn't mean to discover a free concert on one of the Riverside Park piers, but did.
Didn't mean to happen upon a couple of boys kissing on the park bench, but I did.
Didn't mean to get wistful about spending the rest of my life alone.
Didn't mean to be gay.
Didn't mean much of anything.
But here we are.

Another Job Well Done

2011-07-27T20:14:00.000-04:00

Therapy is awesome. It's an amazing, life-affirming process.

I was going to go to a pretty well-known center here in NYC to get some therapy for myself...until I realized it was a little TOO well-known. One of my clients goes there. I don't know how regularly, but the way my life goes, it'll be on the day I go.

The People Whisperer

2011-07-26T16:36:00.007-04:00

I can't watch a convincing portrayal of an Asperger's Syndrome person without identifying with them. I've done this before, blogged about myself in terms of my possible diagnosis. Well, here we go again. I don't think I've detailed how much I think I'm like Abed on NBC's Community, but of course, I am. Now there's a new autistic character on Syfy's ALPHAS who I'm much less alike than I am like Abed...and mind you, I'm not as monotone as Abed is. Not as grandly "different" (and entertaining) but ... I sit outside of people's experiences and look in and THAT'S the common thread that I feel with all the autistic characters, severe or otherwise, that I see on TV & movie screens.

I choose to believe that this lends me some skill in a bunch of areas. I think, for instance, that I'm a good writer because I pay attention to my observations. I also think I'm a good therapist because I can read a lot of the cues in voice, body language, and language-choice use. Those are good skills to have, right?

Of course, the drawbacks are phenomenal. Obviously. The drawback = a disorder. That's why it's got a label, or is given "syndrome" as a last name. Having this thing that makes me different has limited my life in major ways.

So let me share with you what this syndrome looks like from inside of my head looking out; "If I don't feel safe, I don't do it."

Sounds simple, right? Doesn't even sound like a disorder. Ah, well no ... the basic principle is not the disordered part. The basic principle is survival instinct. It has helped bring us through the millenia as a viable species.

No, the level I take this instinct to is what makes it a disorder. When I can't figure out a thing in order to make my world a safe place, I avoid that thing. And so, I think my adaptation has caused be to be able to figure out people in a way to foster safety for myself. People aren't so scary if I can quantify them and explain their behaviors to myself. When you're bullied in elementary school on up, you find that a real necessary skill for survival.

But what I haven't been able to figure out is this whole sexual terrain. I haven't been able to regulate the information of sex. I haven't had morality explained to me well enough to accept it.

Now, I did TRY to get it figured out when I went to extreme religion at 16. I took all the information in, hook, line and sinker. I made it my instructions for life operation. And it woorked for a good while. Kept me nice and cozy and gave me a safe place to live-- until my sexual urges stopped fitting into that framework.

Now 30 years later, I haven't found a suitable replacement for the lost information. I'm gay. So how does THAT work? Butt sex? Really?? Where there's FECES??? How can THAT be right???

But I can't even pretend that's the biggest hang-up I've got. (It's possibly #3 on the Top Ten though). My biggest hang-up is to figure out how to be safe in the entire Emotionally Vulnerable spectrum of life. How do you let guards down and trust people and believe they will be for you, and not use your vunerability to crush your life away? How do you get to that level? How do *I*??

Just saying "hello" to the sexually attractive creature right next to me at the gym feels like a leap off the Niagra Falls. How then do I go any further than that? How do I live homosexually? How do I align my life with all the sexual freedom-fighters putting themselves of the front lines?? How do I assume those risks??

In the absence of understanding how, I have actively NOT. By "actively" I mean that my brain has found me ways of compensation on a superpowered level. I can find scapegoats, blockers, reasons and excuses enough to pardon Hitler from Hell, much less keep me out of this battle.

And it all boils down to this; "If I don't feel safe, I don't do it."

Sex is my Last Frontier. I've never done it beause it has never seemed safe. I blog and I blog and I prod into my friends' lives and I tease and I wheedle and I cojole and I flirt and I do everything I can to get this information from people both real and imagined ... and I've barely scratched the surface.

Sex is not quantifiable. Sex is unknowable and unknowing. Sex is irrational and primitive. Sex is a farce. It's a panacea. It's a lifeline. It's humanity's binding force. It's a paradox. It's a lifebringer. It's our species' only manner of survival. It's our species' greatest curse.

I don't know it. I don't know anything about it.

I don't want it.

I won't do it.

I want to do it.

Eating Alone

2011-07-25T20:11:00.001-04:00

I used to love it. Get my book and read and eat, and zone out and be left alone. But when I wanted to go out with company, I couldn't find any. So I went alone. It felt MUCH different. It felt lonely and like I had somehow failed in a job I had.

When did I stop being okay with being by myself?

Did You Know I'm A Vegan Now?

2011-07-24T20:03:00.000-04:00

Not really. I don't actually align myself with the philosophy, nor have I resigned myself to a life without meat, but today certainly marks a week without it. Veggies, seasoned and flavored, thick and juicy, make for wonderful substitutes. If I can sink my teeth into them and chew it like meat, and if it fills my stomach like meat, then I'm satisfied. Each meal.

I'm doing it for weight loss. The worst reason EVER right? But I want abs, and my new identity as a runner hasn't taken me there all the way yet, so I trying something new. If I see my abs like I want, then I could get used to it.

I want abs.

On Saturday He Gets Drunk

2011-07-23T19:57:00.000-04:00

Or at least, as drunk as I allow. A quarter of a pint of Jack Daniels mixed in with Coke. Makes me lightheaded. Fun to feel.

It Did Happen

2011-07-22T19:54:00.002-04:00

I left the house well before 4:30 today.

I just had to get my workout on. I had to put it on myself, peel and squeeze these last ten lbs out.

Slowly but surely.

Too Darn Hot!

2011-07-21T22:22:00.001-04:00

Actually, just hot enough to keep me in the house until 4:30pm.

People Enough

2011-07-20T00:00:00.000-04:00

Tell me how this is possible...how does a person encourage someone else to power through their pain and the bone-deep throb of rejection when they themselves have spent all of their life avoiding the exact same thing? How does a person tell a homosexual man that "it gets better" when he himself is a homosexual man who is too terrified to find out the truth of that statement for himself?

I said this July might be the month that I came out of the closet but I'm sure I lied. I've told people close to me, and even told one guy who now will not be my friend because of some petty disagreement we had -- so I've taken some risks with some questionable characters. I just don't seem to be willing to do it with ALL OF THEM.

But I feel such conviction for my clients. I believe such good things for them. I believe they have strength I haven't seen yet. I believe that no matter how hard it will grow for them, they will persevere because that's what we do. I believe that they have me and will have others step into their lives to help them carry their load when it grows heavy enough to crush them. I believe all that is true, except ... In my own case.

I'm wrong of course. If what I believe is true then it's true for ALL of us. If what I think is possible, it's possible because we MAKE it so. We do it for each other because WE want to. Where I must fail is because I don't believe that there will be people enough for me.

Will there be people enough for me?

Today's Therapy Session Created Tomorrow's Post

2011-07-19T20:20:00.000-04:00

Wibbily wobbily, timey-wimey.
#timetravelinghindsightforeknowledge

Heat Wave

2011-07-18T09:13:00.000-04:00

Finally arrived. "NYC Bakes, The World Takes."

Downsides; Forced to go out in that heat to meet a client who never showed.

Upsides; Bought some noise-cancelling earphones and so will therefore be fantastically sheltered from now on from the noisy antics on the subways.

Days Off RULE

2011-07-17T09:00:00.001-04:00

The sun was a litttttle bit too warm today so I waited until 6-ish to go get my workout on and then do this; http://www.mapmyrun.com/routes/view/42035716/

I guess it's true that sometimes a midlife crisis can result is some pretty good changes. Good thing I don't have a wife or any kids to walk out on.

A Nap Does Wonders

2011-07-16T10:28:00.001-04:00

Started out the day with a home visit turned into a scenic outing, which was nice, but it saw me walking too much under the warm-to-hot sunshine. 3 hours later, I found myself drained like kelp. I curled up on the subway back home and slept.

People, don't set a goal to sleep on the subway. The subway is not your friend. And no, I'm not talking about the possibility of a friendly neighborhood rat nuzzling your chin (the subject of a YouTube film that I refuse to watch, let alone post here). Nor am I refering to the chance that someone will roll you and take your shit while you sleep. Too many pissed-off New Yorkers on any given train to allow that to happen, I'm sure. I honestly trust my fellow NY'ers. We've jumped on subway tracks to help people, dammit. We're good people.

BUT!! I can count on only one hand the amount of times I've rode a train WITHOUT someone coming through the car blaring at the top of their lungs that they're "Sorry to bother you ladies and gentlemen and I do apologize for the inconvenience but..." to which they go on to tell of their misfortune. Or they proceed to play music I wouldn't buy myself for a $0.99 download, then charge us all for the performance. Or they'll dance and flip and clap and bang the car ceiling, turning the subway into the circus. Or they'll want to sell me stolen Welch's Fruit Snacks (where the hell else did they get them from?). Every time I try to catch a wink on the train, I leave angrier than I was when I got on. It's a problem.

However, yesterday the trip home was one of those exceptions. Saturday afternoon around 1 seems to be a buffered zone. Perhaps the homeless, hungry, street-dancing people of New York are on their lunchbreaks. But the nap was such that I was able to get home, cook me some lunchtime food, lie down for another respite then feel revived enough to GO BACK OUT ON THE TOWN BEFORE THE SUN WENT DOWN!

It was no big deal, really. I went to the high-profile candy store at 60th and 3rd Avenue for a sweet fix and ate substandard ice cream. I should've had ColdStone.

But leaving there, I took the Lexington Avenue line downtown in a protracted "I want to be out on the town" mood, and was overtly flirted with by a dude with a nice tan and golden body hair. I couldn't help stare at the hue of his legs. He looked like a benign tiger with no stripes. He was a little fidgety to begin with, which is how I noticed him (I can catch sight of a fly moving across a subway platform, trust me. I'm kind of hypervigilant that way. It's not always fun). Then our eyes met. He fussed with his arms, (the same light-bronze color as his legs, covered in soft golden down) and then took some either real or imagined long hair off his skin that a woman must have left. Being as I had someone next to me applying her makeup, this made me laugh. We exchanged a "I know right? These WOMEN" look. Then he kept trying to lock my eyes again.

At that point, I was out of the race. He really wanted something from me and I knew I wouldn't be delivering, so I kept turning my eyes away. That was quite the experience. Been a long time since I was the object of someone's lust like that. (Unles Faux Leonardo yesterday at the gym was giving it a try). But I knew that until I come out of the closet and reconcile the complete me with the world, I'm not going to be confident enough, or man enough, to treat an interested dude right.

So I let him go.

This time.

5 Miles

2011-07-15T10:12:00.001-04:00

Friday was a phenomenal day. The house visit took place in a part of NYC that I think had it's design heyday in the 60's. You go into the lobbies of the buildings and you're walking into the set of "MADMen," "Catch Me If You Can," or this season's new "PanAm." I like it.

After I was dohe with that, I had the rest of the whole day free. So, naturally, I went to the gym and got my pump on. I'm now able and happy to run 5 miles instead of 3. (3 miles of straight running was quite the accomplishment when I did it, let me tell you.) It just takes me 40-50 minutes and sometimes I don't want to be on the treadmill for that long. I'd rather run out on the west Riverbank of Manhattan or in Central Park if I'm going for distance.

But the gym. How I do love that place. I've heard it called "Gay Church" from a gay man. Which, hey, I ain't mad at it. But I do wish the congregation where a bunch less shy than they are.

It's pretty clear that a lot of the straight men in gyms atre terrified of being though of as gay and are pretty insecure about their masculinity. Isn't that why we're all trying to max out our masculine appearance? But being that the case, it sure makes it hard to figure out which straight-appearing guys ARE gay! (As if I'd do anything if I knew!)

Regardless, I went back to a gym location that I hadn't seen in months, back when I was about 20 lbs heavier. I recognized some of that gym's regulars, including this one dude who seemed to favor hairgel a little too much. But he also appeared to make gains in his workout routine and I must say he had a DYNAMITE chest this time around. He's kind of Leonardo DiCaprio-ish without the big round head and female mouth. I liked his swagger. Again, it's no big thing because I won't/don't do anything with guys I'm attracted to at gyms. I just look.

Thing is, I noticed Faux Leonardo was looking too. Mind you, not just at me, but looking around--the way I do. When I notice that, I always imagine that Looker is just like me. Attracted to men but unable to make a connection. The presence of hairgel seemed to support that theory.

But what a sexy, tight, stout, hairy chest he had. Makes me want to go back again and again.

Until, of course, I see the next amazing guy at the next gym location.

Trust me, every gym has one.

While The Cat's Away

2011-07-14T10:00:00.000-04:00

Did I mention that my roommate's out of town? Or I should say my "landlord." Because he's both. He's also a world-traveling band conductor and a mathematic savant who started a curriculum in quantum physics until he followed his passion for music performance. He practices day and night when he's home and we live in a small 3 room /1 bath/1 kitchen (no dining room, no livingroom) apartment, but what you're not going to believe is that I love it.

When he's playing, it's like the soundtrack of my life playing in the background. It's like I'm the principle player in an arthouse film.

But don't get me wrong, I don't miss him. He's not in any physical shape that I lust after. We aren't friends because we don't have that much in common. And even with the things we DO have in common, he's a bit socially awkward and doesn't really know how to share conversation space. Most times that we talked, he just kind of owned the convo and announced everything without listening. (I've witnessed that when he's on the phone at times.) But hey, I have to give him money every month to stay here, so there's no need to complicate that relationship as far as I'm concerned. The power differential prevents friendship. Much like the therapist/client relationship.

But being here alone this week has reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeally made me remember how much I need to be my own man again. Living not in a room, but in my own place. My own space.

Do it.

Dooooooooo it.

Tripping The Rift

2011-07-13T09:46:00.001-04:00

Buckle up, TARDIS crew! We need to revisit the days we missed!

VWOOOORP!! VWOOORRRP!! VVVVWWWOOOORRRRPPP!!!!

Hello Wednesday! Yeah, this was a day when I only had one house visit and then the rest of my day was free. No wonder I didn't blog! I spent the day nothing a lot of happy nothing!

I did spend some quality time being jealous of rich white people, if that helps. See, I did my house visit in a nice part of the city, where if you live there, you ain't doin it on the cheap. And I'm always wondering what people do to make this crazy money to live where they live in this city. How does one afford to pay $4000/month rent? Or, more absurdly, afford to buy a condo with a mortgage of possibly $2-3000/month and THEN pay monthly carrying charges/maintenance fee of $900-$2000 forever??

And more importantly, would I do it if I could afford it?

I can begrudge the rich white people, but why bother? Why spend the energy? To begin with, all white people aren't rich. And secondly, all rich people aren't white. And thirdly, I know what I have to do to bring more money into my life, and I'm not doing it at the moment so I have no right to be mad at anyone. I need to be mad at the dude in the mirror who won't get his shit together.

And I won't do that EITHER. Haha.

I Did Good Today

2011-07-12T23:34:00.003-04:00

I love being a therapist. I love going in with people to find the logjams that has them stuck. I remember when I attended my first few sessions as a client and how I watched the guy in the chair wanting at any second to just go hug him and hold onto him for dear life.

I'm saying I always understand why people come to see me. I always know that feeling. I'm always giving it my all to answer their needs. I always respect them and love their process.

Today was one of those days that makes me remember why I do this.

People ROCK.

Procrastination Redefined

2011-07-11T09:36:00.000-04:00

Today I spent a majority of my 'free time' doing work I could have and should have done in the last two weeks. In addition to the office sessions I do as a therapist, I also visit those with Traumatic Brain Injuries at their homes. In order to get paid, I have to enter the session's note through the computer to an online scheduling system. It's a nifty little tool. Right after each session, I have the ability to right the note as I'm transporting away. This is a reason why I bought an iPad. Talk about a lightweight, ridiculously 21st Century tool! The kids in the 1940's would go into catatonic shock if they ever saw this thing. Either that or become Issac Asimov.

But in that last two weeks, I didn't want to do anything but read comics as I left the sessions. I was tired. So, I paid for it yesterday.

I often define procrastination as the thing perfectionists do because we don't want to get it wrong when we try it. So we don't try. Then when the deadline "sneaks" up on us, we are forced to "just do it." That extra burst of "Oh shit, I gotta get this done" juice seems to either open up our intellect to perform outstandingly, or else it gives us the perfect excuse to accept a performance rating that comes in less than perfect. We can say "well, I let it go to the last second, so no wonder I got a lower score. Oh well." And somehow that makes us feel better about not being perfect. What ISN'T acceptable is if we take our time, use all the resources offered us to complete a project, and THEN get a low score/review.

Games people (LIKE ME) play.

How complex.

Unexpected Consequence

2011-07-10T09:31:00.001-04:00

My 4th of July Central Park run netted me with a sunburn on the back of my neck. I had no idea what it was until I but two and two together. Pricky, itched, tender to the touch, and the only part exposed under the sun for an hour on a hot day.

BOOOO!

I thought the melanin in my cocoa brown skin was supposed to take care of that ish? I guess I'm whiter than I thought! Certainly I'm not as black as some have wished me to be, so I should have known!

So there goes the idea of me running shirtless! Plus, not *quite* there yet. Now I have two good excuses to wait until Autumn. It'll still be warm enough, and by then I should be all ripply.

Never too late!! Never too old!!

From Gallifrey

2011-07-09T09:16:00.000-04:00

which could qualify me as a Time Lord! (TOLDJA I was a geek!)

Because I missed blogging over the weekend, but I intend to have an entry for every day in July as I planned, therefore, I'm going back in time and planting these posts on the appropriate date.

Yes, I will let my work ethic take a hit in the pursuit of being a completist.

46 and still growing!!

#cheater

#heybutatleastIadmittedit

Who's The Man

2011-07-08T13:36:00.003-04:00

In case you haven't heard, my state recently made it legal for gay people to marry within it's borders. I've been so busy just trying to identify myself as one of them that I hadn't thought about what it meant to me personally. But now, I've been getting a real idea. And as a man, I don't know what to do with all these thoughts.

First off, I'm a singleton in this Big Apple. This means that I live off one income. My income is from the mental health field, which also means that it is LOW. It could be higher if I worked more cases per day, translating roughly, in both my jobs, to about $30 an hour. If I worked 40 of those kind of hours per week, I'd be set. But there's no way to work 40 full hours of one-on-one focused, emotion-driven, full-brain work per week. Any given 40 hr work week is interspersed with daydreaming, web surfing, smoke breaks, eating at the desk, chatter with a cubicle neighbor, reading a newspaper, bathroom oasises, water cooler gossip, phone calls to friends, smartphone games, ad infinitus. I daresay no one works more than 4 solid, 100%-ly dedicated hours per day. And that's about what I can do at max. That's $600 a week before taxes. So I survive, but I'm not rich. I live in a room in a dude's apartment. My name is not on the lease. I had a car but after one too many towaways, I realized I couldn't afford it in NYC. I never picked it up from the tow pound. It's been 7 months now. Add to this that my jobs are contract. I have no healthcare.

And many a day I wondered how would I continue living here successfully? At THIS level? How can I be 46 when everything about my life says I'm only half that age? I put those thoughts on the backburner because they were uncomfortable and undermined my sense of safety. I didn't want to confront something that seemed hopeless.

Until they said a week or so ago that I could marry a dude.

So here now is the problem. If I can get married to a guy, and get health benefits through his insurance, and have tax breaks due to my legal status, and that whole nine--then does that make me the woman of the relationship?

Women have been storming the gates forever against that very idea. Depending on a man for their safety and livelihood?? RIDICULOUS!!! And yet, here I am practically in that boat. I want a relationship with someone that turns me on, makes me want to mount them and have them call out my name. I want to do every saucy thing to my guy that women all over the world wants to do to, say, Sean Connery or ... Barack Obama. But I also don't want to have to become his live-in servile sex slave. I want equal footing. I want to be a man.

It feels insane to even think this way, but the discrepancy between male & female roles are so ingrained that I actually feel threatened by the suggestion that I would not get to enjoy my male position in a relationship if I came into a marriage as I am right now.

Ah. I think I'm just thrown off by the gender thing. If I were to marry a six-figure earning woman, what would be the difference? Ah ha...but I think I know. If the woman were the breadwinner, I'd still be the one with the penis.

Wait, WHAT???

No, yeah, seriously. Having a penis is AWESOME. It really is. But then again, I'm gay so I guess I WOULD think that. But it's been my experience that the use of said instrument turns my whole body into a machine. Something of industry. Of strength and ability and function and drive and accomplishment and power. Orgasm is an eruption of life-affirming masculinity. At least it is TO ME. Which is why I love men so much. I LOVE that ideal of the John Henrys of the world vs. The Locomotives. The Tarzans against the lions. This is why I love muscle and hard, masculine, MEN men. It's an endorphin high for me. It's a sexual fantasy. It's an inspiration. It's a motivating force. It's a mission statement. I both love men and I want to be a man. Nothing more. Nothing detracting from women, nor meant to devalue women in any way. I'm only expressing what floats MY boat.

And so having said all that -- where would I fit into a marriage with a man?

I want him to be a Man. But I want to be a Man too.

Maybe gay marriage DOES threaten heterosexual marriage because ... Well maybe because it forces everyone to re-examine the roles of each partner based on gender.

But hell, maybe that should've happened a long time ago anyway.

Meanwhile, all this talk is specious because I don't even have a boyfriend, let alone a fiancée.

I'm just blogging it out.

Blame NaBloPoMo. :-D

Busy Day

2011-07-07T22:52:00.002-04:00

which started WAY too early. So blogging content is low because most of my day has been taken up with confidential information that I can't share.

I can tell you this, though; if 35 years ago someone would've told me I'd be a therapist to New York City's most interesting people, I'da called them a science fiction writer.

But don't be confused-- EVERYONE in New York City is the most interesting. Everyone has a story and everyone's story is amazing.

Amazing.

Wow. Is It EVERYONE At Pixar??

2011-07-06T09:45:00.003-04:00

I saw this video at Facebook, posted on a fella's wall who I recently friended after meeting him at a comics convention. He is friends with other friends who I also know from comics and the internet. And yes, his is cute in a red teddy bear sort of way.

According to his FB profile, he seems to be enjoying a relationship with a girl who I also find is really cute. So he might be straight. In one pic, she is nuzzling against his cheek and he just looks so contented and ... grateful. It's a beautiful picture.

Today for some reason, he was moved to share this with all his FB friends;

Well, of course this brought me to tears. It's such a struggle. I've come out to possibly a dozen people in the online comics community (of which I've been describing) and none of them have let me being a gay dude spread. Or if they have, no one's made any big deals about it. And I picked some pretty hub people to tell it to, I must say. If they were to talk, many MANY people would know overnight. But nothing blew up. No trauma occurred. My life isn't changed.

I suppose they're all waiting for ME to tell my own business. Which is respectful and decent of them. Which I should have known because they're my friends for a reason. And maybe this is the month that I get this done. Maybe THAT'S what my big move is going to be in July.

Everything these Pixar people are saying, up until they start telling us how It Gets Better, has been my life for the last 40 years. And yes, I'm starting the countdown at 6 when I became aware of how hot this guy was as I watched a snake slithering across his torso.

As a kid, I didn't think I was supposed to be aware of sex, yet I was. I didn't think I was supposed to do anything about it, yet I did. I ran to church to hide myself away from the images I wanted to see, but then I sought them out anyway. And now that I know what I am, I'm still too terrified to do anything about it.

Well, I have been too terrified. Now I'm just terrified minus the "too."

When I hit 50 yrs old, I will have a life I will be proud of. What these Pixar people are saying, I will initimately know.

And I'm aware that I don't have to wait until I'm 50.

Maybe this month I'll get a jump on it.

