Being Me, That Guy

Chapter 17. Being Me, That Guy

            I have been at the bar for quite some time now.  I am learning it’s kinda okay to be me.  If this were a movie, this would be the time-lapse part where you watch me eat pints of ice cream to mark how much time has passed.  Since I have cut down from 1 gallon of ice cream week, to a pint and a half a week cause I’m health-consious now.  You’ld watch me eat about 120 pints or so.  Instead of being uphauled at watching me injest so much ice cream, it’s cute.  At this point, I have moments where it feels like I have been here too long, but it is what it is.  It’s like when you’re watching your favorite show, week after week, month after month, year after year, and it looses momentum.  You watch it anyway.  You do this because that’s what you do and just wait for them to add another useless character before eventually the show gets cancelled.  Unfortunately life doesn’t work that way.  I often imagine my life to be like a sitcom, the bar is like a Mel’s Diner if you will (80s reference, look it up) and I am an odd mix of Rhoda from Mary Tyler Moore (cause she has the best lines), Saundra from 227 (cause she gets around), and ideally Eric from True Blood (because he is so hot that even in my dreams he’s too cool for me).  Point is that I hope that if this show gets cancelled, that I will be good enough to get my own spin-off series or at least have something to show for my experience at the bar.

I have made it through many hurdles as of yet.  I lasted much longer than most of my coworker’s expectations.  I know this, because the douches I work with tell me about it all the time.  They say things like, “Oh, you’re still here?”  Or “Geez, now I have to get to know your name?”  That’s kind of an exaggeration but, none the less it’s close to the way it really is.

I have now lost about 25 pounds of blubber.  Even though I am thinner, I now have phantom fat in place of that blubber.  When I stand in front of a life-size mirror, and look back at myself to check my ass out, (admit it we all do it)…  I still see side-titty.  It’s not there anymore, but I still see myself as fat even though people tell me that I’m not and my clothing is much smaller.  The phantom fat only exists in my head, like an imaginary friend you just can’t get rid of.  Shit, I’ld burn it off if I could.  Whenever I hear someone make a fat joke I still assume it’s about me, when it isn’t.  It’s like when they call Marty Mc Fly “Chicken,” the word “fat” just hits a trigger I can’t explain that makes me go ape shit.  As a result of this weight loss, my waist is smaller and my overall style is slowly changing.  The hair is short, and the curls chemically relaxed, which makes life tough.  Now, I also know why you rarely see black women in pools.

Getting your hair relaxed is expensive and means avoiding rain, pools, sweating and any kind of moisture at all costs.  All this is done, just to keep hair from frizzing up and looking nappy.  Like Ms. Dolly Parton herself says, “it takes a lot of money to look this cheap,” which is my mantra.  If it wouldn't look odd, I would get a weave just to make this process easier.  I’m also not hiding my eyes with glasses of any kind anymore, which means I can now focus on my need for eye cream.  I also have a subtle sun-kissed glow now.

      

          I have traded Southern California and it’s superficial stereotypes for San Francisco’s because simply, they eat better. San Francisco has more variety in food option if you’re okay with everything being a fusion.  That’s what half of the restaurants in San Francisco are into for some reason.  It’s like you’re chow main fucked some fettuccini.  Not a fan.  This city by the bay is supposed to be full of individual thinkers and people ready to behold each other’s iniquities. From hippies to bears, bull dykes to buttoned-up financial district accountants, all types are represented here. They are loved for their unique and eclectic charm and aren’t cast out for not joining the masses. This is at least the way I would like to see San Francisco. In my head, I like to keep it as this place, an oasis, so to speak, even if that isn’t true.  While SF has just as many superficial, lame people, it also can be a place for some of us where we can just be ourselves.  This is without having to completely conform to society the way we would in any other US city.

The truth is that San Francisco will always have a special place in the spot where my heart would be if I had one.  It extends about 7x7 miles and has been home for so long. It has always been one of those places that I have felt most people could live in comfortably if they come here with an open mind. It’s a place to find one’s niche, travel, come back feel at home with a just comfortable being.  If I am in the city for more than a month without leaving, I get burned out on every aspect, from the homeless people, to the buses never being on time, and the hippy bullshit.  Then go on a trip, when I return I all of a sudden remember what I liked about San Francisco, how beautiful it is.  While I love SF, if I ever move it will be the end of our relationship and on to the new adventure, like that first love.

While the city of San Francisco has often considered diverse for American standards, it’s odd how there are so many areas still very segregated. The gay men often stick to the gayborhood (The Castro), Polk Street, select South of Market bars and a few bars in the not so Tender Loin. The poor lesbians of the city have an even smaller pool of places to choose from. There is the Lexington, the SF equivalent to “Lesbose,” the bar on Southpark, where even the most feminine woman have bigger balls than Rocky, rhetorically speaking of course, although I may be wrong. I have not inspected these menly women.  Then they have events bi-monthly at various gay-man stomping grounds where ladies can meet and get their clam taken for a ride or at least slapped, or whatever it is that women do. There are very few places for ladies to really go out and be as there are for us gay boys. Maybe that’s why they are pidgin-held to potlucks and staying in more here than in many other “large” cities.  The other question is where are the black people here?  There are so few that live in the city of San Francisco, finding a black person who actually lives in San Francisco is like finding Waldo, few and far between.

