The Visit

         I couldn’t shake the sense of dread.  I had a feeling of impending doom, that all was not right with the world.  What had I done?  Was it a lapse in judgment or temporary insanity?  What exactly was I thinking when I booked a trip for my parents and younger brother to come to New York for a visit?  I had the best of intentions; it was their Christmas present.  I paid for half of their airline tickets and booked a room at the Hotel Pennsylvania.  Right next to Macy’s!  At times, even thirty four year-olds romanticize the perfect family life.  The four of us enjoying the city.  Conversation would be easy, communication open and healthy.  It never happened before, but who says it can’t happen now?  Right?

            Upon learning of my gift, Mom was in the constant throes of excitement.  She became an internet maven, addicted to finding the best things to do in Manhattan.  She also became a pain in my ass.  After reading online reviews of their hotel, she asked if I would find somewhere else for them to stay.  Citing roaches, cold water, and uncleanliness, she thought it best not to stay at the Hotel Pennsylvania.  Fine by me, I thought.  Then after the seventh email and fourth phone call making the same request, my temper got the best of me.  I emailed her back.

            “I’ve attached a link to a small hotel I found of interest.  I read online that the rooms are pretty small, but the towel service is impeccable.”

            With the email, I attached a link to the West Side Club for Men, a gay bathhouse in Chelsea.  She called me the next day.

            “Was that supposed to be funny?”

            “I don’t know.  My roommate and I got a big kick out of it,” I replied.

            This is a typical exchange between Mom and me.  I have always wanted to get a rise out of her.  Not to piss her off, just to make sure she is still listening…and breathing.  Mom doesn’t upset the cart.  Status quo is just fine.  She likes to remember the good times which is her way of glossing over anything remotely unpleasant.  Her mother was the greatest, but she was also passive and mute.  Mom is the same in many aspects.  She likes to paint a Rockwell scene in her mind when it comes to our family.  And then becomes cool as ice when the paint dries, revealing cracks in the canvas. 

            When I came out a few years back, her silence was deafening.  But that didn’t stop me—and still doesn’t—from forcing the issue.  At first, my tactics didn’t work.  She even bought a book written by some insane woman whose son had “gotten lost in the gay underworld of sex and drugs” but through extensive therapy managed to “go straight again.”  After perusing this literary equivalent of junk mail in the bookstore, I called my mother.

            “Does this book ever say where I can find this gay underworld?  Because it sure sounds like a hell of a lot of fun.”

            I went on to inform her that there is no possibility of me ever eating pussy, marrying a girl, or buying a minivan.  Her call-waiting beep sounded, and off she went.  Over the past few years, she slowly came around and actually started asking questions about my life and listening to the answers.  She still needs nudging every once in a while, but she’s only human.  It can’t be easy for a Southern Baptist lady who is also the mother of a queer. 

            If ever two opposite personalities attracted, it was Mom and Dad.  For every opinion that Mom did not form, Dad was there to make sure his was heard.  At least he was never indifferent.  Silence has never been his forte.  Like a male counterpart to Mama Rose in “Gypsy”, he pushed me to succeed and, more importantly, to be popular.  I wasn’t even ten years old, and I already knew what would make one popular and what was unbecoming of real boys.  According to Dad, real boys did not dance, sing into hairbrushes, wear women’s shoes, or fix their babysitter’s hair.  Since I enjoyed all of these things, reasoning told me that I wasn’t a real boy. 

            As I grew older, Dad and I clashed over everything.  His drinking, my drinking, college.  As a long-standing member of the National Guard, he was deployed to Saudi Arabia for nine months beginning in 1990 for Bush War I.  There were tears—mine.  There were more tears—his—but only when he said goodbye to my brother.  They had more in common, I suppose.  Either way, I’m still not sure whether I missed him or the idea of him. 

One of the most basic of human traits is to crave what we cannot have.  So all my life I have craved the idea of a father who is here—physically and emotionally.  Like Mom, he has made great strides since my coming out via the telephone.  At the ripe old age of 29, I heard him say “I love you”.  I long assumed that if I ever heard that from him, it wouldn’t mean anything since I’m older and he neglected to tell me when I was younger and really wanted to hear it.  I was wrong.  Turns out it doesn’t matter how old you are.  “I love you” is never a bad thing to hear.

            Back to the trip, Mom eventually passed on the idea of staying at a bathhouse, opting instead for a hotel in Midtown.  They flew up in May, and for their first night in the city, I met them on the street in front of Extra Virgin, one of my favorite restaurants.  Dad looked a little grayer, Mom looked a little wearier, Keith, my brother, looked a little heavier.  But I held my tongue and greeted them with a cheery “Welcome to New York!”  It would have been lovely if the gesture was reciprocated. 

            “I thought you said you’ve been working out,” Dad said.

            “I think I’ve got some extra eye cream in my suitcase if you want to try it out on your crows’ feet,” Mom offered.

            Keith looked at me and rolled his eyes, as if to say “I feel your pain.”

            My shrink would have told me to confront them and tell them exactly how their remarks impact me.  How their remarks really make me feel.  I pondered this for a second.

            “How about a cocktail?”

