twenty-something

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas... in my mouth.

I bought a case of Orbit gum at Costco a couple weeks ago and I just cracked it open. My first pack was Bubblegum, and I've taken to chewing on it fairly constantly since.

On my walk home from work tonight, rocking out ot my iPod, trying not to cough up a lung from this damn cold, I started blowing bubbles.

And for some reason, the kick-back from these bubbles -- you know, the-pop-and-inhale thing -- combined with the cold November air juuuuust right. And my mouth was filled with the taste of cinnamon and... something. It was familiar, tasty -- no delicious -- comforting, and somewhat wonderful.

"Hm," I said to myself, seriously, aloud, walking home with headphones on.

I did it again -- the bubble, the kick-back, that taste. And then it donned on me.

The bubbles taste like Christmas. My mouth tastes like Christmas. Still. I don't get it. I'm not "ho ho ho"ing my way home. I'm not picturing chestnuts on a fire or anywhere else. No stocking. Not even snow. But I taste something, and it just screams Christmas to me. Like a Yankee Candle, in glorious gum form.

I am a very ridiculous man. I don't believe in Santa or Christmas spirit, In fact, maybe I'm the Grinch. But this gum tastes and feels damn good when you blow a bubble. Olfactory bliss on the walk home from work.

It's Christmas in my mouth. And everyone's invited.

So Rutland has a gay bar. And it is called Shooka Dooka's.

This isn't Rutland's first gay bar, mind you. There's a vague history of them in the minds of many Vermonters. I remember one when I was coming out in high school -- I can never remember the name of it, but I do remember going, once, to some "T Dance" on a Sunday my senior year. I lurked on the edge of the dance floor as I watched my friends dance (this was before I had truly discovered the joys of alcohol). A handsome guy came up to me as the place was closing. He said he'd been watching me all night (I was oblivious). He gave me his number. He looked a bit like Val Kilmer.

I called him a week or so later. We met for coffee downtown. He revealed he had mental problems and lived in an apartment above somebody's garage. He was quirky, but probably fuckable, but I was innocent, so I just had him bring me home and that was that. I don't remember his name.

Back to Shooka Dooka's -- I went twice over Thanksgiving with Greg, both Thursday and Friday nights. We made a pact before we descended on Rutland that we would go, so when I picked him up T-Day Night, it was on our agenda. We drove by once, twice, maybe three times (still not a lady). Finally, I parked and we embarked on our Rutland gay bar adventure.

Admittedly, I reverted back to my high school self. I was nervous and a little freaked. Why? I go to the bar here in Burlington now without batting an eye.

The bar itself was a letdown. The space itself is surprisingly nice. Well, not nice, but it has potential and character. It's big, and there are many different facets -- two bars, a couple different rooms, a big dance floor, a live-music stage, many televisions. It was obviously an old Rutland redneck bar, but now it had a rainbow flag or two. I wanted to buy the building, move it to a city, sink a million into it, and open it as my own little gay bar. But, yeah, back to reality...

Night one was uneventful. The "crowd," though small, was colorful. Among them: A stern-but-friendly lesbian bartender. A semi-cute obvious regular in a ball cap and slight southern drawl, who harassed said bartender by telling her he was drunk enough to "eat her poontang" (Greg, incidentally, became smitten with this charmer and we ended up trying to find him at another bar after we left and went to Denny's). A young-ish lesbian couple (?), half of which seemed familiar. And a kind-hearted black man who eyed us since we entered, so outgoing it bordered on functionally retarded. He came up to us to chat and filled us in on some of the bar's story. Among other things, we learned that the last Saturday of the month is always "Men/Bear Night," and that he DJs then.

My heart skipped a beat when a group of people came in shortly after us. It was mostly girls (three or four of them), a handsome and tall gay guy, and finally -- a truly beautiful man, all baseball cap and single earring, in some North Face-ish jacket, oozing masculinity, oozing straight, newbie, or closet case -- ya know, any of those things I always fall for. I was immediately smitten. Increasingly long story short: the girls came and asked us to dance. We did, but I reverted to my high school self again. I wasn't drunk (I was driving) and I couldn't dance. I stood awkwardly, swaying a bit, on the big, empty dance floor, watching my man sit on the sidelines, one of the girls almost constantly on his lap. What a waste.