Fish Out Of Water

2011-07-05T23:10:00.003-04:00

At my new haunt NaBloPoMo there is a theme about swimming which comes along with a contest. Soon as I was made aware of this, I knew this was the place for me. Even though this is sponsored by BlogHer, a women's movement in writing, I was informed by the recommender of the exercise and the moderator that I could be a dude and still participate. I figure I bring a little from Column A & a little Column B.

I've been posting of late about a fella I have named "New Hunk". He is clearly my new mancrush. I have had several as my personal blog will attest. So my entry into this swim-themed contest is not so much about myself as it is about him.

When I first "met" New Hunk, he had innocuously posted things about his interests in comicbooks, as had I and many others in the virtual interspace where we geeks from around the globe gather, check in, discuss, fuss, and blunderbuss. We have the option, as do many forums, to attach little cyber-tchotchke's under each of our posts. Little clickies to send you, the reader, to our own personal corners of cyberworld. "New Hunk" had put a link to a series of YouTube videos he's done with himself playing guitar and singing his self-written songs. I found him to be a little morose with them. He has a way of staring at the camera like he's challenging it. His songs are dark but introspective. Full of art and expression from someone who seems less than chipper.

And too, I thought he was handsome. Like, a basic 1950's Father Knows Best handsome.

Well, shift a few months forward and New Hunk takes an interest in our weight loss thread at the aforementioned forum. His entire approach seemed a little too meticulous. A little too anal, if I may dare. But soon afterwards he dropped some details as to why he was going about this so painstakingly.

He told us that he'd been off work for maybe a year from stress and depression. He was looking for something, ANYTHING that would help him get out of the quicksand he was in. So he was taking his nutrition seriously and hoping it would help.

I began to understand his Type-A approach to weight-loss. It was a way he could wrest some control out of a world in which he had lost so much of it otherwise. Even though he had a wife, and guitar talent, and the skills to write songs, he was trapped by depression. A feeling I am patently acquainted with.

So in I leapt with the praise and encouragement. By trade, I am a therapist so I know how this works. But by way of just being me, I thrive off of the well-being of people. I want us to be better. To do better. To fulfill the potential inside of us and to enjoy it. It means a lot to me. For whatever reason.

Round about that time, New Hunk started hitting the gym and deciding that swimming was going to be helpful for him. So while he was learning better techniques in the pool and in the weight room, and while he was overcoming earlier traumas of being bullied from the ignorant and young gradeschool grindhouses ... he was getting more and more good looking. Then one day out of the blue,
he decides to post a shirtless pic of himself flexing his biceps.

That was the day I renamed my blog.

New Hunk and I, we have this internet friendship going now where he gets encouragement and flirting from me, and I get to see him flex his muscles every now and again. I like to think he's trying to provide a little giveback, him being a straight married guy and all.

But at the same time, he writes in notes and posts of how swimming is like a relaxation technique for him now. He says it's like transcendental meditation for him. He says it feels like he's flying. And I utterly believe him.

On the one hand, this makes my heart lift to know that he found a way to help himself in the middle of his debilitating depression when usually the very tool you need to help you -the brain- is the thing that is in itself depressed. I see him in my mind's eye cutting through the water and becoming serene and at peace with himself.

And that takes me to the other hand. In my mind's eye I also see his now-powerful shoulders causing his arms to windmill and propel him forward. They are like a set of oars carved from Michelangelo's David. I envision what the surface tension of the water looks like as it breaks between his shoulder blades and flows across his rippling back. I can picture how his narrow hips and washboard belly knifes through the foam that he creates with his power and his purpose. I know his thick legs and long feet are dutifully thrusting, kicking, flapping. I know that with every reach, every thrust, every stroke his muscles are cast into gleaming contour just above the water's surface.

I can see him and I want him. He is a water god but I ...

... I'm a fish out of water.

I Officially Kicked The 4th's ASS Today!

2011-07-04T23:12:00.007-04:00

I mean I had a GREAT day!

As I mentioned, I now consider myself a capital R "Runner." Today I set out to test my upper limits. I've done a round trip run on the Riverside last week;

Well when I looked at the above map I thought "Wow. I could probably do Central Park." (I remember when I thought I had been sayin' something when I made it once around the Jackie O Reservoir a few years ago.) So this early morning, armed with a few scoops of protein and a cinn raisin bagel with light cream cheese, I set out to do that very thing.
Here's the results;

The first run was about 50 minutes judging by how many songs I had left over from my "RUN MIX 60" playlist. The run today was half a song more than an hour (So about 62 minutes). I was told from a cyclist that the path is about 6 miles, so I pretty much maintained an average of 6 mph (I kan do maffs!) which is pretty good for me. For a whole HOUR without stopping? Of course, and please believe, I was much slower going up them hellacious hills which were long and steep up at the northern end.

Then I went to Greenwich Village and had ribs and a mojito.

Yes, all this was done alone, but I was in a great, life-affirming, Did Better Today Than Ever mood and I wasn't going to let anything spoil it. I didn't even need to watch the spectacle of NYC's fireworks. I wanted to come home and relax, play me some ChampionsOnline. I smiled at the hot men I saw on the way back though, I will tell you that. I'm "priming the pump" for my big move into Manworld by July 31st. Perhaps it will be sooner, who knows?

Let's see what happens tomorrow!

All The Sweet Green Icing

2011-07-03T19:57:00.002-04:00

I just got sent on a Donna Summer jag and I regret nothing.
This was from a mere 5 years ago.

It's insane to think that because I love/d disco and Donna Summer that I should have known I was gay, but there it is. Or, for that matter, that because I love Wendy Williams of radio and now TV fame, that I should have known.

Stereotypes are rubbish. They are ways invented to marginalize, categorize, and dehumanize human beings. Yes, there are *some* basis for stereotypes wherein *some* groups of people have common traits. But in the world of the gay male, you are really acting a fool if you think you can always spot one because of their interests or way they speak.

This is what I tell myself every day. I choose to believe it's true until the day I die. I do this for two reasons. (Probably more, but I'll list just two).

1) I refuse to be stereotyped. EFF you, that's why.

2) I want to believe I have a shot with the gay dude who is muscular and butch. The guy that nods slightly in the gym and grunts a 'Hey what's up.'

This keeps me both frustrated and in the game. I know there are gay men out there that would not set off your "gaydar" and I want one. I don't know if I have the same to offer him, but he might not even care, which would make him a better man than me.

But this is why I'm running now and losing weight more steadily than I ever have in my life. I need to have my game tight. I know what I want--so I have to *bring* it. We men are driven by the eyegate. I'm sorry, but we are. So if I want the eyecandy I seek, I have to be eyecandy as well. If I ever find a hunky dude that doesn't care what *I* look like, Teh Blogworld will be the first to know.

Today was a good day. I got five miles in on the treadmill like it was a walk. LOTS of energy! (It was prolly last night's deep dish pizza crust had my system still all carbed-out) I was looking at my gym co-work-outers with an eye towards July 31st, and how I'm going to do something by then. I felt possibilities. I felt the momentum that has visited me so many times building up again. It was the momentum that sent me out on my first two man-dates ever. And now with my stomach disappearing and my man-boobs drying up, I feel even MORE confident!

Again, I ask you, though, am I wrong to be so shallow? AM I shallow? Or do I just know what turns me on and what doesn't?

I'll add this in closing. I am Captain Risk Aversion. It takes A. LOT. to get me to do something risky.

For instance (and this is important, please pay close attention); I have never had sex... and I am 46 years old.

I don't think my friends and acquaintences would believe that of me. If they did know, I don't think it would be so much of a shock for them because I am strange in my own way, but not THAT strange. It would be just as easy to believe that I'm a guy who could have had some sex within the last 30 years as not.

But I never have because if it doesn't feel right--or safe--I won't do it. If it requires a sustained commitment on my part and I don't feel it then I will not try it. I don't want to try and fail, so I don't try.

So this month, if I *DO* try ... I'm gonna need some help. If the dude looks like Jason Statham ... well lemme tell ya, that will be some pretty powerful effing help right there. But if he looks like Andy Richter (sorry buddy) then not so much.

I would however not kick Kai Owen outta bed. something about those eyes, and of course, that accent. Oh yes, I likes the Kai Owen.

See you tomorrow.

The Art of Being Alone

2011-07-02T23:05:00.004-04:00

So I started NaBloWriMo ... or some similar anagram ... and naturally, I used yesterday's post.

Self-serving miserable claptrap, right!? "Suicide note" who am I kidding?? I have too many goals and dreams and joys to kill myself now. I look both ways before I cross the street, waiting for the light to turn from the safety of the sidewalk. I take 0 to No risks for fear of messing up what life I do have.

This is both my safety net and my bigger hindrance.

So allow me to reintroduce myself, NaBloWriMo Readers, I'm Me and I'm complicated.

So, yeah, I'm a gay dude attracted to straight men. This does not automatically equate to my eternal failing aloneness, but it does make me a crappy, self-hating kind of homo. I have been teaching myself for the last few years not to dislike the more effeminate homosexual man, but rather appreciate them for their brave stance of out-loud pride. However, I am in no way, shape, or form attracted them. Unfortunately I find them less sexy than women. And while I do find women sexy, I don't find women sexy enough to sleep with any of them, despite opportunities to do so. So it's my misfortune that while there are plenty of wonderful, caring, loving gay men out there - one of which I dated twice - I didn't have enough attraction to give us both what we wanted from each other.

Thus the name of this post. Here I sit across from UNO'S on Columbus & 81st St at 11:30pm in NYC, watching several couples find their ways around and into one another while I sit alone typing a blog because I play it safe. I acknowledge my faults and my shortcomings, but it often feels better doing nothing about them than doing something scary.

However, I'm starting NaBloPlehPlo because by July 31st, I intend to have made a change. In something. Somehow.

So welcome to my process. I hope if you stay along for the ride, you will find something encouraging and uplifting by the end of the month. I will take suggestions, encouragement, anecdotes, and forgiveness for my hateful ways. Please. And thank you.

Still Mad

2011-07-01T10:12:00.003-04:00

Last night's post didn't do the job for me.

I discover this as I'm on my way to work, taking trains, seeing all the pretty men. And by pretty I mean handsome, of course. So many my type. Especially the straight ones with their women.

Even if I were an out and free homosexual, I couldn't HAVE the straight ones. And even if the straight ones would for absolutely no reason whatsoever give or show me what I want to see, I couldn't have as many as I want anyway. This constant craving kd lang sings of so proficiently, I'm hereby officially requesting in writing that it be played at my funeral. It is the literal story of my life.

I'd like to believe this is my own fault. That I shouldn't have watched my mother's porn back during the summers in elementary school. That I brought all this sex awareness and premature attraction of any sex on myself. That somehow I deserve this torture because I'm a sinner. That I deserve Hell and why am I wasting any more time on Earth trying to do any good when that's where I'll end up for eternity anyway. And that since I'm going there eventually why wait? And I think too that these blogs of mine would make for a pretty grand and extensive suicide note.

But I don't think I'll do that. I think instead I'll stretch out a little farther and join this blog to an Internet community, if I'm allowed, and try to broaden my access to some peer help. Because I damn sure could use some help.

A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum

2011-06-30T23:31:00.006-04:00

Haha!! That IS funny because that's actually the name of the movie that I'm stealing for this post!

But I meant the title in regards to the online comicbook forum that I go to to share my geekdom, where also there is a weightloss thread where we are sharing our gains, losses, successes, joys, defeats, whatevs. So remember the post where the guy I was telling you about put up a pic of himself shirtless which served to remind me how homosexual I am? Well he struck again. Another picture and he's put on some real muscle. Now he's not just cute. He's hot.

Well, I've made some changes too.

1) I did call back my ex- and we had a nice long talk. If you want to know how that went, listen to this song;

Just take out the grocery store, her car & the beer and substitute "her architect" for "her enlisted military guy" and add a 5 year old daughter. She might want me, but I doubt it. She's a good girl and wouldn't do that to her husband. She might be lonely, but she won't be when he's back home from deployment. For myself, I know I don't want her because if I did, she'd never have become my ex-. After our talk, I reconciled myself with that fact and I'm okay with that now. Closure is a fantastic thing.

2) I've made some new progress in my fitness goals. I'm a bonafide RUNNER now, and I can go 5 miles without stopping. As a result of getting this far, I'm down to 175 lbs. This was my goal back when I was 216 lbs. So I feel real good about that. I have about 1/5th of the moobs that I used to and my stomach is no longer an outty. I can lean back in anything I wear now, and you can't see it anymore. So THAT'S cool. So when I saw the New Hunk a bit ago on the message board, I didn't get the sinking feeling of despair. It occured to me that yes, someone else can look hot, but I can now look hot too! It ISN'T hopeless for me. There IS a sixpack under all this. My chest CAN look tight and sexy. My shoulders CAN have heads and sculpts. It just took me to lose my last 10 lbs. So now my new goal is 165.

3) When I first saw The New Hunk with his shirt off, I flirted a little with him, which means I complimented him. Being a socially awkward geek, he privately messaged me instantly to say I was either gay or reallllllllly secure in my hetereosexualness. I private messaged him back to tell him I was neither.

No, I didn't take the "same old hiding denial" route. I told him the truth. I told him that I've never been with a guy but I sure do think guys are hot, and if I was going to be anything, it is that I'll be gay.

See, what I knew as I was answering him back is that he's married and he lives in Canada. So no matter what I tell him, he wasn't going to cross any lines with me. I could tell him whatever I felt like and nothing would happen. So I told him the truth. This may sound like the thing I always have done, this "truth" thing, but there was a difference this time.

This time I had no hope held out that he would somehow be gay as well and reach out to me in my loneliness. This time I felt resigned and I had decided. I'm gay-oriented but I'll most likely never do anything about it, so who cares if I tell a hot stranger that I met on a messageboard? Who cares if he tells anybody else? Who cares if anyone else finds out?

What are they going to do for me? Anything? Are they going to take it away? Are they going to make it okay? Are they going to find me a hot man?

No. They won't do jackshit for me, so who cares what they know?

And why should I be the one to tell them anyway?

It's my personal business.

They don't want to know because nobody else is asking.

They want me defined as a neat little image in their heads. They want me funny, not tragic. They want me to be a womanizer, a 1970's pimp, a Jungle Brother. Not a lonely and angry homo.

So fuck them.

Anyway. I thought I came here to say that I was better with seeing a hot dude that I can't have, and I do still think I am better in that regard. But I'm not at my best. Even at 41 pounds lighter than I was two years ago.

No. Rather, I'm in this alone. Again.

And I'm dealing.

And I will win.

One day.

Still Mad

2011-05-30T21:02:00.003-04:00

So, yeah. I saw Bridesmaids today. I shouldn't watch chick flicks. Even when they are much less chicky. Because inevitably, in whatever measure, they major on relationships--and I don't.

Yesterday, my Con Buddy took me for a daytrip to Baltimore to see a culture museum and get away from the ratrace. I mainly went to be with someone and share the day. It was a nice time that was spent with laughter and conversation and too much food that I have to spend all week working off. A nice time, right? Yes. A nice time.

I should try to grow this relationship. He really does like me for a friend. He likes things about me that he doesn't find in other people. And I have a lot of availability, so that should work out in his favor too.

And I was able to distance my crush on him all day yesterday. I was able to notice that he bites his fingernails way too much and that his arms are thin. I was able to talk myself out of wanting more from him that I won't ever get. And that's good, right? It's not like I haven't had practice at this. In fact my life is pretty littered with the wreckage of doomed crushes that have never been fulfilled.

We'll see what's what when I get a set of abs I can bare in public. We'll see if Teh Cute Masculine Gays will want me then. We'll see if I get a chance then. Maybe I'll reject them this time. Maybe I'll never be with anyone, but be happy.

Maybe.

But I'm mad about it.

And Do-Over Again

2011-05-20T23:11:00.003-04:00

So since my ex called, I haven't given it a repeat listen. It seems the memory of her voice is crystal clear. And I've toyed with how many ways I was going to call her back. What tone to set? What content? Confident? Cocky? Angry? Sad? Needy? Vulnerable? Honest?

Honest?

And then I just thought, if she wants me--I'm doing it. If she wants me--I want her. I want that normal life. I want that chance. I want it back. I want to fit in. I want acceptance from everyone who I fear will reject me.

I thought that, yes, I tried dating a man--but I couldn't seal the deal. I couldn't even kiss him. Too terrified. So I figured I could just forget I ever said anything. Just stop talking about it. Go with a girl who wants me, and I'll figure stuf out. I like to watch hetero porn a lot of times, still! So what, I think dudes are hot? So what??!! Girls think girls are hot too!!! They even kiss each other!!! That doesn't make THEM gay!!!! SO WHY DO I HAVE TO BE GAY!!?? WHYYYYY!!!!!!!???

And that's where I was at. Then I came home and checked out--went to play ChampionsOnline and listen to my friends' podcasts just to let all this pressure go.

Then I checked the comics' messageboards hangout where I chatbout comics with, and dipped in to a weight-loss thread to check out the latest progress of my cyberfriends. And lo and behold, what did I see? A fellow geek was so proud of his current weightloss that he posted a pic of himself flexing his biceps, sans shirt.

And he is so fucking cute I wanted to cry.

And now I'm like fffffffuuuuuuuck. Imagine I'm trying to date a girl who wants me when I'm having a reaction like this out of NOWHERE. Minding my own fucking business and then this guy strips his shirt off and suddenly my heart's doing a motherfucking cha-cha.

What the fuck, man. I cannot win. I can't kiss a man and I can't date a woman.

The loneliest fucking place in the whole wide world.

You know what Jesus? If you're coming tomorrow then come the fuck on because I'm quite done. This life you gave me is one tremendous clusterfuck and a total washout. Pretty fucking ridiculous fucking situation right here. You coming to get your faithful little perfect heterosexual angels, all fucking so merrily and having babies and getting married under your holy roof? Yes. Good. Take them and GO. All you and your people do is remind me of how UTTERLY FUCKED UP MY LIFE IS AND HOW THE FUCK MUCH I WISH I WERE FUCKING DEAD SO GOOD FUCKING JOB GOD, AND CONGRATU-FUCKING-LATIONS. AND THANKS FOR ABSOLUTELY FUCKING NOTHING.

Do-Overs

2011-05-19T17:12:00.002-04:00

So on my phone right now is a message from my last girlfriend, whom I loved. When my life was messier than it is now. When I hoped I was straight and not gay.

I don't know why she called. She Googled me. She said in the message that she wanted to catch up. Last I'd heard, she'd gotten married.

Why do things like this happen?

Life is working out real well for so many of you out there. I'm happy for you all. And I was maintaining myself with the acknowledgement that I remain as you first found me. Conflicted, complex, maybe a little tragic - but human and therefore by dint of Creation, deserving of a little happiness, no matter what my lot is in life. So I went away for a Geekfest and I involve myself in creativity, imagination, entertainment and my career, which is fulfilling on many levels (except financially).

And also I've been running more regularly- not jogging but running. 6.0 miles/hour for 35 minutes, several times a week. That's the equivalent of a 5k race in a half hour. ME! Been getting below 185lbs and fighting to go lower. Been watching what I eat. Been tweeting and enjoying the words & pics of my many cyberfriends. Bought a speedo and trying to get to be a swimmer. Been just trying to live. Live... Even if it's alone.

So WHY did I have to hear her voice today? Why did she have to speak to me so kindly? Why am I still on her mind?

Don't get me wrong, we broke up wonderfully. No fighting, no hatred, no acrimony. She had concerns about me as a potential husband and so did I. When she lost faith, so did I. I let her go because she was right. Still she said she loved me, which was nice - but clearly, I didn't. Not enough, anyway. Not enough to take advantage of the evenings we spooned on the couch. Not enough to kiss her as deeply as she deserved.

Hearing her voice opened up a million emotions. I want to be what I could've been with her. I wanted to be her lover. I wanted to be her man. I wanted to be her protector, her partner, her friend. I want to be that. But I couldn't because nothing came naturally. It all felt like uncharted territory and I had/have no maps. That's where I was when I started all this bloggeration. Leaving Trenton, and her, and trying to make a new life.

And I'm still trying. And I feel like I'm failing. Or at least hearing her voice - knowing she's still real, and still out there with a mind that turned back towards me, even for the span of a phone message - reminds me how long I've been at this. It feels like failure.

I feel horribly inadequate and damaged and like such a terrible failure. It makes me very, very sad.

And I still have two clients left to see today. Well, thank God I do. Soon as they start to open up, I lose myself - and that sounds just like what the doctor ordered.

The One Month Match.Com Membership....

2011-05-05T07:07:00.003-04:00

... is finished.

Not reactivating. I'm not attractive enough for the hunky handsome ones, apparently.

Oh well.

And also, Grim, the friend I re-united with, is acting like a right putz. I confronted him on his behavior (generally bullying of me to amuse himself) and now he's withdraw interacting with the group. He loves games, but mostly only if he wins. He's the sorest loser you ever met.

But this time, it's his decision, not mine. If he's doesn't want to be MY friend this time, that's on him. I can use one less sore-losing bully in this life. Especially that we're mostly in our fucking 40's. Grow. The. Fuck. Up.

When No Means ... Nothing

2011-05-02T20:18:00.004-04:00

Wherein our hero hasn't heard from Blacks Only in more than a week, even though he had said he was still interested and that we'd do something before I left town last weekend. Mayhaps he was very, very busy. Mayhaps he chanced upon a better-looking man than I. Mayhaps I don't want it enough or else I'd pursue him more.

Because right now, I don't want it. I spent the weekend geeking out with my long distance friends at a meetup convention in PA. I had a great time answering no questions and being accepted. Knowing this familiar comfort made me want to stay single, celibate, and safe. I feel it right now as I'm typing. It'll change again and we'll see what I'll do when it does, but right now Blacks Only need not get back to me. Neither do that dozen or so gorgeous hairy chesty men I came across and dropped letters to and received no responses.

Ah life. You been mighty cruel but you're all I got.

The Road Not Taken

2011-04-22T23:08:00.003-04:00

I chose to communicate with Blacks Only instead of He's A Doctor. I'm more attracted. He's got a cute smile. He seems more approachable. Or at least, he seems to fit into my affectionspace. Total chemistry at this point. He's not even hunky -- he's just ... I dunno. Handsome in an odd way. Imperfect. Juggy-shaped head, low ears. Square, dark eyes and straight eyebrows that frame the outer ridges, curving down towards jolly crinkles. A smile that looks warm, framed by a Frank Zappa goatee. It's just physical cues that make me want to know him--move into that space.

He might be a constant downer. He might hate everything. He might be hyper-feminine. He might have dealbreakers left & right. But physically, I've just got to meet him. See how that all looks in 3D. How it moves. How it sounds.

We'll meet before next week is out. He had grown-up stuff to do last weekend and I had grown-up stuff to do all week, and he's got grown-up stuff to do this weekend again. So before next week is over (when I depart for inner Pennsylvania and a Geek Retreat) we should be meeting. If he keeps having grown-up stuff to do, well ... I guess I wasn't all that.

But so far he sems to like me still. So we'll see what's what.

High Horse

2011-04-16T13:30:00.000-04:00

So let me get down off mine, because now I've got TWO dialogues going. He's A Doctor is still waiting for my answer... but Blacks Only was too cute of a guy for me to judge. Or to resist. Probably the latter. And Blacks Only responded quickly. Both times. So I think I'm actually going to wind up going out with him sooner than I'll date He's A Doctor. Again, pair it down to chemistry. Chemistry trumps principles.

That's a horrible thing to say. So let me be even more honest. I have said this before (I hope)-- I'm attracted to white guys. So why did I judge those who are NOT attracted to black guys? I can't have it both ways. If I allow myself to dig white guys then I've got to let other people dig who THEY are attracted to. And if Blacks Only digs me because I'm black, I should just accept it. Especially if I want to date him.

Which it looks like will happen this week.

Hell, maybe he's got good reason to enjoy us black folk. I mean, we ARE pretty cool.

