New Theory

Ok, here's the new definitive reason I'm single.

Of course, me being me and thinking the way that I do I should totally preface this with a disclaimer that this theory has in no way been tested scientifically which means that I may very well be datable and lovable no matter the number of times I speak to the contrary.

Me also being me, this theory must in some fucked up way involve food. In this case, PIZZA!

It's all part of my unique language I have dubbed Chrisenese. If you don't speak it, you may sometimes think you are picking up the thread of what's going on in the conversation, but you'll never be quite sure.

So, I was having pizza for dinner the other night. Two things happened.

The second was that I decided after eating the whole damned thing-or as I like to put it, I fell face first into the thing and sucked-that a medium pizza should be enough to make two meals of. Not the type where you eat half one day and half the next. The type where you have someone with you eating half-maybe with a salad for balance.

THAT, I thought to myself as I dusted crust crumbs off my shirt, is what I need a boyfriend for.

And THAT, I thought immediately afterwards, is why I will never have a boyfriend. They aren't there to keep you from gorging yourself on pizza. Of that I am pretty sure.

People who know me won't be surprised that I started with the second occurrence of the evening when describing my pizza stained epiphanies. They know me well enough to not even hope for me to back track to the first one.

But, in this case...you lucky dogs. It was nearly embarrassing to me, so you know I will totally talk about it!

The first thing that happened was that the pizza guy I have a crush on was my delivery guy that night. Yay! I so want to smear pizza all over him and do rude things to him.

Anyway, he shows up and I have broken routine and not left my money clip on the table by the door. I tell him to come on in and go to the kitchen to get it...where else would it be? He puts the pizza down on the counter as I start flipping past the small bills I keep on the outside of my clip for bus fare, looking for a twenty. I flip past about five twenties before I realize I didn't have any small bills on the outside of my money clip as per my usual. I also notice out of the corner of my eye that this guy is looking like he's getting propositioned...and doesn't mind. He looks kind of comfortable with the idea.

FML.

I grin sheepishly at not paying attention, give the guy a twenty and start crying on the inside. My lusty pizza delivery guy is a hooker.

I am reminded of my amused reluctance to find a new pizza place after I moved to First Hill from Belltown. I didn't want to give up my Zeek's Pizza. I had gotten drunken slices at Hot Mama's on the Hill and thought they would be the next closest thing, rather than waiting over an hour for Zeek's to make it across town.

The thing that amused me about my reluctance was that I had heard rumors of-and I thought these to be just urban legends-the Hot Mama's guys working for their tips, if you get my drift.

This was back before my time in Seatown. In the era of the Timberline night club. An era that has passed, I assumed taking the Hot Mama's hookers with it.

The reality ended up being that the delivery guys were all gals. Really nice ones, too. Alternative and edgy with an "I can kick your ass seventeen different ways" kind of vibe. But really nice.

Until my little hottie started delivering to me. Every time I see him, I almost tell him that I lust him-barely catching myself before I hit on him while he's working.

Now, I guess it would have been ok.

FML, again! No one to share a pizza with and now no one to share a pizza delivery fantasy with. Boo-frickin'-hoo.

the forest through the trees

while my schizophrenic heart hardly allows me peace to live comfortably while seeking personal enlightenment as a single man or enjoying a "for better or for worse" situation with another human, it does know one thing.

i think it knows anyway. btw, i should pause here to provide a bit of proof of the aforementioned enlightenment: normally i refer to my heart and follow up with an, "or where my heart would be if i had one" or a "or the lump of coal i got instead of a heart" type of rejoinder. self-effacing or pre-emptive? you know i can't commit to either.

so, here's what my heart knows: i am not a sex addict or sexual compulsive.

which is something.

this thought started kicking around a few months ago when i went to work at my new job. turns out an old friend of mine works there too, albeit in a completely different part of the world. when he and i used to live in the same city and hang around together he was going through his sexual compulsives program. it was interesting to watch that journey and be there as a friend for him as he experienced it..

but a little part of me always wondered if my frequent hook ups or the not insignificant amount of time i dedicated to getting laid could indicate i was in denial of a similar problem. i always joked and said it was "vigilance, like looking for a clean restroom on a road trip" because you never know where your next opportunity will come or "boredom", kind of ripping off gilbert gottfried on that last one.

now i have answered that question. at the ripe old age of-let's say-37.

no. i am not. (in case you missed that earlier)

here's how i decided. and, no...it wasn't the fact that i was in a relationship for 6 years. simply going without sex for that long does not indicate you are free of sexual compulsion.

