Lightswitch

My life would be so much easier if my emotions and memories could be controlled by a switch. I'm not talking about long-standing grudges (I'm glaring at you Evil Roommate) or the important events in life. I'm referring more to the occasional slights that happen now and then with no lingering consequences other than angrying up the blood whenever I think about them -- sometimes incessantly.

Though, in fairness, positive feelings also get caught up in this cycle of white noise, which has kept my spirits up. I'm still referring to the general subject of my last set of posts. (Don't worry: eventually something else will come up in my life that will be the subject of future posts. Maybe?) To that end, I am going to continue reading too much into every single interaction. Partly because I like the warm fuzzies and partly because I apparently lack the ability to read the nuance of the situation. So far there are only two downsides to this course of action:

1. As I am making eyes (since I somehow turned into a 12 year old girl from the late 1800's with that turn of phrase) I realize more and more that rather than being all doe-eyed I think I'm coming across as more Cookie Monster-eyed: A step beyond "googly" with no control of my pupils as I become victimized by a bizarre eating disorder. Or something.
2. I keep thinking of the creepy Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer claymation thing CBS shows every December. "CUTE. She thinks I'm cute!" Then I start flying around until my fake nose falls off and starts to glow. And then I'm on the Island of Misfit Toys. And then things really start getting fucking weird.

Although I may be wasting my time, I think I'm getting experience of some sort. Maybe?

Read More......

Nonrequited

So I got my ping. Rather, my pong: the results came up negative. This does not bode well for my track record, or my psyche.

You see, there's a huge difference between "unrequited" and "nonrequited". With unrequited, you may get "sorry, I'm just not into you," which can be countered with bizarre displays involving skywriting or guitars played outside windows. It's all about trickery and manipulation and the manufacturing of co-dependence. Y'know, romance. With "nonrequited" you get "I'm NEVER going to be into you." This is the other side of the "you don't choose to be gay" coin that doesn't get much press time since, well, it kinda bums people out. You can call heads or tails on that coin: you'll be getting neither.

I would think at this point in my life experience I would be able to cope with the frustration and the general down feeling of nonrequited a lot better, but I'm doing the exact same thing as the last time and the times before all the way back to high school: find the best Sarah McLachlan or Ben Folds Five song that encompasses my "totally unique" experience and then superimposing myself into my own Annie Hall like montage and moping around until something happens. I'm guessing that will be when I take the GRE over Fall Break and start actually working on The Plan.

Dammit.

Read More......

Rebuttal

DAMMIT.

Discuss.

Read More......

'Dar

As you know, I am plagued with uncertainty 80% of the time. Or maybe 90%? Anyway, one of the consequences of such a low level of confidence is an inability of really being able to read people.

Sometimes I'm the person I can't read. One of my least favorite questions I was sometime asked during high school was "so why don't you have a girlfriend?" This was before I was 80-90% certain that I was gay, so dealing with this question was even more peculiar. The question was never mean-spirited; it was more of a curiosity about how someone who is obviously the complete package could be going through life single (I'm paraphrasing...slightly). I think what bothered me more than the fact that I was single was that I couldn't actually answer the "why" question. Well, not at the time.

Fast forward to college and the question shifted from "why don't you have a special someone" to "is he gay or what?" Although I'm sure the conversation happened more than I am aware, since the latter is more of a gossip starter, it really is an awkward situation when someone just asks you point blank. This is where another shift occurs. With the "why single" question, the asker is asking out of concern and seems to come from a place of admiration in that the asker recognizes positive qualities in the person. Not so with the "so, gay?" question, which in my experience has been used as a means to justify or resolve a disconnect between behaviors and social norms or what "straight" is. And the question is of the "do you still beat your wife" variety, in that any denial could just be met with an "mmm-hmm, right". Though it is fun to gobsmack people with an equally blunt "yes" to their question. Good times.

Assuming that I'm still the same complete package I was in high school (work with me on this one), it would seem to follow that I should be getting the "why don't you have a boyfriend?" line of questioning. Well, the difficulties of uncertainty and identity politics, and my need to obsess over them, has rendered my gaydar completely useless for the people I find myself attracted to. It has been driving me crazy recently, as having a "ping" or some sort of confirmation would make life a lot easier right now. Not because the time has been unbearable (it hasn't), but because if there is a next step to take, I would like to do so this decade. And if not, I would like to not be coming across as creepy or whatever (I don't think I am, but again, not good at reading any room I'm in). Without some sort of ping, my only course of action would be to do the "so, gay?" thing which is beyond inappropriate and totally shows my cards. I'm so not going to do that.

So if anyone has a way of calibrating a gaydar that isn't Gay or European?, I'd appreciate the assist.

Read More......