GRINDR GAVE ME COVID

True story. Grindr gave me COVID.

 

Okay, it’s not that simple, like going from Point A to Point B. I’m in a committed relationship. We’re not interested in opening it up to guys with curated dick pic collections. Seriously, is a dick pic enough for a hookup? Not a single face shot or even a pec pic? What happens in such situations? Does one guy head over to another guy’s place, both appearing disoriented when the door opens until the fly unzips? Ah, yes! There you are. 

 

I’m glad I’m not on Grindr. I’ve never set up an account. Still, I’ve learned a thing or two about the app and Grindr “culture” over the years from acquaintances who can’t seem to put their phones away lest some prime uncut specimen be only three hundred feet away. I don’t have a lot of gay friends but, if they’re on Grindr, they don’t talk to me about it. Perhaps they sense that I’d be uncomfortable. I grew up, after all, in a prudish household where repressing things was what made us feel at ease. The only birds-and-the-bees talk I ever had was a quick primer on refilling the hummingbird feeder before my parents went away for a Shakespeare festival weekend. (And, no, there was no wild Saturday night party in their absence. I simply had a few friends over to play Uno while we drank root beer. My friend, Spencer, was the best belcher.)

 

But back to Grindr. Evan’s friends have no problem talking about it. If there are different levels of Grind-ing, I suspect they’ve reached gold status and are hell-bent on achieving platinum. They’re a goal-centered lot. 

 

To be clear, these are guys in their fifties. They seem to have embraced their role as Daddy and get their egos, among other things, stroked by guys at least two decades younger. I presume it’s a quick exit when the young host wants them to linger for a discussion on the transformative powers of “Hannah Montana” or sets up the karaoke machine for a “High School Musical” sing-off. 

 

Evan gets annoyed by how much his friends are drawn to Grindr, but he enjoys the storytelling that comes as his friends run through weekly highlights. I’m mostly quiet, my smile being more about how relieved I am they got the monkeypox vaccine than the play-by-play of a backyard sex incident that required a dog-walking baggy. 

 

I may not understand the intricacies about Grindr, but I didn’t realize that listening to Grindr stories can give you COVID. It happens. I am proof of that.

 

This past weekend was my turn to be on Evan’s turf so I drove down to Seattle. We’d talked about all sorts of road trips that involved renting cabins that were either too expensive or unavailable so we decided to make it a simple Seattle weekend, enjoying his neighborhood by Lake Union, swimming, biking and taking it easy. When I walked into Evan’s apartment, he was on a call with his best friend, Dean, with Evan reading recent reports of people’s hiking experiences on a certain trail. I thought we’d ruled out hikes since Evan said any enjoyable experience required significant driving to avoid trails that were overwhelmed by Seattleites who wanted to update their Instagram accounts. 

 

It took a couple more evening texts before it was decided we’d get up at 5:30, then drive to Dean’s and head to Mount Rainier for our second hike there in the past month. No middle-of-nowhere motel this time, just a two and a half hour drive each way and a four-hour wander along a gorgeous trail.

 

Evan had me sit up front, riding shotgun, as Dean drove. I thought it was part of Evan’s plan to help his best friend and me bond, but then Evan said, “I can’t watch Dean’s driving.” Okay, not a romantic revelation. If someone flew through the windshield, it would be me. I double-checked the seatbelt. Seemingly secure. 

 

I wasn’t awake enough yet to engage in much conversation with Dean. We didn’t make a coffee stop until after the first hour on the road. Who does that? Still, I was indeed getting to know Dean. The guy didn’t require caffeine. Every yes/no question turned into an essay answer with tangents that were hard to track. I tuned out a time or two, visualizing lattes, imagining the aroma, scanning cupholders in Dean’s car. Maybe I could order two for myself. Double shots. Triples! It didn’t matter that we’d reached rural roads where the last sighting of a funky, independent café was twenty minutes behind us. We were in a region where coffee was served at roadside shacks with drive-thru windows and baristas who wore bikinis. I needed a latte even if it came with a cleavage assault.  

 

Dean got on a roll about his Grindr hookups from the week—a guy from the gym, a new twink from Mississippi, even an experience that didn’t have a satisfying ending. Two out of three ain’t bad. One week…Dean had been busy.