the summer heatwave of '09 hit seattle as i began to acknowledge these thoughts burbling to the surface of my subconscious. while i more frequently found myself tending to my small forest of foliage in my condo-watering, removing dried leaves or aged blossoms-i realized that i had stopped chiding myself, or amusing myself as it were, with the thought that i don't own plants but rather slowly kill them. then a few days ago i remembered the relationship guide for a recovering sex addict including keeping a plant alive for a year, moving into a pet and then maybe a relationship with another.

that's what it was. i can keep a plant alive. many of them. although some are less needing of caretaking than others and there are some that did not do as well under my green-esque thumb (just getting ahead of the silver fox's claim to reviving my schefflera when he inherited it as i moved from portland to seattle) i can care enough for the needs of another thing-and, ostensibly, that would include another human.

so what the hell am i doing single? what of those claims that i am too picky, always disqualifying people for habits i deem to be negative or other shortcomings? through some miracle, i am not going to bore you with my laundry list of those attributes i find to be disqualifiers.

the reason i am not dating is simple.

i'm not going to date simply to prove i can. in my opinion, that's why there are so many break ups and jaded and bitter people out there. people are dating-hopefully-just because they can. more realistically, they are probably dating to cover up the fact that they need to have their sexual appetite fed. which is to say they are dating for validation. again, that's why there are so many break ups. once that validation ends, the need is to move on to the next source of validation to provide what one isn't providing for oneself. that cycle continues until these folks find the one person that can provide that validation for them (themselves), another soul that is as co-dependent as they are or as afraid of what being alone suggests about them to the world (love junkies), or become hollowed-out shells of people (tragic and bitter old queens).

let's just say that i am not the guy to settle for very long for one of those latter examples. i'm looking for the guy who knows who he can always rely on and wants a boyfriend or partner to enhance his happiness.

until then, i have plants to tend to.

friends like these

these are the folks you can always rely on.

neighbors you love that you can count on running into when you run into the hall in your underwear to prop open the fire door so you can create a little breeze on your floor on an impossibly hot day.

different neighbors you almost cream storming out of the elevator in the lobby as they try to board. you're in a hurry going on a murder-mart run for a frosty monster lo-carb on that same hot day. no biggie, but then you realize you haven't brushed your teeth since rolling out of bed and throwing on shorts, a tank and flip flops for the run across the street. then compounding your discomfort by realizing you may have had an entire bag of barbeque chips for breakfast in bed, too. luckily, they were coming back from the gym, all sweaty and pitty, so if there were smells it was a melange.

maybe my luck is changing with that realization. changing into galby luck!

galby luck is something i wouldn't wish on anyone, cuz it really kind of sucks. but in life, it is sometimes the small victories that get you through the day. although there are no guarantees that galby luck always works in my favor.

that said, i approach the cross walk with the signal already blinking it's red hand at me, suggesting i hold up for cars, but decide to keep strolling as i text a friend. some poor delivery guy in a blue striped shirt pushing a hand truck decides to push my luck and make a jog for it, too. we could both die or be confronted with obnoxious expressions of the drivers' displeasure since we are bound to slow them down on their way to or from where ever they are to-ing or from-ing. i am not concerned with either scenario that deeply. remember, i'm running on galby luck.

safely and noiselessly negotiating the cross walk, i arrive at the murder-mart to discover a dearth of monster lo-carb. i have to settle for the full sugar option.

so i buy two.

and a lottery ticket.

and a king sized reese's peanut butter cup.

if you're gonna go, go big.

here's the most priceless part:

on the way back home i hit the crosswalk on the red blinky part again. i'm sashaying across the street with two monsters in my hand and a reese's king size sticking out of the leg cargo pocket of my shorts.

trash. purely.

but better looking than most.

when an asian helmed a4 takes the corner from madison onto boren trying for two wheeled speed as much as an asian driver has the balls or skills to try.

i notice the passenger leaning across the driver to lean out the window toward me and yell, "HOOKER!" and realize it's a friend i used to work with.

i start laughing and waggle a monster in front of my crotch like a monsterously sized penis as the car careens down boren. something to give my friend a reminder of the stereotype he just leaned across to screech at me.

i just shake my head and chuckle at my friends.

i do love those hot messes.

then i realize that people on all four corners and sidewalks are looking at me questioningly.

i glance back around the intersection with my best, "why charge for what i can give away for free?" look.

my only recourse after this most amusing comeuppance? a "well-played, sir" on my friend's facebook page. it came out as a simple, "oh, no...you di'nt!" but the meaning was clear.

the response? "I know I laugh for ten min str8 after that. Hahaha" at least my english is slightly better than that rice-poisoned queen. lol.

decomp

i was pretty sure it was to the point this had run it's course. me and this 21 year old guy. let's call him tyo (twenty-one year old. original? i think not).

tyo is a nice guy, we'd started out chatting on one of the myriad gay hook-up/chat sites out there. he was just getting over a relationship. not ready to date, yada-yada-yada. this was around christmas. he was in hawaii on vacation, so it was safe on so many frontiers.