The Shoe On The Other Foot

2011-04-15T22:18:00.002-04:00

So I just came across this Match.Com profile where this cute white dude said he did time in the Peace Corp in Africa, and he lived there for two years. So guess what Ethnicity he's requesting. "Black/African descent."

ONLY.

ZIP. No MAS.

I laughed, and laughed and laughed.

I instantly felt like, "Well alright den, white boy! Come git you somma dis blackness."

So, this just in from the Hypocrite Department, You may not exclude me because of my race, but apparently I like it when you exclude ERR'BODY else to make me feel wanted.

Sigh. Morals are HARD.

In other news, I got my letter back from the Match.Com'r who I wrote to last night. I just know we're on our way to a date if I keep this up. Oh I wish he were more hunky. I just know I'm not going to give this guy what he wants.

Unless I just DO.

Anybody out there have any idea why I shouldn't, if he's a nice enough guy?

PS; He's a DOCTOR.

I really hate a little bit of myself right now.

"You Try Sometimes But They Won't Stop..."

2011-04-14T21:32:00.004-04:00

Another post titled with a lyric that I plucked out of a song. I featured it recently, though ... "I'd Do It All Again" by Corinne Bailey Rae, if you recall. Today I think I know why this song had me bawling for a week.

"I'd do it all again" doesn't just mean I'd make all my choices all over again -- it also means I'd fail the same way all over again, too. I'd make the same mistakes, make the same ommissions, the same acts of cowardice, waste the same amount of years of my life, have the same regrets that I do now, and be this old with nothing to show for it as I do right now.

I was made acutely aware of this today when on Twitter, in the public arena of my 463 followers (some of which you guys are), it was assumed that I was not gay. The young lady in question challenged my sexuality because I knew stuff about soap operas (I was crying out against the inherent violation I felt from them cancelling All My Children and *choke* One Life To Life). Well because she assumed I was straight (those are the words she used) I chose to let her go ahead and keep assuming that. The girl is clearly fascinated by me. She loves my sense of Twitter humor. And she involves me in conversations when she's play-fighting with a fellow New Yorking Geek. And myself, I have involved myself in those playfights as well. Instigated one or two. Trying to play matchmaker, in fact. She's resisting that (although who knows what they're texting each other behind the scenes), but she seems to be probing around MY area to see what I'M made of.

And those are the times when I wish it were true. That her assumption was right. That I was eligible and available. That I could just fall into a whirlwind romance and go along with the flow and upset no applecarts and challenge no one's assumptions, and shock no one, and be well-wished on by every witness of my relationship. But that's not what happens when you're gay. This is why kids jumped off bridges and campaigns called "It Gets Better" were started. "It Gets Better" because it starts out HORRIBLY, full of judgment and ridicule and rejection and classifying and ignorance and segregation and attitudes and whispers and scoffing and name-calling and ... stuff.

So I dodged my Twittersationalist. Deftly warped and weaved around her assumptions, leaving all who witnessed with "The Impression" which I've been nursing for years now. Alan's a little strange, but funny in a "ha-ha" way. I've LITERALLY had guys on a podcast call me "Cool--Because he's just himself." AND THAT KILLED ME because I swear before God how I wished that they were seeing the real me for true, and STILL thought I was "Cool." A part of me wished that they kind of know I'm gay, but since I don't talk about it they don't, and that adds to my "coolness." But no. One of those guys once asked me, a few years ago now, in a Direct Message, if I was gay, and that was back when it was more horrifying-er. I'm sure I denied it back then. So he must be left with the impression that, 'Hey, Alan likes to flirt with straight guys! But he's straight too! So he's COOL!'

So ... I'm not.

And I was thinking all this as my battery slowly died on my phone and my Twitter access died with it. And I started feeling like a failure and a coward. So I turned on Corinne Bailey Rae's "I'd Do It All Again" and realized why it was a painful song for me. I was doing it all again.

Then I went downtown to get some English-style fish and chips, and made a detour, and marched myself right into The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center on W13th St. and inquired about groups I could attend. I got me a brochure and I found out how to get me a peer counselor and we 'gone talk about some stuff and I'ma fucking figure out how to get the fuck out of this closet. Because I need help and I went and got me some.

Because I can't keep doing it all again.

Cool, right? Not the way you thought this blogpost was going to end, right?

But wait, there's more.

So you know how I've been fizzzling out on Match.Com? Well, no, I haven't gotten any of the dreamy hunks to wink back at me (and good gosh are they dreamy) but I DID get a letter from a fellow therapist. In Jewish Mother Voice; "A DOCTOR."

He wants to start a dialogue! I got that just yesterday, after I looked at his profile -- because after I did that, he was notified, so then he looked at mine and voila! He likes what I am.

Of course, I'd love to say he was a dreamy hunk, but ... not so much. I mean he weighs what I weigh, only stretched out to 6 ft tall, so hopefully he's got something nice to look at. SOME interlocking rib muscles would be cool.

Well, I'll find out. Because I wrote him back. Because why not? Plus--like my First Man Date, he's given to being therapeutic--he's a listener. Hopefully patient, but also hopefully, he's got something more. Something I find sexy. A manliness maybe. A guy-ness.

We'll see.

And I'm going back to The Center on Sunday to get my therapy on.

So yeah.

So let's see what's what.

Inadvertant, I'm Sure ...

2011-04-05T08:29:00.002-04:00

... but there's nothing quite as hurtful as when you check out the profile of a particularly attractive someone on Match.Com, and you find they've left your ethnicity out of the qualities that they want in their date. You don't want to say they're being racist -- people are allowed to be attracted to what they're attracted to. It's just ... well who wants to discover yet ANOTHER way to be rejected?

"You're a great guy, Alan, but I'm sorry. I'm just don't find black people attractive."

Wellllll, okay then. Have a great life.

Gym Story

2011-03-27T20:35:00.012-04:00

And this is exactly the way I'd always wished it would happen!

So today at the gym, I do what we always do. I'm getting my workout on, deciding what to do and what not to do, seeing what equipment is avaialable and what's not, noticing the astounding bodies and the not-so-much, knowing which set I belong to and being mad/sad/depressed/determined about it. And also what we do, brief eye contact and then possibly a very masculine head nod of acknowledgement, and keep it movin'. Because omg shoot, kill, and eat us right there on the spot if any of us dare be gay at the gym. So unless we're working out with a buddy (and I use the term loosely) we're all in our own little orbits of homophobia, saying nothing and dying to look sexy.

During, I saw a fella who I found attractive in a strange way. He had loose unkempt hair. He was medium build, no discernable paunch (unlike me)but no outstanding v-shape or awesome shoulders that I usually go for either. He had one of those interesting mouths, though. Lips thin and somewhat recessed, in an m-shape. Very white-guy-in-his-forties. Possibly Irish. Curlicues of wild chest hair poking up at the neckline. Not unlike the George that I used to live with three years ago. (Or is it four now?) Not unlike him at all. So let's call him "George II." I wound up doing shoulder shrugs next to his weight rack, where he was doing squats. Nary a word passed between us. I can only hope at this point that no one notices how much I look at them during any given gym session.

After I was done, I hastily changed back to my street clothes, not even stopping to shower. I had no one and nowhere to go so why bother? I was listening to a shuffle of Corinne Bailey Rae and it was affecting my mood again. The first lines of many of her songs can soooo send me to that place --

"Seems like everyone else has a love just for them ..." - Breathless

"Ohhhhhhh ... you're searching for something I know won't make you happy ... " - I'd Do It All Again

"I don't want to give you up, I don't want to hold you up..." -Closer

"So young ... for death ... we walk in shoes too big ..." - I Would Like To Call It Beauty

So I didn't wait around for a shower and I didn't do any aerobics on the elliptical. Just shrugged on pants, shirt, sweater, jacket, hat, scarf, sneakers, and I'm out the door.

Now, this gym is on the 15th floor of a Time Square hotel (one of its' best perks with BEAUTIFUL views of Hell's Kitchen and into the T-Square itself) so leaving it takes me to a bank of elevators. And who should be standing there waiting for an elevator? Why, George II of course! I'd missed when he stopped doing his squats and threw his clothes on, but it had to have been in a lockerroom apart from mine because I didn't see him. And trust me, I look. The lockerroom is the place where I get involuntary confirmation that I am, indeed, gay. Sorry, straight guys who just want to go get their workout on and get on with their day after a shower, but we gay guys are checkin yo shit out. I try not to stare, I promise. To be honest, I don't like you nude anyway. Your junk is ugly. No, I'm sorry, it really is. And your toes are often ghastly. But once you slip into your BVDs ... h'oh boy. And you be wearing them SEXY ones too. Oh no, not just tidy-whities anymore hath our Johnny Straight Guy, oh nooo. And then some of you have the nerve to have abs, and those interlocking rib-muscles?! And NORMAL clean feet with well-proportioned, trimmed nails on EVERY toe? You bastards.

Again, I'm trying not to stare. But wow. A glimpse says a lot.

Where was I?

Right! The elevators with George II! So these are highspeed elevators to service the 30 stories full of hotel tourists above us, who've shelled out good money to be here, and so accordingly, if you press the down button you better be ready to dash to one of the eight possible elevator doors that could open -- because it will not wait for you. And fortunately, when one did arrive, it did so near me, so in I went -- and I held the door for George II to catch up to it. Then I said as much to him by way of banter -- you know, about getting to the vator before it leaves. To which he answered 'It's a fitness test.' Which I laughed at because I thought the same thing about the hard-to-open lobby doors downstairs! And I said so aloud!

And then George II and I had a nice little stream of casual convo all the way down the elevator, down the escalators, through the lobby, out onto Broadway, and two blocks north until I departed to cross the street.

And we didn't talk about anything at all, really. Just about gyms and their opening, closing, the value of ours and the possible value of others. But his voice was sooooooo nice. Cool. Deep but clipped. Announcing every consonant and vowel. Like he could be a radio DJ. Again, very Middle-Aged White-Guy. Comfortable and safe like Ward Clever or Fred MacMurray. And apparently, comfortable with ME! So comfortable in fact that when I was ready to cross the street, he jut out a hand for that fraternal shake and announced his name! To wit I clasped in kind and gave him mine. So masculine!! So buddy!! Nice strong grip, but not trying to out-macho one another. Just Men being Men!

And then I thought DANG! I LIKED that!!! and went to my train.

So, his name is not "George". But neither's was the original George. And I'm not in LOVE or anything. George II had some manky teeth which caused his M-shaped lips to be as recessed as they were. But then again, my teeth are gappy, so who's perfect?

But he was the kind I like. Just a guy, you know? A guy who is open and friendly and ... a guy. An average guy. Who might have a interlocking rib-muscles under there. And a chest full of hair. And who might be gay.

So I'll end it with this -- the odds are, he's not gay. He's probably divorced and probably a sex addict. He's probably disorganized and maybe has some destructive addictions that he's trying to overcome. I'll probably never know why he'll accept me as a friend, but he will. And I'll probably wind up with a big inappropriate crush on him, and on it will go into nowheresville. You know ... that town at the junction of Despair Rd and Chronically Frustrated Life Ln?

Because hey. I'm nothing if not consistent.

And that's what happened today!

*curtsey*

The Therapist

2011-03-24T14:51:00.002-04:00

Me.

More than once I have sat with a client and together we have arrived at answers for their lives that illuminated the whole room. Last week, one of them said "I don't know why I spent so much time worrying about what other people thought of me."

The peace on the client's face was incredible.

And I sat across from them thinking, "Why am I in THIS chair? Why are they not MY therapist??"

And those words have been in my head ever since. Because I've spent SO much time considering others thoughts about me. All my life, I guess. And it is seriously killing my happiness.

Over the weekend I was sitting between hobbies and feeling not lonely, but kind of ... oh, say, put out. Inconvenienced by being alone. And I do now have friends. But I thought to myself, in this one aspect, "Why am I alone? Why am I allowing myself to be alone like this? This is just STUPID."

Then I promptly did nothing.

But I tell you what. Out of all the people I've come across, whether it's through Blogging, Tweeting, Professionally, or In Person -- 98% of them refuse to be without someone. They don't care HOW effed up their lives are or WHAT their challenges are. And they don't give. A. Shit. what anyone thinks of them when it comes to this area. They hunger and they fill their appetite.

I owe myself nothing less.

I'm getting closer to blowing these doors off. FUCK Victoria Jackson and all her ilk who want to keep me in this closet. I don't see THEM doing without.

Fuck this.

Why am I alone?

I Would Do It All Again.

2011-02-22T18:13:00.006-05:00

I'd do it all again.

I'd do it all again.

I'd do it all again.

I'd do it ALL again

Ooohhhhhh.
You're searching for something I know won't make you happy.

Ohhhhh ooooooh.

You're thirsting for something I know won't make you happy.

Oh, you did it all again.
You broke another skin.
It's hard to believe this time--
Hard to believe that my heart,
My heart's an open door.
You got all you came for, baby.

So weary.

Someone to love is bigger than your pride's worth.

It's bigger than the pain you got for and it hurts.

It outruns all of the sadness.

It's terrifying lights through the darkness!

And I'd do it all again.

I'd do it all again.

I'd do it all again.

I'd do it ALL again.

You try sometimes but they wont stop.
You got my heart and my head's locked.

Oh.

I'll be burning down these candles for love.

For love.

So weary.

Someone to love is bigger your pride.

Oooooooooh.

It's bigger than the pain it got for,

It hurts.

Ooohhhhhh.
You're searching for something I know ...

...won't make ...

... you ...

... happy ...

Ohhhhh ...

... H'ooooooh.

NYC 2, ME 0

2011-02-10T10:54:00.006-05:00

Welp, NYC claimed another of my cars, but this tragic tale started in NJ, honestly. Back when I had my accident and needed a new car, it was clear that my credit was shot 8 ways to hell and no sane person would extend me credit without something exhorbitant and rapey. So I got my car. 3.15 years later I've paid 14K on it and still have 10K to go. The hope was that I'd start making enough money to pay the principal off on the car loan early.

Well that didn't happen.

Then I moved to NYC and then I got the dicey job I have now, and then took the supervisor's position, then gave it back, then the car got towed ... and towed ... and ticketed ... and ticketed ... and towed ... and finally towed again two weeks ago. Just when my finances bottomed out.

So not only can I not afford just to maintain the car in an openly hostile driving environment (I'd love to meet the person who owns a car in NYC and has never gotten a ticket for anything.), but I can't afford the car itself. Insurance + car payment + gas + repair/maintenance equals a broke and despairing Me.

So I told the Toyota finance company to take the car -- I no longer can afford it. "Voluntary Surrender" they call it. 150 pts put on my credit to be reflected for the next 7 years, they warned. Okay, whatever, thank you ma'am. I can't afford the car anymore. And in all truth, I never needed it the moment I moved into NYC. Every dime I spent on it, except in the service of my clients, was a waste and a delay on my saving money and being able to get my own place, one prepaid-yearly lease at a time.

So in the next few paychecks, I'll know where I stand. Will it be just enough to only pay rent to this guy I live with, or will there be some savings this time around?

We'll see.

In other news, My First Man Date checked-up on me through e-mail. It was confirmed--I DID see him that night in Williamsburg when I was with my hetero Con Buddy. I told him everything I had felt and he put on his "I Understand" hat. And he's no longer in the relationship he was in. And he's been with guys since. And he's definitely not the one for me. I get the feeling he's pursuing me now because I'm the one that got away. Soon as he's had me, he'll be on his merry way and I'll never hear from him again. But for right now, he doesn't want me -- he wants us to be each other's wingmen at a gay bar. Although he doesn't know where because he says he doesn't go to them. Also, he doesn't drink, and to his recollection, neither do I (which has been true in the last two weeks. I've fallen out of love with the idea and the sour taste in my stomach started to annoy me.)

So I might do that, although I'm not eager. It still feels awkward to go out with a guy I rejected, even though he insists it's friendship only. I mean, I AM a guy. I know how we think. And too, I don't want to watch men in a gay bar dancing. That's not attractive to me.

So yeah. A little down at the mo. Treating my clients has become all the life-affirmation I can muster up lately, and that's not so bad. I'm still helping people deal with their lives, regardless of how badly I manage to keep fucking mine up. That'll have to serve for self-esteem at the moment.

Memory Lane

2011-01-12T23:59:00.005-05:00

So I was looking for my comments at YouTube to find out how long ago I had noticed a cover artist and how long ago I had been leaving him messages because I found out from his postings that he had been in a band 25 years ago, and what I thought was a heck of a good try for an amateur was/is the latter day stylings of a professional musician.

Little bit of a letdown. My messages were all, "Great job! You're really good!" when he was probably all, "Fool, *I* know *that*!"

Hehe.

So I came here to see if I ever posted his vids into any of my blog entries and it seems that I didn't. But I did find that it's been two years since I acknowledged my gay self. And I have noticed that now it's going on THREE years. And I've noticed how sad it makes me to see such a lack of progress on my part. And I noticed how I slowed my blogging down because I didn't want to keep dealing with the same failure over and over again, and neither did you.

So I found this post which details the group of geeks to whom's wife I told my designation sexuale a few nights ago. One of those people in that video died last year of a heart attack. (I repeat that each time I talk about them now, because I didn't want to face it before.)

I found that back then, I had some crippling anxiety issues that I had taken meds for. I found that at another geek getaway, I stayed in my hotel room and blogged with you guys and ate at Olive Garden.

I found that I'm not much different now than I was then. I find that yes, I do get out more, and have more friends, (and the same ones also), and I don't need the meds anymore to get me to go to a new social venue and meet people. But I still drop jobs like a neurotic person. I still live with someone instead of on my own. I still under-earn like an absolute wanker. I still hope for something (well, ANYthing really) that I haven't been able to achieve. I'm still weird and strange.

Surely I'm autistic? I live inside here and have not blogged or medicated my way out yet. I still hate mornings enough to reject fulltime work, even when I had it.

So anyway, it seems obvious to me that I've lost 2010. I've no idea where it went. It seems like it was a great year for many of you guys, though. So that's great.

So ... yeah.

That's just what's on my mind right now. Tomorrow is one of those insanely early days that I hate, but thankfully, it's only the one per week. So I should be going to sleep, but I've no chance of sleeping right now. Too many thoughts. And tomorrow, I'll have to clean the snow off the car practically at the crack of dawn to get going INTO the morning. No fun.

And I don't feel as coherent and as determined right now as I have in days (years) past. Little disappointed at that, really. I feel like there are some great things up in here that I keep failing to access. Well, I'll say that I have failed up to this point to access.

Who knows what tomorrow will show? I need to learn to ignore all the failed tomorrows of yesterday.

And ... just that's it right now.

Take care.

I See What's Going On Here

2011-01-07T23:18:00.003-05:00

So I come to my blog and I spew my latest vitriol, drop a few f-bombs, then I go out and tell someone else that I'm gay. Somehow this is a process for me.

Because this time I told one of the Inner Circle. That is to say, the band of geeks that I've gone down to North Carolina to meet, dine and share with at the comics convention --I told the wife of that group. Her husband is the glue that holds us together with his podcasts and his energy and near-autistic love for comics and us. Out of that group we lost the 36 year old brother to a massive heart attack a year ago from Thanksgiving.

She knitted me a hat and is knitting me a scarf out of no reason, just because she likes me and thinks I'm a great guy--and she's a Mom to all of us and she's a fantastic woman. So I felt the safest with her. Her husband will probably also not freak out too, too much--but I can tell he sometimes gets uncomfortable with homosexual things. And our Geekmates in the cipher, one is a church-working mid-American Christian. Another is a slightly effeminate single black fella transplanted down there. Another is a brilliant satirist young feller, single and unlucky at love, living with mental illness. Lastly is a handsome young stud-nerd who is just a few degrees of seperation away from normal. He's like the Marilyn of this Munster family.

They are the faces that I see so often whenever I fear rejection the hardest. They are the ones who project all sorts of ladykilling antics on me to live out their fantasies. And they are the ones who, if a Gay Me repulses them, will hurt like a bitch. A biiiiitch. And no amount of "Well fuck that guy!"'s will make the pain vanish. I'm getting choked up right now just contemplating it.

But yeah. I keep saying it and it keeps being true. I can't stay like this, frozen and frightened and alone and lonely. Since the Amazing Mister Cosplaying Superhero Comic Nerd He-Man Gay Dude hasn't come to sweep me off my feet and out of my closet, I'm going to have to do it the slow hard way, on my own.

I have to take on the identity for everybody to see.

Then I have to start living out in the open.

Because I'm dying here in the dark.

No Worse

2011-01-06T13:28:00.006-05:00

Which translates to "The Same."

The holidays were WAY quiet, despite many invites to go places to celebrate. One invitation I had was to go out to Ohio and share the integration my geek buddy's teenage son back into his life. He's already married with a single-digit kiddo from but the first child he had out of wedlock was far from his life due to distance and the child's mother. Now he's getting to know his teenage son through things like Twitter (before all our eyes) and business trips that he turns into personal trips, and the son is all for it because, well, the boy's gay and probably needs all the family he can get.

And thus why I turned the invitation down. It was a family affair, one of love and acceptance of a gay youth. It was something I wanted personally -- too much. I wanted it to apply to myself and I just couldn't let myself steal this kid's thunder, because when I do finally meet my geek buddy, I'm going to out myself. I feel he deserves to know for all the personal that he shares with me (us), and for all the affection he has shown me.

So far, it seems to work. Those who I love, to whom I came out to, loves me still. I doubt the streak would end with this guy because, hello, he just welcomed his gay son into his life with much fanfare (letter of announcement, invitations, everything). So you'll probably agree, when I make my diva move, it shouldn't be at the expense of someone else's.

And then on top on it, the Blizzard of '10 hit day after Crimmas. No more ice-driving for me! One near-death experience was plenty enough.

I also had an invite to go over to MFTD's family's house on Christmas Day for din-din. I din-din't. It was another family shindig that I didn't feel I was an actual member of. Plus there's this whole "by the way, the guy 10 years older than your son, who has known him since he's 15, who strongly influenced him to go away to Missouri and changed his life, (in some parts for the better-hello, he's a Doctor now)--well yeah, you know THAT guy ... ? He's gay."

Now, for New Year's Eve, I had the invite which I've enjoyed two years in the past--My Geek Celebrity's house. (Yes, I like that. I haven't called him this before, but I've referred to him before. He's the geek guy who is the lowest-key gay dude I've ever known. He runs a podcast with his loud, celebrity-seeking, name-dropping, attention-whore co-host. My Geek Celebrity has much more class than that, although thanks to the efforts of his co-host, he now enjoys a moderate level of geek fame and influence.

THIS is the guy who I've gone to the movies with on lots of occasions, and sometimes just he and I, and each time I always think--"Tell this guy! Maybe you and he will hook up!" except he's not 'manly' enough for me either. Mind you, I think I'm way more effeminate than he is, but he's not got those 'turn me on' qualities that would cause me to drop my guards and tell my WHOLE NYC GEEK COMMUNITY that I'm gay.

And let me add a new detail (finally!) I've started drinking.

Okay, well, not a lot of drinking. But ever since I've had a few successful whiskey sours, I've been lured by the memory of the taste to mix them at home and just drink them here. So twice I've had an evening polishing off one of those hand-sized, $7 bottles of whiskey mixed in with various amounts of Mango Lemonades and Crystal Lights.

So on New Year's Eve, with plans to go to My Geek Celebrity's place for festivities, and meeting up with My Con Buddy (the one I think is so handsome, and yet is so straight), for my warm-up drank activities, I chose Jim Beam. Is it "a fifth" that comes in the hand-sized flat bottle? Well whatevs, I drained it by 7:30. Then I set off toward the party. Then I realized My Con Buddy was still handsome and still straight. And I still haven't told him I'm gay. Nor My Celebrity Geek. And I realized too that they both had excellent positions in life. And that they were going to celebrate for the New Year because why not? Life was good!

For them.