 

I got my latte. I showed restraint, keeping it to one. The woman who served us wore a standard t-shirt. Maybe that’s why we were able to drive right up to the window. We got to Mount Rainier and enjoyed the hike, spotting end-of-season wildflowers and lots of mooching chipmunks. No marmots, no bears. A unique cloud topped one side of the star peak. Dean and Evan noted that it looked to be safely covered in a giant condom. It wasn’t an inaccurate observation, but I preferred my more conventional interpretation: a spaceship had arrived for a study of one of Earth’s stunning landscapes. 

 

Dean talked more about sex and perhaps other things on the hike. I wasn’t obviously antisocial, but I often created space as I like hiking to be a quiet experience, taking in the scenery and trying to blot out the impression now that Mount Rainier was covered by a condom.

 

Spaceship.

 

Condom.

 

Spaceship, spaceship.

 

Condom.

Dammit!

 

I’ve gone on a lot of hikes and one of the things that amuses me is how many of them end at a human structure such as the remains of someone’s version of a “castle” or, in this case, a fully intact wooden forest fire lookout station. Yes, the lookout was placed thoughtfully at a high point with sweeping, 360-degree views of mountains all around, but instead of photographing the ridges, near and far, people lined up for selfies and group shots on and around the elevated cabin. As if a standard wooden structure eclipsed all the nature in our presence. Humans are egocentric. And weird. 

 

I snapped away at the mountain views and, yes, got one obligatory pic of The Thing that Man Made. Maybe I’ll give Everest a climb after someone gets around to building a warming hut at the summit or, at the very least, one of those quaint lending library boxes.

 

We walked back, got in the car for the drive home and stopped for lunch at a Mexican restaurant housed in a small-town motel. It’s best that I don’t leave a review on Yelp. When you opt for motel Mexican, the warning signs are implicit.

 

Something about being out of internet range while hiking seemed to have Dean in Grindr withdrawal. He talked more about hookups as I sipped a mediocre margarita—shouldn’t they lose their liquor license?—and watched motorcycles go by. I’m assuming they were in town for the festival set up under tents off the main road, but maybe the town was simply a Harley haven. (Could it have something to do with baristas in bikinis?)

 

On the road again—cuing Willie Nelson here seems apropos—Dean was suffering the equivalent to Grindr DTs. We were two hours out of Seattle, but he propped his phone against the steering wheel and sent emojis or woofs or eggplants or whatever it is people do in the Grindr world to acknowledge someone without saying anything. And, as it turns out, an eggplant (or whatever) was enough. Guys started unlocking their photos. Dicks, butts, sometimes even faces. You’ve reached a kooky corner of the internet when showing your face is more daring than flaunting your penis. Just an observation. Okay, judgy, too. 

 

It was surreal watching Dean at work/play and seeing the way an app for gay men looking for sex can short-circuit regular brain function. Is this what Evan meant when he said, “I can’t watch Dean’s driving”? I was at the ready to yell if Dean swerved or lingered at a green light. To his credit, the guy was a skilled multi-tasker. Even so, I’ll drive next time. My turn, after all. 

 

The next morning, I stepped out to get Evan and me our morning coffees. Snooty café, oh how I missed you! (Have you noticed that servers ignore you until it’s time to pay? “How’s your day going?” is the tired line. “Fine,” I say. They don’t want elaboration. They just want me to press a higher tip percentage on the credit card machine. I still fall for it at least half the time, notably before I’ve had my first coffee.)

 

I got home and handed Evan his almond matcha latte in bed. He cleared his throat and looked at me all too seriously before saying, “Dean texted. He has a sore throat. He took a COVID test. He’s positive.”

 

Wait. What?! 

 

We tested. Both negative. I figured that’s the way it would stay. Evan just had COVID back in June. He got it from my mother after we met my parents for lunch in Seattle after their Alaskan cruise. Mother, father and boyfriend got it; I was apparently immune.

 

By early Tuesday morning, I had a cough and a sore throat. Another test: negative. I drove back to Vancouver, making none of my customary stops in case I was a COVID carrier. By Tuesday night, my list of symptoms had grown. Denial was getting harder to cling to. Still, I have a solid track record of hypochondria so I hoped that ol’ trickster was messing with me again, making me think I felt awful. I tested.  Positive. 

 

I suppose it’s payback. If my cruise-happy mother gave Evan COVID, then let Evan’s cruisy-happy best friend return the favor. Lessons learned: never trust the (future?) mother-in-law and sometimes it’s best not to trust the best friend. Well played, Grindr. You got me.

 

What’s done is done. Let Dean take a break from his app while I catch up on crosswords. Who’s got the upper hand on a good time now?