ADJUSTING, TO ABSENCE…AND TOGETHERNESS

Chez Evan. I'm sure there's some
fancy name for the colourful wall
collection but it's lost on me.

On a Friday night in late August, I am sitting in my boyfriend’s Seattle living room. Alone. He won’t be back until tomorrow evening. I’ll pick him up at the airport in his car which was left stranded in visitor parking at my place in Vancouver two and a half weeks ago. It’s a convoluted story, arising from a two-day flight delay in Ottawa which radically changed Evan’s itinerary. 

 

Pre-Evan, I came to Seattle several times a year. Alone. Seattle was one of my weekend escape spots, a break from where I lived in Vancouver. Alone there, too. Somehow being alone somewhere else made my relentlessly coveted time to myself more special. Exciting even. 

 

Now, instead of racing around, trying to snap as many evening shots of whichever area of Seattle I might be in, I’m chilling at Evan’s. Technically, not chilling. Evan lives in a heavily shaded, first-floor apartment where it’s always chilly, even in late August. But here I am, alone, and I don’t have socks on, I don’t have a blanket draped over me and I’m not checking my earlobes for icicles. When he left for his trip, he closed up all the windows. It’s never been like this. Room temperature actually feels like room temperature. Evan always says he needs fresh air when he’s here. He keeps the windows open through every season and walks around with four layers of clothes, dressed for arctic conditions. 

 

I’m a one-layer guy. Layers add what I view as heft, not on Evan, but definitely on me. Sane or otherwise, the perception is intertwined with my eating disorder. Heft = Heavy. I haven’t opened any windows since I arrived an hour ago. There is no window battle—the overt kind which is futile or the covert kind where I sneakily—desperately!—close panes a smidgen and then another smidgen. One of my smidgen maneuvers resulted in an irreplaceable glass vase crashing to the floor, scattering in hundreds of pieces. Evan still mourns. I’d have broken it eventually. I’m highly accident-prone. 

 

BONUS: With the windows shut, I can’t hear dog walkers passing by. Can’t even hear the dogs. This is heaven!

 

Adding to the quiet is the fact the speakers in every room are silent. Normally, it’s NPR or jazz during every waking hour, even when Evan’s gone to work or the yoga studio. I like his station choices, but I can only the same three-minute newscast every half hour once. I welcome silence. Especially when I want to write. 

 

Evan had me download an app to control the speakers, adjusting the one volume in one room while keeping status quo in another. Most of the time, all I want is “Off.” I press a button on an actual speaker and my wish is granted. All the speakers shut down. Somehow that kind of simplicity messes up the app and the timing of the speakers next time Evan turns the system back on, aka, when the moment he returns home. He asks if I used the app for the speakers. I smile what he says is my fake smile. I suppose it’s a slightly evolved version of my eleven-year-old smile I’d offer whenever coerced to participate in a family photo. My grins remain a work in progress. My generation was not taught The 6 Essential Poses for Social Media as a prerequisite to kindergarten. 

 

Without distractions, I read a chapter of a novel, not once losing my place. I’m confident I haven’t added wrinkles to my forehead or made my crow’s feet more pronounced because I haven’t been squinting while reading. That’s because I’ve just discovered that Evan’s shaded abode actually has great lighting. Without clarification, Evan would be offended that my discovery comes a year and a half into our relationship. He’s a designer with consummate style. Lighting is an area he’s especially passionate about. His vintage lamps and art deco light fixtures are prized finds he’s been collecting for three decades. So, yes, I know he has great lighting. What I’ve just learned is they can project a functional level of brightness. For me, bright lights mean easy reading; for Evan, they render everything overexposed. Ambience is lost. Blemishes are exposed. The coffee stain on my sleeve garners too much attention. Reading alone at Evan’s with full-capacity lighting, the pages of my book look white instead of dark gray. Sentences don’t play hide-and-seek.