            Dinner was fine.  The waitress was amused by Dad’s Southern accent and Keith’s ability to down two shots of Jeigermeister for dessert.  She must not know how taxing it can be to travel with your parents, I thought.  After sending them back uptown, I walked home with a controlled excitement.  Excited because dinner had, in fact, not killed me.  Excited because it had actually been relatively nice.  Controlled because I was waiting for the other shoe to drop.  Then, surprisingly, I felt sad.  A strange kind of sad.  I wanted to share this walk with someone.  Or have someone beside my roommate waiting for me to walk in the door and tell him about dinner with my family.  I’ve been single for awhile and enjoy it.  But suddenly, I didn’t want to be single anymore.  Strange effects this family reunion was having.

            The week continued with a Broadway play.  Keith was miserable, Dad fidgeted, and Mom unzipped her purse during Angela Lansbury’s monologue.  A Yankees game, twelfth row behind home plate, courtesy of my brother, a golf pro with surprising connections.  Keith schmoozed while Dad and I drank beer, and I scanned the dugout for a potentially gay Yankee.  “A Chorus Line”, with just Mom.  She told me that I should really use moisturizer on my elbows.  A night out in the East Village with my brother.  I introduced him to my friends as we hung out in a gay bar.  Keith hyperventilated at first, but three shots of Jeigermeister warmed him up to the “gay underworld.”

            As the week drew to a close, I realized, despite vehement rejections from my common sense, that I was enjoying their visit.  I did not want them to leave.  On their last night in the city, I took them to The Garage in the West Village for dinner followed by drinks at Rose’s Turn, a small piano bar where a couple of friends were singing.  When it was time for goodbye, I got emotional.  A few cocktails probably loosened my tear ducts, but still.  It was a nice visit.  As I watched their cab drive away on Seventh Avenue, I decided to walk home.  It was a beautiful spring night.  I replayed the week’s events in my mind.  I missed my family.  For the first time, I really missed my family.  

What the hell was that? 

So maybe it was time to let go.  Let it go.  And by it, I mean all of it.  The disappointments, real and perceived.  The pain, the memories that can only come from childhood.  This is my family.  And they’re all I’ve got.  I can’t trade them in for a nicer model.  And someday, when they’re gone, all I’ll have are memories, so they might as well be good ones.

            As I walked through Chelsea, two guys came out of a storefront holding hands and giggling.  I looked up at the sign.
            “WEST SIDE CLUB FOR MEN”

            I giggled too.  No amount of Jeigermeister in the world would have helped the family get through a week in there.

My Tommy

           A few years ago, I ended my relationship with my personal trainer, which was harder than dumping any silly old boyfriend.  I learned quickly that relationships with trainers take on new heights of perversity and co-dependency.  A month before I started with Tommy, I read an article in GQ that humorously outlined the gray area often created between client and personal trainer.  There were tales of woe and disappointment, anger and confusion.

            What pathetic chumps!  I will never be one of those people.

            Well, hello world!  Meet the newest pathetic chump!

            I paid fifty dollars every month to work out at Bally’s Gym in Chelsea, but there were always better things to do.  Like eat and sit.  So I decided to hire a personal trainer to motivate me and keep me in the gym.  I figured that eighty dollars an hour is plenty of motivation to put down the fork and get off the couch.  Besides, I was going to Provincetown that summer for a week with a group of friends, and the thought of looking like a broomstick with hair didn’t appeal to me.  Or to anyone else.  So I found Tommy:  young, hot and straight.  Tommy was in graduate school studying to be a physical therapist, so he obviously knew his stuff.  He looked like Daniel Craig, only younger.  I say this because Tommy told me this at our first meeting.

            “Girls tell me I look like the new guy that plays James Bond,” he offered.

            “Oh really?” I asked, interested.  “I haven’t watched that series since Roger Moore quit.”

            “Who’s Roger Moore?” 

Jesus, I suddenly felt like Mrs. Robinson.                                                  

            He started me on a workout regimen that included a mixture of free weights, resistance exercises, cardio, and a high-protein diet.  The diet lasted three days until I had my fill of eggs and cottage cheese.  I continued to take the protein shakes that he prescribed but slipped in a Big Mac and kept that to myself.  I dutifully went to the gym, three times a week with him and once or twice a week on my own.  He pushed me to the limit, and for the first couple of weeks, I couldn’t lift my arms above my head.  Making out in a bar isn’t quite the same when you can’t lift your arms.  But I kept at it, the gym that is.  Gradually, I got stronger and noticed changes in my physique.  I actually had visible muscles in my back, and friends could no longer grab my love handles and squeal “Pinch an inch!” 

I hate that.

            However, my newfound positive body image came at a price.  Tommy increasingly used me as a substitute therapist, asking my opinions on everything from parental issues to friend problems.  Once he even asked my advice on how to break up with his girlfriend.

            “Tell her you’re gay,” I proposed. 

He looked at me, blankly.  I guess he didn’t know his audience.

            I slowly became too reliant on his motivation.  It was clear that I knew how to do all the exercises, and my form improved significantly.  But I still saw him three times a week. Suddenly, an epiphany:  I was basically paying for an escort service.  He was an appealing straight guy who carried on intelligent conversations and rubbed my shoulders.  It was actually fun to work out with him.  I enjoyed his attention and loved to make him laugh.  But anyone would laugh at my jokes if I were paying them eighty dollars an hour. So I decided to break it off, but not cold turkey.  Baby steps.  We scaled it back to twice a week and finally once a week.