The second night was much busier, but I guess my perception was off from Night #1. I mean, at that point, 20 people would've felt like 200. But still, the place felt not just fuller, but almost full. There were people of all ages, shapes, sizes -- well, all but really attractive or appealingly intelligent. But I guess that's just Rutland.

Greg and I lurked for a bit. We ended up sitting at the end of the bar, by the front of the place, directly in front of the large picture window. Undoubtedly, foolish people like us were driving-by the place all night to check out the novelty of the gay bar, or to scope it out before they went it. All night, we were the first (and maybe only) ones they saw. I hadn't been the face of homosexuality in Rutland in years.

The handsome and tall gay guy from the night before was there, suddenly bleached blonde. I said hey, and he joined us for a while. Marshall was his name. Kristen, my best bud from another life (Rutland High School), breezed through. She looked amazing and, well, breezy. She, a stanch bisexual, said she was "sick of lesbians" but then proceeded to leave us for the girl drama in the other room.

A cute but creepy guy began to cruise Greg. He was cute. Nice face, short hair, glasses, decent build -- he looked a bit like Wesley from Angel. The thing was, he was wearing an ugly yellow jacket tied around his waist as he circled the bar. It was just horrifying. Eventually, he sat near/next to us, and we mostly ignored him. Finally, while Greg was in the bathroom, I caught his eye contact and couldn't not say hello. So we struck up a conversation, and this Charlie ended up being a pretty nice guy. A fellow RHS graduate (surprisingly, class of '82 - I would've said '90 at the earliest - we looked young), now a wine dealer in Boston, he was home for the holiday. Add a couple other random gay guys through out the night (all of us were just in town for Thanksgiving), and you got our posse for the night.

We stayed until 2AM, and the place didn't seem to be closing. They stopped serving and things had wound down a bit, but in many ways, things were still in full swing. Greg and I left for Denny's, without any boy adventures, or any interest in having any. But I guess that's just Rutland.

What can I say about this year's Thanksgiving with my family in Rutland? Truth is, not much. It wasn't very exciting. I ate turkey, did many loads of laundry, and came home with allergies and a bad, bad cold. Awesome!

I did not spent any quality time, really, with my mom, dad, or grandmother. I didn't sleep at all at nights, and it took its toll. Overall, the two days and two nights in Rutland weren't as bad as I was dreading, but the visit certainly wasn't the heartwarming homecoming I have secretly dreamed about since I left for college.

Two quick updates:

My sister, 12, has become very pretty. She used to remind me of a baby Jennifer Aniston. Now she evokes, to me at least, a pre-teen Beckham era Keira Knightley. It must be the soccer. Or the haircut. Or the fact that she looks like she's wearing make up but isn't, and is the social butterfly of her seventh grade. She's just gorgeous.

My brother, 14, has become tall and thin, and has hair longer than anyone in my family. And it isn't even that long. My mom still has her lesbian-chic-meet-Marsha-Brady 'do, and bro's hair is sorta down past his chin, longer in the back, but not mullet-y. He needs a trim, but it looks good. Almost cool. He's growing up, and it's odd. I see so much of myself in him. Is he what I would've been had we stayed in Rutland and I played more football?

I love those fucking kids. And I miss them. I feel like I'm missing out on them growing up.

Sad face.

Well, fuck me.

It was The Birthday of The Ex (Joe), and I thought I would be a good ex myself, and send him a birthday greeting. It was a short note, with a short update of my life. Which mentioned that I have a great job which sometimes allows me to hang out with rock stars. And might've included a bit about my approaching (and scary) two-year anniversary with my mysterious new beau (Joe met Duncan, briefly, in August '03). It was brief, civil (hell, friendly even!), and did not do anything to rub anything in anyone's face.

So I send the email around midnight. Literally 5 to 10 minutes later, I received an Instant Message from him. Here's the jist of the exchange:

J: "hey"
P: hey, I just emailed you
J: "i know... reading your email made me sad"
P: why?
J :"you have your shit together, and I don't"
P: I don't have my shit together...
J: "I haven't really dated anybody since you"
J: "I have Ani DiFranco stuck in my head... Untouchable Face..."
P: [some delay] how come?
J: "just seems fitting, after your email"
P: i'm trying to listen in iTunes... but of course its freezing up [which was the truth]
J: "Sorry for being an ass... thanks for the email..." [signs off abruptly]

There was more in the middle, but that's the general jist. Crazy, huh?