 

It's nice to stretch out on the sofa as I read. My shoes are off, as they always are when I step into my place or Evan’s. This mystifies Evan. Drives him crazy. A man of style, he views my shoelessness as offering an incomplete look. I remind him I’m Canadian. It’s what we do. I’ve googled it to show him shoes off is the norm in many countries. I feel weird being shoed in someone’s home. I like this Canadian gesture. Quirk, if you will. With no shoes, I can stretch out, feet up on the furniture as I read. Without having to go another round in the shoe debate, I manage to read a second chapter.

 

Pillows are nice but sometimes they
make me feel I should sit on the floor.
(NOTE: Not Evan's home. Too much light.)

Before fully settling in, I had to rearrange a few things on the sofa. Evan loves pillows almost as much as lamps. I stack them just right so I’m sitting straight, not swallowed up. My back has been giving me a hard time lately. There’s sorting to do as well. I move the meat pillows to an empty chair. 

 

For strictly ethical 

reasons, I prefer

Pam's lettuce bikini.

That’s right, Evan has meat pillows. Meat pants, too. It’s not stunt fashion like when Lady Gaga wore a meat dress, slabs of bacon stitched together with a keyhole neckline for peekaboo cleavage. That’s over-the-top offensive, one of those desperate fashion stunts to out-Insta the Kardashians. As a vegetarian of nearly four decades, I stopped wearing leather shoes and belts long ago. I got tired of my meat-loving friends poking holes in my principles. Without leather, my fashion options are fewer—pleather rarely wows. I now have three dozen pairs of Converse to contrast with Evan’s extensive cowboy boot collection. We’re the same shoe size but we don’t play tradesy. 

 

The leather pillows get cast aside. I’m thankful the whole dang sofa isn’t leather. 

 

So here I am. Friday night. Alone in Seattle. Kinda like the good ol’ days. Bright lights, comfy temperature, a peaceful aura, kicking back, shoes off, a safe distance from cow coverings. It’s bliss as a throwback of sorts. Life before Evan.

 

But it’s tainted. This is life without Evan. 

 

Despite the objective perks, I don’t like it.

 

I miss the man. We’re different in so many ways. Sometimes there’s a lot of negotiation. Sometimes we just accept that we’re two different guys who, on the important things, aren’t too different. Our habits and tastes may vary but our values are in sync. 

 

I’m enjoying the moment, but I look forward to driving his car to Seatac, hopping out of the car with flowers in my hand, giving him a kiss and a hug and returning to Home Base Washington. I’ll be closing the windows, a smidgen, then a smidgen more, but I’ll be smiling—genuinely—through my shivers. I’ll continue to deal with his way as he continues to adjust to my way. 

 

In time, we’ll have “our way” fully figured out.

 

IN ADDITION TO CRUSHES, CROISSANTS AND COMING OUT, "HEARTSTOPPER" TOUCHES ON AN EATING DISORDER

The second season of “Heartstopper” on Netflix went down just as smoothly as the first. I paced myself, allowing only one episode per night, stalling the story as I took off for the internet-free family cottage—first visit since 2019 (curses to you, COVID!). 

 

My boyfriend watched the first season under duress. It was the early months of our budding relationship and I suppose he was still learning when to say no. He prefers shows with zombies, cowboys and, the ultimate of ultimates: cowboy zombies. There are probably four of five such series, but I can’t name them. We’ve both gotten very good at no. 

 

I didn’t even try coercion this time. I get that “Heartstopper” is too sweet for viewers accustomed to “Game of Thrones,” “The Walking Dead” and flicks about Jeffrey Dahmer. I wondered if I’d get into the second season. I thought I might have graduated from mild high school drama but, once again, “Heartstopper” was the sugar fix I didn’t know I needed. 

 

For all its lite-ness, the show surprised me by introducing a rarely addressed subject: male eating disorders. At first, the hints that were dropped were too subtle. In the fourth episode of the season, as the gang explores Paris on an extended field trip, Nick buys Charlie an ice cream cone which Charlie refuses, saying he’s still full from breakfast. What? Ice cream from the bf is supposed to be romantic and, gosh golly, it’s ICE CREAM. Who could refuse? 