But for me? In mid-travel, while fetching some Starbucks latte and a slice of pizza to prevent totally TOTAL drunkness, I realized I was suddenly, amazingly blindingly pissed off beyond all measure. I suddenly didn't want to "celebrate" a fucking thing.

"Celebrate?" HA!!!!!!!!! Celebrate WHAT?

Well, that was New Years Eve. I texted My Con Buddy and let him know I was changing my mind and so I went home and I played ChampionsOnline because Fuck Them, That's Why.

New Year's Day came and I had no hangover or regrets and it was another opportunity to be at peace with no one else's attention needing mine, so I played more ChampionsOnline for hours and hours and that's how I spent the holidays.

No better but no worse.

And that's just my life. It's redeemable, in theory, but ... yeah. Not so much right now.

But wow. For a while back then, I sure did come close, didn't I? Can that be my consolation prize?

"how things are"

2010-11-27T23:49:00.002-05:00

Came back a few minutes ago from My Con Buddy's invite to run out and meet him for a bite to eat. He's the guy I drove down to NC with, and went with him to join a gym, and we've done a classic movie, and attended a podcast recording event, and who I told everything in my history to except me being gay. ("Con" as in "comic convention", not as in "he's served time in prison"). He's (one of) the handsome budd(ies) I have that I hope somehow are as gay as me and are hiding it like I am, and are waiting for me to say the right thing before they'll take me in their arms.

Last week we went out to see a concert. He had an extra ticket because he wanted to invite this girl at work and she became unavailable. So, yeah, he's still hetereo. No indie flick, "best-friend comes out and reveals his true love for the hero" ending to this story. But pre-show, while we were eating bagels in the window of a Williamsburg deli (and yes, I can't lie--it was as cool as it sounds) who walks by on the street except none other than My First Man Date.

Mind you, I haven't spoken to him since he reached out to me in my silence. But there he went on by. Far as I know, he could have been going home--I never knew his actual address, although I do remember his neighborhood, and I didn't mark it as being near Williamsburg. But yeah, there he went. And there I sat with my straight friend, My Con Buddy, who I haven't been able to tell that I'm gay to. And I waited for the panic attack to set in. And oddly, it didn't.

And I thought, not for the first time, that if there's a God, He's writing my life like we write cable drama. Because WHAT?! REALLY?! And my next thought was, what if My First Man Date saw me sitting there with my handsome friend? Well, of course he'd think I was on another date. And he'd want to be introduced, if for no other reason than to verify that I was doing well and getting on with my dating life after it not working out with him (because honestly, My First Man Date is THAT nice--albeit also being a little horndog). And what would I then say to My Con Buddy, seeing an "obvious" gay man greet me warmly and possibly take for granted that I'm on another date with a dude? Well, I'd have to come out, wouldn't I? And what if I did? Would I lose My Con Buddy? And if I did, shouldn't I Cee-Lo Green his ass to the curb?

Hey, if it was that easy, I'd be out of the closet.

One thing My Con Buddy hasn't done point blank is ask me about my taste in women. Of course, I'VE done the asking of his taste, for my own curiosity sake. He either already highly supects I'm for the dudes and doesn't want it confirmed, or he doesn't really care and would prefer not to know anyway. I can't think of a third alternative. Either way, I don't feel like it's a good idea to reveal as I've done with some of my married geek buddies. I figure, I suppose, that since they're married, they could feel less threatened by me (although I know in my heart of hearts that I wanted them to confess their lust for me despite their statusi). The married ones accept me. I dunno if the single ones hunting ladies would accept me the same way. ESPECIALLY if they might be a little gay themselves but want it even less than I do.

So all this is to say that the "how things are" of my life are not so good. I'm still repressed and afraid. I'm still frustrated and ashamed (evidently). And although I'm doing fun things, thanks to My Con Buddy, I'm lonely. (And I miss Ned).

Wish I had better news, but this misery is comfortable and it seems to be the destination of my choice. Even when I considered calling My First Man Date to tell him I saw him in Williamsburg, I opted out of that too. I just want it all to go away. But it doesn't. So I do.

Before I Run Out The Door ...

2010-11-07T13:47:00.003-05:00

...heh. NYC Marathon was today. So my title is funny. But not what I meant.

I'm going to Brooklyn to the convention that totally snuck up on me this year. I've been sick like dog for the past two days, and I cancelled all of yesterday's appointments, and this mornings'. And I had this afternoon's cancel on me, so I was suddenly freed up.

Freed up to go to this Brooklyn convention.

Which just happens to be the place I saw THIS GUY (pictured).
Which is right now the absolute only reason I'm going back to this place.

So I wanted to say that yes, if I find this guy today, I'm going to talk to him and see what's what.

And if he's gay, and available, and likes me, then I am ready to tear the door off my closet and get on with My Life As A Gay Man.

Otherwise, it'll be business as usual, which I will be blogging about undoubtedly. Just not as much.

Wish me luck.

Byeee..!

Hiiiiyeee....!

Well, romantically, it was a bust. I haven't seen the Dream Hunk since the last Brooklyn Convention, despite all the conventions I've been to between then and now. He's gone. Practically forever, as far as I need to be concerned. It was already a big chance that someone as gorgeous as him would be 1) single 2)available 3)gay and 4)attracted to me. I interpreted those looks he kept giving me as a 'come hither' glance, but whatever. Even if he wanted me then, I wasn't really ready. A year later I think I am, but I'm probably not really. I mean, I'm like a teenage girl holding out for Brad Pitt to leave Angelina. Foolish. Picky and foolish. (For the record, Brad Pitt is not my type. Too much lip-meat.)

Anyway.

Still nothing.

Wait, a little something ... my First Man Date reached out to me again a few days ago and I didn't respond. Prolly because I want this all to go away and I do want to retreat into my shell. Which is what he suspects. And you see, the 'want to' is very powerful. Like every one of my female dates/girlfriends have done, I need one of these gorgeous hunky men to approach me. And for that to happen, I have to be where they are. Which means a gay bar, which I've learned exists within walking distance. Or a gay society club. Or ... whatever. This is just ridiculous. Stupid stupid stupid.

Whatever.

Monosexual

2010-10-20T09:23:00.007-04:00

So I can blog again now that I haven't caused NYC's 2nd gay-related suicide leap. I know. That's not funny. But hey. I'm not laughing at, but with. I'm just as gay as they are and I feel the same type of isolation and fear as they do. All those "It Gets Better" messages apply to me even though I'm 46-plus-two-weeks old. What keeps me from suicide is a fear of the unknown and a suspicion that yeah--it will get better.

I mean hey, it got better for My First Man Date, anyways. After our last date he was able to find a guy who he likes a lot, and who likes him a lot. He even said that he waited until their fourth date to get busy, and he learned that from me! So folks, see? Instead of driving him to the point of suicide by depriving him of my gorgeous self, I helped him into a relationship that he's happier with than he would have been with me. My Hero Friend's advice was spot on.

Isn't that great?

Yup. That's great.

Great.

So.

I'm currently blogging between doing wash and the supervision that my Part-Time Gig demands of me (they want me to write someone up) and I ran into Hunky Married HeteroDad Neighbor in the laundry as I usually do when I do the wash. A head taller than me, wide shoulders, smiling eyes, always having one of his two kids in tow, friendly and responsive with them, thus far has been in various states of undress--just a real day-off casual working man's Ward Cleaver.

And I think to myself, "How did I get here?"

It seems like it's not that I'm gay--it's like I'm a woman. I don't want a gay man...I want a man.

Problem is, I'm not blessed with the estrogen that makes women soft, receptive, accepting, and supportive (well, wait--I can do supportive real well actually). But I'm stuck on stupid. I don't want just any man, be he pudgy, skinny or whatever. I want a bruiser. I want a roughneck. Gruff and rumbly. I only want one type of man. A physical type. And these are the times when I can easily just really hate myself.

Still, I'm not diving off of any bridge and letting my body be tweeted about by my
Inwood neighbors as it washes ashore. I want more for myself and my life--it just feels like I'm not able to get any of it.

It's like I'm not a homosexual--I'm a monosexual.

PostScript;
I was alerted to this article. I need to be this guy. Couldn't I still please have a wife?

The Next Conversation

2010-09-24T22:29:00.004-04:00

Grizz suggested the tone of the next conversation that I should have with My First Man Date in the last comments section. So I started this new post to say that I did actually have that conversation with him and found that he didn't want to rush me and understood perfectly that I needed time. At least, he said that. It didn't change the fact that he has had sex with a lot of men, and I'm not sure even he knows why. He says it hasn't all been satisfying. Well, he actually said most of it has not been satisfying and this was why he wasn't in a relationship currently. Yet, he still has sex.

So on the one hand, he wants me because I represent a chance at something he's never had -- which is not just virginity (I hope) -- but someone honest and open. And too, he said that I really turn him on.

Which has always sent me running from all my relationships. But I don't want to get into that.

As Grizz has also said, Look. At. Me. Doing this! Really dating again! Two dates now and the dude wants more. MUCH more!

However, the REAL next conversation happened last night, on the phone, with my Hero Friend. My Hero Friend should be a therapist. My Hero Friend said some things last night to me that really drove some points home.

1) One act does not have to define me. *I* get to define me.
2) I erroneously think that having one experience in this new dating world indicates that I'm ALWAYS going to have this same experience; ie, if I'm not turned on by him, I'll never be turned on by anyone.

Long time readers, doesn't that sound familiar? Have I not made those points in the past? Oh how soon I forget.

But today, after a little while, I remembered this guy;

Now you talk about being attracted to a man. Talk about no hesitation on my part. If THIS dude wanted me to kiss him ... omg OMG. I would snog his ever lovin' brains out.

There was something about this guy, besides that brawny powerful body of his. One, he was shy. He made eye contact with me, arched an eyebrow, grinned, but could never say 'Hey.' (Of course, neither could I). So there was a gentle masculinity about him. But that body. Oh that body. I am so gay for this guy.

And many, many others like this guy.

I'm saying all this, not to skeeve out you straight guys, but to re-affirm one fact that I overlooked.

I AM ATTRACTED TO A CERTAIN TYPE.

Duh?!

I can't change that. I could knock boots with anyone if I want to (and if THEY want to), but I'm just autistic, closeted, shame-based, repressed, stubborn, or fill-in-the-appropriate-adjective enough to never have done it with someone I wasn't attracted to.

So why am I going to start now? My First Man Date isn't my type. That will hurt him. But it will hurt him more if I go into a relationship that he really wants and I don't (Another kudoes to My Hero Friend). Especially when I'm so good at leaving relationships that I don't want to be in.

Take another look;

That's who I want. Or his twin bro.

Lets have it folks. What do you think? Am I copping out and running away behind a screen of words or does this make some small amount of sense?

2.5 Hours To Go Until The Next Date

2010-09-22T16:09:00.003-04:00

Because I postponed last night to tonight. Work had to be done. But yeah, even though I expressed what I expressed, I'm going out with him again because he is such a nice guy. And because he DOESN'T deserve to be dumped because of how he speaks. And because he might make an incredible friend.

But I still don't feel how I felt last week. It was the opportunity, the adventure, the kind words, the newness of it all. Always heady stuff, that First Blush. And I think I know what my female date from Match.com--lo these many years ago now--what she must have felt. I just didn't do it for her. And my new friend just doesn't do it for me. I think that's the safest way to put it.

This whole week has been busy with work, but there has been no ... how do I put it ... no passion in it. Nothing to rev me up. The whole idea of sex has made me slightly queasy, in fact.

Hmmm. Reading this back to myself, I think I know what's going on here. Life Students, can you see it for yourselves? I'm going to leave a big gap in the narrative to give you guys time to guess before I say it.

Trauma.

Faced with the actually possibility of sex, now with a dude instead of a chick -- I'm getting the same reaction. Distance setting in. Separation. What do we call it in the business? Disassociation. I couldn't even think of the word until the third try.

Shiiiiiiit. I'm still fucking victimized by the molestation. (edit; changed it from "my molestation" to "the molestation". But I'm paying attention dammit to what I'm doing. I saw that.) 45-minus-innocence years later. Damn. I want to even say that I WANT to overcome this, but I'm so fucking disassociated from it that I don't feel like I even want to try. Only when the opportunity comes around am I perfectly happy doing nothing. Which, clearly is not "perfectly happy" -- but in all truth "rather terrifiedly running away from". But when there's no opportunity and I'm lonely -- oh then it's all "Poor me" and "Oh my lonely heart" and "When will I ever find a love of my own".

It's bullshit. I don't want anyone. I want to be alone. I want to be safe. I don't want to be touched. idontwanttobetouchedidontwanttobetouchedidontwanttobetouchedidontwanttobetouchedidontwanttobetouchedidontwanttobetouchedidontwanttobetouchedidontwanttobetouchedidontwanttobetouchedidontwanttobetouchedidontwanttobetouched

shit

I'm losing my fucking marbles here. No I'm not. I'm not losing them. I'm finding them. I'm finding what's really going on.

Shit. I need some real help.

I need some real help or I'm going to fucking die like this.

Fuck.

2 hours to go until the next date. Oh that poor guy.

Freedom FAIL

2010-09-19T08:34:00.002-04:00

So last night I reunited with my old D&D group. Since I had been stepping over to Grim's place a few times I felt ready to make a whole re-entry, being that Grim was the one I had the problem with to begin with but now I had conquered that.

(To recap for those playing at home; Grim both pissed me off and I have a mad crush on him at the same time. I left the group because of both reasons. During my travels one day, I saw him driving and forgot all the anger and only missed him. Called him up and have since been to his house three times. Told him I was gay, and he accepted it with no fanfare nor calamitous disaster.)

So yesterday, on the day I chose to return to the group, Grim took the stairs out of the Hosting Girl's pool. This is a yearly ritual in which Grim takes off his shirt. This year I got a look. Several looks, to be honest.

Grim is so fine. omg is he so, so fine. He is the closest real-life equivalent to Jason Statham I have ever had the fortune of being friends with.

What's funny is, Hero Cop was also there and he's looking good too. He's maintained his weight loss and is as full of affection and enthusiasm as a puppy. He's eating right, working out, and is dying for appreciation. Which I give in copious amounts. So without a moment's hesitation, at the slightest encouragement, Hero Cop yanked his shirt off too (nowhere near the pool, I might add) to show me and the rest of us his progress. Clearly this was something the others hadn't allowed him to do during my absence. Well ... Hero Cop's stomach was flat. He is a full 30 lbs lighter and about 3 inches shorter than I am. BUT. There was no shape. No tone to him. He looked like a compressed man. Like remember those bodywraps people used to get? He looked freshly unwrapped. Things were held in, but I saw no muscle tone, except in his arms. Triceps, to be precise. I love my lil dude, but he's no Grim.

Anyway, I say all this as a preamble to what, exactly? That I didn't tell them all about my being teh gay. I just ... I couldn't. The same fear and pressure in my belly remained there through the night. Every time I considered it. Grim was able to comport himself as though he didn't know or care what I was, and that made it easier for me to do what I've always done. Pretend like I didn't know or care either.

And the moral of this story is, I'm aware that this is the way I'd rather live my life. This is my default position. This is what I've been doing for 4 decades and despite all my big talk, or maybe in the light of my kissless date with a kind and cute gay man, I know how safe it feels in this closet of mine and I know I want to stay in it.

I mean, I do know that. For the last couple of weeks, I've been wanting to change that but for the last couple of days, with increasing intensity, I have not wanted to. Very not.

Today it feels like Freedom FAIL. So much so that I want to cancel my date for Tuesday and pretend none of this ever happened.

And that's what's going on.

Obsessively Analytical. Still

2010-09-14T15:30:00.003-04:00

The Date occurs in 2.5 hours. I'm inclined to buy something new, then head out. I should buy him a little gift too, huh? I'm nervous. I've pictured this going some-odd thousand different ways. I woke up early thinking about it. Songs come on the radio and I think about it.

While I'm not inclined to go all the way tonight, I do think that this is the beginning of the end of my hidden position. Dating a fella. I might as well kiss him. I might as well sleep with him. I might as well tell the world I'm gay.

I'm finding my boundaries. I don't HAVE to tell everything to everyone, do I. It's not a question. It remains a fact. A lot of people don't want to know about my life outside of the words that I pepper Twitter with. A lot of them have their own notions. A lot of them will think what they want. And a lot of them is not my concern.

My concern is me. I don't have to kiss him. I don't have to sleep with him. I have to be true to me and take my time with this. I'm not in a race. Another year of deliberation won't kill me after 45-minus-innocence years.

I just want this guy to be well. I wish him no harm at all. I am already as grateful to him as I am to all of you for coming into my bubble of shame and fear and helping me out of it.

Okay. I'll be back to fill out the rest. For those of you reading this late in the game, no suspense for you!

Oh, and if I never blog again, I ran afoul of life. Avenge me, Eliel. But it really couldn't have gone down any other way. And trust me, I was so unsure about this whole life of mine--on some level I'd be glad the struggle is over. So if this is my last night on Earth, I'm going gently into it. If I'm going to my murder, I'm not going to resist, beg, cry, or carry on at all. I'm resigned to it. Let's roll.

_______

Not dead.

Well, he's a HANDSOME little thing! He's like a miniature Tom Selleck, blond version! He's athletic, but not cut like deisel. And let me say this, he's softer than me. More gay, if that holds any meaning. Now, I know I've come to this life lusting after the straight dudes. I love guys who are guys. But my date looks like a guy-guy, even though he sounds a little gay.

God, this is so effed-up.

This date of mine was so sweet, and understanding, and patient (in otherwords, we were close enough to kiss several times, for several lengths of times, but I just couldn't yet. And I told him that. And he understood. Tonight anyway.) He's been gay for just shy of 40 years (oh, and by the way--dude is NOTHING like a 50-year old. NOTHING. He easily looks to be in his thirties.) and he's conmfortable with it. So enviably comfortable -- although he's tried women. Done women. But he knows what he likes.

He likes me.

Hugging him told my body that I'm gay. I'm waiting for the rest to follow. I'm waiting to kiss him and see what THAT does. I wanted to hug him for longer, but he most definitely wanted to kiss. I just didn't.

It's like the kiss would be the thrust of the ski poles that will tilt me over the precipice and plunge me into the ride down Mt Everest, and I've never been good with heights.

We'll go out again next week. I asked him if he would, please, even though I'm not kissing him yet, and he said yes. He really seemed to like me. He said a lot of nice things. He said I was genuine.

I'm going to hold his hand next time.

I think we'll kiss next time.

And Yeah, So. That Happened.

2010-09-12T21:11:00.001-04:00

First phone conversation happened.
And now I have a date.
A real date.
A DATE date.
Wow.
Here we go ...

Sh*t Just Got Real

2010-09-04T20:07:00.003-04:00

Actually real.

My nibble at FindFred turned into an interested tug.

To begin, his pictures were cleared by the Admins.

They were nice. Blond, curly-headed moustached guy with blonde eyebrows, and a smile that looks like he's up to something. He's thinnish, but has some shape to him. He takes pics of himself in the gym, at the beach, out on vacation. He's just hit his fifties but doesn't look a day over 45. His bare chest is fuzzy with coppery hair. No tattoos. And he's my height.

So I responded to his "Where in Manhattan do you live?" with a

"Why, have you seen me around? ;-)"

to which he has responded;

"No, but I'd like to."

Now. This means a few things.

1) He knows I'm a black dude.

2) He's attracted to me.

3) He wants to do stuff with me.

4) He will accept my interest in him.

And I'm sitting here thinking how much I want to do this. How my heart is speeded up right now thinking about how this could go down. I look again at his pictures and I'm thinking he looks better and better. Rugged-like. Right now, he looks like the best thing in the world.

He looks like hope. Like, yeah, he's someone who could like me the way I want to be liked. And he's someone I could like the way I've always wanted to.

I think of all the boyfriends of my girlfriends, and how I'd look at them and get this little heartspeed thing going. Wishing that I could see a little more of them--and then going to Gym and getting that wish fulfilled in the lockerroom, only to know that they'd beat the living shit out of me they knew how I felt. I think of how much I hated wanting what I wanted, and how locked-in I was. I remember how I'd quickly run away from it and try doing life the expected, "normal" way. Yeah. Ran all the way to church and hid under Jesus' skirt.

But 30 years later, here I still am. I traded the hem of Jesus' garment for the internet. I hide behind my side of the screen. I watch and I do not do.

And now I'm standing on the precipice of something real. Maybe. Something to change the way I live the rest of my life. Now I am entering into a flirtation with a man who actually knows I'm flirting, and is flirting back.

Stop.

I've never done this before. I've flirted with straight guys. I've been entertained by those who most likely think I'm playing bantery games with their masculinity. But I've never done this with someone ready to take it somewhere.
And I am really thrilled right now.

Breathe.

Breathe.

Yeah.

So.

Wow.

Okay.

Okay.

I'm going to talk to him. I'm going to find out more about him, I hope. I may just meet him. I might just kiss him. Perhaps I'll [censored] him. Or maybe I'll get to hug him.

You know what?

I would like to hug him.

Hug him for just being there and talking to me. For calling me handsome, and meaning it the way I want someone to mean it. The way I've always wanted a man to mean it.

Yeah, for right now. That's what I want. That would be just amazing.

Long Stretch

2010-08-31T09:28:00.002-04:00

4 weeks later I got one nibble at FindFred. From a guy with no picture. Frustrating. He did say I was handsome, but he wants to know where in Manhattan I live. As IF, buddy. Can you take me out to dinner, verbally, first? I've had some others look at my profile, but I don't feel the impulse to leap.

It's all so strange. And defining. And humbling. Because I find that I'm a shallow prick. Yes, now's the time to realize that my snooty perceptions of love have been a lie I told myself. Because clearly to me, looks matter. When it came to women, I guess I was more open because it wasn't the promise or lure of sex drawing me in. I wanted to be friends, always. I wanted to laugh and talk and share. I wanted what most other girls want from their girlfriends. But I didn't want what a "man" wants.

Now, I do. This "man" wants to close the circuit between what he sees and what he feels. As most men do. What I don't know is how that works across the spectrum with straight men. Obviously there are the superstar gorgeous creatures in the media. Straight guys get to look but not touch. So when they go into the obtainable, are they "settling"? Or are they more mature than I've gotten the chance to be, and they realize beauty is where you find it? They love the skinny, the full-figured, the short, the tall, the slightly-off proportioned. They love without the trappings of Hollywood and the lie of beauty.

So why can't I? Why does it have to be muscles? Why do I have to learn these things so late in my life? I'm almost freakin' 50 years old.

And the inverse of that question is, why can't I have muscles? It's what 'trips my trigger' as a happy man once said to me. Why am I going to take on the stigma of being gay if I don't get to enjoy it on some level? Instead of an unfulfilling sexual relationship, I'd rather do nothing -- like I've been doing for 46 years, minus pre-sexual awakening.

Damn. What a sad freakin' life I've had. In this area--and that other area about having parents. But hey. I'm not the only one. And I do good things elsewhere. I'm not a TOTAL waste of protoplasm.

Maybe the FindFred guy will put up pics and be Jason Statham. And maybe I'll wake up tomorrow morning and be straight. Haha.

The One I Haven't Blogged About

2010-08-20T23:10:00.004-04:00

So there's this gay comic fan and podcaster who I've gone out with a few times, just me and him. And it isn't Former Pastor, although he and this guy were friends way before I slipped into the cypher. They may even have History. I once saw a frustrated knowing glance that Former Pastor shared with a gay third-party about the guy in question. But Former Pastor moved back home down south. He ain't here no more.

Now. Let's call the guy in question "Eligible." Because, you know actually, he is. And each time we've met up for a movie, there's been ... You know. A Thing. Attraction. Or not an attraction actually, but more like our radars pinging off one another. It's like we're sizing each other up. No pun intended.