He soon became suspicious, and I knew what I had to do.  I needed the money spent on him to save up for a security deposit on an apartment.  I wanted to travel, and not seeing him would untie some of my funds.  I decided it was time to be an adult, to take charge of the situation and not be intimidated into seeing him again and again. It was time to be my own man!  Hear me roar!  Take the bull by the balls!  And all that other hyper-masculine stuff.

            So I did what any other passive-aggressive, self-respecting gay man would have done in my situation.  I broke up with him.  On his voice mail.

Let Me Entertain You

         I was sitting at a table, sweating not only from the hot lights but the sheer terror of failing as well.  I was at my first acting class in New York City doing an improvisational exercise with my scene partner.  And we were failing.  Miserably.  Our teacher instructed us to improvise a conflict and assigned a sweet girl to be my partner.  Very sweet.  She was a titmouse, and it’s hard to fight with Pollyanna.  But we gave it a good shot.  We were to be a young married couple and were fighting over whether to stay home for the weekend and paint the house or go out with friends.  She, the responsible one, wanted to stay home and paint.  Me, being the loutish husband who liked going out with his buddies for beers, wanted to go out with my buddies for beers.  We were doomed from the start.  Considering this was my first acting class and first improvisational exercise, and considering that I’m eons away from a loutish husband who likes to spend time downing beers in a sports bar, I voiced my concern.

            “Shouldn’t we start with something a little less difficult?”

            “Don’t be silly,” my teacher yelped.  “You’re an actor.  So ACT!”

            It was only the first time I heard him say that, and already it was too much.

            Suzanne and I were the fifth couple to go on that night, so I expected our improv to last somewhere around five minutes, judging from others who went before us.  A few were good, a few were bad.  I knew I wanted to succeed at this, but would I be able to forget about the audience?  Yes and no.  I was nervous when we began but soon forgot about them until we started to falter.  I presented a valid argument for waiting on the paint job, and Suzanne couldn’t really find fault with it.  She just sat at the kitchen table peeling carrots for dinner.  I wanted fireworks and melodrama and screaming and throwing things.  Yet, we ran out of things to argue about.  It was painful.  After time was called, we were instructed to sit in the “hot seats.”  The chairs at center stage where we received our critique from the teacher.

            “Craig, have you ever been really mad?” he asked.

            “Um, yeah.  Many many times.”

            The conversation proceeded for the next twenty minutes where he probed and dissected my anger and how I show emotion.  Apparently, Suzanne was believable as a carrot-peeling WASP who just wanted some quality-time with her new husband.  However, my anger and conflicting emotions must have fallen flat somewhere between “Action!” and “Cut!”.  And he wasn’t letting up.  He kept on and on, delving deeper into my emotional angst until I felt like I was in a psychotherapy session that was being telecast for sixteen up-and-coming actors.  One of whom—the ex-football player from Nebraska—I had a huge crush on.

            “Do you know how hard this is for me?  I’m passive-aggressive!  I’d rather take a goddamned nap than argue about paint!”

            “Well, you’ve got to push through that!” my teacher exploded.  “Or you’ll NEVER be an actor!”

            I signed up for this class because of that very reason.  I wanted to be an actor.  Still do.  And I was doing quite well in the first couple of classes.  The teacher was dry and boring, but he had worked with Uta Hagen and some of the greats, so I assumed he knew of what he spoke.  I even got some of the loudest laughs in the room one night.  We were in small groups.  Someone started the exercise by “creating” an object out of thin air.  This “object” was passed onto the next person who took it and created something entirely different.  I thought it the lamest game I’d ever seen, but I played along.  I got belly laughs from my group when I took the guy’s “necklace” beside me and transformed it into a doobie I was taking a hit from.  However, the ethereal lesbian beside me upped the ante and took my marijuana cigarette and made an eight-ball of coke. 

            So I was shocked by my fall from grace.  I left class after the improv vowing never to return.  But acting has always been in my gut.  As a little kid growing up in Alabama, I loved a production.  I had zero access to any kind of real theatre, so I loved the movie musicals.  I would play along with the television in my bedroom, creating my own character and singing along with the actors.  And when my grandmother showed me “Gypsy” with Rosalind Russell and Natalie Wood?  Oh Lord.  I pranced around the house for a month stripping off anything I could get my hands on.  I would take one of Mom’s nightgowns and snap it in place around my waist.  Mom had the ugliest high-heeled shoes, so I usually just wore hose and stood on my toes.  On any given day, you could find me in our living room, “Let Me Entertain You” blasting at top volume, sashaying around the room and flinging off the nightgown to reveal my Superman underoos.  I thought Wonder Woman was more appropriate, but Dad had to draw the line somewhere. 

            I constantly entertained the walls of my bedroom.  Not only would I create characters and act alongside my television, but I also choreographed dance routines.  I rehearsed them until my legs were sore.  I grew tired of using my fist as a microphone, so I began to use a hair brush.  My dad was exasperated.  On numerous occasions, he caught me cheering or singing or doing toe-touches while wearing his oversize t-shirts with a belt cinched at the waist.  I would either get a spanking or worse.  The dreaded drive around the block.  We loaded into his S-10 pickup and drove around the block at a snail’s pace, and I actually had to sit and listen to him.  I always found it odd that the only times he wasn’t at the Country Club playing golf was when he was criticizing my performances and taking away my pom-poms.

            “Think about what would happen if the boys in your class found out you were dressing up in those clothes,” he offered.  “They would make fun of you and tease you all the time.”