 

As an aside, was I the only one

distracted by the size and amount

of food Tao & Elle have at the movies?

(I could. As much as I love ice cream, it’s chocolate and that’s never been my thing. I won’t waste calories on a flavor I know doesn’t do anything for me. But then, I’m a guy with an eating disorder. Every bite I consume—of anything—is carefully considered.)

 

Charlie takes a lick. And, because it’s “Heartstopper,” he gets chocolate on his nose and is oblivious to it. Like a four-year-old. Or like an adorable teen boyfriend. Nick swipes his thumb across the chocolate spot and then licks his thumb. Aww. How cute. End of scene. We assume Charlie eats on and lets Nick clean his face after each messy lick. No napkins. Let’s conserve paper.

 

Later, the entire school group gathers for dinner and Charlie looks somewhat repulsed by the meal set in front of him, some sort of meatball dish drowning in heaps of dark gravy. He hesitates, as would many people. He doesn’t even touch it but then that’s because there’s a very public tiff between one of the teen couples. No one eats. Charlie and Nick leave the dining room to comfort one of people involved in the quarrel. There’s a little group hug. Happy, happy. Does he go back and have dinner? Who knows? That doesn’t seem to have any bearing in the story.   

 

It wasn’t until episode five that my eating disorder detectors awakened. At breakfast on Day 2 in Paris, with more skipping and hugging and laughing on the itinerary, Charlie says he isn’t hungry. It’s possible he’s upset from being teased over a hickey—how’s that for a high school plot point? (This is a far cry from HBO’s “Euphoria.”) Charlie’s not feeling well. And then, later:

 

Charlie faints.

 

That’ll happen when someone doesn’t feel well and/or doesn’t eat enough. If this were a teen vampire show, it could even be the result of that hickey. Proving to be a thoughtful boyfriend, dear Nick had wrapped up and carried around the croissant Charlie didn’t eat at breakfast. I’d figured this teensy storyline was an queer adolescent version of saving the damsel in distress. No dragon or evil knight to fight; just hunger pangs sated with a stashed French pastry. Très romantique! 

 

But then “Heartstopper” goes for it. Nick expresses concern about Charlie: “I want to understand.”

 

Charlie, bless him, opens up. “I know I don’t eat like normal people. Some days I’m fine but…other days I feel like I need to…control it. I used to do it a lot last year when everything at school was really bad. Sometimes it feels like the only thing I can control in my life.”

 

Charlie takes a small bite of the treasured croissant. “It’s a bit dry.” A joke for levity. Back to touring the museum. A playful tumble. An admonishment. Time to flee. Boy chases boy. Apparently, the fainting spell has passed. A wee bite of the underwhelming croissant energizes. 

 

I’m the one wanting more.

 

The momentousness of the scene is not lost on me. My obsession with weight began at ten. Anorexia set in at seventeen, roughly Charlie’s age. That’s the onset for many guys—when there’s that push to coax a bicep out of some dumbbell curls, when the dream begins to get a six-pack from a hundred sit-ups. Or a thousand. There are guys who are genetically gifted with tonier body frames. They become the standard. Along with the Brad Pitts du jour, gracing magazine covers and posting shirtless selfies across social media. It’s the look to strive for. It’s what elicits a hundred likes per post. Or a thousand. 

 

Come on, “Heartstopper.” Charlie’s character has the potential of offer something more than, It’s okay to be gay. Charlie shows there’s still a struggle in coming out, there’s still bullying and sometimes it breeds a sense of chaos a young person can neither calm nor control. The Croissant Incident is a welcome start but, when you scratch the surface of a serious subject, there’s an obligation to go deeper…even in “Heartstopper” happyland where animated flowers and butterflies flutter across the screen and where problems last no longer than a zit.

 

I went to bed bothered. The show hadn’t even given Charlie’s condition a label. Some labels matter. Some labels are the first step to understanding differences and, in this case, getting help.

 

The subject didn’t come up in the next episode. I still loved “Heartstopper,” even if I felt a tad heartbroken. Opportunity knocked, then ran away.

