HELLO, NEIGHBOR

If you’ve checked out my blog on a semi-regular basis, you know that I’ve spent the last eight years in a gay black hole. I do hear about rare gay couple sightings along the sixty or so kilometers of coastline in my region, but maybe that’s just a rural legend. Cougar reports are more frequent. There are two gay couples I know exist in the closest town. They own competing coffee shops. (New dating plan: open my own café and hope it lures a future co-owner/husband. I do love a good latté.)

Single gay sightings do not occur. It seems I’m the one and only. The last dodo bird. A creature too thick in the head to know that there is no chance for survival in the current habitat.

Yes, I tried to relocate. Over the course of three years, the house would not sell. I put in on the market, took it off, put it on, took it off. In early June, I was about to re-list, when two homes on my street suddenly donned FOR SALE signs. Too much competition. I bowed out. Within a month, I accepted a new job only a two-minute drive from home. I was here to stay. Love it if you can’t leave it.

To my surprise, both houses on my street sold over the summer. It meant an end to the suspected drug activity across the street and goodbye to a family a few houses down. On October 1, moving vans zipped in and out of my cul-de-sac. However, I never glimpsed the new neighbors.

Two weeks ago, I was in the midst on my Sunday afternoon grocery shopping in town, strolling the Health Food/Toilet Paper aisle, lost in thought. (Are these products grouped together by coincidence? If I buy the Cashmere toilet paper while it’s on sale, can I make my own bargain sweater?)

And then someone yelled down the aisle. “Jim. Jim Gregory.”

Huh? Sure that’s me. But I’ve gone by James ever since I moved here. It’s the first place where people haven’t cut it to Jim or Jimmy as soon as we got on friendly terms. (Maybe it’s just a reminder that I’m not that friendly with anyone in my area.)

I turned and Anson Turnbull walked right up. Hadn’t seen him in ten years. Back when I lived in Vancouver, we played in a gay tennis league, often carpooling to the courts. Nice guy if you can get past his perpetual awkwardness. He works as a technical writer and speaks the same way. Everything is very precise, each comment screened and revised in the millisecond between thought and speech.

“Anson? What are you doing here?”

“I just moved here.”

“Where?”

“Cedar Creek.”

“I live in Cedar Creek! Where?”

“On Newton Road.”

“I live on Newton Road!”

Yep. Hello, neighbor. The single gay male contingent suddenly doubled.

And before you get any ideas, dear reader, there will be no mating efforts between these two dodo birds. Still, it’s nice to have some company. We went for coffee—at one of the gay-owned coffeehouses, of course—and got caught up. Like all my former tennis friends, he’s been sidelined by physical limitations that pop up during middle age (Achilles tendon, in his case), but Anson is a welcome addition to the neighborhood.

Now I wonder who’s in the drug house...

SUMMER CRAM SESSION

In a few days, I head to Los Angeles, with leisurely stops along the way on the Oregon Coast and in San Francisco. I am itching to go, but part of me feels like the timing is all wrong.

Summer is the best time to be in my own sprawling coastal community. While the HUGs (Highly Urbanized Gays, something I used to be and, admittedly through this trip, a status I am seeking to reclaim, albeit temporarily) stay clear of my homeland, the summer beauty of this area is what lured me here.

I write this while my car is in for a tune-up before the big trip. I walked down the street from the auto shop and stumbled upon an oceanfront park I have never explored. I ambled along the rocky beach before retreating to a shaded picnic table with a million dollar view of the cresting waves and the silhouette of the gently rolling mountainous landscape of Vancouver Island in the background. It’s simultaneously calming and exhilarating. Should’ve brought my camera. [These photos are from the general area, posted on Google Images.]

Am I really leaving this? Yes, the need for a HUG moment has churned for too long within me. Knowing I am spending the bulk of my summer vacation elsewhere, I have spent recent weekends and the past few days cramming in all the outdoor beauty this area has to offer. Yesterday, I biked to a jetty about twenty kilometers from home, taking in an idyllic northern beachfront as a group of kayakers set off for an evening paddle. (Note to self: I must investigate kayaking options upon my return. Hadn’t I planned to buy one when I first moved here nearly eight years ago?)

Peddling home, I exchanged curious looks with a coyote crossing the road and, later, a deer, patiently waiting for the right moment to saunter across the highway. Two days earlier, I cycled farther from the ferry terminal, toward the mill which is the biggest local employer. I stopped where I always do at a little cove where I have a ritual of dipping my bike tire in the ocean, just as I did twenty-one years ago with my AIDS Project Los Angeles Buddy’s wheelchair tire in Santa Barbara in the final month of his life. It is my way of honoring Stephen and thanking him for the strength and hope he instilled in me.