He's the kind of gay that I can see myself being. Folks know but it's just understood, not bandied about. Eligible's conversation is about Eco-friendly conservationism and comic books and civic awareness and his interests and stuff. No massive declarations or drawing of lines in the sand. The only reason to believe he's gay is because his co-host throws out a joke about it every once in a while and he'll great-humoredly catch the lob. In fact, his contribution actually dignifies his co-host's ham-handed attempts at the "gee isn't it fun to make fun of teh gay?"-humor. Think 'The Odd Couple' except Felix is gay and Oscar is a bartender who loves comics and fame.

So knowing Eligible was this bachelor, gay, subtle guy, I fired my retroes and allowed my craft to dip into his planetary orbit. When I went to my first social party (whereupon I denied my sexuality, posted pictures here at the blog, and tried living a life that I'm not destined for), it was Eligible's cool-ass Harlem pad w/a backyard hosting the party. And when the Geeks of New York would gather for events, I would hope he'd show up--glad and gravitating himward when he did.

And because he has shared many a kee-kee with me as we'd huddle in our theatre seats, I think he digs me too. It's like we're both waiting for the right signal from each other.

Except I have one thing (okay, LOTS of things) holding me back. He doesn't look like this;

Except he kind of does have that round head with receding hairline that I like. And he's a slim guy, but he said he's not packin' a sixpack under those urban casual clothes of his. (Yes I HAVE asked. I toldja ... the radar be pingin'!)

So. Here's the thing. To try a relationship with him would mean two very major MAJOR things.

1) Houston we have liftoff. Dude is a public geek figure. I arrive somewhere on his arm, or he on mine, and it's DONE. No turning back. Alan. Is. Teh. GAY. And ERRRRRRRBODY gunna know it.

2) He might never have that sexy-sexy that I crave. If I'm going to DO this, I want it to be GOOD. I want it "all." And if there's an abundance of anything, it's muscly gay men. Don't believe me, just walk along 23rd St in Chelsea for a few avenues. How that happened, I don't know, but Chelsea has become Teh Beefy Gay District. WOOF!

I got distracted.

Anyway, I want one of those. Eligible is eligible, pleasant, intelligent, successful generous, erudite, and a geek. He has a lot of qualities I like. But he doesn't stoke the fire. I find that with him, I'm just curious. I would share a kiss with him, if only to see what it's like to kiss an actual guy.

So yeah. That happened. If anything comes of it (the puns refuse to stop) I'll be sure to blog it.

I Talk A Good Game

2010-08-07T19:12:00.005-04:00

But when it comes to rubber y road, I'm crap.

So I keep getting emails from frickin "FINDFRED" which happens because I went over there and started a profile. But stopped. Because. I'm crap.

But today I thought, no. Let me look around. BUT!! In order to look around, I had to frickin' finish the profile. So okay. Bastards.

So I started. I'm in fact in the middle of it now.

And SHIT! This effing thing is going all out!! It's asking nice questions like you would find on Match.Com, and then it asks stuff like what sex position I like, what is my ... size, what size do I WANT, what's my favorite bodypart, what's my BEST bodypart ... and I'm like HOLY CRAP. This thing is talking to me like I'm gay!!

And the voice in my head answered back "Well isn't that what you've been telling everybody?"

And I'm like "NO! I haven't been telling EVERYBODY...!!"

And the voice says, "Well either shit or get the fuck off the pot Nancy-Boy."

And then I literally want to break down in tears. Because FUCK YOU that's why!!! This is fucking fuck fuck HARD!! MOTHERFUCCCCCKKKERRR.

Dammit. I hate this. I'm lonely and scared and this is the worst thing that has ever happened to me. I feel like I can never EVER share this. Nobody wants to know this shit. What's MY size? What do I like???

How the hell do you answer something like that?

I hate this.

I'm going to be alone for the rest of my life.

It's not fair.

FUCK. YOU. KEVIN. You perverted criminal son of a bitch. I would kill you right now if I could. I would kill you.

I Am, In Fact, Now NOT Buried And Hidden In A Basement

2010-07-26T22:34:00.005-04:00

I told Grim and survived. It took a few hours of playing on the Wii (amazing gadget that) before we went out for pizza and I went in with discussion about relationships and what he was doing with his. Friendly reciprocation kicked in, and when he started giving me advice on how to make all my Match.com dates successful from now on, I knew that was my moment.

With heart staggering, I told him that 'I don't think I'm attracted enough to girls.' I said 'I'm probably not even straight.' I said in fact, the opposite was true and that I thought 'guys are quite nifty.'

Good ol' hetereosexual that he is (to my dismay) he doubted my self-ideas for a little while and fished around for a saving grace to retain my membership for the Home Team. But I told him what I experienced in high school; how I escaped The Great Adolescent Sex-Race by immersing myself into religion yet I would systematically still have crushes on most of my friend-girl's guy-dates.

'Yes,' he declared. 'Then you are gay.'

'Yes,' I agreed. 'I am gay.'

We volleyed more words around for the next hour, but mainly from me. What I was facing at 45, how I did and did not want to live the rest of my life, and how I didn't know what to do with this self-info. "Do I just tell everybody?"

And he said "You know it won't matter to us, right?"

By us he was referring to him and the rest of them who I dumped in fear that it, of course, would matter and very much so.

And that's what I keep missing. I keep missing the fact that if people are my friends ... really my friends ... me being gay is not going to matter. I don't trade porn with my friends. They don't slip me pics or details of their bedroom lives. My sexuality is not something that affects my friendships.

And so far, I'm 100% successful in coming out of the closet and still being accepting by the friends who I do love. I may even have enough support to help me if I DO discover some of my acquaintences shall no longer truck with me upon discovering my orientation. To which by that time I will most likely roundly return a hearty "FUCK YOU, THEN" in response instead of being the recipient of a shattered world.

In other words, I'm seeing the dawn break through the gap of my slowly opening closet door.

It's kind of nice. I just don't know HOW nice yet.

We'll see.

Oh, and just another peek at why I like and want Grim to stay my friend; one of the responses he made to me, while I was vomiting my truth out in an adraline rush was, "You'd better change your Match.com profile then."

Doing This

2010-07-26T10:57:00.005-04:00

Today I'm getting with Grim, with no one around but me and him. And I'm telling him.

Worst Case Scenario; he bludgeons me to death and hides my body in his basement. From his point of view, he'll have done it as an act of mercy because he is so diametrically opposed to homosexuality and feels it's a birth defect like mental retardation that can never be cured.

Best Case Scenario; He admits he's gay too, one quite like me in fact--closeted and attracted only to the roughest butchest of the lot. Then he snogs my brains out and tears my clothes off.

I suspect this will land somewhere in the middle. He'll hear it, respect it, but then the friendship will go cold and stale with him realizing he just doesn't have enough in common with me anymore, and he's not ready to be close to someone who has such a radically different lifestyle (potentially).

In other news, I went out for face-to-face meeting-type socialization with some comicbook-liking folks in my neighborhood! The ones who I introduced myself to as "liking guys, a lot" at the neighborhood messageboard. So if any of them cared or have good memories, they were meeting me already as a person who said he's most likely a gay dude. Vague enough?

So they either thought, as I was sitting there, "this guy's gay, right?" or they were thinking nothing of the sort because they didn't remember my little epilogue. Nice and ambiguous, the way I like it.

But that's not going to happen today with Grim. Because as afraid as I am of this mess, I'm stuck as stuck can be and I need to move. I don't wait for anything else in my life--I get impatient and depressed when I can't make stuff happen that I need, so what is more important than a prime human relationship? How much longer am I going to deny myself this basic human tenet? Who was meant to be alone on planet Earth? Who was born with no sex drive, no ability to be attracted to another person?

Well, not this kid. Grim might not be The One For Me, but he's a little too skinny anymore, anyway. There are some fine. ass. men. out there in this city, and I want one.

If I'm ever going to be an active participant in the search for Mine, then I'm going to have to be gay 24-7, because somewhere in those hours and days, somewhere outside of this closet--that's where he is.

Didn't Know How Mad I Was Until I Finished This Post

2010-07-14T21:59:00.009-04:00

So about three weeks ago, maybe going on four, I saw Grim Jester driving in his car while I was out with a client. Details of that can be found here.

Well, I still haven't told him yet. He called last week to say we could get together some time when his girlfriend was not around, and that might be this weekend. Meanwhile, I visited our friend-in-common this weekend (the guy I met through Grim and would give rides to our venues because he's just on the other side of the Harlem River from me) because I wanted to use his unlimited metro card and save myself some trainfare. He's another that I could've told my gayness to, but again I just lapsed into the same hetero-patterns that I always do when I sense that I'm with a hetero friend. I chicken out. All the worse case scenarios come crashing down. (re: they'll ridicule me, they'll tease me, they'll scorn me, they'll call me a liar, they'll get angry with me, they'll suspect that I want them, they'll go silent, go uncomfortable, see me as different, as less, as worse, as deviant, as damaged. That everything will change. Everything.)

So I can honestly say that I ditched Grim Jester and the others as a pre-emptive strike. Because I want to tell them my truth, just so I can stop pretending that we have this girl-hunt activity in common anymore, and I can stop that particular type of personal isolation and despair. But if I've already ditched THEM, and the worst case scaenario happens, well--fine. Jokes on you. I left your asses a long time ago anyway.

Yet when I saw ol Grim driving that day, I didn't feel any of the frustration, anger, or fear. I felt lonely. I wanted our friendship back. I wanted someone who lets me call them. Someone who would be willing to take me out when I'm feeling low.

And it makes me want to get rid of the homo-ness again. It's just so ridiculous. Why does this have to be real? Why can't I just have a girl like everybody else? (haha)

Finding a girl would just be so much more ... better for me than going with my stupid homo urges. Sorry, I don't know what else to call them. It's just that they seem to be keeping me from what I want most in life--I want to be happy and accepted. And I DO want kid(s). And I NEED a second income, thanks to the way the country values psychology. I need to be in a family wherein one of us can cover all of us with benefits from their job. And I want to be able to have tete-a-tetes with neighbors without carrying around my homo-baggage. Without having to challenge pre-conceived notions, march in parades, educate children and became a fucking two-man mission-statement instead just being a fucking average guy who gets to have sex with the person who turns him on, like every fucking body else in the LITERALLY fucking world.

Clearly that's too much to ask of the universe. I have to be gay. LUCKY FUCKING ME. And THANKS A FUCKING LOT.

See title.

I Could Use Some Advice

2010-07-05T06:52:00.001-04:00

So Dr. Something-Or-Other has still not responded, and perhaps I need to stop expecting he will. But the bloke with the hot body, who I wrote to the Doc about, I've found in the Doc's Facebook pages. Hot Body is as closed off there as he is at the "porn" site where I first found him (porn in quotes because while many others are showing off everything, Hot Body is only showing off his ... well ... hot body.)

Clearly what I've done is the act of cyberstalking. Is that bad?

I want to see this man walk and hear him talk. I want more than these tantalizing pics.

So here's the advice I need, should I FB message this guy? And if so, what could I possibly say?

I'm obsessed again. That much is clear. Would it be best if I get myself over this?

Coming Out

2010-06-29T18:41:00.005-04:00

Well, I threw it down. A Neighbor in my neighborhood opened up a message board for alla us up in the hood, (that person wasn't Manhattan's Peak, but through her I learned of it) and in introducing myself I ended saying "And I like guys. A lot."

These neighbors of mine might follow me on twitter some day, you know, where all of everybody else does? So one day one of them just might follow up something gay about me and it just might get out. And yes, I'm as scared about that as I was about having a Facebook page. Because I don't want to "come out." I just want the world to allow me to do me without judging me or condemning me. And I want to be able to put it out there in the public that I'd like a nice guy to date. I'm not trying to "come out", I'm just trying to live.

In other news, Erica and Grizz, I haven't heard back from Dr. Something-or-Other. Maybe he didn't like me pushing up on his buddy. Because I'm telling you, between the two of them, it certainly would be his biddy I want. (Honestly, they were "buddies" not boyfriends. There's a place in the profile to say if you're single and they both were, whereas they could have made each the other's Partner and shared a profile. So I wasn't crossing any boundaries. Promise.)

Another Message In A Bottle

2010-06-27T19:21:00.003-04:00

Because Match.Com isn't direct enough.

So yeah, I like to look at the nice men at a site called "something-or-othermuscle" Most of that name I made up, but not the muscle part. Because that's the part I like, of course. That muscle.

So it's a social networking site that features most prominently the pictures of how buff and wonderful the participants are, and they get to leave "I Likes" for one another, and they give out other details like their cities, their height, their weight, and all sorts of other details. And yes, THOSE details too. In fact more than half of those profiles and pics are pornographic. The lads love to show off their naughty bits.

With that kind of frank openness, I feel like I know what I'm dealing with. And too, I feel like I know what I want. I want to live as unashamed of my body and my sexuality as they seem to do. (Also they might just be exhibitionist freaks with damage in the restraint centers of their brains).

But I happened upon a connected pair of profiles, one amazing looking man who has a zipcode near me but no e-mail to use, and his "buddy" who has a very open profile link to a Facebook page where he reveals his professional side AND his orientation. HIS FB profile has a link and an e-mail address. And to backtrack a few steps, neither of their "something-or-othermuscle" profiles show pornography. Nothing more pornographic than you'd see in a underwear catalog, anyway.

And so, I went in. I'm hooked. Again. And to the professional one, I wrote the following e-mail (and I will censor the names, lest a google search opens me up to them before we ever meet. Not that I have anything to be ashamed of HERE. And actually, it would save time to let them see it...but in due time).

So here, read this;

"I don't know if I should call you, XXX, XXXXXXX, or Dr. XXXXXX, but whichever you prefer--hello!

"My name's Alan. I'm a 45 yr old black male New Yorker and I browse the (something-or-othermuscle) profiles pretty regularly. I've reached out to a few fellow New Yorkers there with no success so far. Given your Facebook link, I'm hoping that you might be open to a little communication from a guy who is seeking clarity on life and "the pursuit of happiness" whatever that means.

"I am currently a therapist in midtown Manhattan, (definitely not living as well as that might sound), and have also realized within the last four years that I'm gay. Being late to the life means, of course, that 95% of my friends are "straight" (jury's out on a few) and I don't know where I fit in with them anymore. I suppose it might go a little better if I were just to come out to everyone I know and let me friends accept or reject me accordingly, but all the repression and shame that I've been taught from my teen years makes that the hardest task ahead of me.

"So I'm writing to you for a few reasons. At the very least I'm looking for a pen pal who could offer some encouragement through opinion or shared experiences. At best, I could gain a new friend or a whole group of peers to help me into this new identity so I can get along with the rest of my life, and possibly do some good as a result. Now, of course, the guys on (something-or-othermuscle) are my types of guys. Prime example is the guy, XXXXXXX XXXX, whom you're buddied with and who doesn't seem to take e-mails. I definitely know I'm gay when I see his body. But finding you through his profile seems also like a win because you might be more willing to respond than have others. So I guess I was drawn to send you this e-mail on all kinds of levels. I suppose, whatever else could come from contact like this is yet to be seen. It's certainly new territory for me.

"So, yeah. I guess that's pretty much it. I have more online info about who I am and what I do that I can share if you want to know whether I'm a spambot, or want to know what I look like, or whatever. I figure that's only fair, right? Oh! Also I work out at NYSC too, usually in spots around midtown, mostly at 73rd near CPW because afterward it's a nice walk across the Park to work when I'm done. Or vice versa.

"Right. So. Here I go sending out my message in a bottle.

"Hope to hear from you. Thanks.

"-Alan"

What do you think about that, Dear Readers? Biggest Mistake Ever or About Damn Time?

Two Weeks and about 7 Hours Ago...

2010-06-26T22:48:00.002-04:00

I saw Grim Jester on the road while I was out with my client. I texted him to say "I just saw you" but I had the wrong number. I sent an email to my old group to repeat "I saw you" but again, as if I'd dialed the wrong number again, there was no response.

That was two weeks ago.

In the last 14 days, I've been a therapist for other people. A woefully underpaid one, so much in fact that I shall be late to pay July's rent. And will be a thousand and change behind in my car payments by the end of the year. And My license will be suspended for non-payment of the ticket I can't afford to pay since I had to get my car out of the tow pound 4 weeks ago.

Yeah, ol' Me is in that place again. However, the insurance company is actually the reason why this time--not bad judgment on my part. They keep making mistakes during my pay-out and I keep having to return the checks. I need them to cut the shit, and cut me a check on Monday. But even so, I won't get that insurance money until July 15th after the center has held onto it and gotten their interest's worth.

So this has been my frame of mind for the last 4 weeks. My money woes returned a sense of the stupid dumbness of my life. Yet I sit in the big chair, encouraging others to see the brighter sides of THEIR lives. I teach OTHER people how to make the best of communication and relationships. I got crazy mad "maximize your life" skills--for someone else.

And two weeks ago, when I saw Grim Jester, I saw an opportunity to regain a little control back out of this crazy life. So I called the house number that I still had until I reached him. And I arranged to go over to his house to see him today. And I sat up in the room with him and his new girlfriend and mended fences. Mind you, Jester's way of mending fences is to proceed like nothing's happened, which worked for him. I only stayed for a few minutes because his girlfriend looked sleepy, possibly post-coitally, and I wanted to have more of a "talk" than this virtual stranger's presence would allow.

But he walked me out to my doomed car, and he seemed glad that I had come, and I sensed that whatever I was holding against him, I had let go.

But the control I wanted back in my life was not fully restored today. For what I intended to tell him was that I was gay, and have been all this time, and the reason I left the group is because I couldn't stand being around him and only letting him piss me off instead of meeting my need. I intended to tell him that all his anti-gay remarks had made me feel embarrassed and ashamed of what I was, and that while I was struggling to accept this about myself, I needed a lot less of him and his hairy muscles, and his locker-room fratboy group of geeks teasing gay people (and thus, ostensibly, ME). And I meant to tell him that I still haven't figured everything out yet, but if I was going to get anywhere closer to who I am, I was going to have to come out to a few more people until I did it completely.

Because why am I a therapist helping other people make the most out of their relationships with people and lovers, yet not do anything like that for myself? How much older am I going to get watching people all around me continue to have their fantastic and magical relationships, while I resign myself to an inhuman experience of isolation and fear?

I cry foul on all that. I'm lonely. I want a dude. I just have to accept that.

(Untitled)

2010-06-16T08:44:00.002-04:00

In a bloggy mood this AM. It should be illegal to post pictures of yourself on the internet if you're male and you have muscle. Or are hunky in any sort of way. At all.

I do think I'm recovering nicely from a whirlwind crush I achieved a few days ago. I got turned onto a comicbook/comedy troupe last week by a fellow fan, and lo and behold, they had a kinetic manhunk in their ranks. Made me laugh and made me lust. So what do I do? Well, I hit 'im up, of course! I posted on their YouTube, friended them on Facebook, Tweeted them with praise. And who of the four should respond immediately? Why, Hunkalicious of course! Letting me into his Facebook world helped not at all. "Single" declareth he! As I browsed his camping pics and wrestling shows attendance, we traded messages "Have you done this?" "Where do you live?" "Did you read that?" "What'd you like best?" kind of stuff. All the while I'm noticing his (as well as his troupemates) involvement in a big church. Pics of song services begin to unearth. Hunkalicious on a stage with a mic in one hand and the other stretched up to the sky in prayer.

Hunkalicious' Facebook preference is "Women" and these boys are ministers in a mega church. And although he's the only single one in the group, and the best looking, and the hunkiest, he's involved in ministry. That means that even if he harbors a secret love for the well-figured man--he's buried himself under the protective cocoon of Godliness. At my most grandiose, I know that to court him any further would be (another) big letdown for me.

So, here's the deal--if you can avoid being gay, I highly recommend that course of action at any cost (Yeah, right).

It's absolutely no fun getting these unbidden crushes when you least expect them, as they have approximately 0.0034% chance of turning into anything. And NO it is not just like hetereo crushes. No it is NOT. Because a guy can find a girl attractive and can expect a reasonable chance of chatting her up. It would be a surprise if he discovers she's "Single" but interested in "Women." But this is what it's like all the time for the gay single man. Guys befriending guys is common and expected, without the baggage of sex-attraction. Poor single straight guy just wants a friend. WHY did it have to be with THIS guy, preying on him with unwanted sexual advances that skeeve him the ufck out? He didn't ask for that. He was just being friendly.

Not to mention that Facebook puts all your business out there in front of all your "friends."

My safest fantasy scenario is that any of the single, good looking guyfriends on my Facebook chat with me, and I with them, and somehow someway (through osmosis I guess?) he or I approach the topic of why I'm single at my age, I tell him in a PM, and he says, "Oh. Hmm. That's funny. So am I!" Then we start communication on another level "What's it like for you?" "Isn't it difficult to see all our friends married, having kids, etc etc?" "How many gay relationships have you had?" "You neither?! Wow, you're exactly like me!" Hilarity ensues.

I suppose that could still happen with Hunkalicious, but the man is ensconced in a church. Publicly ensconced. Unless their church is so open-minded as to allow samesex marriage within the ministry -- I'd be setting myself up for failure. Or something illicit and potentially disastrous. Have you ever seen a church line up to excommunicate a member for moral indiscretion? I have. Participated in fact. Sick and tragic. Talk about moral failure--WE committed it that night, regardless of what that member had done.

And then of course, there's the fact that he's 12 hrs away from here.

Oh, speaking of that, Ned, I missed you during my trip to Charlotte! I guess there was a lot going on for both of us? I was running with two groups this time instead of just the one group you met last year.

Anyway, so that's what's going on. I'll probably still head down that road with Hunkalicious in conversation ... I feel it. No. Stop it, Me. He said he's interested in "Women" on his Facebook. It doesn't matter if his church supports samesexness. He doesn't. Let it go. Stop it.

So much fun to be me. Eat your hearts out. :-/

45 Years of Bad Road

2010-05-24T14:26:00.003-04:00

I'm going to re-name this blog "downer" because that's all I seem to use this space for anymore. I twitter happy stuff with pictures and funny things to say all the time. All day everyday, in fact. In 140 or less. But when Teh Suck descends on me, 140 or less don't cover it. And too, some people who follow me on twitter are not trying to hear Teh Suck. They don't follow me just so they can hear me say that sometimes my life is no better than a steel-toed boot to the face.

Because frankly, EVERYBODY lives a life which isn't always that great. And so people subscribe to twitter accounts for their own entertainment, not to be brought down. Which is why there are therapists. You go pay for the service of having someone hear you whine. Not many want to do it for free.

But for the ones who WILL do it for free? Them I call "friends."

So friends, here it is again.

I spent over an hour on the phone today because the insurance company that pays me for listening to people's problems wildly both overpaid and underpaid me--as if they lost their entire minds when the insurance buy-out took effect and their pay rates to me changed.

In trying getting to the bottom of why they screwed up so badly (no answer was forthcoming), I did find out what they intend and actually WILL pay me, once they get it right on a consistent basis.

This;
Fully one-third less than what I had been paid.

This will be from now on with my insured clients. The same work for much less pay. For no other reason than that one company bought out the other.

Aside from the ethics of that action, I ask myself, when does life get better? How many setbacks is ahead of me, yet still left to wade through?

I tend to think that, okay, life sometimes absolutely sucks. Without question. It can ab. so. LUTELY suck. Absolutely. But through the suck, you grab a foothold here, a threshhold there, and you get to enjoy what's "normal" sometimes. You get to have a sense of equilibrium. Some security. Some love. For just a while. Maybe for a good while. And maybe along in the good whiles, you can make a difference. Plant you a flag somewhere. Matter to planet Earth and a few of its inhabitants for just a spell. Get a little of that glow before you go back to Teh Suck again.

But what happens when Teh Sucks seem to mount up to more than the Good Whiles? Inordinantly disproportionate numbers of Teh Sucks. Wildly out of kilter. What then? When you look back at your life and you realize you're looking at 45 years of bad road.

Parents who physically fight one another.

Polysubstance-abusing father.

Bipolar-disordered mother.