we talked, got friendly, lost contact. basically one of the three or four possible outcomes with relationships between gay guys: meet, fuck, never see each other again; meet, fuck, fall in love; meet, never see each other again and meet, become friends.

scenario number three.

or was it?

a few months later, we start chatting again.

variations on a theme.

particularly, since this time he is apparently over whomever it was in december and whatever had happened with him and was presently dating someone else.

imagine my surprise when he shows up at my lil part time gig one day and offers me a ride home.

fine. scenario number four it is.

we start hanging out. a phrase i generally steer clear of since it is basically gay for hooking up. it used to be that getting coffee was gay for hooking up, but that became such a confusing cliche that we had to evolve. hanging out is way less confusing.

this was maybe late february and we would go for a drink or two now and then, see a movie, grab food or watch a dvd at my place. had to be my place, tyo still lived with the 'rents.

one afternoon, tyo tells me on the phone that he wants to cuddle while we watch whatever movie we're gonna watch at my place that night.

brakes screeched in my imagination. easy, tiger. boundaries.

he doesn't see the big deal, it's just cuddling. now this is something that has confused me about a couple of my friends/neighbors, kiki and bebe, who can sleep in the same full size bed when one or both of them has drunk to much without anything happening or cuddle on the couch while watching tv. another friend, the silver fox, can also put people up for the night in his bed without feeling odd about it. i just don't get it. sharing a sleeping space seems so intimate to me. as does cuddling.

i put the kaibosh on that, explaining that i just don't do that with my friends. cuddling seems to be a gateway toward sex in my experience. i muse that he has perhaps not been held enough as a child.

he keeps working on me.

of course, i am stubborn.

yet, i challenge myself to grow. kiki and bebe can do it. perhaps this is something that is holding back my emotional growth, this intimacy between two friends. we give it a go.

nice.

and then the sexual tension pops up. single entendre, "pops up" is.

i mention in a text or something that i am eager for that sexual tension to fade. this is a few weeks after. his response? he hopes it doesn't.

he breaks up with the guy he's dating.

one night we're watching a movie. cuddling. he rolls over to face me on the couch and nuzzles into my neck, begins to snooze.

i put an end to the sexual tension that night. i'm merely a man.

to my surprise, he seems perfectly open to this evolution in our relationship. i resist doing my "told ya so dance". i do, however, explain my own code of conduct when dating younger guys-leave them better than i found them. i don't want to be part of what i percieve to be one of the biggest issues and oxymorons in the gay culture; namely treating each other like tissue. use 'em and throw 'em away. nsa sexual encounters, predatory sex...come on, how can we demand equal rights and marriage equality as a culture when within that culture we fail to treat each other as equals or with respect? it's like blacks calling each other what my white guilt prevents me from typing.

soon, we're seeing each other four to six nights a week and texting or talking daily.

shortly thereafter, perhaps a few weeks ago, he tells me he has just assumed we were dating exclusively but wants me to confirm it. i do so by suggesting he hasn't left me much time to cat around, nor have i. not my style. doesn't fit within my dating credo.

last week he's talking about joining him and his family in hawaii for the fall.

i'm talking to my friend brian about how to get out of this relationship and whether i want to.

i resolve to ratchet it back before i leave for vacation on july 5th.

my goal, to do so while preserving an opportunity to maintain a friendship. this fulfills my credo and my goal. i have never been good at maintaining friendships with guys i date. i have determined that i generally remain in the "dating" mode with them too long and become so irked with whatever it is that makes me want out of the relationship that i don't want to be their friend, i just want away from them.

then, there's the alternative.

anyone seeing where this is going? i'm not good at building suspense without tipping my narrative hand.

so tyo invites himself to my friends' 4th of july party. the founding members of the dea are throwing it, brian is slated to attend. tyo knows these guys, so i figure it will be ok, plus it has the added benefit of reinforcing my desire to remain friends with him by taking him somewhere with my friends the night before we have "the talk". the next morning i can take him to breakfast, talk, then get out of town so we can adjust to the new parameters of our relationship. i actually dread this type of conversation but really think we'll come out of this friends-who can cuddle.

growth. not bad for an old dog.

shortly after arriving at the party, i ask him to be aggressive about introducing himself to people i talk to if i don't introduce him right off. it means i can't remember their names...he tells me that will be hard for him since he's not that aggressive.

that said, i virtually don't see him the rest of the party. when i do it's strained and i feel like i'm intruding. i take responsibility for his distance by assuming he's miffed at me for what he percieves as pushing him away.

brian is a no-show.