The Castro bubble is so small that it is one of those places where you will see the same face over and over, and over, and over and over. Like an SD that just wont go away, or more so like deja vu. The weeks start to blend together, the faces much the same, yet different, but only slightly. All of our unique qualities that I originally thought San Francisco allowed us to keep in tact are seemingly becoming one homogeneous blob. We all are clones of each other, although we hate to admit it. We are all more like lemmings. It’s like staring at a sea of those crash dummies from those early 90s commercials, where we all look the same yet subtly different. It is funny because I too, being the individual that I would like to consider myself, find that I too, am becoming a part of this blob. As my jeans tighten to be form fitting, the gay way, the time I spent at the gym increases so that I can fit them. The years of hiding behind baggy shirts have been traded with form fitting deep-v-necks. It’s funny how I am now one of them. Have I lost myself or is this just a part of the growing process?  Who cares?  I look great.

Today, I work this shift with James. I work most of my shifts with him in the daytime, when it’s slow.  James is a newer bartender and tends to work slower shifts. This is also how we really have got to know each other.  During the weekday-afternoon lulls we listen to each other’s drama and bond over common trials and tribulations.  It’s like hanging with a brother, I assume this because I was raised an only child.  Near the end of this shift, right before the happy hour switches over (where the nighttime staff takes over for us), there is this guy who comes up to both of us. He comes up to James, who is one of those guys I would label as an eternal twink. He is one of those guys who will always look young for his age, lean and petite.  It’s one of those “kiss, kiss, hug, hug,” homosextical (I made the word up, create a Wikipedia page for it) sort of moments. He, I guess has been out of town for a near year. He tells James that he looks more handsome than ever. He then asks who I am, like it matters. James fills him in. His response is to try to pull me aside, in front of the now moderately populated bar and ask me my name even though he has already asked James. He then asks me if I remember him. I lie, as one may do in these type of moments, and say “yes” not to hurt his feelings, although now I wish I just told it the way it is. He then says he remembers how “chubby and awkward” I was when we had first met, but now I “finally look alright.” He smiles while saying this backhanded compliment as though I should be grateful. He goes on to say that with a few more pounds and cutting of the hair more I would look great, once I loose the water weight. It’s hard to understand if that could be interpreted as a compliment.  I don’t know how to process the situation, I proceed to smile, nod politely, walk away and tell him to fuck off under my breath.

I am about 15 feet away from the jerk and by this point, Aaron a.k.a. “Yentl.”  I call him that since we bond over our love of Barbara Streisand.  In the movie, for those too young or unaware to know, in Yentl  she is the daughter of a rabbi, so excels at studies of the holy texts that clearly she is more man than woman.  She cuts her hair off and pretends to be a boy.  It’s a classic.  Back to the story, one of that night’s bartenders is right behind me stocking alcohol for his shift.  He overhears the conversation and what just went down.  He then tells me that I should relax and take a cookie out of his locker, cause he like any Jewish mother knows that cookies always soothe the heart.  His cookies are delicious and magical, just what the doctor ordered.  He then tells me that I am much cuter with some “cushion for the pushin.” Aaron also is what some gays would call a “hunter.”  This is a thin man who is into bears.  Get it?  He hunts round, fat, hairy men and has his way with them…  I will give the reader a moment to paint the picture in their head and then look for sanitizer.  The question is whether Aaron’s comments are compliments or not.

Aaron is not the only one who doesn’t seem to care what anyone thinks. He is some people walk to a beat of another sound.  Most of us walk to a drummer.  He walks to the beat of a fucking orchestra.  Aaron walks to sounds of another wavelength.  His unique style could only be described as eclectic elegance married to punk rocker edge, with a David Bowie’s ambiguity. His tattoos all tell a story.  Some of the stories only make sense after a joint and a 5^th of vodka, but none the less they all add character.  His androgyny is the most intriguing part about him. Unlike most gay men I know, the magical powers of those with abs of steel, waxed chests and faux-collegiate style do not in the least bit work for Aaron. His kryptonite is full of jelly and covered in a carpet of man fur and musk.

Aaron always responds to hot, chiseled, Abercrombie-American-Apple-pie dudes with this sentence, “Back away, you’re powers don’t work on me!  I would trade you for a John Goodman or John Candy type, may he rest in peace, any day of the week.  Be gone!”

At this moment I realize that I will never be good enough for these people and maybe myself.  The question is whether this matters.  Do I really care?  I’ll admit I do, but why?  I will need to learn how to be okay being me, not the image people think I should fill. There must be some fine balance of me, and the persona I will create in order to survive. I needed to learn how to be confident with my looks, my body and if I ended up like the rest of the Castro lemmings, I am okay with that. As long as I keep true and intact to myself in the process, the rest doesn’t matter.