 

It’s hard to fit Big Topics into a feel-good show and the second season may have overpacked for its journey, epic Parisian field trip and all. The story arc for the season centers on Nick coming out, a gradual process of telling one person, then another, with hesitation and stumbles along the way. There’s also an absent father, a lesbian struggling with the word love (and vague issues on the home front), a boy discovering he’s asexual/aromantic, another boy crushing on a trans girl, an older sibling returning home to resume being a jerk, a harsh ex seeking forgiveness and two teachers as clumsy with their feelings as the teens. How the heck can “Heartstopper” adequately portray a guy’s eating disorder?

 

With only two minutes left in the seventh episode, Nick’s mother puts the subject back on the radar while cleaning up after an eventful dinner involving the two boys’ families: “Charlie didn’t eat very much.” Yay, mom. Adults in these shows aren’t supposed to solve things, but it’s enough to prompt Nick to search “eating disorders” on his phone. 

 

I cheered aloud. 

 

I conjured up my own visions of flowers and butterflies. 

 

It took nearly four decades for me to be diagnosed and I’ve made little to no progress since then. I felt hope for Charlie, this fictional teen with whom I suddenly felt very connected. Chances are many young queer viewers did, too. That’s me. I’m like Charlie. Early diagnosis and intervention can result in a better prognosis.

 

And just like “Heartstopper” seems to always do, it segued into a perfect song for the moment, “Blush” by Wolf Alice, with the opening:

Curse the things 

That made me sad for so long.

Yeah, it hurts to think that

They can still go on.

 

The final episode of the season is called “Perfect.” Indeed, it’s the perfect title, capturing how hard “Heartstopper” tries to be in capturing happiness, the good people triumphing over the bullies, love winning despite any and all obstacles thrown its way. 

 

But there’s a darker side to “perfect” when it involves eating disorders. And, hallelujah, it appears “Heartstopper” is game to go there. 

 

As they’re together in Nick’s bedroom, Nick says, “Is everything fine? I know you like everything to be fine and happy and perfect all the time, but you don’t have to be perfect with me. Charlie, we said we’d tell each other things. After you told me about your…eating thing…”

 

Eating thing. Nick is treading lightly. It’s understandable. Charlie’s never outed his disorder and people with eating disorders get defensive. They deny the problem, often heatedly, to make the intrusive person back down. It can be quite effective.

 

Charlie, however, neither denies nor takes on a label. Rather than admit to an eating disorder, he reveals he was a cutter in the past. Is this a mental health distraction, bringing up something he no longer does? “I just don’t want you to annoy you or burden you. I don’t want to think I’m some fragile, broken mess…and need to fix me.”  

 

Nick asks Charlie to promise to tell him “if things get really bad again.” It’s a typical response. It’s what Nick needs to hear. It helps Nick feel reassured.

 

That kind of promise is rarely kept when it’s made by someone with an eating disorder. The behaviors associated with eating disorders are done in secret. The person covers up his habits and, in so doing, masks his pain, his conflicts, his imperfections. Indeed, everything must be fine, if not perfect. Or appear as such. This entire way of being is well-learned, well-practiced by the time it’s ever revealed. It’s entrenched. 

 

It will be interesting to see if and how Charlie’s eating disorder plays out in the third season. It feels weird to be excited about the possibilities. I immediately think that many viewers would consider the continued storyline to be a downer. Can we please just let Charlie be happy?  And that’s precisely how a person with an eating disorder views the world, thinking that being happy and “together” and, yes, perfect is the only way he’s allowed to be seen.

 

“Heartstopper” has been bold and bright in putting queer characters on screen—lesbian, gay, bi, trans, ace. Queer people continue to report a higher incidence of mental health struggles. May the show add more flesh to the eating disorder arc. Let Charlie open up. Show his struggles and, in the end, do what “Heartstopper” does so well: offer hope.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PROUD, AWAY FROM THE CROWD

It’s strange feeling like you’re late to the party. Six weeks late. That can’t possibly be fashionable. And yet that’s Vancouver. 