later in the night, the gal i have been chatting with, her friend, antony, and tyo and i are all hanging out. antony suggests heading out to dance. i'm ambivalent about it. antony is being less than sublte about hitting on tyo. antony looks a few years my senior. i send tyo a text suggesting antony could be a little more subtle. tyo looks torn about going out, i tell him we can. he doesn't shoot antony's advances down and antony gets more aggressive. tyo starts shooting me looks that transition from annoyed to complicit. i suggest he go ahead and go out with antony to whatever bar they want to hit and i will take a cab home. i am assured that is not what he wants and we decide to head back to my place and turn in.

i wake up at 5:30, hearing tyo in the bathroom. he comes back into the bedroom and then leaves again. feeling guilty that he is sleeping on the couch because it's been so hot in my condo, i think about going out and talking him back into the bedroom. then i hear a paper bag rumpling in the hall, the door opening and then shutting quietly.

i lay there for a second, confused. i double check the time. still 5:30.

then i get up and take stock of the sitch.

shopping bag with xbox: gone.

toothbrush: gone.

key fob to my building: left behind.

note: negatory.

i pace around, composing my feelings on the sitch for a few minutes. within the half hour, i have sent the following text message: "i love being right...you should have just gone with him last night". ok, not the most mature response, but i feel like i can loosen my grip on the wheel a bit.

this unravels a spool of what are at best poor attempts to spare my feelings and at worse-and so much more likely-lies intended to save face on his part. my favorite was his deliberate decision to leave the party and come to my place the prior night because he knew he could have something long term with me versus what a drunk at a party had to offer. i mirthlessly point out that he snuck out of my place without explanation five and a half hours after making that deliberate decision.

i mention he should have said something and update my status on facebook to indicate how i enjoy being right. perhaps this is too loose a grip on the wheel...

we trade a few texts throughout the morning. tyo tells me he wants to be friends. i suggest he's got some ground to make up before that will happen as my friends are people that are close enough to me that i can invest truths about myself to them and expect real attention and support; suggestions on how to conduct myself. as well as just having fun. the rest of the people i know i classify as acquaintances. someone who places his own comfort above mine, and doesn't mind a lie to me to make things easier on himself since he has no loyalty to me other than an occasional public run in.

i hope he sees the lesson i am attempting to display here.

tyo attempts to roll out a laundry list of reasons why i deserve such poor treatment which ends up containing one item and changes his own status on facebook to something that makes it sound like he has been raped.

clearly the lesson was too thickly veiled for him to discern. sadly, he preferred to not learn from this experience.

i unfriend him and haven't heard from him since. matching his maturity level...i'm so proud.

the dea did mention that they had caught someone having sex in their master bathroom at the party. knocked on the door and left the room so as not to embarass whomever it was. there was a doubt as to what they might have interrupted until they went in after the party and discovered a bunch of missing hand towels and general disarray in the bathroom.

i'm actually surprised by my reaction to this seemingly spontaneous development. i'm sad. i think it's more my reaction to being lied to than the loss of a friendship opportunity.

guess that means i still have more work to do on myself. yet i can't stop worrying that tyo will use me as an excuse to behave unaccountably toward others since he felt perfectly entitled to leave me with no accounting.

Exodus

This is not what I am used to, this reversal of roles.

I am the one who leaves. I am good at it, as a matter of fact. I've gotten used to the fact that when I move a few hundred or a few thousand miles, my friends still have each other to keep themselves company. I don't feel sorry for myself that I wouldn't have that same cushion, I face change with a certain detached interest usually.

Usually.

This last year or two in Seattle has been rough. Economy. Relationships. Personal Finance.

Friendships. Those have been better.

Until I stopped to look around and took a roll call of the locals that are important to me that have begun to be not so local. The overwhelming common thread has been move or face local unemployment.

My best friend here in Seattle, Mark/Kiki, is moving to LA in a couple of weeks. We've known each other for over three years now. Meeting for the first time when Macy's bought Meier & Frank and he came down to survey my store's Women's Shoe business-his area of responsibility.

This was the first of five (I think) Macy's restructures our friendship would pass through. The result was that my job was eliminated and moved to Seattle, hence my presence here in Sea-Town.

I moved on up to Seattle, selling my house and leaving my friends, family and home of a decade to do so. As I had done probably a dozen other times in my life. I moved into Mark's apartment building (the Shelby) and a year later bought a condo in the same building (the Decatur) that he bought his in.

I joke that I am his SWF.

We have a weekly brunch at his house with his group of friends and neighbors. It's fun. It helps me stay in touch with pop culture through the conversations that people bring with them. At the very least generally reinforces my decision to not watch tv as we have VH1 or MTV on for background noise and the discussions they provoke. The amount of energy spent on and invested in Brett Michael's Rock of Love Tour Bus is certainly disturbing. Both for content and the fact that it does prove to be entertaining...don't get me started on Tool Academy.