            “Would they tease me if they knew I pretended to be Wonder Woman?”

            He almost wrecked.

            I was determined not to back down from this acting teacher.  Or from any of my classmates.  After a few days of pouting and doubting my self-worth, I picked myself up by the bootstraps determined to improve my improv.  I spoke with Suzanne on the phone and gently suggested that she get angrier.

            “What has really pissed you off before that you could use?” I asked.

            “Well, my last boyfriend announced after two years that he was gay.”

            BINGO!  We had us an improv! 

            The next week, I arrived at the studio on Bank Street a little early.  I watched from across the street as the other students walked in.  They walked in by twos, sometimes by threes.  How did they get to know each other so quickly?  And why wasn’t I in their little groups?  I started to become paranoid.   Did they hate me?  Laugh at me behind my back?  What if I suck again?  The doubts came in waves.  As I was about to walk away and go to the McDonald’s I just passed, a fierceness gripped me.  I wasn’t just doing this for me.  I was doing this to show all the people in my life that I could, indeed, be creative and artistic and could act outside the realms of my bedroom.  All the people who said ‘no’ and ‘stop’.  All the way back to my dad.  And I didn’t walk away.  I walked right up to the door, and I paused.  With my hand on the door, I paused.  But what if they did think I sucked?

            Ten minutes later, I was sitting at McDonald’s eating a Big Mac.  Still dreaming of becoming an actor.

What Are You Doing The Rest Of Your Life?

           “I quit.”

            With those two little words my life changed for the better.  I quit my job last week.  I quit my job last week with basically nothing lined up.  I have options and ideas sure.  But nothing tangible is lined up.  And I love it.  I hated my job.  Cliché, yes, but true.  It was finance, and I loathe finance.  Growing up in a small Southern town, boys were encouraged to be football coaches, doctors, or businessmen.  Since blood makes me squeamish and I throw like a girl, business won out.  I had no idea that you could major in drama or English, so I majored in accounting.  I never got above a “C” in any of my accounting courses, so that should have told me something right there.  So basically, my job bored me to tears.  There was nothing exciting about it.  Literally, the most exciting thing about my job was being able to purchase theatre tickets for my boss.  And I would absolutely cringe whenever I had to utter those tragic words, “I’m behind on my filing.”  

            My boss.  Truly a piece of work.  The tantrums were regular and legendary.  No phones were thrown, but words sure were.  People were sent home on a regular basis to “think about whether they want to stay or not.”  His line of fire was intense.  If you found yourself in that line of fire, it could be days, even weeks you would stay there.  We called them beatdowns.  He would constantly pick apart something that he considered wrong and harp on it for days.  In front of everyone.  We had group lunches every week.  And every week, he held court like a puppet master.  Choosing people to tell jokes over and over and over.  It didn’t matter if they were the same jokes…and the more offensive the better.  Nobody escaped unscathed.  Jews, Mexicans, African-Americans, the Polish, blondes, gays, women.  Some were funnyish, most were not. 

            Humiliation was his forte.  Of a junior member of the firm, he once announced to the entire office at group lunch, “He’s not the sharpest tool in the shed, but he tries hard.”  He was an expert at finding a weakness and capitalizing on it.  Especially weight.  For overweight employees, group lunch was an exercise in remembering one’s self-worth.  He constantly rode them about exercising more, always “jokingly” of course.  If humiliation was his forte, empathy was not.  Just last month, he called me into his office.  Apparently the day before he saw one of the cleaners in the kitchen with her mouth full.  Our kitchen is always stocked with fruit, so he assumed she was eating the fruit. 

            “Craig, I think you should hide the fruit everyday before you leave.  I don’t want those people eating it.”

            I stood there, dumbfounded.  A man worth a ton of money couldn’t let a woman who probably made minimum wage have a fucking banana?  I was livid.  And everyday, I hid the fruit.  With great shame.  A series of smallish events led to my decision to leave.  After over five years, the toxic atmosphere had seeped into other parts of my life.  My creativity was zapped.  I was drinking at night to forget about the days.  So I handed in my notice, gave an extra three weeks until they found someone to replace me, and I left.  I handled the notice so well, he agreed to pay me for my two weeks of unused vacation.  Until he didn’t.  After I left, he accused me of unauthorized usage of his credit card.  And cut it down to one week.  Basically, I was accused of stealing.  And I haven’t stolen anything since I was twelve years old when I lifted a Playgirl magazine and a set of Lee Press-on-Nails from the local drug store.  So, that was the final nail in the coffin for me.  Any doubt I previously had about leaving flew out the window. 

So to answer the title’s question…I don’t know.  I don’t know what I am doing the rest of my life.  Maybe something in the theatre.  Maybe I’ll teach.  Maybe I’ll move to Provincetown for the summer, schlep drinks by a pool, and screw my way through tourist season.  Maybe I’ll wind up in the welfare line.  Or turning tricks like the trannies on the West Side Highway.  Oh wait, they’ve cleaned up the West Side Highway, so that option is null and void.  Maybe I’ll finally get paid for writing—more than the $50 I was paid for a published piece on broadwayspace.com.  But I just don’t know.  I do know that I’ll never walk into that office again.  And that fills my soul.