So part of me feels like total shit that I upset him on his birthday, because I honestly didn't mean for that to happen. I really only mentioned the Duncan in like two sentences, and it was very tame. "We are still together, almost two years. I am pretty happy." I wasn't trying to rub anything in his face, cause I just assumed that he had completely gotten over me and had moved on. But then I think, "oh shit." He's alone on his birthday. I'm still his "Big Love," the one and only guy he's seriously dated. And here I've gone and gotten into another thing, this one less than a year after our big breakup, and it's become a LTR that's outlasted the little barely-one-year thang that Joe and I had. And that felt so epic to me until I got into my current thang with Mr. Aiden Shaw. So... yeah... I guess I can sympathize. I get it. I can feel bad.

Another part of me feels like, "Fuck me, and my untouchable face? FUCK YOU, BUDDY!" He's the freak who was meeting guys behind my back. He's the one that dumped me. And as much as I'm grateful, because my life post-Joe has turned out pretty good, I was completely broken by that at the time. He hurt me pretty bad, and left some scars I'm still dealing with. So that part of me is totally flipping him off and singing Mariah Carey. "Someday... the one you threw away will be the only one you're wishing for..." (Hey, he can quote Ani, I can evoke MiMi!)

And still another part of me is worried that I'm obsessed with this now, worried that I still have some feelings for him. I suppose I do - I mean, I know I do. I always will. He was my first big love, so of course there will always be something leftover from him. But here I thought I was completely over him and just felt nothing, maybe some anger. But it's weird... I dunno. Drama drama drama..

But then there's this part of me, and I'm not proud of it, but there's this part of me that feels -- no, knows -- that I've won. I've moved on and, yeah, in a lot of ways, I do have my shit together. And he's a mess. And he still wants me, wants my untouchable face...

Dude, seriously - check out those lyrics. Good song, but some FUCKED UP SHIT!

Link

I am staying home from work today. It's almost 3PM on a Monday as I begin writing, and I am still in bed, in my undies, listening to Sarah McLachlan, and loving every stinky moment of it. (How's that for a mental image?)

I am just returning from a four-day venture to a Marlboro, MA for a Campus Activities conference, and I am taking a day of rest. It was four days of loud music, bad comedy, matching t-shirts, and "Ride That Pony." Waking at 7AM and passing out at 3AM, only to do the same thing the next day. Overall, it was mostly fun but most certainly always exhausting.

Sadly, little of any interest to those who weren't at the conference happened, or at least nothing I'm willing to put the effort into making into something particularly dramatic, enticing, or funny.

Two items I'll share:

(1) Mr. Belding (or at least the actor that once played him on Saved By The Bell) was there, like always, and he looked sadder and drunker than ever. On the last night, at the hotel bar, where I sad on an uncomfy stool, Mr. Belding drunkenly pressed up against me as he closed out his tab, awkward and inebriated, hopefully unaware that he was touching me, hopefully not coming onto me in any way, shape, or form. I could've given him the satisfaction of turning around to greet and recognize him, but I couldn't muster up any enthusiasm. So he paid his hefty bill, removed his hefty gut from me, and went on his unmerry way.

(2) There was also a mystery man there at the conference, not a celebrity, but a fellow professional. I knew him and he apparently knew me -- or so he told one of my students. He looked and seemed familiar, but I swear I have never met him. He was balding and slightly chubby, but he was cute and, inexplicably, sexy. Especially when he wore his Sox hat. I could have gone up to him to introduce myself, but then again, this "Chad" person could've done the same. We made crazy eye contact at times, but always kept our distance. Maybe we could've had crazy conference booty calls. But that's all past.

So I guess I still do have a serious boyfriend waiting for me at home, and maybe that's why I didn't answer any real or imagined conference booty calls. In fact, I came home to him yesterday and we spent some quality time with fast-food Chinese and The Simpsons. How deliciously domestic.