 

The entire month of June was filled with Pride hype. A beer company aligned with a trans influencer. Target displayed Pride products. Haters brought on the backlash.

 

Goodreads sent me a newsletter listing the best new queer books. (Please let my name and my still-unpublished book show up one day.) 

 

We remembered Stonewall. We used the media’s limited attention span to yell louder for trans rights. We danced, preferably shirtless. We wore rainbow socks and tutus as we lined streets for gay parades, floats teeming with drag queens and cute gay men, obligatorily shirtless. 

 

Pride Tel Aviv.

Pride São Paulo.

Pride Zurich. 

Pride Madrid.

Pride Dublin.

Pride Paris.

Pride Mexico City.

Pride San Francisco.

Pride L.A.

Pride NYC.

Pride Toronto.

 

June wound down. London wrapped things up. #Pride tweets stopped trending. Everyone switched to fireworks, Taylor Swift concerts and mentioning climate change without doing anything about it. (Hey, media…more Greta, please. And, by that, I mean Thunberg, not Gerwig.) 

 

But then, as the dog days of August arrive, Vancouver wakes up and finds its own Pride. (Other stragglers include Amsterdam, Stockholm, Reykjavik, Montreal, Johannesburg, Taipei and Buenos Aires.)

 

Oh, hey world. Ahem. We’re here and we’re queer, too. So proud! 

 

Perhaps I’m the only one who feels the scheduling is off. Most folks aren’t prone to question or turn down an opportunity for another party. In fact, I believe the Pride celebrations are calendared over a period of months to promote gay tourism. Back in the ’90s, gay men I knew jetted off to various cities for circuit parties. It was like there was a pink passport and they needed to fill it with stamps. These parties probably still happen. I’m basically off-grid in terms of Must-Do and Must-See gay events and I like it that way.

 

One of the benefits of having a later Pride celebration is that the rainbow flags tend to be displayed longer in Vancouver. Many businesses and residents fly their flags and slap rainbow stickers on their windows at the beginning of June because it’s widely known as Pride month and they keep them up through the first weekend in August. Like many, I maintain a healthy skepticism about corporate displays. They want our dollar. I’m okay with that. It’s nice to be courted. There was a time when that was a rarity instead of the rule. This year, businesses have had to think a little more about chiming in since haters have been emboldened in part due to conservative politicians finding there’s a cash value (aka increased political donations) in creating fear and labeling all-things-trans as excessively woke. For some, hate fosters likes. Sad times.

 

I passed on all Pride events this year. I’m proud; I’m just not PrideTM proud. It wasn’t that I was consciously making a statement, sitting out because the Barry Manilow retrospective I wanted came to fruition. (I just made that up, but if there was such an exhibit or performance, I’d be there.) I still see great value in holding various events that make people feel good about their identities and that allow allies to join in and have a gay old time. This gay old-timer googled events at least three times and didn’t feel like coughing up $50 for a gay boat ride or $80 for a gay dance party. I’m proud enough, no booster required, bump to my credit card statement averted.

 

I will say that I was amused by some of the fare. The events had appealing names. There was a “pool party” without a pool. Presumably gays were drawn to the spectacle of throngs in thongs and Speedos. Some guys with massive biceps might be able to rock a look wearing floaties. Seeing someone do the dog paddle would have only ruined the moment.

 

There was also a “disco party” without any soundtrack from the ’70s, just a lineup of current bands I’d never heard of. I can listen (and dance) to Donna Summer, Silver Convention and Thelma Houston anytime I want at home. YouTube automatically plays these artists for me. It knows me. I’m happily stuck in the Smiley Face decade with my pet rocks, mood rings and repeated views of “The Mary Tyler Moore Show.” Nothing about me will ever be trending.

 

Perhaps I could volunteer to be on next year’s planning committee but getting booted as a volunteer would turn my stab at Pride to shame. I’ve had enough of that already.