            And what did I get from all of this?  Over five years of browbeating, verbal abuse, uncomfortable situations, and having to watch my boss’ utter disregard for another person’s humanity?  Well, first of all I got a life experience worthy enough of an essay.  Secondly…and most importantly….I got a new group of friends.  A small but weary handful of friends who made the days go by a little faster, made the verbal beatdowns a little easier to swallow, and the long group lunches a little less uncomfortable because every time, I was silently laughing at their fake laughter.  So I got friends out of an enormously difficult life experience.  And that’s what counts the most. 

            Because friends would never make me hide the fruit.

Make Me A Match

            I do not condone torture.  However, if I were to meet the guy or gal that invented the online dating service, Guantanamo Bay would look like a time share on Fire Island.  After a few months of hitting the internet chat rooms and other virtual meeting halls for sex-deprived gay men, it was inevitable that I try the G-rated version.  Match.com. Obviously, mucho dollars are spent on advertising for these sites, and they take great pains to coax the lonely and needy into a world where everyone meets their Prince Charming or Sleeping Beauty.  So color me lonely and needy, because I bought into it and excitedly signed up. 

After I paid the hefty admission ticket to enter for three months, I was asked to create an online profile and answer a dazzling array of questions.  I hadn’t been that excited since filling out my senior book in high school.  Ten pages where I got to talk about ME!  My physical features, my favorite vacation spots, hobbies, future plans, favorite food and drink.  Like Christmas for the emotionally unfulfilled.  So I sat down and went to work.  I butched up parts of it in case a baseball fan wanted to take me to a Yankees game.  I toned down my love of show tunes for fear of stereotype.  I could be any person I wanted.  In hindsight, I should have settled for being me.

When it came time to search for my new husband, I was like the proverbial kid in a candy store.  I “winked” at or emailed practically every hunk on the site.  Each email was custom-made for each prospective beau.  When finished, I reviewed the emails and was quite proud of my witty repartee and intelligent anecdotes.  Funny how three glasses of Merlot can make the most mundane of sentences sparkle.  I went to bed that night tipsy and satisfied.  Satisfied, knowing that the next day my mailbox would be chock full of suitors.  It’s horrifying how wrong a human being can sometimes be.

The next morning I went about my day, going to my loathsome job at a downtown Manhattan bank, kowtowing to my uneducated boss, and hitting the gym with a semi-gusto.  I practically skipped home, overflowing with excitement and confidence that soon I would marry.  There were several responses in my mailbox, all unsolicited.  I was crushed.  No one that I reached out for reached back.  I couldn’t understand this.  I was so methodical in my choosing.  If the guy was hot, then he got an email.  Wait. Maybe I should have actually read their profiles.  Looked for similarities and differences.  Suddenly, clarity.  Despite all of their hard work trying to convince us otherwise, the internet dating world is just like the real world, only with emoticons.  Guys that aren’t interested in me in 3-D aren’t interested in my picture/profile combination either.  And the guys that follow me down Eighth Avenue in Chelsea unsolicited will also follow me down the virtual dating highway as well.

So I sifted through the junk.  I reluctantly set up a couple of dates, one of whom paid for dinner.  He turned out to be a nice guy.  A copywriter who accidentally almost form-tackled Katharine Hepburn on a busy Manhattan sidewalk years before. He offered to take me to a Yankees game—being I love baseball—but when I offered just my cheek for a goodnight kiss, that was the last I heard from him.  I retreated to lick my wounds which entailed several glasses of wine and a one-night stand to make me feel worthy.  After getting an unhealthy dose of faux self-worth, I hit it again.  This time I was more realistic about my wants and needs and tried to look for men who were more willing to reciprocate.  The new formula worked.  I started getting some responses from guys who I really wanted to follow me down Eighth Avenue.  At first. 

I accepted a date with John.  A cutie with wavy brown hair.  A buyer at Bergdorf-Goodman.  I met him at the mother ship of gay bars, G.  I was standing at the bar, nervously looking around for my date.  John tapped me on the shoulder, and I was pleasantly surprised.  He looked just like his picture.  I breathed a silent sigh of relief, and his facial expression told me that he did the same.  He bought two drinks, and we headed for a table.  I noticed his oversized man-purse.

“I like your bag,” I offered.

“Thanks,” he dramatically sighed.  “Fifteen hundred dollars.”

I almost swallowed my tongue.

“Really?  My entire outfit costs barely over a hundred.”

“Oh, how could that be?”

Easy.  I went on to explain how the jeans came from a really cool thrift store, my nice fitted shirt came from Century 21, and my new boots were on sale.  He looked at me in disbelief.

“That is so funny,” he went on.  “These jeans alone cost almost a thousand dollars.”

The night proceeded in just this fashion.  Everything had a price tag.  And not only did he tell me how much he paid for his clothes, his house, and every stick of furniture in it, but he also told me how much he made and the huge amount of his recent bonus.  And here I was.  Working for a shitty commercial bank using credit cards almost to their limit and shopping at thrift stores.  If the constant bragging wasn’t enough, each time he told me how much something cost, he dramatically rolled his eyes and looked so put upon as if to say “I stitched every last thread of these jeans” or “I laid every brick of my house.”  I was secretly plotting excuses to get out of going to dinner with him.  Turned out I didn’t need to.  Our income disparity and my obvious disgust were enough.  He didn’t ask.  Instead, he paid the check, and we headed home.  Separately. 