I have hiked each morning with my dog along a local trail which begins a mere two blocks from my house. I don’t dare venture too far, as I have no sense of direction and I got lost in these trails sixteen years ago with a school group before I ever decided to move here.

There is more to do and see, but time ticks and I’ll come up short in this cram session. I can explore more upon my return.

I regularly bemoan the fact that I mistakenly moved here on my own. A better plan would have been to find a partner and hope he too would feel a strong connection to this land (and water). Waiting for that guy to come along, I might never have moved here. This is the season, however, when I don’t care about being alone. I am reinvigorated by this place. This is when the move doesn’t feel like a mistake.

I will soon head South, happy to reconnect with my Californian friends and to take in all that my old haunts of West Hollywood, Santa Monica and Malibu have to offer, but there is a good chance I will be thrilled to return here as the vacation winds down, eager to discover another coastal pearl.

For now, I sit, eyes continuing to gaze upon the ocean as a gentle breeze massages my face. Simply stated, this is a perfect moment.

FIVE AND THEN SOME

Yeah. I’m the kind of guy who forgets an anniversary.

I let the day marking nine years being single pass right by without playing a song by Linda Ronstadt, Eric Carmen or Gilbert O’Sullivan.

Today marks twenty-eight years of being a vegetarian, but I only stumbled upon that fact as I began writing this. I have no special plans with tofu tonight (not that I ever do!).

Mid-June marked the fifth anniversary of my Rural Gay blog. That is indeed a milestone. I began with a short post explaining my love for quieter, scenic surroundings but ruing the fact that I was losing my gay identity. My thoughts are as true today as they were then.

I felt the blog provided an original point of view—what middle-aged fool goes from urban to rural as a single gay man? What compelled me to play The Opposite Game? Isn’t it a law of nature that all small town gays must move to the city as soon as they attain some semblance of independence? Aren’t the suburban and nether-land gays the ones who have found a partner and want to explore gardening and daily nature walks? I’ve discovered that we fools are few and far between, but I am not alone, at least not in spirit.

Five years ago, blogging was new to me. I didn’t really get it. I’d write something, post it and then nothing would happen. Did anyone read it? I figured it was my online journal—if nothing else, a way to save paper as I worked through random, often self-absorbed thoughts.

It took sixteen months before I received my first comment. Eureka! A reader! Comments have come sporadically since then, but they’ve never been as much as I’d hoped. I wanted the blog to be a meeting place, particularly for other remote gay men, a way for them (and myself) to feel connected and to reaffirm whatever it is that makes us gay.

Eventually I got a Twitter account, using the Rural Gay name and it has proven to be a better connection to The Disconnecteds. I’ve also received far more feedback regarding my posts through Twitter. I suppose a quick Tweet is easier than posting a comment under an account and affirming you are not a Spambot by typing one or two blurry, usually nonsensical “words”.

My greatest dilemma in keeping the blog current is having something to say. If I want, I can Tweet about cutting my toenails or burning a piece of toast. These “events” are not blog-worthy. (Really, they shouldn’t be Tweet-able either but there are thousands of people who lack Twitter sense. I’m talking to you, ArizonaDaredevil4. I don’t care which McDonald’s you are at for lunch.) A key aspect of being Rural Gay is that nothing much gay happens. Perhaps the blog concept was inherently flawed. Still, I’ve somehow managed to write 227 posts. My apologies for the more inane ones. Rest assured, I’ve rejected even duller ideas!

A few years ago, I decided I needed to abandon rural living. I needed the sound of sirens, I’d come to appreciate traffic lights and, yes, I wanted to eat at restaurants that featured a single cuisine. (Still haven’t tried the Greek/Indian/pizza place in my neighboring town.) With the house up for sale, I figured the blog’s days were numbered. I’d go from “Rural Gay” to “Gay”, maybe even with a celebratory exclamation mark. As one of many urban gays, my life would be happily unbloggable.

And yet I blog on. The house is off the market. I’m here to stay for the foreseeable future. The blog has gone from Is anybody out there? to a modest but growing 3,000 visitors a month. I am glad you are with me, Dear Reader. Even when you lurk in silence and are nothing more than a number on my blog count, you provide me an audience which is what every writer desires. More importantly, you make me feel less alone, more connected and a part of something bigger.

Thank you for reading. I am immensely grateful!

EXCUSES, EXCUSES

It was Pride weekend in New York, Toronto, San Francisco, Seattle and in many other metropolitan areas. But I did not have to book a flight to The Big Apple to walk around with a water bottle and plastic rainbow bead necklaces this weekend. They celebrated in my isolated region as well.