 

Where is the Pride hike? Has the gay community strayed from its long-celebrated bear culture? The prospect of a wild bear encounter seems to have lost its appeal. Regardless, a hike was the highlight of my highly personalized Pride weekend. No bears. Lots of lily pads, a few chipmunks mooching for food and supreme coastal views. I’m a gay man, quirky as hell, and not much of a follower. Proud enough.

  

FREEBIE GAY NEWS: A ONCE-VITAL LINK

I’m sure some still exist in Vancouver, free little newspapers that offer news headlines with a paragraph or two of elaboration. Mostly, they’re a space for printing a slew of banking, real estate and car ads. I don’t notice them anymore. The freebies that mattered to me are long gone and I cheer myself up with the thought that less newsprint must mean we’ve saved a hypothetical tree, perhaps even a whole forest. Alas, at present, we lose them to out of control fires. That’s dark but it’s real. I almost understand why deniers double down. Maybe they just can’t cope.

 

There was a time when The Vancouver Courier got dropped off at my house or in my apartment building lobby twice a week. I’d skim through the grocery ads—Score! Häagen-Dazs on sale!—and read about a dog park on the rooftop of a downtown parking garage. A stop on my next bike ride, not because I had a dog anymore but, hey, it sounded quirky and perhaps I could snap a photo to post on Twitter. 

 

There was also a time when my eyes were trained to spot purple news boxes. That’s where I could grab a copy of Xtra West, the free gay paper that came out every two weeks. When my daily life was consumed with slogging through seventh graders’ stories and planning an archaeological unit to teach them about Ancient Egypt, Xtra West was often the link to all I was missing in terms of being a gay man. 

 

I first stumbled upon a free gay publication in the mid-’80s when I lived in Irving, Texas, a suburb of Dallas. I taught at a special ed school operated by the Catholic Diocese of Dallas. Many of my colleagues were nuns and, since the campus also included a convent, my social life involved people like Sister Herman Marie and Sister Joan of Arc and no one who identified as gay. I didn’t dare step out of the closet. The fear was too great, partly due to AIDS, mixed with worries about being gay-bashed and, more than anything, a concern that I’d be fired if someone outed me. (As a Canadian citizen, I wasn’t allowed to teach in public schools so it felt essential that I keep the private school gig.)  

 

During my second year of teaching, I got a roommate to help pay the rent. My salary had risen to a whopping $12,300—half what public schools offered—but I needed breathing room in my budget, a chance to splurge on a meal at Chili’s instead of another dinner of peanut butter sandwiches made with Wonder bread and no-name PB. My roommate was Carla, a teaching assistant from where I worked. The nuns thought we were living in sin and I was informed they were praying for us, but their sheltered world contributed to the fact they weren’t imaginative enough in considering us sinners. Neither was I.

 

Carla and I got along great, connecting through humor and a willingness to step on tennis courts to retrieve balls more often than actually hitting them. We burned plenty of calories, modifying any dreams of playing at Wimbledon to competing against black labs in some pick-up game of Fetch at a local park. We also lingered at Friday happy hours in Las Colinas, ordering extra rounds of frozen margaritas after the nuns had gotten tipsy, smoked a final cigarette and left. 

 

I didn’t see Carla much at home. She was often spending time with Nancy, a best bud. She often stayed over at Nancy’s for the entire weekend. She and Nancy had some sort of falling out, but then my roomie became best buds with Maureen. 

 

Anyone else would have known where this was going, but I was as clueless and as experienced in the real world as the nuns. 

 

I missed Nancy. I tried to give Mo a chance even if Mo seemed gruffer. Why was I comparing? It wasn’t like Mo was replacing Nancy, right?

 

Then one day I noticed a compact little guide on the kitchen counter, neatly tucked under the telephone. The cover was a photo of some guy in a baseball cap and a sleeveless t-shirt. Lots of pink, which was unconventional for menswear in the ’80s. It was enough to make me pick up the free magazine, the same width and length of a paperback novel, but probably only sixty-four pages. The title was This Week in Texas. I browsed while my roommate was apparently hanging out again at Mo’s.