Still stinging from John and his gold-dusted jeans, I reluctantly kept a date with Stan, a date that I had agreed to go on the week before.  So three nights after my lesson in the economics of dating, I met Stan at Gym, a gay sports bar—which I’ve learned is not an oxymoron.  We were to have a couple of beers and then head to dinner at an Italian restaurant.  I walked in, saw him, and we both smiled.  Again, he looked like his picture.  Tall and handsome.  A blue-collar look.  Like he could pour cement or something.  We introduced ourselves, and he bought two beers and turned to me.

“So like I said I’m Stan originally from the Midwest but I would never claim that to anyone HA HA HA HA HA HA no kidding I love the Midwest it’s so provincial and pure and my parents are still there who I adore and my siblings and their kids who I just love do you love kids? I LOVE kids I want three do you want kids?  It would be so neat if you took my last name and then we could name our son Henry!  How much fun would that be?  I love my job I’m a contractor and am so busy all the time and can never find time for a relationship but you’re too cute to pass up and you seem so interesting and fun and cool so what do you say?”

My eyes crossed. 

“I beg your—“

“What do you say about going steady?”

I downed my beer, put five dollars on the bar, and walked out.

“Well, you seem too wound up to have kids anyway!” he called out behind me.

Two weeks later, having given up Match.com for good, I got a message in my inbox.  I didn’t even look at his profile and picture.  I wasn’t interested.  Until I read his email.  No talk of walking on the beach or income level or how many children we were going to have.  Just simple and direct.

“Fuck this match.com bullshit. Do you want to go out to dinner with me?”

I met him for dinner the next night.  He was already seated when I arrived.  He stood up as I approached the table.  Well over 6’4”, he had the kind of smile that made my stomach flip.  Firm in all the right places with a little bit of gut.  Classic features with just a hint of flaw.  I said a silent prayer and sat down.  His name was Doug.  He was a successful visual arts designer from California who had only been in New York for two years.  Conversation was easy.  We talked about our likes and dislikes, the perils of online dating, and our respective horror stories.  Dinner and drinks turned into a three hour date.  I felt like I had known him for a lot longer.  He had exquisite taste in wine and was well-versed in just about everything, including theatre which I love.  Even his flaws were cute. 

“Do you want to go see a play sometime?” I asked.

“Um, yeah.  But I get kind of anxious when I’m boxed in with a lot of people, so I may need to sit on the aisle.  I actually had to get up and leave ‘Mamma Mia’ last month.”

“Well, that probably didn’t have so much to do with your social anxiety as it did with ‘Mamma Mia’,” I offered. 

At the end of the night, he wanted to walk me home.  Walk me home!  I couldn’t believe it.  We got to my front door, and he kissed me.

“This has been the best date.  I really want to see you again.  I haven’t met anyone in a long time that really grabbed me like you did,” he said.

This was it.  My last blind date.  I just knew it.  We made plans for the next week.

“Next time when I walk you home, I’ll come up,” he grinned.

I watched him walk away.  I was happy.  Content.  Smitten. 

I got an email from him two days later.

“You’re a fantastic guy and a great catch.  But dating is just not where I am right now.  Take care, Doug.”

Just like his first email.  Simple.  And direct.

The Way I Am

                              

            In the first thirty-eight years of my life, I’ve had Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, small pox, hepatitis, a brain tumor, gonorrhea, syphilis, and a recurring case of homosexuality.  None were diagnosed by a medical professional, yet more than once I asked my mother for a living will.  I brought this up to my shrink once, and she said, “Craig, I have to go to the bathroom.”  Upon her return, I completed a series of tests, and just like that, she wrapped up all of my previous diagnoses and even tied a pretty little bow on top.

            “Craig, I think you have OCD,” she explained.

            “Oh God.  Occasional Crabs and Dysentery?”

            “No.  OCD.  Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder.” 

            She explained that OCD is an abnormal brain function where a person has intrusive and unwanted thoughts and feelings and/or engages in repetitive behavior in order to halt them.  She told me that medication is not necessary since mine is a mild case and assured me that my recurring case of homosexuality obviously decided to stay.  It seems that part of my OCD causes me to project symptoms of various illnesses on to myself, but unlike hypochondriacs, I keep these feelings trapped in my brain.

            “So, my worries are unfounded?”

            “In most instances, yes,” she assured me.

            What a relief!  Now I could have sex with men without the nagging worry of giving them the Clap.

            At the time of diagnosis, I was twenty-eight, living in

Birmingham, Alabama 

and tip-toeing out of the closet.  Now with this newfound knowledge, my life began to make sense.  The faux illnesses, the angst and sense of dread, the constant praying.  Not to mention the typing in air.  I always thought I was fucked up.  Come to find out I’m just screwed up.

            As a pre-teen, I had an abnormal fear of being kidnapped after I saw a special report by Barbara Walters.  I also have an abnormal fear of Barbara Walters, but some things even medication can’t help.  Her report unleashed unfounded fears in my brain that could be so gripping and immediate, they often paralyzed me.  I went through phases where I never played outside after dark, even though we lived in a tiny tranquil burg where the talk of the town for an entire summer was the bank secretary’s affair. My dad spent many a happy hour at our local country club, and I waited by the window every night for him to come home.  Without him at home, I was more susceptible to being kidnapped by some deranged fanatic in a windowless van.  Each night, like clockwork, I saw his truck lights coming down the street and was relieved whenever they turned into our driveway.  Dad would come inside, sometimes sober and other times blitzed.  Either way, his presence served a purpose:  my physical security.  With him at home, I felt safe and could adjourn to my bedroom for the evening to do homework and watch “Dynasty.”