Today was the last brunch at his house. It was the typical fun and food with a side of sad. I don't know what my social life will be like without him here.

Earlier this month another friend of ours, Mark's boss at Macy's, made the same move.

In March Crystal-the manager of our old apartment, the Shelby-and a friend of mine, packed up her family and moved to Texas to try her fortune in that job market after her job here basically cut her pay by 25% due to the economy.

Also in March, one of the founding of the DEA was put through the less-than-dignified process of having his work pyramid restructured and being asked to re-apply for his position, with the stipulation that it would likely not remain in Seattle, so he and his partner/outlaw husband were facing relocation. Unluckily, he was not re-hired for his job and is now unemployed with about 12% of Seattle. His job search thus far has pretty much indicated that he will be relocating. Early speculation suggests it will be DC, where else would a lobbyist for the drug company have more opportunities? So, when I look at Chip and Joel nowadays at our weekly Burger Night at Purr (Purrger Night) I already see them from a distance.

Last fall, my boss here when I was with Macy's was actually promoted-one of the few beacons of a positive light in the last year I can recall. His promotion took him to Salt Lake City. He comes to town every now and then, maybe once a month. Sadly, I don't always get to see him since he's usually only here once a month or so. His promotion came at the same time that a couple thousand other people at Macy's in Seattle lost their jobs due to a merging of buying offices. Basically the same process that is causing Mark to have to relocate. It's also causing another former co-worker of mine from Macy's to have to relocate to Vegas in order to remain employed. This is the final restructuring go-round for Macy's corporate employees in Seattle. The remaining 200 or so are pretty much evaporating as it happens. Going forward, there will essentially no longer be a corporate presence for Macy's in Washington. The prior lay-off scattered friends of mine from Macy's to New York City, Chicago, Vegas and many other cities as people-friends-sought employment elsewhere. Recently, I have even gotten reports that some of those friends who lost their jobs and moved have now lost their jobs again and are beginning the process all over again.

I went through that in 2007, leaving Macy's and not working for two months. Suffering through another four months of unemployment after my new company-US Bank-let me go later that same year. Six months off all-together that year, it was financially devastating. I still feel that pain as well as a certain guilt for having enough savings and a comfortable enough family to help pull me through my financial collapse in style. But it may have looked too easy and sent the wrong message to my friends. The side of that experience for me that I kept private was that I emerged from it essentially broke. Savings, gone. Retirement fund, gone. Credit-worthiness, gone. Now I have to watch friends go through the same thing-and try to comfort them without sounding hypocritical for having a family that could help me through.

I see how hard it is for these friends to leave; most having no real or recent experience uprooting themselves, their families and abandoning their lives, friends and homes simply for work. It's like the homesteaders of our country's history.

I have "lost" more friends to this crap economy in the last year than I did to AIDS in the 80's and early 90's. The consolation is that they are alive, just out of my life. The speed with which they are leaving my life is much more shocking than that earlier, sadder time though.

All I have is the equanimity that I traditionally face change with. Hopefully, that lack of panic will be rewarded with a return to reasonable levels of unemployment as well as normal rates of pay for myself and my friends. Hopefully, that will be the outcome. I cannot stretch my imagination to see a worsening of this shituation.

The Difference, Redux

So after my Friday the 13th romance revelation in Portland, I returned home with a renewed sense of purpose toward my dating exploits.

I dumped the, pardon the expression, fuck buddy after telling him that I sought something more meaningful. I made it clear that seeking that depth in a relationship didn't exclude him, but I knew that beneath his repeat trips to my place lay nothing more than an interest in a good lay. He is 21, after all. Wanting more from that situation is like wanting marriage equality from a Republican administration. Besides, if I knew he was coming over each week, how hard would I really look for something deeper?

That said, try to keep up with this account of my initial foray into the wilds of Seattle:

I met a guy in a bar while I was out enjoying a few drinks with my friends, Mark and Brian. I spoke to him. I expressed my interest in him. As he was leaving me with nothing, I became aware of another man in the bar staring at me. I ignored this. I can project, fairly accurately, what his thoughts might have been-but until he makes himself available, he's just another barfly.

Seriously...he's there with a pitcher of my favorite food every time I go to the Elite.

Soon enough, all of my friends fade into the night and I am nursing the last of my beer alone. The Barfly is staring at me again. No easy thing, considering I am directly behind him. He has turned himself completely around on his barstool to stare at me.

Feeling belligerent, I stare back. Holding his gaze with mine. I realize how much stronger I am than him, as his increasing discomfort is betrayed in his eyes.

Still, he won't let go. I am slightly impressed by this but suspect he has selected a spot slightly over my head to stare at, making it easier for him to rise to my challenge.

I release him with the raising of a single eyebrow-no small feat given the amount of botulism in my forehead. He turns around and nurses his loss in his pitcher.