Friday night featured a lesbian film I’ve never heard of, screening at the local playhouse. On Saturday night there was a Stonewall Dance at a community hall in a former hippie enclave, now facing gentrification as retirees and Albertans wanting waterfront summer homes attempt a takeover.

I passed on the movie and the dance. That’s right, I bemoan my single status in post after post on this blog and then, when opportunity knocks, I hide under the bed. (My dog and I think it’s quite nice there.)

You have every right to give up on me and to go back to spending your online time reading Gwyneth’s goop or scanning Lady Gaga’s tweets.

Skipping the movie was a no-brainer. I didn’t have my car Friday night as I had to leave it at the ferry terminal on the other side. Besides, I knew I’d feel self-conscious being the only guy in the audience.

I still feel shame over the dance pass. Could’ve, should’ve, didn’t.

Since you’re still reading, I assume you are up to date on Gaga and goop. Allow me to share my So I Think I Can’t Dance excuses.

I ‘d left my dog alone all day while dashing into Vancouver to see a local production of Avenue Q. I’d gone with a couple of gay friends, there were other gays in the theatre,...surely, this country boy exceeded his gay quotient for the day (heck, the week,...even the month). My dog’s sad eyes demanded I stay in. Besides, I needed to recover from my first exposure to naked puppet sex. (Since when did puppets start getting luckier than me?!)

It was a hot evening. I’d been in that community hall on a hot night before. No air circulation. I hate meeting new people as sweat clings to my forehead and creates broad pit stains in what is supposed to be an eye-catching fashion-forward shirt. Damn you, summer heat. (But please stay.)

I’d gone before. Two years in a row, years ago.

The first time, I lasted twenty minutes. I was forty-one and a guy immediately started talking to me. It had been a perfectly normal, superficial first conversation until he said, “So, are you retired?” Just how old did I look? Crushed, I casually excused myself, fled to the car and zipped home to stare desperately in the mirror, contemplating Botox, plastic surgery and the miraculous effects of Oil of Olay.

The second year, I dragged a friend from the city to come along. Amongst the tiny cluster of gay men, he was the star attraction. I didn’t get my feelings hurt. Not that much anyway. They all started smoking pot and, being as I’ve always found all kinds of smoke extremely unappealing, I grabbed my friend and insisted on leaving. Still, I left feeling like I’d grown. Staying forty minutes, I’d doubled my time. For some reason, my friend has refused to come again for future dances.

 The LGBT events I have been to—there is the occasional potluck as well—are always heavy on the L, lite on the G. (No idea if the Bs and Ts have a presence at all, but it is imperative that we’re inclusive, even if in name only.) Past dances have had about a hundred people in attendance—85 women, 15 men. I knew the odds were stacked against me meeting someone special, even having a conversation beyond, “I’ll have a Diet Coke with lime, please.” Why should I have to launder another shirt? Why set myself up for a miserable drive home, fighting to keep the disappointment in check. Besides, there are enough risks with night driving here. I’d never forgive myself if I hit a deer.

The last Saturday of June is when I look my absolute worst all year. Schools in British Columbia remain in session until the last possible day of June. As a principal, things do not die down. The May and June calendars are loaded each year with more and more celebratory events that require loads of planning and result in regular crises that I must manage. (No, I didn’t realize the school carnival’s co-coordinator was sleeping with your husband. Can’t you two settle this in the dunk tank?) Add the work happenings to ten months of a five-hour daily commute and I look and feel ragged by the time Alice Cooper tells me it’s all over.

Why hadn’t Stonewall come at a more convenient time? How about mid-July when I’m rested and I’ve worked off the few pounds that always show up during the final months of the school year? (I tried to have donuts banned from the staff room, but that whole apple-for-the-teacher thing didn’t go over well.)

If I’d gone to the dance and actually met Mr. Right, the timing would be all off. In a week, I’m off to West Hollywood for the summer. I’ve done the “Let’s go for a date six weeks from now” thing before—twice, in fact. It doesn’t work—too much anticipation, a certain letdown.  

Excuses, excuses.

It all comes down to how painfully awkward I am when surrounded by strangers. The confidence gets harder to find as the years go by and I remain single. I realize that nothing can possibly happen when I don’t even show up. Still, I need some rejuvenation. Maybe the trip to West Hollywood will help. Maybe a guy will give me that look. That’s exactly what I need—a little affirmation, a sign that perhaps I can fall in love a fourth time. Maybe with the right guy even.

I am not proud of opting out of Pride weekend. Let’s hope I don’t have to wait until next June to put on a brave face and step out again!

WE WANT YOU!