Things really got odd once I hit puberty.  It was 1985, Rock Hudson had just died of AIDS, and an older football player at my school, Steve Avery, was giving me hand jobs on a regular basis.  I was skinny and unsure, an awkward kid who enjoyed attention from both girl and occasional boy.  I enjoyed a modicum of popularity but quickly learned my role was the class clown, the jester with the effeminate gait.  I also had braces which paved the way for all sorts of nicknames and catcalls and also irritated my gums.  So they bled easily.  Our biology teacher added a new unit to our curriculum that year about AIDS, which was quite revolutionary for a small Southern town in the mid-80’s.  I’m still not quite sure where she got her facts though.

            “One of the first symptoms of AIDS is bleeding of the gums,” she instructed.

            Pangs of horror shot through my gut.  Goddamn it!  I knew I shouldn’t have let Steve touch it!  I went home, locked myself in the bathroom, and looked in the mirror.  With all the melodrama and nuance of Susan Lucci, I wailed at my reflection.

            “Oh GOD!  I’ve got AIDS!”

            Steve couldn’t understand why I wouldn’t play around with him for six months.  I didn’t want to tell him that I possibly had AIDS and that I needed to wait six months for any other symptoms to appear.  Again, not sure where my revolutionary science teacher collected her data.  I waited and occasionally worried that each new zit was a lesion.  Each bleeding gum episode was further AIDS infection from Steve’s hand jobs.  Every cough was AIDS-related pneumonia.  However, six months passed, my gums healed, and I didn’t die.  All clear. Steve was thrilled.

            Throughout my teen years, I was getting reborn and baptized as a result of my pastor’s sermon on homosexuality.  The word ‘reborn” triggered something in my brain, and I had regular engagements at the baptismal pool.  I also prayed.  Constantly. At the time, I subscribed to the Southern Baptist Laws of Christianity and Tolerance.  “If you don’t believe in God, you go to Hell.”  Easy. So to avoid the down under, I prayed the same prayer every night of my life, verbatim.  My brain dictated that any deviation in the prayer would cause my world to fall apart, and I would keep the devil company for eternity.  But when my Sunday school teacher said that we must vary our prayers and not recite something that we don’t mean, I simply reversed the sentences and prayed with conviction!

            “Dear God. Please don’t ever let me or my family get kidnapped, killed, or robbed. Keep us safe from all sin and evil. Please forgive me for my sins. And please let me get a hard-on with my girlfriend without having to think about Steve.”

            Looking back, I’ve exhibited classic symptoms of OCD as well:  keeping everything in certain order, doing tasks a certain way, not readily accepting change.  I’ve always hated cleaning, but my bedroom has always been kept just so.  Everything has a place, albeit sometimes a strange place, but a place nonetheless.  Condoms always in the same drawer as the Bible.  I’m not sure why; it just seems like God intended.  But some things even perplexed my shrink.  After I learned to type in junior high, I began to simulate typing random words that I would hear in my head. The principal could be lecturing me in the hallway. Before I knew it, my arms would be at my side, and I’d be typing in the air with my fingers:   

W-H-A-T  A-N  A-S-S-H-O-L-E! 

            Balance has always been very important to me.  I’ve gone through phases where if I scratch one arm, the other deserves a scratch too.  Smooth the right eyebrow?  My brain would be in a state of fury until the left one was smoothed also.  In gay bars, I’ve gotten more than a few odd looks from men who would playfully pinch one of my nipples, and I would turn and say, “Wait, you have to do the other one too.”

            There are darker compulsions as well.  Since coming out ten years ago, I have discovered that all men, straight or gay, are horny pigs.  The only difference between the two is that straight men don’t have the luxury of sex in the gym.  And never has there been such easy access to compulsive sexual behavior than now in the age of the internet.  It’s easy to mask the fears and doubts of self-worth and the disappointment of rejection when you’re sexually compulsive. Instant validation with the aftershocks of regret and depression.  Sort of like snorting coke with the added benefit of orgasm. But with time and therapy, I found myself surfing the virtual sexual highway with irregularity and confronting the taunting thoughts and fears head-on.  Spontaneity may be gone, but so are the crabs.

            OCD, just like homosexuality, is my DNA. Both needed to be hidden for awhile. Both needed to be eventually accepted. And in the end, both were embraced. And every so often, I’ll meet a kindred spirit. A few years ago, I met a guy at New York’s gay pride parade. He was a tall blonde strapping fellow from Nebraska on his first trip to our fair city.  We talked all afternoon among the revelers and drag queens. We had dinner with my friends, and I walked him back to his hotel. Standing in front of the Gansevoort on a breezy June evening, I was feeling quite randy. Using my substantial sex appeal and with all the romantic intention I could muster, I slowly brushed one side of his blonde hair back behind his ear, a la Streisand and Redford in “The Way We Were.”  He looked at me rather sheepishly.

            “This sounds so weird.  But can you brush the other side back too?”

            I smiled.

            “Absolutely.”