Finishing my beer, I reflect on the evening and how quickly I retreated from my earlier assertiveness to my old habits by playing a mind game with the Barfly. He's someone that I have been warned to stay away from which should be reason enough for me to engage yet I confine my actions to games-which, not for nothing, I do win. Perhaps it was the knowledge that my friends found him to be an unsatisfactory person for me that kept me from exercising my new strategy of making myself available. Putting it out there, so to speak.

Yet I was the one who was in the hot seat. The object of affection. For the moment. Why must I make any move at all? If he had wanted me, he could have very well (perhaps) gotten off of his barstool and come over to speak with me, right?

Laying aside these distinctly un-heavy thoughts, I make my way to the bathroom before heading home.

He tracks me in the mirror the whole way. Pussy. But that pejorative may be a bit harsh depending on how long he has lived in Seattle. He simply may not know how to behave or express his interest in a functional capacity. It is a hazard of this environment.

Or probably he was drunk.

Berating myself in the restroom (internally, of course) for letting his bs put me off my commitment to myself to be more assertive in finding an acceptable dating situation, I made a point of stopping to speak with him on my way back from the bathroom.

"I couldn't help but notice you looking at me before." No wonder I'm single.

But what a wonderfully sublime statement. He was staring. And my return gaze was simply hostile.

Anyway, Barfly and I talk, he invites me to sit and I accept having found that I actually am enjoying the conversation.

After about 20 minutes, the first guy walks back in. Gay-ja vu!

He seems absorbed with his group of friends, so I just stay put and enjoy the conversation while the bar burns down around me. No, wait...that bright light wasn't fire, it was the lights coming on. Shit, I closed the worst bar in Seattle! Damn it, damn it, damn it!

Barfly is too drunk to drive, so I bring him home and let him sleep it off. He passes out immediately, which is nice. I stick to my own side of the bed and have a fitful night's rest. In the morning we snuggle a bit and then exchange numbers as we head out into the day.

Midway through the day, I get an email on my phone letting me know that a friend request on facebook.com has been approved.

WTF?

It might be sad that I don't recall making a friend request of anyone recently. Then it hits me. On a lark, I had made the request while I was talking with my friend, Brian, the night before and the guy he was chatting up had told him to hit him up on facebook. Knowing, ok-suspecting, he wouldn't, I did.

This had the added advantage of perhaps helping me find the original boy from the Elite the night before as he had come to my attention when his friend had struck up a conversation with Brian. God bless ulterior motives.

My life is like an episode of Soap. Remember that sitcom? If they made my life into a TV show, it would be, of course, a shitcom. But I ain't complaining! LOL.

So now I have options. Just by dropping a set and talking to people I find appealing. Even if it's only physical. I mean, that's generally where anything starts, right? Who ever says, "I met the ugliest guy last night!"?

I make a tentative date on facebook with the first guy. No name for now but I am sure one will come to me soon enough. He immediately starts texting me. Frequently. It's cute, but come on, we haven't even met yet. Officially.

Around 2:00 a.m. that next day, I get a few texts from Barfly. Closing time. How charming.

Barfly wants to come over. That's a negative. Some of us have to be awake in four hours, pal. I make plans with him the following evening. Feeling good about the sitch, good practice if nothing else.

A lot happens that next day.

The boy with no name continues to text me like a teenage girl on spring break and Barfly cancels our date for that evening, not feeling well.

I leave Barfly with the "Call me when you're feeling better" chestnut, expecting never to hear from him again and make a date with the boy with no name...let's actually call him the Mad Texter.

So, as it happens, I have no real time to commit to either of these guys in the upcoming week so it's good that Barfly has malaria and is out of the equation for the week. The Mad Texter, on the other hand...sooner for him is better. I have learned in the interim that he is 22. Nothing like instinct to guide your attractions. In my defense, he looks much older. Might just be the company he keeps.

Between working toward a VP visit at work-chaotic hours included-and the gym, I manage to carve out a couple of visits to my fave watering hole, Purr, to keep up with my friends and frenemies.

Both times, the Mad Texter just happens to be there.

Creepy. You'd think I would have noticed him before this if he's so frequently in the places I frequent.

I usually enjoy a few minutes chatting to this guy (sic, as he doesn't say much) but would like to see him when one or both of us is not buzzed, so I am looking forward to our dinner date later in the week.

The big day finally comes and I get a text as I am walking over asking if we are still on. This kind of ticks me off, but I confirm.

Long and short of it? Finally? My first thoughts when I see him are "Are you stoned?" and "Thanks for dressing up". He's in a baseball tee and jeans and has eyes like he just came out of a burning building. Maybe he was at the Elite when it burned down, too...