Raised by a woman who, while is not your mother, dysfunctionally loves your father so much that she covers up for the absolutely shitstain of a human being that he is.

Molestation from a neighbor.

Uprooted from home and transplanted into a roach-infested, impoverished neighborhood.

The task of fitting in thrown comically off-kilter by the fact that you already know what sex is, and it's terrfying.

Learn to escape your life by playing D&D and reading comicbooks.

Sequester yourself in a religious cult, because fantasy & science fiction isn't covering your tracks when your peers want to go get high and make all the gooshy sex.

Made to believe that the only life worth living is the one on the other side of death.

Realize religious zealotry is mainly best suited if you're a bigot, but your skin is brown, so you know you'll never fit in there.

Realize also that men are more sexy than women, and so, hey guess what, you've actually been gay all this time! 1000 bonus points!

Try to turn this shitstorm into a life, head off into being a therapist because that's the only degree your years in religious zealotry can be folded into.

Discover your chosen profession pays the least amount of all the degreed professions because mental healthcare is low on the totem pole of societal concerns and values.

Turn around to see yourself smack dab in the middle between your 45th and 46th birthday with no savings, living from paycheck to paycheck, rooming out of someone's apartment, no girlfriend, no boyfriend, no kids, no future security, no ... you don't know what. So unsuccessful at being an adult that you don't know WHAT else it is that you don't have. But you know you don't have it.

Yeah.

Now.

If I don't succeed in something within the next 5 years of my life, then really, what am I doing? What's the rememdy for the facts as I've lain them out here? Do I need to shake off the cobwebs and get that doctorate? Go deeper into debt but come out somehow with a better paid position because of the PhD? Do I reinvent myself as a Super Hip Metropolitan Professional Life Coach, and pile on the charm to court the affluent and needlessly wealthy & encumbered? Do I jump tracks completely? Do I sign up for public assistance--again?

Or maybe I go back to the pursuit of art and find ways for it to make me money this time. All this free time, forcing the time & opportunity to write, maybe that makes it "put-up or shut up" time.

I think I'm a good writer.

Oh yeah?

PROVE IT.

Make some MONEY with it.

Stop whining.

DO something.

Else.

I Hurt My Friend

2010-04-30T07:44:00.005-04:00

So I go into my geek internet hangout and got all shouty and preachy last night, and called out one of my favorite dudes--one of the thimbleful to whom I came out of the closet, mind you. I challenged him on the idea of elitism. He didn't verbalize how upset I had made him, but he did withdraw from the forums for the evening with a statement that indicated how he felt.

So of course, now I'm upset. I don't regret my opinion, I just regret the sledgehammer with which I delivered it. There are some truths out there that people aren't ready for. And there are some comparisons that aren't fair to make. I'm guilty of doing both to one guy who really didn't deserve it from me.

It's just that the term "I'm better than" sets off alarms for me and it calls up images that scare me and threaten me. I didn't want that to be true of my dude, so I rang the bells and called him out. And his reaction seems to indicate that I touched a nerve.

But I need to let him have that. His sense of superiority put him where he is now and keeps him successful in his field. I also think it's a character flaw and that career success isn't so important that it should allow you to look down on anybody. But that's why I'm not a sports fan. I'm clearly a hippie, in fact. Still, this guy has never shown anything but love to me--so why did I let his character flaw threaten me? Did I think he was going to go get a rope and a white hood and lynch me?

Ahhh! I just hope he can recover. I hurt him. I sold him short. I've asked him to forgive me. I hope he accepts.

"I Deserve This Sexy"

2010-04-28T23:14:00.004-04:00

That's what Fringes said at her place when she told readers that her size 4 jeans were falling off her butt.

I LIKED that!

Because I've been strutting my stuff in front of my mirror too! Today I finally made that bitch of a scale say my name! "186!" it said, clear as a bell. 30 official pounds have been shed since Jan 5th.

Last week I was at the gym in shorts and only my black athletic t-shirt (and socks and sneakers). I've never before worked out in public in just an underwear t-shirt. Other, thicker, "outerwear" t-shirts always, but never a common Hanes t-shirt. This time I did, actually because I forgot the other kind at home. And this was following a day where I felt fat and unattractive and just yucky. What a difference a day made.

Day before yesterday, I came up with something that for some reason I hadn't at all considered. It's this; even though I like to blog 99% of my business out, and Tweet 75% of the same, I actually don't have to declare JACK.

All my friends to whom I haven't told about my sexuality--never need me to. Whether they want to know or not. Whether they would care or not. I don't have to tell them anything! I'm not a war that needs open declaration!

After all, they don't tell ME the saucy details of THEIR shtup life! So why they have to know mine?? When did I assume THAT responsibility?

And the corollation goes thusly; I can go get my freak on without worrying who knows and who doesn't. Because if I'm ever 'found out', or if I ever get one 'a dem lurve connections and my smoky hot man wants to come to a comic convention with me, I don't have to feel guilty at all. At all.

Here's how it'll go;

Friend; "So who's your buddy?"
Me; "This is my dude, Rick." Rick pecks me on the cheek. Or maybe the mouth. Because Rick is never ashamed of who he is. And he thinks I'm hot too.
Later, when Rick has gone--
Friend; "So ... dude, you're GAY??"
Me; "Yeah? Is that a problem?"
Friend; "But ... what about Corinne Bailey Rae? And Ciara? I thought you loved them?"
Me; "Ciara's hot, and if Corrine ever entered my life, I surely would try to make a go of it, but nah dude. Generally guys turn me on. Always have, as long as I could remember."
Friend; "Hmm. Just ... I don't know...I had this whole image of you!"
Me; "Yeah, no."
Friend; "But why didn't you ever say so?"
Me; "Didn't seem appropriate at the time. We never really talked about sex, have we? I mean, not really."
Friend; "I guess not ... really."
Me; "And if you would have asked me point blank, I guess I would've told you. But you never did. I mean, I've never asked you when the last time was you had sex. I never thought you really wanted to get that intimate with me."
Friend; "Fair enough. I guess it does make sense in a way."
Me; "So again, is this a problem for you?"
(And as I suspect, those who are really my friends will say--); "Dude, what's changed? Be who you are. You'll always be my friend."

As others have already done.

I'ma have a sixpack by June.
I deserve this sexy.

I've Heard It Calling My Name

2010-04-19T20:41:00.001-04:00

I've heard it too many times to ignore it
It's something that I'm s'posed to be.
Someday we'll find it
The Rainbow Connection
The lovers,
The dreamers
And me.

This Homo Life, Pt 2

2010-04-14T08:44:00.002-04:00

So yeah, so out with Con Buddy last night and had a fun time with the geekery, which went along with more candid talk about our private lives whereupon he detailed more of his very very straight libidinous attractions and I fronted again as if I were Johnny Hetereo.

Yeah, I'm settled. Con Buddy loves the ladies and I'm just where I always have been--on the outside looking in.

Whatevs.

This Homo Life

2010-04-09T07:43:00.004-04:00

Did I already use that blogpost title once? But anyway. So the bloke I've blogged about once, we'll call him Con Buddy--not because he's been to prison, but because he's great to buddy up with at a comics convention--is getting closer with me in terms of friendship. Handsome Italian guy who has made offers of companionship since the day he first said hello at my first Geektogether lo these two or so years ago.

Of course, his offers have mostly concerned conventions. He booked us in the same hotel room down to the next con, and we're driving down together, and then the plans evolved to include others in on the trip and the hotel room.

Then lately, at the start of the year he wanted me to come with him to Yoga. (Didn't work out because he said he'd hurt his back, but I was going to go, dang it. Was going to show my feet and everything.) Then he wanted to meet up with more geeks when I did, here and abouts in the city. "Don't forget me!" said he. Then last week he wanted me to take him to a gym for a trial membership since he knows I go. Which I did, and afterwards we went out to eat. Tomorrow, we're going out to a small and regular comicbook social venue that I've wanted to attend for ages.

So lemme ask you...in the mind of the average man, this is just what friendship between dudes is supoosed to be like, right? We laugh, we have things in common, we're physically butchy, we cuss, and we talk about girls.

*skkrrrrxx*

Oh yeah, that's right did I mention that part? This is something we men seem to need to do. Talk about girls. Even when, as in my case, we're not actually sexually all that interested in them. So in the mind of my Con Buddy, I'm a single straight guy who makes a good and available friend.

And in MY mind, he's a single straight guy who is where I was when I was his age (just touching 40). He's had girlfriends like I have, (only in his case lived with one of them, and has had sex with more than one of them), and now has drifted back into singlehood by his own choice.

So of course, in my mind I've thought and hoped more than a little that all his overtures for friendship have been because he's attracted to me but doesn't want to be gay, but is just obeying his libido and not piling recriminations on himself. I want to believe he's going with his flow because life is too short, plus he's not learned how to live in the shadow of self-condemnation and fear religious judgment.

But.

Even if all that were true, I rediscovered the other day just how fearful I am of This Homo Life. Even with all the above hopes and beliefs about Con Buddy fully in place, when I had the opportunity to come out to him over dinner, after the gym, I didn't do it. It's not for lack of ability--I had the same conversation going with him that I had had with my Podcast Mancrush(es) when I came out to them. I knew what conversational road to go down in order to lead to the Homo Destination. But with Con Buddy, I breezed right past my stop.

Why did I do that? And, you might ask, why do I not plan to revisit that stop at all? I accept that he could be just like me; attracted and looking to be swept off his feet with his first passionate butch-kiss but has never had any homosexual relationships and doesn't really want to cross that line into that world and that identification. Which, since I've chosen that same path for myself, I respect. But if there's ever any chance to even briefly experiment, much less have a full-on same sex romantic relationship, he would be the guy to try it with.

Yet, I just can't. It's like bungee-jumping (do they still do that anymore?) If the cord breaks, I'm dead. Dead dead dead. And I've done just fine without it. And people who have tried it say it's a rush, and life-affirming and yadda yadda yadda. But the shit is scary.

So I'm content to just have a friend to do stuff with and go places with instead of being alone all the time. Even if I think he's handsome, I don't need to be kissed (wants aside). It feels safer just to have the human connection without complicating it with The Love That Dare Not Speak Its Name. I mean, hell, straight guys do it all the time, don't they? Why can't I?

And that's what's going on.

Hello Blogger My Old Friend...

2010-03-06T11:40:00.002-05:00

...I've come to talk with you again.

So about my D&D buddies, who I've left behind because of utter frustration and growing tension between myself and the Grim Jester, I've discovered some news. The guy who I once gave a lift to, who once canceled because Jester wasn't going to show up, still checks up on me once inna. Even though he prefered Jester's compnay over all of ours that days, he still wants to be a friend of mine and invites me over to see movies and all sorts of things that I keep declining--the way I keep declining going back over there in a group-friend capacity.

Because, really--it's not so much about the tensions between me & Jester, now is it? Or, actually, it's EXACTLY about the tension between me and him. Or more just about MY tension. He turns me on. Always has done. And he infuriates me too, because he won't stop being a misanthrope weirdo who scoffs at my profession and pretty much everything else in life. That was all covered in previous posts.

So the news I got through the grapevine is that Jester found himself another girlfriend. Through Match.com. HAHAHAHAHAHAAAAHAHHAHAHAHAAAAAHAHAHAHAAAAAA!

And isn't it ironic?

Dontcha think?

A little too ironic.

Because, yes, he's successfully moved on from the death of his last girlfriend, which is great for him. And he's giving relationships another try. Which is also great. And he's successful again--which I thought was a longshot, given his crazy ways. But there's two things about this which makes me want to--need to post.

1) I continue to feel such jealousy toward the hetereo world. How nice and convenient and tidy how hetereos can date and find other other and hookup and be accepted, and be normal. Match.com. How very lovely for you. These guys in that group, they do date, yeh. Remember The Cop, another member of that group who I found to be a nice friend, affectionate and friendly? Serial dater. Never goes without a girlfriend, love interest, and at the very least, coitus. Little Italian sparkplug is what he is. And it's just so friggin disheartening to be in their company and watch them date, and make jokes about girls, and make fun of gay stuff (as hetereos do without nary a though) and sit there laughing and fronting as though I were one of them. When, once I actually was one of them. But now, I'm just nothing like them anymore at all. And that breaks my heart.

but

2) Like a fool, and I do mean an utter fool, I've been holding out hope that Jester is living a lie and is secretly gay (a power top if full definitions are to be used), and that the tension between us has always been sexual. That somehow my absence would have made him more fond of me, and that someday--and soon, I was going to make my confession to him and he'd just throw me to the bed and voila! Happy Homo Ending. Yeah. Meanwhile, he's been Desperately Seeking Susan, and of course, because he's all MAN, he found her.

So I'm so done with These Stupid Dreams. All these storybook fantasies that I've been pining away for. Ridiculous waste of my time and emotion. In the big dice game called life, when it comes to love, I crapped out.

But I have other things going for me, that I enjoy, and will continue to do so. No need to reserve energy for things I cant change or force to happen--I'm going to spend it on things that are fun, and wonderful, and make me laugh, and make me smile. Like comicbooks and friends who know I'm gay and don't care. Like controlling my weight and getting myself gorgeous for absolutely no one but myself. Listening to music that I adore. And making art for art's sake. And leaving a positive mark on planet Earth for when I'm no longer living on it, but enjoying my right nows in full succession until that day.

And that's what's going on.

Being Human

2010-01-31T07:50:00.007-05:00

So, I haven't read Ned's blog since "Food Lion", which was about like two weeks ago. A little more. So I go over there today in consolation of not being able to chat with him at the moment, and I discover that he posted about dreams and the interconnectedness of dreamstate phenomena, etc. and then I stopped reading because his post was on the 26th and my post about my Hetereo Dreams was on the 27th. (Please refer to the fact that I hadn't read his blog for 2 plus weeks.) So I'm hoping that the time stamps are somehow jacked, either on his end or mine, because otherwise, right after he posted about dreams and the other-realm quality of them leading to ESP and stuff--I was moved, 700 miles away, to post about MY dream. And you can check the history of both our blogs. Do we post much about dreams at all?

So how weird is life?

Right. I'll tell you how weird.

So every once in a Wolf Moon a television show or a movie will breeze along and drown me in overidentification. Once it was the movie "Sideways," back when I lived with George, and once (way back) it was the TV series "Family Ties" when I realized I was the ghetto version of Alex P Keaton.

Haha. I'm so punny.

So the newest sensation is a TV show called "Being Human". It's a gritty treatise that starts with the tagline "So this werewolf, vampire, and ghost all live in this house..." What it's REALLY about is how hard it is to fit into society when you're not like them. At all. The vampire (who is a hot hairy little number that I'd think was more suited to be the werewolf) has stopped drinking blood and is running parlay between the vamps who still do. The werewolf (who is a right nerd--not geek though, mind you) infected his girlfriend last season and he's trying to life with the consequences of that--and so is she). And the ghost is trying to forget that she's dead and attempted in the first episode to have a job at a pub, get a boyfriend, and stuff and t'ing.

In great dramatic fashion, it all goes slightly sideways. It's a great show.

So I watched the second episode today, at the break of dawn because that's my sleeping schedule nowadays, and I realized how much I have in common with their theme.

Just two days ago I met up with two of my podcast mancrushes for a dinner of laughs and comicbook chatting goodness. Geeks Afire! We are SO not yer granddad's geeks anymore. Or at least, THEY aren't. And to the one, I had already personal messaged my confession of homoness, but on Friday I "came out" to the other. Which makes now 3 altogether out of this community of maybe 50 comicbook geeks.

And it was funny, but my new confidant, who was as cool with it as I'd hope he would be (having had a gay uncle in a 25yr-long relationship until his death, and being an atheist, and believing its purely biological, and realizing one of his three sons could be gay by sheer dint of the odds, and expressed that he and his wife would be perfectly fine with that) said to me pretty quickly "So are you dating?" This was after the rundown of how I "got here" and how I tried so long to fit in with religion and with girlfriend after girlfriend.

So, already feeling vulnerable and skittish, with the guts laid open like that on our 13 dollar burger plates, which he paid for btw, I told him what I was really thinking at that moment and...well generally feel actually. No I'm not dating. I doubt if I ever want to date. And he said, "Don't tell me something stupid like you're 'going to be celibate for the rest of your life'?"

And I thought, God, why do I have to be the one in this position right now?

And this morning I watched "Being Human" and saw these vampires, werewolves, and ghosts struggle for normalcy, and fail and fail and fail and I think again to myself--"I am so kidding myself. I will never be normal. I have never been normal. It won't ever be easy. I have never had it easy."

And at times like these, I feel the greatest despair. The most hopeless. The most prone to curl up somewhere and just fade away.

And really, that's all I wanted to say about that today.

Oh, and that I've lost 16 lbs since Jan 5th. Trying to get comparatively sexy in order to enter into the homosexual dating life that I'll never really do.

And so it goes.

Hetero Dreams

2010-01-27T13:13:00.002-05:00

About three weeks ago, yeah. Very sexy girl with the right kind of expression of her face did one of those come hither giggles and I went hither. We nuzzled a little and then of course I woke up. Blinking in the harsh morning light I had the afterglow of Girl Lust. I remembered what it feels like to be entranced by the female--to be woo'd and to woo. To fit into the Yin as a standing member of the Yang Club.

That's it really. No big revelation there. I still am what I am. I've dug on dudes since then so I didn't dream myself into 100% heterosexuality. I've never been that.

I only wish it had were that easy.

Checking In

2010-01-10T14:55:00.003-05:00

Bullet Points;

-Still realizing that Life In The Closet is warm and toasty.

-Got with Former Father Figure a few Saturdays ago and eventually got down to my baseline. He had a lot of advice how to become "normal." I argued staunchly pro-gay. I represented my side of the equation and made many analogies so he could see my side of it. And somewhere in all that I realized that I didn't care anymore what he or my old church people thought about me. If they don't realize that I've done everything...EVERYTHING they taught me in order to be "normal" and NOTHING. WORKED. then they can, to a man, kiss my ass. All them blessed with "normal lives" and sex drives that happen to pull them in the accepted direction. So they can slap each other on the backs, attend each others weddings, make saucy innuendos about each others sex lives, have children, and the whole nine. How very fucking nice for them. But if they want to peer down at me from their lofty "normal" heights of superiority, point fingers at everything I've done wrong to "make myself this way" (yes, the Former Father Figure went there), and now wants me to wire up like Clockwork Orange to "fix this." then it's about time I stop caring about their opinions.

So I took the code of secrecy away from Former Father Figure. I gave him permission to tell anyone in the church that I'm alive, where I live, and what I'm doing. I told him he can give them my phone number if any ask for it.

And they can come get me.

But you know what will most likely happen? Not one God-damned thing. Ain't nobody but my Former Father Figure was checking for me all these years. They don't give a shit about anybody else's life but their own. They only try to convert people to Christ because it's a feather in their Holiness cap.

Now mind you, none of this means that I'm about to jump in the bed with the next dude I see.

In fact, at the gym this AM was a nice guy who I could tell had to leave his comfort zone to chat me up in the locker room, making small talk with me and hoping for the best. He was odd and not my type (unlike the Haagen Daas guy), but I had mad respect for his courage. I spoke back, flattered and responsive, but we were not going to be hooking up today.

I'm not desperate to pop my gay cherry with just any ol' bloke who comes along. And the scorn of the Holy Saints of My Former Church is not going to drive me to it. If the right one comes along, if I have the opportunity, if there's enough there to cross this line of sexual commitment -- I will do it. But if not, I'm committing to living comfortably, with quality and honesty. I'm here to help people, enjoy what I can in my life, and do no harm. If God is still real, surely He understands that. Who I am and what I've done. What I want. The true and honest beat of my heart.

Nothing is stopping Him from loving me. Nothing I can do can MAKE Him love me more. He either does or He doesn't. I've left it up to Him.

So That Was Alright Then

2009-12-19T15:49:00.000-05:00

Another of my geek friends now knows me for what I am (see last post) and he's still treating me the same. He even said, I don't care if its with a man, woman or beast--why are you still single?

Well I certainly am feeling the singleness these days, femme tell ya. And I realize that I've been doing something...semisneaky. The flirting I do online with the menfolk...I'm trying to seduce somebody. Essentially. One of these fantastically brilliant and comicbook loving men. The handsome ones. I want to discover, with my flirting, that they feel like I do. And that at some comic convention soon, on one of these rendezvous, our eyes will meet across a spinner rack of Fantastic Four and we'll fall in love.

That's just not been the reality though. All my geek brethren love fish. And the three that I know to be gay are not my type. Even tho one of them shaves his head.

Enter stage left; Christmas 2009 and the death of one of my closer geek buddies.

Add to it the limbo of that 2nd job still not giving me the job yet plus the sun going down at 4:25p in the frickin m, and you have one sad little panda who feels very alone these days.

Another Step Closer...

2009-12-07T15:01:00.005-05:00

...to full disclosure.

I strongly hinted earlier today to another of my most favored and cherished comicbook internet geek buddies what might be going on behind my cowl.

On Facebook, he overloaded my senses today with--in addition to his amazing wit, gorgeous wife and two crazy-cute kids--a posting of videos with him singing at karaoke, and he's as good as ANY professional. So, as is my wont, I plied him with the usual praise because, dammit, he deserved it and life is short and people ort ta git their flowers while they're still alive! And I pointed out that on Facebook his wife ticked the "Like This" box on his songs. Which to me was awesome. A wife "liking" her husband. So I went on to comment about that too. Then I got the idea of how to turn his singing into a nice Christmas present for the wife, and shared that with him as well. (That's more of my projecting, I imagine. Sort of the "what I would do if I were stright, could sing, and had a wife who 'liked' me, and who gave me two beautiful children" fantasy.)

Well, he appreciated my ideas and he said, "Poetic as ever. How are you still single?" Which oddly enough, is not asked of me often, thankfully.

So, because my heart was already open and because this guy seems to value me too, I answered him back thusly; "Think about it, my friend." And left it at that.

Now, in the past, when I would tweet about something gay in the news, he would tweet back "Aha! I knew it!!!!!" jokingly. And of course, during the course of jests, I'm not going to open up that can a' worms. But today was different. He wasn't joking. And this was a private exchange. So ... I picked my moment. If he asks anything further, I'll tell him everything. I might even give him the link to this blog and he can read it all for himself.

And my fears are the same as they have been in the past, but not nearly as horrifying. I love this guy and it would really bring me down low if he rejected me for being gay. It would put a lie to everything I thought about his personality, and it would be Big Pain if I lost him and his affection and sense of humor.

But he's not given me too much reason to believe he'll do that. He's not romanticized my character like some have and postulated about my exploits as Black Dynamite with the ladies. He puts a lot of his own personality and thoughts out onto the internet and nothing in any of that has been homophobic. So I guess I trust him. And too ... well, I guess I've gotten to a point where if this is all going to come tumbling down--I tell the wrong person and it explodes, well ... so what. I got it honest. I've never tried to harm anyone or break up anyone's marriage with my flirtatious ways. I adore the straight male. I champion the cause of the strong, faithful, loving and honest family men. I am his strongest advocate. It's everything I would want--HAVE wanted--for myself. All my life. And if I could find a switch inside and recalibrate my sex, I would in a heartbeat. In less than a heartbeat. I'd do it in a heartbreak.

But I'm what I turned out to be, and all I want is to be loved. I've got the rest of my life to figure out how to make that happen for me.

This is just another step closer to it.

So we'll see what happens.

Wish me the best.

(and ... exhale)

On the fly...

2009-12-05T12:43:00.003-05:00

Well here I am in rainy, downtown Williamsburg, Brooklyn, looking for Hunky Comics Geek. I'ma give myself some credit because I did come out of the house when most of me was ready to stay inside. All day. I went to the venue and had a walk around. The need for bathroom was a marvellous motivator. And well, I didn't see him. And my coward's heart rejoiced. So then I found no internet/phoneservice in the venue and left in search of the same plus lunch. I find I like Williamsburg. Yummy lunch.

