Hold me, somebody please hold me. Touch me. Kiss me. Let our hands, lips, bodies connect.
I need to be felt to feel alive.

When There's Nothing Left to be Done...

At my hometown gay bar...

A seemingly straight guy with a goatee and a straw hat with a beer logo on its face motions me to join him at his table. Despite the warning from my over-weight pet store employee acquaintance, I join him anyway.

"Do you drive?"
"I do."
We're interrupted. It's the rotund homo in his 'Pet-Smart' uniform.
"Don't do what he asks you. Or you're gonna suffer," he says.
"Do you in anyway do drugs?"
"I don't really..."
"Ok. Thanks. You're pretty cute, by the way".
The seemingly straight dude heads back to his possible girlfriend sitting across the bar.

If I had agreed to this drug run, what would have Mr. Pet Shop done to me. Made me "suffer"?
What the Hell does that mean?

When there is nothing to do, you make your own fun. Either that, or you make your own drama.

Only The Lonely

I am alone and I know you are not. When lonely, this is the worst.

Home Town Bar

It's Friday night. I can count the number of people in the bar on two hands. If I had come with friends we would have increased the number of patrons present by half. But I am alone. The bar still seems empty.

A rotund drunk thirty-something homo, still in his red 'Pet-smart' uniform, approaches me at the bar. "Let me introduce you to my friends," he slurs. "You look alone and shy. And I want to make sure you have a fun night." I am alone with nothing or no one better. I join him and his friends at their table.

Her name is Jamie and she is a lesbian. It is only stereotypical she is an accountant for C.A.A. She is friendly and non-threatening so I strike up a conversation. We are interrupted by a powerful forty-something prairie lesbian (short hair, dyed auburn, leather jacket and cowboy boots with striking maroon lipstick). "I really like the decorations", Dani mentions motioning to the Dollar-store "HAPPY NEW YEARS" signage and the meager spattering of balloons clumsily taped to the ceiling. "It really makes a difference", the power lesbian concurs. Their friendly demeanor makes up for their lack lustre decorating skills.

Only three people are grooving on the dance floor. Sean is one of them; a member of my rotund friend's circle of companions. He is a faggy bottom; you know the type. His shirt is undone to reveal a tight flat muscled stomach. He wears lip balms marketed toward women. No matter how awkward or inappropriate it is, he is bending over like an MTV booty dancer despite how there are obviously no cameras filming his small twinky ass. Though I would never be as outrageous as he is, we are not that different. I want to be the object of attention and affection and admiration as much as he does. I am just not as brave as he.

Here I am. Alone at the bar on a Friday night with only a fat petstore employee, tragically unstylish lesbians, and an attentioning seeking faggot for company. This is the gay bar in the city where I grew up. Am I home?

At times I am unaware of how much I need you. I am foolish, I know. One should be conscious of what one needs to survive.

The Plague of Social Existence

There are always more than two people present in any relationship. Be it friends, family, lovers, or even casual acquaintances, directly or indirectly we infect each other. What exists between you and your mom, or you and your room mate, or you and your best bud, or you and your boyfriend does not remain resistant to the myriad of relationships you are exposed to with everyone else in your life. What exists between you and your mom, is not immune to what you share with your boyfriend. Your casual conversation with your room mate is not quarantined from your drunken banter with your best bud.
We are contagious.

It is foolish to think that you're a singular organism that maintains isolated relationships with another isolated singular living organism.

We are all symbiotic.

We are not insusceptible to the actions of those around us. Like it or not we infect each others existence.