Urinetown

      Six months after moving to New York City, I decided that life wasn’t fucked up enough, so I began dating an alcoholic.  I worked as a temp at a prestigious yet insanely dull midtown law firm.  I lived in an extended stay hotel in Morningside Heights and was awakened each night to the sounds of my next-door neighbor, an Asian transvestite, entertaining her gentlemen callers.  I had met a few acquaintances but spent large chunks of time by myself.  At the time, I was not accustomed to being alone much.  In Alabama I was always surrounded with friends and never did much of anything on my own.  Upon moving, I found that there are worse things than being alone, but occasionally alone wears thin.  And it was wearing thin.  The loneliness was palpable.  I didn’t set out to meet an alcoholic, but he was just too tall and dark and, yes, handsome.  His name was Frank.  And he was very flattering and complimentary.  Two things I love in a man.

            We met in a West Village bar called The Dugout whose clientele generally skewed older and hairier than most.  Frank walked up to me, and he did not fit into this norm.  He was tall with a shaved head, sharp features and brown eyes that were startling in their intensity.  He had a lean muscular frame, and he drank Canadian Club.  Instead of extending his hand first, he did what most gay men do upon meeting other gay men.  He checked out my ass.  I was smitten.  After about an hour of conversation, we left the bar for a little restaurant on Bleecker Street. He ordered the roasted chicken and another Canadian Club and took a deep breath.

            “I’m a recovering alcoholic,” he said.

            “Oh,” I replied and pointed to his newly arrived cocktail.  “Medicinal purposes?”

            “No,” he deadpanned, not really getting my “humor”.  “I went to rehab and dabbled in AA.  I followed the twelve steps but now just do my own thing.  I don’t get drunk anymore but occasionally like a few cocktails.  I know my limits.”

            I never really knew that AA is for “dabbling”, but I didn’t want to judge someone else’s decision.  I figured that as long as he wasn’t hurting animals or small children, then he’s datable.  Christ, my shrink was going to have a field day with this one.

            The relationship started smoothly.  For once, I was all for taking it slow.  Coming from a dysfunctional family with little emotional communication skills, I am now a dysfunctional adult with little emotional communication skills.  So slow is good.  I’ve learned through therapy that I tend to seek out men with some sort of problem that I can try to fix.  Sort of like a home improvement project for the emotionally retarded.  It gives me a sense of purpose and feeling of control.  I knew that this was the case with Frank from AA, so I entered with both eyes open and proceeded slowly with caution. 

Our dates were fun though.  He was a great conversationalist, and we had many things in common.  We both loved the theatre and movies and art.  We had the same taste in literature and politics.  And he looked fine in a pair of leather pants. He took me to see “The Glass Menagerie” on Broadway with Jessica Lange, and I didn’t even flinch when he put his arm around me halfway through the second act.  Coming from Alabama, I have a hard time with even the slightest display of affection from members of the same sex.  In New York, it’s sweet.  In Alabama, it can segue to getting your throat cut.

About three weeks after we met, he invited me to a piano bar where a friend of his sang.  He showed up, visibly intoxicated.  He drank two Canadian Clubs for every one beer of mine.  He carried himself remarkably well considering he was drinking his weight in whiskey.  We decided to call it a night early and headed back to my place.  By this time, I was living in a friend’s vacant studio in Murray Hill where there were no unwanted sounds from an obviously hard-working Asian transvestite. 

After three unsuccessful attempts at sex, he passed out and I fell asleep.  At about four in the morning, I heard him get up and stumble across the room.  Apparently, he was sleepwalking and thought he was in the bathroom.  I opened my eyes and focused just as he began to urinate in the corner.  I ran across the room and looked down in horror.  He was relieving himself on my favorite pair of shoes.  My denim sandals from Kenneth Cole with wooden soles.  They were being used as a urinal.  I lost it.

            “You idiot,” I shouted.  “What in the hell are you doing?  You can piss on anything in this apartment, but don’t piss on my shoes!”

            That was a mistake.  He turned toward me.  Seconds before he woke up and realized what he was doing, he peed on my legs.  He stood there, his dick hanging out, in utter humiliation.  I stood there with his urine dripping down my legs and thought of the irony.  Most gay men would consider that foreplay.  I did not.

            “I don’t think this is going to work.  You really need to go,” I told him after he emerged from the real bathroom.

            I’ve never favored normalcy.  But Jesus, will normalcy ever favor me?  As I mopped up urine at four in the morning, I wondered if there were any normal men or if I would ever be attracted to one.  But I knew in my heart what Frank from AA was.  He was a filler.  Just like on the Academy Awards, when an actor steps onstage to accept his Oscar, a filler takes the empty seat until the real thing gets back.  So that’s what I was doing.  I was waiting on my own Academy Award winner and biding time with guys who were merely keeping his seat warm. Even disregarding the alcohol intake and the urinary misfire, I knew that Frank wasn’t my type.  But loneliness and flattery make a potent cocktail. 

Frank from AA called me one more time, but we both knew it was done.  People think New York City is a huge place.  It is a huge place unless you’re talking about running into guys that you dated but wished you hadn’t.  I’ve run into him in bars, on the street, even in my doctor’s waiting room.  Is anywhere sacred?  I saw him just last summer at a Gay Pride event for people into leather.  It’s also open to people like me and my friends who love to go and gawk.  I was not pleased to see Frank walking around with a drink in his hand but pleased despite myself to see him wearing nothing but a pair of leather chaps.  He still looked damn good.  He gave me a nervous wink.  I gave him a forced grin, and we moved on. 

He’s still an alcoholic, and I’m still emotionally retarded.  I sometimes miss him, but nobody pees on my shoes.