And I'll go back to the venue and see what more I can find. Or who.

Which Way Is Up?

2009-12-03T08:24:00.004-05:00

So I've been closer to the idea of 'coming out' to ALL my internet geek friends, and not just the one I liked and trusted the most, leaving it to his discretion to tell others.

Then yesterday I learned that New York State overturned a proposal for gay marriage. Then today I learn the mom from Family Ties had been gay for the last 7 years. She was married three times and has five children. Quote; Baxter has also come clean to her five kids, according to People. Her 25-year-old son Peter was all smiles. He told the magazine that he "just couldn't stop smiling, because she finally figured it out."

And it's all such a mishmash. Back when I didn't dare admit that what I felt was homosexual in nature, I HATED all the gay this and gay that talk in the media. Why did we have to know all this? Why couldn't people keep it all private? It was all too scary and too close to me.

And now I almost feel the same way, even though I know what I am. Because it's still such confusing news. Clearly I think in terms of black & white. I wanted to believe that I could have these urges & attractions and still live a hetero lifestyle. Meredith Baxter did. But all this "She finally figured it out" stuff seems like I'd be doing something stupid if I tried to get with a woman. That I can't have it both ways--either it's gay or straight with no 'in-between.' EVEN THOUGH I KNOW FOR A FACT THAT PEOPLE DO LIVE BISEXUALLY. Then my state decides it shouldn't be legal for gays to be married. So it's clear that my fears of coming out are legitimate. My own state, and dozens of others, are not willing to accept gay as a legitimate, valid mode of humanity.

So here I sit. Planning to go to find the "man of my dreams" this weekend while many social signals are telling me that it's wrong to do so, and OTHER signals are telling me how awesome it would be to get a girl, meet the expectations put on me, and make a few children that will delight me forever.

Sometime life can be so ridiculous.

The Week To Come

2009-11-28T08:15:00.004-05:00

So a few days ago, or maybe a few weeks ago (hello speeding train that is my life), I was made aware of ANOTHER small indie comics convention to take place next weekend. In the outer boroughs. That seems to be the kind of venue that Hunky Comics Geek might show up at, since that's what he did at the last two that I attended.

So guess what I'm doing next weekend? And guess why?

Again, I'm going to find out what's what. If he's arrow-straight I'll have very nothing to lose, except the potential to see him barechested. And even so, I still could if we became friends. Straight guys--well okay, GUYS--find some of the strangest reasons to strip their shirts off when they have something they're proud to show off. And if anyone has a reason to show it off, Hunky Comics Geek doth possess it.

What I am aware of is that I'm setting myself up for that familiar ol' heartache of unrequited lust. I'm not sure how else to interpret those long, on-the-edge-of-approach looks from him, but given humans, there could be dozens of alternative reasons.

I could look exactly like an old Army buddy of his.

He might have seen me at a previous convention when I was working the booth for My Hero, and given his build, he also is aiming towards being A Hero.

He could be a Blackophile, one of the rare breed of white folks who attribute the Black Man all these powers of unspoken cool and prowess, sight unseen. I do know a few guys who are this way and since I enjoy fulfilling a few myths AND I'm an Anglophile, we get along fine, no matter the fact that out of Black types, I'm WAY more Carlton than Fresh Prince.

But whatever the reason for the previous eyelocks, I have to know. His handsomeness & potential haunts me.

And in addition, let me put this out here too; if he's straight, then I'm putting myself in the same position position I've been in for ... well ... since I broke puberty at the hands of a pedophile at the tender age of 6. Pretty gross, right? So the fact remains that if he IS gay, and DOES want me--there's no guarantee that I'll capitulate. I've considered over and over again, and the evidence is in, that I'm just not ever going to be sexually active with a consenting adult, male or female. Too repressed/haunted/scarred to be with a dude and not turned on enough to be with a lady.

I have waves of time when I'm okay with that. It's my comfort zone and intellectualism is my defense mechanism, with a liberal dose of compartmentalization. I have my comics for rollicking fun, the internet for my online conversations, I live in NYC for my culutural infusion of cool, and the audioworks that I love. My career is about to get ALL the way on track, I'm about to get a job that keeps me in NYC and frees me up to pursue the PhD, and I didn't die of a massive coronary at 36 like my friend did the week before Thanksgiving.

I said I wasn't happy before, but right now, with the future looking a little brighter...well I'm not UNhappy right now. So if Hunky Comic Geek wants me ... in THAT way ... there's no guarantee of a happy ending. Pun intended. Or if he DOESN'T want me. It's all just another chapter in This Redeemable Life.

With many more to come!

NO pun intended.

Weekend Process

2009-11-09T10:17:00.006-05:00

So I went to a small comic convention, prompted by one of the New York City comic geeks who didn't even show up in the longrun. I went all alone and counted myself as brave, until I got in there and found a perch from where I didn't move the whole time I was there. Hey, I was alone and everybody there were strangers. I GOT there, what else d'you WANT.

Eheheh. Defensive much?

But here's why I'm blogging.

The last time I went to one of these small conventions was down on Lexington Ave in Manhattan, in the Armory. In June. I went to meet specific comicbook internetters who run a podcast that I heart muchly. It was a nice meetup and it went well. I didn't make an utter, UTTER ass of myself nor did I chase off these highly admired and mancrushed-upon men of fandom and action! But an odd thing happened when we were in the pizza shop.

A dude who I didn't know caught my eye. A Dude. So you know the drill. Muscley, balding, alone, the whole nine. And the odd thing is, I caught his eye too. I mean CAUGHT! Like soon as eyes locked, it looked as though he was about to say "Hi!" Such was the smile and nod he gave me. Well, of course I smiled back. Oh, in smiling, I've learned that I am King. I give good smile! But I was in the company of the internet podcast mancrushes so I had my perfect excuse to do nothing. And I watched this hunky comic guy go sit by himself and eat a few slices o' pizza. Which, as I did so, we did that eye-thing again. I swear it was like he knew me from somewhere and was on the cusp of saying so, except he never did. Just like I never did ask him if he did.

Yeah, well, guess who I saw from my perch this weekend. Hunky Comic Geek. And guess what happened. That eye-thing. Every time he walked past. Along with the smiling, mine and his. Right up to the verge of speech and then not. And guess what DIDN'T happen? Not a single word.

And yes, I kept hoping he'd maybe sit down near me because this time I was alone too! Or that he'd come close enough for me to ask him, "Do I know you?" because I felt like I could pull it off this time. Because I really felt like this was the strength with which this eye-thing was happening. I mean, picture it, he's walking past, I recognize it's him from the Lexington Avenue convention, and just as I'm doing so, thinking "Wow is he good looking," he looks up and looks me dead in my eyes and smiles as if to say, "Oh hey! I recognize you from that other convention, right?" But he then averts his eyes and keeps moving and it's done. Then picture this happening four more times. And increasingly my smile is saying, "Dude. Let's talk--you want to talk to me right? Dude, you're like this amazing looking guy and I want to talk!"

I had even come to a point where I thought, "Look, who cares if he's ... if he wants me. At the very least he wants to talk to me. Maybe he does know me from somewhere and I can at least find out from where, and if he's straight as an arrow or married with three kids, at least I can make a new gorgeous friend who is easy on the eyes!"

And so as this thought sounds better and better to me, moving me from will to power, a NYC geek enters the convention who I DO know, recognizes me, and comes sits next to me. Yeah. You know what that meant. No more of this dalliance. Flirtation. Pursuit. Because what? I'm going to out myself now?

But I do have some consolation for you, the poor unfulfilled reader. Another fellow geek went to the last day of the convention yesterday and took pictures of the con floor. And of course I scanned his online pics to see if I could find Hunky Comic Geek.

And I did! WOOT!

So I played with my Paint program enough to now show him to you.

Doesn't he make your knees weak? Come on, hetero men, admit it. He's so damn handsome.

So all I've got to go on is that he likes small press indie comics. At one point I thought he might be a comic creator because he hovered over in the same area, but he didn't have a badge. In fact, the wristband identifies him as a paying customer. And ...

pluh. Why am I going on and on? Just to process this I guess. Because AGAIN, the moment is passed now. Add it to the mountainous pile of "I Wish I Had..."

But I swear. If I ever run into him again--which is possible honestly, then I will slay this dragon. And ESPECIALLY if I see him ever outside of a comicbook convention setting in this city of millions and millions, well...then it's God. And if he's available and interested in me?? Well then it's God saying that Gay is Okay! It'd be God saying, "Look, I sent him to you. Now stop doubting my love and concern for you and stop being afraid that I won't accept you as you are. Have more faith in Me than that. I will never leave you and I will never forsake you. I love you. Unconditionally. Now go get this gorgeous bastard--I made him just for you!"

Because if God would make me a homosexual partner (for life, may I add because... well just LOOK at him!) then He'd call him a 'gorgeous bastard.'

And that's what's going on.

Message In A Bottle

2009-11-03T09:01:00.005-05:00

So I've done well for a little while, yeh? Shared my sanitized thoughts on Facebook. Been whimsical, played well with others, been a little naughty, had some fun, yeh? Met some new people, met some old people, met some people I like, and a few I don't think I'll like in the long run. Viva la zeitgeist!

This morning I'm ever so slightly off kilter, tho. I miss the initmacy and unlimited word count of Blogger. And tomorrow, after a two month successful dodge of training, I have to perform another 8-hour crisis management class. The thought of it today when getting out of my car and coming into the building, made me want to scream and curse someone out. I felt/feel cornered and threatened and angry as all hell. I never asked to be put up in front of a classroom of strangers and entertain them via a curriculum with physical touching. And tomorrow I've got a training partner who I do believe will be her first time. So I don't have just the class to manage but a new trainer as well. And it makes me furious enough to quit. If this had been the job, I would not have taken it.

But let's face it, this aversion to discomfort is just the tip of the iceberg. I'm sick to death of discomfort. It's ALL discomfortable. ALL OF IT. Yesterday I had the evening off (a tradition I believe I'll insist upon. No more Monday nights at the office). And I played ChampionsOnline for a good 8 hrs as a result. Yeah, from about 4pm to midnight. Why? Well, because it's awesome to get out of my skin and inhabit the fit and colorful little hero who can literally leap tall buildings in a single bound, heal with one surge of his bioenergy, and explode villains away with another. That's why. And too, because it kind of feels sucky to be me.

So I complain about working as much as I do, and I toil toward the goal of going monojob, but then I realize that when I do have that opportunity to have free time, its all spent trying to be anything else but myself.

And I've been on the road of self-discovery. I'm as introspective as a clam. Solopsistic to an absolute fault. Obsessive. And the answers I find lead me to one major idea. I'm not a happy man.

I can be happy. I can laugh and find real joy in things. People's lives are wondrous. People's ideas are special and unique and beautiful. The works of man are breathtaking. Life is precious. People are precious. And I know that I am too.

But what it feels like? It feels like crap.

Would it still feel like crap if I were in a loving relationship? Would it feel like crap if I had a 6pac? Would it feel like crap if I could live off one job? If I were a Doctor of Psychology? If I had my own apartment? If my car was paid off? If I had a cat again? If I were younger? Taller? Had superpowers?

You know what? I don't know. Sometimes I think this is just what life is. A series of disheartening challenges with brief flashes of light and hope and happiness. No? Is it better for you?

Are you happy? Mostly?

I really want to know.

Can you tell me?

A Fad?

2009-10-06T09:42:00.002-04:00

Well, I haven't seen the handsome and virile Kilt Guy since I posted. I have traded looks again with another strapping dude at the 125th St. station while waiting to cross trains, one that had real potential if I knew how to do more than smile.

But I don't think I do. I mean, ol' dude caught my eye as he came off the D train, and I smiled. he headed toward the steps and looked back at me, and I smiled. He headed up the steps and looked back one more time, and me, who kept looking ... smiled. Then he was gone. His expression said, "Really? YOU?" Or maybe that was just what was going on in my own head about myself.

What I've discovered is that my male-enhanced libido helps me flirt, but the awkward socialness that I expirienced as a hetereo is following me into my homoness. I can't open my mouth and say 'Hello.' I can't initiate the conversation that will lead me to, "I'm interested in you, let's go out." When I was hetero, I was petrified of not being enough or having enough. Now "as the village's only gay" I'm terrified of what I do have.

And I'm still brainwashed down to my core. It still doesn't look right for two men walking up the avenue holding hands. Two men pushing a baby carriage. Two men sharing a tender kiss. No. For me it's the rough grunting sweaty porn sex. The stuff that doesn't look anything like love, but more like hunger. The male power.

And in this, I find my disorder. My own trauma. I come back to the abuse. The introduction to sex through perversion and crime. The shame and self-loathing.

And so I think I'm going to leave it there. I think this experiment of The Redeemable Life is a failure, like so many experiements must inevitably become in order for one to succeed.

Facebook is a nice, sanitary place where I don't have to drag through filth the people that I've come to love but chase away. This unsolvable thing about sex ... I'm done. Nothing works. Time to find my joys in other things--the things I've always done. Comic books. Audio dramas. Helping others who possess more potential for success than I ever had. Well, maybe I once had.

It's been nice and it has gotten me through the last six years of depression, eviction, terror. It showed me the hearts of good people. It's been a special place and I miss it every day.

I miss it and I miss you every day.

In Other News

2009-09-10T07:45:00.006-04:00

I haven't had a crying jag in WEEKS! I used to about every week or so, on the way to work when I have to go down to Edison. Just a miasma of sadness sitting in my chest until it runs over. Of course I'd help it along with "Home" from The Wiz or "Be A Lion" from the same.

Yesterday on the street a fella was walking towards me, fitting my ideal description. Bald, built, and ringless. I made eyecontact and I allowed myself to smile--I allow my face to show what I'm feeling. And may I say I do this a lot anymore. I'm already looking, so if they see me looking, why not send them a smile? I'm not trying to hurt them and my intentions are pure. I like what I see, that's all. So I smile and then I re-occupy myself with whatever I was doing before I looked. Well, this guy yesterday returned eyecontact and the smile. And then zoom, we went past each other and it was over.

So now that I'm all gay and whatnot, how does it go to the next step? What does one man say to another man without the slightest idea (okay, there is the SLIGHTEST idea) that the other is available and interested?

Last night I wrote an email to a gay feller who I though was hot. I found him on a site that advertises such things. He lives in New York City. And I asked him the same question. We'll see if he cares one way or the other. He probably gets dozens of e-mails, and surely most of them hot guys do. But Since he put his stuff on the web for attention and solicitation, I figured I'd give it a shot. Maybe an intelligent conversation can be found out there? Maybe I can find a Gay Ned who looks like Jason Statham, lol!

So yeah, I'm not whining about it anymore. I'm doing something about it. I'm going to see what's up.

Okay. So Now That I'm Gay ...

2009-09-04T21:26:00.003-04:00

Here's a list of women that I'd go straight for.

Felicia Day

Sade

Corinne Bailey Rae

Freema Agyeman

So. There's This Guy.

2009-09-01T12:06:00.006-04:00

He's about a head taller than me and he has a runner's frame. His head is completely shaved and he sports a sandy brown goatee. My new glasses very much resemble the ones he usually wears. He surely must be in his thirties. And I see no wedding or commitment rings.

He works in a designing firm on the same floor as our counseling offices, and I catch him at times near the 5:00 whistle if I come in early enough for my night gig. We meet at the bathroom--I'm arriving, he's leaving.

Now, you know chemistry when you see it. You make eye contact. You smile, they smile. You get a little flutter. You feel a little nervous. You want, more than air at that moment, to say something--ANYTHING--smart and funny and winning and deep and binding and everlastingly impressive.

Lemme back up some. A few weeks ago, while on the street approach to the building, I saw him heading my way, walking with someone in big conversation. That made the twice or third time, but that time, he was broadly striding in a kilt. Complete with black Doc Martin boots and that dangly, beaded, leathery adornment that goes in the front of kilts. (Kind of like a pipeless bagpipe? I dunno.)

So that was my in. I knew that the next time I'd see him, I would bring up that kilt. (No pun intended). I always need a good reason to launch into conversation. (Remember me, the guy who took meds for nearly a year because of social anxiety? I only quit because my doctor was holding them hostage. Finally the withdrawal symptoms have faded away. Now I feel unmedicated and still have managed to keep my dayjob and call new people back who want sessions in the evening. Yes, I was openly weeping on a weekly basis, but I was sad.)

But I digress! That kilt was IT! So, yesterday was the 'next time' I was waiting for. In fact, yesterday was layered in all sortsa circumstance.

I just got in and hadda go, ifyaknowwhatImean. But the bathroom key was not in our office. So I figured one of our therapists was inside using the facilities. So I stood outside of the bathroom, which is out in the hall, closer to the designer firm than to our counseling center--and I waited. It's taking a little longer than I wish, but so far I'm good.

And who should step out of the designing firm? Kilt-Guy! (Not wearing a kilt, by the way). HE has his own key. So I smile, say hello, and look beyond him into the bathroom so I can confirm that I'm waiting for someone from OUR office to let me in. Except 1) Kilt-Guy engages me, almost as if, while wearing a big smile, he's not going to let me in and 2) I see no one beyond him in the bathroom. I stumble over my words--"someone from my offices ... is it okay if I just ... the key ... I think someone's in there and I need to ..." AWKWARRRRRRRRD!

Kilt Guy lets me in though, he recognizes that I'm here a lot and has used a key to these facilities before, and maybe, just maybe, he's been feeling the same thing I've been feeling anyway. So I'm in the bathroom as he "heads" for the urinal, and now I see ... there's NO ONE IN THE BATHROOM. So possibly I've just bum-rushed my way into the bathroom with a false, and quite horribly cheap excuse to get in with him. After I've been stalking outside both the bathroom AND his office.

NOT a good look, people.

But to my GREAT relief, I found the key inside a commode stall, which I waved around like a battlefield flag as if to say "See? NOT a perve! NOT a perve!" because dang it, it WAS missing and I DID have to go! Well, icebreaker ACHIEVED. Here we were.

So I bring up the kilt. Again, no pun intended. And he shares freely. He likes it. He lives in Jersey City, in an ethnic community. He likes shocking the neighbors with his fashion choices. A chick on Fifth Avenue impulsively lifted up the back. And a few sundry other pleasantries.

But what I'm checking for is "Does this guy dig me? Is this more of the same, like what I got from the Haagen-Daas Dude? Are we flirting here? Does he know that I damn sure am?"

What a perfect tapered jaw I was looking at. What sky blue eyes, wide smile, anatomy-model bald head he has. My heart is just all a-pitter pitter pitter with the odd patter thrown in. Broad shoulders--not as chunky and bold as I usually like but there's some upper chest development and evidence that he's tight under those clothes. Flat stomach. Just ... he's just so ...

And out to the elevators he goes. One more smile, nod, and farewell as he stands and I go into the counseling offices with freshly washed hands.

And regardless of whether he's gay or not, this is how I know that I am.

This doesn't HAPPEN between two straight guys. I mean, I still believe there are constant degrees of ambivalence and fluidity. I believe straight guys are fascinated and still attracted to other mens' physiques. I believe that straight men still crush on the Hugh Jackmans and Jason Stathams of the world.

But do they go as far as I do?

I want this guy to want me. I want to practice a kiss where my heart actually bangs. I want to give in to the gravity of his masculinity, his looks, his charm, his style, his presence, his person. I wanna touch!

Look, I told my Former Father Figure a few weeks ago about why I thought I was gay and why I realized that my past relationships with women never worked. I used to think I was unable to "love." I used to think I never really could, because of my history with Mom, with no parental example, with the lack of practice by the time I was in my late twenties/mid-thirties--whateverhaveyou. Never mind that I thought muscular guys were hot. Nevermind that I bought Muscle & Fitness mags the way middle-aged men bought Playboy. Those facts were all compartmentalized away. I was a Christian and I was supposed to marry a girl. End of story.

So I believed that my affection for women, my admiration and appreciation for them--all that would surely turn into sexual energy given enough time. But it didn't. Even when I left the strictness of church and allowed myself to kiss my girlfriend--even when I was alone with her in her apartment, or in my own, and we were laying spooned together on the couch ...

... I never felt anything close to what I felt in the workplace bathroom yesterday.

I'm sure if he would have moved in on me and crushed me up against the commode stall I'd have fainted from the stark thrill of the moment.

I'm gay.

I'm gay.

And if Kilt-Guy asks me out on a date ...

I'm gunna go.

And that's what's going on.

Reminisce

2009-08-26T23:55:00.002-04:00

Looking for emails to give permissions after I lock this blog down (just in case the Facebook causes some type of mad breach into my bloglife), and I found this post.

It's been slow going but I think I may have made a little more progress since then. Not much, I know. But a little.

More On This

2009-08-26T11:47:00.004-04:00

Okay, for instance, right now I quite feel like a big rolling pile of steaming SHITE. At my workplace a client has screamed his misery to all the workplace and my interventions only made it worse. From that point I was to go into a meeting about him and recommend his removal from this program location where my office is. Which is how I got involved in the first place. Because my office is here and I have a meeting to go to at 1:30 and so my boss felt I should stay on deck, replace him, and advocate for the client's removal. Meanwhile this poor miserable bastard is screaming his throat raw and crying his eyes out, smashing his lunch to pulp and begging for everyone to Just LEAVE HIM THE UFCK ALONE.

And inside, I just could NOT agree with him more. In my heart of hearts I knew that if we all just let the man be, get off his back, allow him his period of readjustment to his broken schedule, he'd be FINE. Like he ALWAYS is. But no. Program Director and Administrators just can't tolerate it anymore. "Something has to be DONE." "We aren't serving his needs here anymore." "He's setting off all the others." Well, OKAY, maybe SO. But CHANGE is what triggers him and here you are suggesting that CHANGING HIS ENTIRE DAY, (ie travel time, site location, personnel, peers) is what he needs?!? And my boss wanted me to be a part of this?

So like the twelfth angry man on this jury, I just went along with the consensus. I faked words of support for the plan. Yes, I pointed out the risks of changing things on the client, but ultimately I caved to the pressure of essentially getting rid of the man. Like a good little clone, I did my job.

UFCK ME.

And so you see, this is the kind of outpour I need and putting that on Facebook just wouldn't do. I don't need people in my profession reading this. But that's just my job.

How and where can I post that my crush on Felicia Day could be the thing to save my hetereosexuality? My geek brethren read my expression of affection for her, and my gosh I do think she's amazing. But if I went on gushing about her on Facebook, but didn't complete my thought--which is--she may not trip my trigger, but with her I would learn. I would take the time. I would make love to her just because SHE wanted me to.

And then of course, I have to face facts, which I do here and cannot do on Facebook--how long could that last? Me making love solely for the other person? Not for myself? And is that fair to the other person?

Yeah. Not saying this on Facebook. Or Twitter. You guys who are here already--this is where you get The Rest Of The Story. Could you please keep this blog in your confidence? Please create no link bridges through your sites to this place here. Hate me if you must. Call me a hypocrite and a liar. But please don't kill me. Let me have my place where I vent, process, struggle. I need this place. I want you here. I need you here. Facebook is not where my heart is. Here is.

Now, to summarize;

I live on the lintel of The Closet. I'm comfy right here. I will express my crushes, my lusts, my whathaveyous, but I will not act on them. I am an Inbetweener. I would not wish this on a dog, but I'm here. On the day I decide that I'm out of the closet and in a relationship with a man--that will be the day I integrate all these areas of my life and let the chips fall. But I cannot--will not do that now. Because I have no one else BUT this right now. All I have are my geeks. They are my community. My support system. They are more vocal and more present than here. And it may so happen that I sacrifice this homosexual lifestyle to fit into the mould they have created for me. Just to keep their love. Yes, I would do that. I've BEEN doing that.

Because I need love. I'm human. I need love. In any form I can get it. I need it. And I'm not the least bit ashamed to say THAT, even if I'm ashamed to say all these other things.

Shit. I'm fighting for my fucking life here. Shit.