He says almost nothing during dinner. More awkward is the fact that he seems to have difficulty making eye contact.

I find myself hoping it's because he has had a change of heart upon seeing me while he is sober. After buying dinner for him, I am barely able to manage the offer of a ride home. Barely. So I am not surprised when I exit the car at my curb and have not been thanked for dinner.

Diane Fossey, could you please begin teaching your gorillas to use sign language to communicate again? It was so useful.

Before the elevator reaches my floor, I recieve a text saying "Thanks for dinner". He is, after all, The Mad Texter.

That point notwithstanding, I haven't had much to say to him recently. What, I need a long distant relationship with someone that lives in the same town as me?

But, at least I am out there. In person and off line, which is how god would have intended it if he had any designs on my social and romantic life, I'm sure.

The Difference

I've grown immune to the reproachful glares and comments of my friends over this topic...a fact I am grateful for as it allows me to finally articulate the meaning behind my frequent complaint that "Seattle men suck".

The most common defense to this-once it is determined that I won't be silenced with a stare-is either "All men suck" or some version of "Men are the same everywhere". I particularly love it when people who have lived in the same place their entire lives use something like that last chestnut.

Now, let me explain the basis of my complaint: I have lived in many cities, both in and near major metropolitan areas: Portland (forever my hometown), LA, Tampa, Long Beach, Houston, KC and Seattle. I have never failed to secure a relationship in anyone of them, until Seattle. It is my relationship Elba. To save you the trouble of googling Elba, it is the exile of Napoleon. Famous for the palindrome, "Able was I, ere I saw Elba" that defined Napoleon's impotency as a ruler. Likewise, Seattle defines my impotency-in a shituational, not sexual manner-as a lover. I'll work on a palindrome to capture the full tragedy of my shituation.

While I declare the men sub-par, from a dating and relationship stand point, simply leaving the city is not the easiest means of correcting my displeasure. I love the lifestyle of the city. I live and work, essentially, downtown. I walk everywhere. My carbon footprint is smaller than a foot-bound Chinese woman's footprint. I have made many great friends who accept me for me, what's not to love about that? And the guys I meet casually out on the town are pretty nice, too. Very nice, actually-and usually pretty damned hot. For many reasons, Seattle is the town I have lived in that I feel the most connected to despite the pull from home.

Many times, I will be out and be perfectly ignored by men. Which is fine, I am one who definitely appreciates looking and not touching, sometimes. But on those occasions that someone comes and talks to me, I suspect they are simply killing time while waiting for their friends to arrive or punishing their friends by ignoring them for a while. I know, how jaded can I be, right? Seattle men simply do not venture out unaccompanied. Too insecure to stand alone in a bar is my guess, and I will explain my theory there later.

Seattle is a sometimes brutal town, perfect for someone as judgmental as me to blend into and disappear. LOL.

On those occasions where my friends are feeling "encouraging", they will be my perfect wing-man. Spotting guys who are "into me" or gently nudging me toward the current object of my erection-er, affection. To what avail, I cannot say. I usually decline because the typical Seattle gay has proven to be a formidable adversary I dare not face when overloaded with drink and when underloaded, seen simply by yours truly as a fruitless endeavor.

I will say this. Seattle men love their sex. Getting my rocks off has certainly been easier in some cities from an opportunity standpoint, but generally never easier to do without fear of entanglement. It seems anyone in Seattle who wants a boyfriend already has one, and I have slept with many of them-in one week I managed to hook up with both men in a relationship...unbeknownst to either of them, which is it's own tragedy in my opinion. But the vast majority of Seattle men claim to not want a relationship, many in this category have a very close group of friends that meets the emotionally intimate needs they may have that are normally channeled into a relationship. This leaves only-in most cases-their sexual needs unmet.

This is where guys like me come in. No pun intended.

When I arrived in Seattle from Portland three years ago, I was amazed to find myself in the middle of a "fresh meat phenomenon" at the advanced stage of life I had achieved. Yet there I was, Ball of the Belles, so to speak. Getting chatted up in bars, people throwing undies at me as I walked down the street-figuratively. Yet when I would try to wrest this phenomenon from the bar and to a restaurant or show, it was no dice.

When you could wrangle an encouraging response from someone, it lacked the enthusiasm and spontaneaity of sincerity. "Let's get together for dinner next week" was met with "I'm busy next week". It always seemed people were two to three weeks out. Then you had to deal with re-scheduling as the date approached. I've forgotten why I liked you or what you looked like by then. I began to recognize this as part of the phenomenon that people referred to as "The Seattle Fade". That's basically the live and impersonal version or "It's not you, it's me". Trust me, I know it's you, buddy.

Confuzzled, I banged my head against this wall for a couple of years, slowly both building my own insular group of friends and giving into the free, one-off sexual environment that Seattle appeared to be. Neither of these situations was a full fledged shituation, but neither was fully satisfying to me. My life was and is in imbalance.