One of the more ludicrous allegations that the Homophobic Front continues to utter is that gays and lesbians are recruiting.  I doubt the people who mention that believe it.  I suspect they are hoping that more gullible people will buy it.  It’s all about the power of suggestion—Happy Meals make kids smile, laughtracks cue us to the uproariously funny parts on reruns of “The Brady Bunch” (Oh, that Alice!) and gay marriage laws make Grandma Hazel consider leaving the ever-flatulent Grandpa Fred for that heretic who wears running shoes to church.  (Should have never let Hazel go to a taping of “Ellen”.  She danced in the aisles right along with that curmudgeonly recruiter posing as a talk show host!) 

Despite Ellen’s solid daytime ratings, there doesn’t seem to be a surge in lesbian numbers.  And that Ryan Murphy with his “Glee” hasn’t converted straight teens to gay any more than his “American Horror Story” has led to creepy neighbors annihilating new residents in the house next door.  Gay marriage laws in Canada (and in Sweden, Spain, South Africa, Norway, Portugal, Iceland, Argentina, Denmark, Belguim, and the Netherlands) haven’t spawned a slew of Tonys defecting from weddings with Tinas and eloping with Tims.

If we are recruiting, we’re doing a really poor job at it.

When I was young and closeted, an oft-cited stat provided comfort:  one in ten.  It was a figure lifted from Alfred Kinsey’s 1953 study, Sexual Behavior in the Human Male, and gays latched on to it as a comforting “fact”.  The statistic helped many of us cope.  Ten percent of the population!  Yep, one in ten...I am not alone. 

I remember sitting in high school classrooms of thirty and wondering who my two cohorts were.  (Please, please let one of them be Randy Weir!)  In college lecture courses with ninety, I had eight Friends of Dorothy.  A potential for friendship, solidarity, maybe something more!  And yet, I could rarely peg anyone else with the gay tag.

I held onto the stat even without proof of its veracity.  Didn’t know the Kinseys, but they must have been highly accurate researchers.  All research is true, right?  Studies never conflict; they are never repudiated.

Within a year of moving to L.A., I bought a white t-shirt with an upside down pink triangle and the names of famous gays and lesbians from history superimposed on it.  Da Vinci!  Michelangelo!  Wilde!  My heroes.  Below the triangle, that familiar phrase:  ONE IN TEN.  I proudly wore that shirt when dusting on Saturday mornings.  (Blinds closed, of course.)

Even before I moved to Nowhereland, I realized that statistic was heavily inflated.  At some point during my time in Los Angeles, I honed my gaydar.  Ten percent of Los Angelinos?  Not a chance.  Vancouverites?  No.  Not even in the West End gay ghetto.  Both cities had a clear presence, but one in twenty felt like a stretch. 

Now I would be thrilled to be immersed in a population where five percent of people identify as G, L, B or T.  Where I live, our numbers—at least for G, B and T—would be deemed statistically insignificant by Kinsey’s academic ancestors. 

I’d say there are about 30,000 people along the sixty kilometres of coastline where I live.  3,000?  Baloney!  1,500?  Someone’s hallucinating.  Gay sightings are extremely rare.  In the seven years I’ve lived here, I’ve known two single gay men under the age of seventy and I dated them both.  No hope for any kind of relationship.  I believe both wisely realized there were no prospects to be had and moved back to Vancouver.

Being as I’m stuck in my current environment—I took my house off the market today—I would like to recruit some of those alleged recruiters.  Bring on the gays.  Stat! 

I’ll settle for one in a thousand.

STILL HERE

Okay, it looks like I’ve gone on a vacation and abandoned the blog.  In fact, I’ve been here all along.  I just haven’t had anything gay-related to write.

Sometimes one part of our lives overtakes everything else.  I suppose that provides a partial explanation for the dearth of postings.  Work has been intense.  I have been spending Saturdays in bed, following my dog’s nap schedule.  We’re both worn down from ten months of rigorous commuting.  A decent break is but two weeks away!

I’ve noted before that I don’t know anyone who is gay in my community.  A ferry and a lack of fine dining/shopping/culture seems to keep the gays away. 

I did talk on the phone last week to a gay friend in Vancouver, but the entire conversation was about cancer as his family goes through a difficult year.  Again, all things “gay” can become irrelevant.

The internet keeps me somewhat connected.  On Facebook, a friend in Boise posted a few photos and remarks about the city’s Pride events.  A lesbian friend in New Mexico provides links to her amazing art while a gay buddy in L.A. chronicles his restaurant stops with his partner in West Hollywood.  And then there’s Twitter, where I’m connected to more than a thousand followers who either provide updates on international gay rights or Tweet about hangovers and provocative pics (#nakedsunday...really?!  I try not to judge.).

It doesn’t add up to much.  I can put off the gayness a while longer.  Wish I could say the same about mowing the lawn!