I'm Not Ready

2009-08-26T09:24:00.002-04:00

So I found My Ned and My Scott and where they've gone and learned how I can go too. Facebook. Childhood Buds, I know you guys are going to kill me for not being motivated to join for you, but you are guys who I can call on the frikkin phone for Pete's sake. Ned and Scott are these millions-of-miles-away guys who, without knowing me prior to all this blogation, poured love and support all up in the mix. Love and support are addictive, I must say. Y'all got children and wife, so hopefully you know what love & support feels like (oh, and you got me), but for me--so, yeah.

So I joined Facebook. I used my mutant name instead of my gub'ment, and see, I told you I knew people. I told you I was popular in other places. I already knew that.

But they don't know all what goes on up in here. And as the friend requests came crashing into my email account by the dozens (damn Facebook sign-up process raping my e-mail addresses and setting me the eff up for TOTAL EXPOSURE) panic attacks ensued. Can they find this blog through my Facebook? People I friended know about this place--will they tell? Do they have links at their places which could lead the intrepid here?

And what's here that I want to keep so private? Well DUH?!! It's just so ufcking nice to know who you are isn't it? Just so very ufcking cozy to put up pictures of your wives, girlfriends, husbands, children--just spread your arms wide open and invite the world into your life with no shame, no guilt, no fear. Isn't life just so rosy and happy and shiny for you?

Now my ass gets pressured, cajoled, wheedled out in the harsh sunlight and ufck me if that sh!t doesn't BURN. People finding pictures of me and posting them on my site without so much as a by-your-leave. I turn around and there I am. Wink, smile, wave of fingers, first and last name put the ufck out on blast.

Why? Why the hell is it so important for people to get all into my stuff? People who are ALREADY my friends?

People, I have two clients who internet stalk. I can't have them finding that I'm a geek, I'm gay, I'm this, I'm that.

So NONE OF MY REAL NAMES ON MY DAMN FACEBOOK, okay? Don't MAKE me have to close that bitch down so soon.

ARGH!! Why am I so angry?!

And when I consider that okay, let's let everybody know everything. Let's drop all the walls. My emotions go UFCK YOU! Not everyone has the right to know! Not everyone has earned my trust! Not everyone has displayed the ability to accept and not judge! UFCK YOU if you think I'm going to set myself up for ufcking failure. Put myself in a position to me rejected by people I once held in my heart.

The more I type, the more I want to check out of Facebook. I love Scott and Ned, but I'm SO so much less secure than those guys. I have SO much less to show and SO much less to be proud of.

I should have followed my instincts. This shit is a trainwreck getting ready to happen.

Ufck me.

REDACTION!!

2009-08-13T22:41:00.002-04:00

In my previous post, I didn't mean it!! I didn't mean ANY of it! Oh please don't leave me! Please don't!!

Heh. Only half of that is true. In my last post I did mean it.

Tomorrow I'm going to put the rubber to the road on this one. I was spurred to write that post because of the recent falling out with Jester. Well Jester's friend and mine, My Cop Hero, wants to play peacemaker. The Cop's known Jester twice as long as I have, so he is Jester's greatest advocate. And I respect that. The Cop is also very fond of me. So he wants us all to be friends.

But I've decided, as have all of you at one time or another, that toxic friends are toxic. And that at this time of life, I need friends who can love me. Just like I am going to love them.

So tonight The Cop called and wanted to help me make up with Jester (because yes, I put it out there in our group messages that I was tired of it, and that I was taking a break. (Go Alan!) So I told The Cop that if he wanted o take on the role of peacemaker, then he was going to have to know why I'm tired of sparring with Jester and why I need more from friends (which will include The Cop, he will soon learn).

The Cop at first thought I was just going to lay Jester out, but I told him it had nothing to do with Jester. And ultimately, it honestly does not. It has to do with me living in constant fear of losing everyone and everything for "coming out of the closet." Irrational as that may be to you, dear reader, it is a very real fear to me. But thanks to the mostly silent Coaster Punchman these days, I started the list of worst-case scenarios and was able to put them into the light instead of the forever unknown nightmare dark. I started to be able to seriously consider it, both the benefits and consequences. Both the friends that would stay and the friends that would leave. It started becoming real.

So then I started telling people.

I told My Super Hero. (He stayed)

I told Childhood Bud II. (She stayed--and denied it for me)

I told my Geek Central buddy, and removed the vow of secrecy I swore him under. If anyone asks him, he can tell them. (Cowardy of me, but the advance here is that I don't want to deny it anymore. They suspect it, now let them know it for sure, even if I'm not the one to tell them. And if it REALLY matters to them, they can ask me directly.)

And tomorrow, I'm telling The Cop. And he can go tell Jester, and our other D&D geek buddies and I don't care anymore. I don't care no mo. I half want them to dump me. I like having my Saturdays free, and not having to go through the sparring and sarcasm deflection, and self-defense, and ridicule of my qualities and my profession, which I'm better at than anything else I do on planet Earth, with the Audio productions coming up a close second.

But the true part of my REDACTION is that my heart really doesn't want them to reject me. My heart is really sore from rejection. I miss the people I used to be friendly with and share words, thoughts, wishes, and encouragement with. They made me feel so good and so loved and now they are so gone. And this stings like a real bitch.

And maybe that's why I'm telling people about this sexuality now. Maybe I'm looking for the kind of love that won't fade away on me. Maybe the kind of love I'm attracted to is the only love I'm made for. The only love that will really make me happy. The kind of love that isn't faked. To be loved for me.

And if I'm going to get that love, then all the games have to stop. I have to be real if I want real love.

So let's just see what's what come Saturday morning, after the sh*t has hit the fan and the room is splattered.

Euw.

I need a better analogy.

The Friends I Want

2009-08-11T11:14:00.005-04:00

So yeah, I tweeted again about some jive mess Jester put me through last night. Snarking at me, ridiculing my sensitivity, bullying the group to play without me while I struggled to get my system up to snuff. Just a bastard. A big bully.

So I realized what I want from my friends. I want friends who will listen. Friends who will lend an ear when I need one. Friends who can empathize and who care. Friends who respect my choices. Who are honest with their feelings, be they positive or negative, but in all manner of communication, affectionate and respectful.

If you're looking to be a friend of mine and cannot meet these requirements then you need not apply. Because I'm shouldering a F*CK TON of weight on the daily. I'm struggling with middle-age, my weight, my failing eyesight, my career which consists of two jobs, plans for pursuing a PhD, loneliness & sexuality, religion & God. Among some of the more minor details.

And let me tell you, it's not all about me me me. Because I offer the same things AS a friend. This is who I have become. I get real joy out of matters of the heart. It might be vicarious living since I'm not able to enjoy it for myself. But there it is. And there I am. And YOU get the benefit. I'm patient, I listen, I care. I can be used for this. I'm made for this. It's one of the clearest things I understand about myself and I experience it every time I'm walking up Central Park South toward the train station or my parked car, leaving a good therapy session. I'm GOOD at this, because I love it.

And that's not to say I'm a big blubbery mess or 100% goosh. I can be sarcastic, cutting, and I'm a hell of a lot of fun at parties (or so I've discovered over the last few years).

So yeah. People who will let a great guy like me slip through their fingers? You never did deserve me anyway. SEEya! (See? Cutting. I Kan Doo Eet!)

It's middle age, I tell ya. I'm on the other side of my life now. I need to be setting up for retirement and leaving this world. I need to make sure I'm secure, both materially and emotionally. If no woman's going to marry a less than manly man such as myself, and if I can't get the world or religion to treat me right if I link my life with a dude that I might dig, then I gotta make sure that I at least cushion the blow of aging & dying with friends I can trust.

And that's what's going on.

And I Thought I Was STRAIGHT?!

2009-08-01T21:13:00.005-04:00

Look at me in my turtleneck. No WONDER I never got laid!! God what a joke. Clearly I am now and have always been insane. And obviously gay.

Anyway, I got this picture from my Aunt, who I told y'all about in June. As she had described, she put together a tribute DVD to her brother Marduke and now I have a copy of one, so I captured a lot of screenshots and posted them as Flick'r pics. I tell a story in those pics, and some other, more upbeat self-discoveries at Flick'r so you might want to go give those a scan. In summary, it turns out that I'm a lot more proud of my family than I thought I'd be.

I went to see my aunt last night to make good on the promise I made her before I went off to the comics convention and Ned. Eliel, perk up--SHE LIVES (and has lived since the 70's) TWO BLOCKS FROM CARLTON AVENUE. She owns a brownstone that is EXACTLY like your old one in architecture. And I do mean exact, as in the steps are on the same side of the house, etc.

Eliel, when I went to visit you those times, my aunt was withoin walking distance all along. And not only that, but in the 70's she was able to purchase a brownstone, and she's been raising two boys in it for 30 years. Now, as you know Eliel, the neighborhood has become one of those trendy gentrified Brooklyn nabes. And my aunt is sitting pretty. I had no idea. Not many other, if any, can say they are as successfully adult as this aunt of mine. And I'm SO glad to be able to have another connection to that neighborhood because I was starting to REALLY dig it before you moved out of there, Eliel. Still mad at you for that!

Anyway, visiting my aunt turned out to be the best case scenario. She welcomed me as though I'd never left. Just like her mother did when I lived in Harlem the first time (happy to say, I found the original post where I mention her mother, and her brother Marduke). And she's doing better than me, but I'm doing okay as well, which means I can visit her again and there will be no agendas between us. I won't be trying to sponge off her, she won't be trying to sponge off me.

The only wrinkle right now is that I haven't disclosed my last ten years to her. Last she knew, and I reconfirmed that her memories are true, that I went out to Missouri to become a preacher. So she wants to know what church I "go" to. I tell her the last church I attended, but not the fact that I haven't gone back in years and that I'm trying to first come to terms with being "Big Gay Al" before I find a new church to start visiting/attending.

But this woman has seen me growing up. She knows I have no girlfriend now, in my forties. She HAS to know that I'm not straight. And I want to have that talk with her. I want the love of family in my life again, as I am now.

And it seems like I'm going to have it.

If my aunt accepts me ... well ... a gift of God, is what that is. And even if I'm NOT straight, God might still be working in my life.

Which is really REALLY okay with me.

Where Are My Comic Books...?

2009-07-30T21:19:00.005-04:00

Yeah, so yesterday my boss calls me about two hours after he'd been standing in my office and he says with a very very stern voice, "You want to tell me why you weren't at XXXX XXXXXX's psychiatry appointment?" There was a tinge of outrage with a hint of hysteria seasoning to taste, as well.

My response, "No no No no no!" because in the microuniverse's lifespan between his question and my answer, I realized that I had totally forgotten the appointment. Instead, I had Tweeted all day, fought sleep, didn't fight sleep, learned how to sleep (or at least snore) on my feet, went out to get lunch, and ate it all without a second's worth of realization that I had an appointment to go to.

I've since made amends (see my Twitter stream for details) and the Boss and me are buds again, but all today one alternative answer to his question has been buzzing around in my mind. "Because," I could have said, "I'm a gut-expanding middle-aged closeted homosexual who is working two jobs in order to live the life of one person, I'm off my meds, and I'm just really, really tired."

So a few minutes ago, coming in from said second job, I opened up my e-mail to discover that the second guy in our Friday-night D&D group has had a baby with his woman (in this case, wife). This is the guy who had gotten married a year or so ago. A guy who was hapy to get married and was looking forward to planning his future with the one he loves. Honestly. So yeah, in the time between, they made and gave birth to a baby.

And so I just thought I'd come and blog about it because I think one should somehow pay tribute to the death of ones dreams and hopes. It's respectful.

So RIP Alan's Heterosexuality. If you hadn't been so sickly in the first place, one of those dozens of babies made and born by your friends in your lifetime would have been yours.

Postscript; This post's title comes from the fact that after I lay my hands on them, I'll be alright.

Adventures In Gayville. Prologue.

2009-07-21T21:35:00.004-04:00

The thing that is really going to cheese me off is the fact that this will wind up being not very unremarkable at all. That I'm not any more special than anyone else.

And yet.

This is me.

And not someone else. And it's kind of astonishing that I would be here. In this place.

So anyway, full of self-loathing and abandon, I was standing in the Haagen-Daas boutique store where the prices for their ice cream is even more expensive than their store pints. I had just ordered my Dulce de Dulce w/ Bananas and Caramel Dulce, and had given the shopkeep a piece of my mind in doing so. More than ANY meal from McDonalds it was going to cost me! He took it in good stride. He knew I was there to pay regardless of my outrage.

"Where are you from?" he asked.

"5 miles from here--up Broadway." I answered, prouder than I'd been all week.

So while I stood there waiting for the poisonous concoction to brew, in walked a pair of fellers in mid conversation. "...wait until you taste it. It's crack, I tell you." Or something to that effect.

I did what one does when alone while waiting for your stuff when other people are yapping. I said and did nothing. The two chatted a little more and I did what one does when the conversation of strangers continues, and continues. I stole a look.

Well, the one chatting and chatting was pretty much what he sounded like. A crisp, late twenties white dude, very earthy and yet ivy league. Like maybe from a working class family who made good in the business world. He wore a dress shirt and slacks, and was very animnated. I could easily see him in a "How I Met Your Mother" set bar with his buddies, throwing darts after work, crying foul with a tenor's trumpet. And while I was taking his full stock from my half a second's worth of glance, I dimly register that he's talking to me as well.

"Sir. Sir, have you ever had a Bailey's shake?" with the sudden familiarity of a frat brother.

Well. What could I do but get a better look at him?

The boy was handsome. Fratman all the way. Flat belly, open collar, hints of chest hair poking out of darker tones like maybe there's some Italian in him or one of the more swarthy Irish. Clean shaven, straight perfect teeth in a big open smile.

Who were these guys? Lovers? The older one also trim. A little taller than the both of us. Visiting NYC, according to the content of the previous conversation before I got included. Salt and pepper hair. Darker still, like maybe Greek or East Asian. Dressed more casually than John Bailey's-Shake.

I smiled. The boy was smooth. He was a talker. He was not afraid of the black guy standing in the ice cream store with the Reed Richards sideburns. "No," I said. "Never did. But I'm going for that golden cup of sunshine, myself," and I pointed to the poster on the wall that had brought me in here. They had to admit that mine looked real good too. But Johnny insisted, the Bailey's was amazing. "Not sweet like regular Bailey's."

"Oh," I said, "Then it's not for me. Sweet is what I'm in here for." And yes, I was. Flirting, that is. Ol' Johnny wanted to play? 'Ight. Let's play.

"It's about a million calories," said Johnny to his companion and me, "But so worth it."

"And about a dime per calorie," said clever, flirtatious little me.

They laughed. Oh, yes, I can make them laugh. I'm a funny guy. "He's payin' for it!" said Johnny. "So that's on him...!"

Then the awkward silence descended as it does, while shakes and sundaes are being made. Then mine came out. I handed my ransom over for it. Then I took more opportunity to show it off. "See," I said to them, "This is what ya need."

"It does look good," said Johnny. And then he said the following, as easy as a breeze. "If you want to stick around you could get a taste of our Bailey's."

And there I was. Trumped. Oh, Johnny B gooooooood. He was very aware of his ability to seal the deal, was our little flat-bellied, handsome-ass Johnny with the big smile and the dark eyebrows.

And I thought, me? This guy wants me to stick around? Me? What about his buddy here, who's buying his Bailey's? What about my fat belly? What about the fact that I'm not ready to be gay yet?

Johnny saw my hesitation. My expression. And he said, with nary a moment passing after his offer--in fact he made it the closing of the same sentence, "But if you're on your way to something, that's cool."

And I nodded, not shy or repulsed or even afraid, but very aware and even flattered, and not ready. "Yeah, I'm on my way to something. But you guys enjoy your shakes."

And out I went thinking, "You betta work, Johnny, with your handsome self."

And as flattered as I felt, or as delusionally giddy (for Johnny may have just been a really open and frathouse kind of guy, as genuine and friendly as My Super Hero is, with a sexy-ass wife waiting in their 775K condo around the corner) I also felt again, for the first time, "I'm not ready."

My fat belly. My self-consciousness. My fear.

I'm not ready.

But damn, is it always going to be that easy?

Because if so--then wow.

I better buy some condoms.

GREs

2009-07-21T08:29:00.002-04:00

The Graduate Record Examination. I've tackled this biatch a few times in my past, attempting to go back to school and begin a doctorate program. This time, I bought The Princeton Review "Cracking the GRE..." series for the general and the psychology subject tests.

Because MFTD, to whom I've accumulated a debt in excess of 6K over the years (you see, he is VERY good with his money) offered me a 6K scholarship. He said "I'll forget the debt if you go back to school for your doctorate."

And I said "Okay."

The subject came up because I was telling him that I was thinking about it AGAIN. Initially, I had called him to fill the space in my day with human contact of the non-therapeutic kind. The loneliness was getting to me. And so I told him I was considering the doctorate because the two jobs in this field are getting to be a bit much. I've now actively begun NOT scheduling clients one out of the 5 weekdays, for instance.

And then he dropped that offer on me. He's a good guy, MFTD.

A few weeks ago, I'd mailed a check to one of other two friends who I owed money to, and it has been cashed. So now I only owe one more person a personal debt. And then I've licked it! No more financial cloud for me. Five years in the making. (This does not include car & student loan, but they are regularly made payments.)

And then on to the PhD.

Yeah. Not bad, eh?

Dontchange

2009-07-14T07:47:00.003-04:00

So, can I pick 'em or what? My Super Hero remains my friend. He said ZERO things have changed.

You know, it seems pretty clear that I'm on my way out of the closet. I seem to be taking it a step at a time, choosing with who and how to reveal. CoasterPunchman walked me through an exercize by e-mail a few months ago that had me face my exact fears about identifying myself as "A Gay American." I've tackled two of those fears on that list now, meanwhile testing waters here at my blog, taking my time, having my panic attacks, crying a little every day, mourning my heterosexuality in my own way, trying to adopt a new dream for my life, trying to still feel human and love-able and ... redeemable.

Well, a few minutes ago, I looked for a music video because I wanted to punctuate one of my messageboard posts with the theme of a song and after I found what I thought was perfect, I realized it had another meaning for another aspect of my life.

So, here you go--I knew I had to post it here--let the tears flow freely. God knows mine did.

Okay. Okay.

2009-07-13T18:37:00.003-04:00

So yeah, my heart's in my throat. How does that happen? I LITERALLY feel my heart beating right at the level of my sternum, right below my Adam's Apple. Because I just sent The Letter to My Super Hero giving up The Last Reveal about me. You know, the whole sex thing? The whole "me" and "not being as straight as I wished I were" thing?

Yeah. And if my impressions of My Super Hero is accurate, this won't go as horribly, horribly horribly maddeningly horrific as it could be. He won't feel deceived and lied-to about me. He won't think all this has just been one big same-sex crush and an elaborate scheme to create a big jerk-off fantasy (which it never ever has. My Super Hero embodies the ideal for me--the me I want to be, removed from all corruption and molestations and illicit seedy porno sex). He's the innocence of reading comics at nine, dreaming about justice and fairness and how to be a hero and a man. He's married and all that, but that's not who he is for me. For me, he's the recapture of a childhood I'll never be able to have had. He's my escape when the world is too brutal again.

So why did I do this? Why did I tell him? Why didn't I just keep it out of all conversation, as I have been doing? Well, because we're friends, he and I. I mean we really get on really well. And sometime I have just not been there for him because of my struggles and my ups and my downs, and sometimes I feel like I've let him down so much and I just wanted him to know why. I thought that because of all he means to me and because of all he's done for my mind and my spirit, I felt he deserved to be let in. That he deserved to be trusted, I guess. Yeah, that's it. He deserves to be trusted with this.

Still, I'm just so scared that despite everything I've tried to be, and everything I've wished for and all the purest motives this bent frame could conceive of, that I'll be misunderstood and rejected. That my heart will be broken and that I'll no longer be AFOMA. And while he'll have the right to turn away from the secret-keeping little perv that I am, since it is HIS life and he gets to decide who HE wants in it, it would just crush me. It would be just so awful.

And I would survive. And I would find new supports, or call you guys up and cry on your shoulder until we both drowned, but .... I would recover.

Right?

Right?

Oh God. Please. Have mercy on me. I just hate all this. Why did this have to be me? Why couldn't I just be like anyone else?

July 11th!

2009-07-11T09:51:00.005-04:00

Because, really, is it any different than the 5th?

So this has been a pretty hetero week for me. The female ta-ta, as a duo, are still some of the world's best looking sound. When pushed up, propped up, straining to float free, or in full jiggle--them thangs is fun to look at!!!

Then I introspect that if I were hetereo, the girls are all I'd look at when Johnny Jogger comes pounding by with no shirt on. So in this leg of the journey, I'm starting to realize that instead of clinging to my female attraction to define myself as hetereo, the truth is that the existence of my male attraction is as much if not moreso a defining trait too. Possibly it's a defining trait that cancels out the other? Maybe the breast attraction is just the residual of having been a baby and primitively desiring breasts because that's where survival was supposed to have come from. No breast-attraction, no life.

And I'm coming to realize stuff about my comicbook-loving geek nation now that I'm examining the depths and heights of my own homo-ness. Just because so many of my cyberfriends are married w/children, it doesn't mean they don't get the same kind of thrill that I do looking at a dude's physique.

After all, what FIRST attracted them to comicbooks? Definitely not the STORIES because that's not the first thing a young boy sees when he hovers toward the comicbook display. He sees colorful, spandex-clad muscles. In equally colorful speedos.

It's true.

And mostly on the comicbook page does a pair of bright red speedos look normalized and functional. A kid can look at Superman and not have any witnesses thinking "Why is that kid looking at male erotica?!?" But what if that's what it's been all along?

Well, to that I can add this; at Geek Central, my cyber buddies are the biggest same-sex flirters you'd ever want to meet! 90% of them are married and 85% of that bunch have kids. But they think nothing of telling a fellow dude poster that they're sexy, got a "purty mouth," etc.

Which brings me back to my idea of fluid sexuality. Which isn't just MY idea. You guys have agreed with me on this. And we know A LOT of homosexual folks have sexed and had children with hetereo-sex partners, before and after taking a homosexual identity. So my cyberbuddies who flirt with each other online (and over the podcasts) are most likely not 100% hetereo. And really, is ANYONE? But they might in fact be a lot less hetereo than the average dude, due to their (our) love for colorful, muscley, underwear-on-the-outside wearing heroes. And they still managed to snag a girl and make whoopie enough to produce babies.

I can't be mad at that. I only wish I could be one of them. With all my heart.

In other news, my Friday night D&D group has not been meeting for over a month now because the DM and his girlfriend (fellow player) has had a baby. She was looking pretty uncomfortable and all swole up for the last month before she popped and they live together so he's also doing the new dad thing instead of running off to us to run our game. So I'm a little bitter about that. All these otherwise hetereo geeks having dates and shtupping women and making babies, leaving me alone.

In similar news, the longterm geek squad (which includes Jester) wants to get together today, and I actually don't feel like it. I'm actually over my crush on Jester. In a major way. It seems he can't do any right anymore. All the strengths and compassion I thought he had seem well-hidden under his emotional aggression and resistance. All I imagine it will be when we get together is me fending off his negativity as we all conversate, joke, dine, watch movies, roleplay, or what have you.

And the biggest thing--I can't share my struggles with them. For being my friends for such a long time, they are the group I feel most the most uncomfortable "coming out" to. Which, again, my "coming out" isn't a major event any more to me. Giving this information out to my friends won't change what I do on a daily basis. I'm still petrified of The Deed and all it's permutations. I still want to be as hetereo as my other speedo-friendly, married, fathering geek buddies.

But what I want TODAY is to have fun with my friends, and I don't feel like that can happen anymore. So I don't really want to go meet up with them. I'd rather go to the gym, get my walk/jog on to Janet in Central Park, nap if I wanna, and produce more audio goodness!

We'll see how it goes.

Happy July!