 

The magazine was chock full of ads. Different ads. Nothing for Dr. Pepper or Jeep Cherokee or Skoal dipping tobacco, the standard Texan stuff. The full-page ones touted a military ball in Dallas and an Austin bar’s happy hour called “Muscles in Action.” Another ad was titled PLAY IT SAFE! and offered mail order delivery for Trojan condoms. I wasn’t one to ever jump to conclusions so I investigated further, flipping pages. 

 

A news blurb from Houston announced, “There’s a big…billboard—the first of its kind—over Tila’s Restaurant…which lists the local hotline phone number…to call for information about AIDS.” Other blurbs provided information about HIV testing programs in Houston and San Antonio. A headline stated, “FORT WORTH GAY PRIDE WEEK HAS BUDGET CONCERNS, ” the lead sentence explaining, “Our people are hurting, both from AIDS and from the poor economy.” Other headlines: “The Big Race to Find an AIDS Vaccine,” “CRAB LICE STUDY,” and “TOGA TEA” with “20% of proceeds going to AIDS Resource Center of the Dallas Gay Alliance.” 

 

Processing….processing…

 

Forget the drumroll. There is no suspense here. But the drama was huge in my mind. This Week in Texas was totally gay!

 

I’d never seen it in the magazine racks at a checkout aisle in Albertsons. Where did it come from? Since it only covered a week’s time, presumably there were more. One for the week before, for instance. And for the next week. While this seemed obvious, it baffled me. TWiT could be a link to all things gay in Texas which was wrapped up in all things AIDS, as my archival issue attests. It affirms the sense I’ve had that my coming out years weren’t a joyous time of gay bliss, but shrouded in AIDS awareness and, for me at least, a pervasive fear of death. 

 

Based on my browse of TWiT, being gay was also about being shirtless and going to bars. Really, there didn’t seem to be anything else. I was certain that shirtlessness would not be in my future. I was much keener about free refills of iced tea at Chili’s than sipping Bud Light and pretending I liked it. Why was everything bar-based? Why wasn’t gay Uno big? Or gay croquet? Maybe a gay vegetarian picnic with a mixtape soundtrack of Madonna, Miami Sound Machine and The Style Council? Maybe I wasn’t fit to be gay. Or maybe I was trying to justify a life in the closet.

 

Still, my roommate’s paper pickup provided my first link to any sense of a gay network during my years in Texas. It’s true that I had been to a gay club a few times already during my last year of college, but only as part of a group of waiters, hostesses and busboys from The Spaghetti Warehouse in Fort Worth’s Cowtown. We’d occasionally go after a Saturday night shift, one or two gay waiters chaperoning the straight contingent which I hoped everyone thought included me. I clung closely to the group. I wasn’t ready to be gay. If copies of TWiT had been at the entrance, I wouldn’t have noticed as I didn’t want anyone seeing my eyes divert up, down, left or right. Even if I’d spied a copy, I wouldn’t have picked it up. “What are you doing with that?” Miguel or Teena might have asked. My red cheeks, obvious even in the dimly lit dance club, would have outed me and then what? It seems inexplicable to have been so fearful even amongst a seemingly pro-gay group who had chosen to spend Saturday night in a gay realm, but fear often isn’t rational. If it had been, I might have talked myself through it…eventually.

 

That wouldn’t come until I flee Texas and moved to Malibu. 

 

Incidentally, Carla did come out as a lesbian during a heads-down conversation at a pizza joint we went to on Sunday evenings. She feared rejection; I offered solid support. It would have been the perfect time for me to say, “Me, too. Not lesbian but, you know, the other thing. For guys. Like, um, ho—…homo—…okay…gay.” I did have this painfully stilted conversation with her over pizza, but it was six months later. I think she smacked me in the shoulder. Perhaps that’s revisionist but I deserved it. As for that freebie gay publication, while the advertised events didn’t make me feel connected to the Texas gay scene, the magazine’s acronym—TWiT—should have made me feel like there would someday be a place for me.