While vacationing at home, it hit me over dinner one night.

Last night, to be specific.

Friday the 13th.

The day before Valentine's Day.

Apropos, no?

I met my friends in the bar at Starky's while we waited for our full party to arrive for dinner. The waiter approached, flashed me a 100-watt smile that hit his eyes and expressed his interest perfectly, took my order and wandered off.

"And out of my life forever" is the way I have come to describe those scenarios. You all know my penchant for waiters, baristas and bartenders...I have learned to take those attractions as life's simple pleasures without expecting anything other than the enjoyment I get from a little eye-hockey and smiling during whatever transaction is at hand.

While we waited, Big Word Ben pointed out a guy who would be right up my alley. Short, cute, even had some ginger hair going. Eagerly I spin around in a not-too-obvious way to look, locking onto the proposed object of my affections just as BWB chuckles and says, "Oh wait, you already had him!"

How droll.

He was a guy who picked me up in a bar. Not literally, but he had game. He chatted me up. Asked for my number. Made a date. And then we did something prior to having sex.

The way the god of the godless intended.

Giving up on a seating quorum, lesbians running on their own timetable as they are want to do, we are seated in the dining room where our waiter comes over and proves to be more than attentive to every man at the table. Ending, and lingering on your humble scribe. I write this off as his schtick initially, but he keeps coming back to me. When the ladies in our party finally arrive, they know him and he introduces me as his Valentine.

Cute.

The thing is, he actually did ask me out. He wanted me to come back when he finished work and when I couldn't he actually asked me out for Valentine's Day. All apologies and no guarantees, I thanked him for the invite but told him I was probably not going to have the time.

On the sidewalk, it hit me.

I had just witnessed the difference, specifically, between Portland and Seattle men. Perhaps to some degree between Seattle men and men most anywhere else.

Action.

Not the kind that takes place between the sheets, figuratively or literally. The kind of action that happens before that.

The kind of action that requires balls. A fearlessness and willingness to pursue what you want because you are worth it. The perfect compliment to this is tact, of course. Manners. An ability to say, "Thanks, but no thanks" without judgment, ridicule or scorn.

Seattle lacks both of these traits, by and large-in my experience. I say that in a completely non-judgmental way, not that it will be believed. My epiphany last night was full spectrum. I saw the entire evolution of this social phenomenon-I almost said "problem" but that would be judgmental.

The men I have encountered lack the willingness to expose themselves enough to rejection to express a valid interest in getting to know someone, giving it instead lip service in their on line "dating" profiles by saying something along the lines of "Open to LTR, with the right guy". But they also lack the tact to politely decline the advances of another man without using the opportunity to elevate their own worth at this would be suitor's expense. Most often, you see someone walk away to a disdainful lear or the subtle "heads in, voices down so he doesn't hear us talking about him" recap. What happened to the days when you could be hit on by someone and tell your friends about it after he left and they would say "Well, that was nice" versus "What was he thinking"?

I think I know.

Seinfeld is the answer.

Seriously.

And he owes me an apology, specifically, but the town itself, as well. Now, his forgiveness is assured, because I do adore him, but still...

I'm going to unofficially pinpoint the date of this emotional deterioration to George Costanza declaring Seattle as "the pesto of cities". I imagine that this began a snowball's journey that has ended with hearts both retarded and frozen inside the chests of many a Seattle-ite. Who wouldn't want to be in the trendy, new city in the Wild West?

Partner that endorsement with Microsoft, et al's creation of new wealth in such a small city area and you probably have a higher than average concentration of people who aren't quite sure how to behave, being caught between the social "caste" they were raised in and the one they now percieve themselves to exist in. As a stranger in a strange town, they have no one to hold them accountable to their behavior. No one knows where they belong, so they self-direct and recreate their social status according to their new geography and wealth, by wallpapering themselves with ego-inflating paycheck after ego-inflating paycheck, losing the person they were along the way.

Didn't these people watch the Brady Bunch growing up or any of the ABC After School Specials?

So, while I enjoy living in the urban setting that Seattle offers and love my friends there as intimately as my personality affords me; I am reminded of an old adage that has been replaying in my head since last night's encounter: "Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home". Perhaps it refers not just to the surroundings in this instance.

Anyway, I'm sure this type of observation is better left to the Diane Fossey's of the world, but there's my $.02 based on my experience. Do I give up? Most certainly not. Am I enjoying the adventure? A little less over time. That's on you, Seattle.

I'm sure this will rain down the ire of many people in my adopted town, so be it-if I am not allowed my opinion, my point is likely made for me. For those who can't accept that, build a Chris-shaped effigy to symbolize your insecurities and I will put the match to it.