Case of the Ex

What is it with people and their exes? I am talking about girls and guys, people, who, have split up, and yet, are unable to separate themselves from each other’s lives. Esme, I’ve broken up, and well, what I really mean is, we are taking a break from each other but talk three times a day. Or better yet, Esme I am ignoring his passive aggressive emails but I will post hints about my sex life on my Myspace profile. These accounts are bullshit and I have been subjected to them long enough.


I will not lie. I have done some pretty low shit in my lifetime. When I dumped my first girlfriend via telephone. I spent the following weeks, months, on and off year, stalking her and her life online. These events were followed by a spattering of awkward phone calls in which I interrogated her about her current life. As someone who had wanted to separate my life from hers, I ultimately got myself knee high in uncomfortable details and animosity. The worst part of the situation was that I forced myself to connect with her knowing that with each event I would endure excessive jealously and anger. Talking to an ex was like drinking after going to rehab—all that work for nothing.

Seeing the relationship quandaries that my friends get themselves into, I know that this social recklessness goes beyond me. So, why do we do it? I have a few thoughts on this. One, we are all masochists in the end; and two; we have the need to persuade ourselves post break-up that we made the right decision.

When a break-up occurs, the dumped person is inclined to create a wall of self-preservation. The mortar is made from beer, your nostalgia favorites from early 90s and, most importantly, 2-3 changes to your online profile or aim icon. Something along the lines of a status change, an introspective quote or more sullen selection of music favorites. These are messages to the friends that said person is staying strong and bitter.

The breaker-upper of course is also in the know and reacts to this. Rarely do exes actually disconnect, un-friend or distance themselves from one another—that would be too logical. The breaker-upper sees these messages and is propelled to demonstrate that she/he is also better than before. The break-up has transitioned from sentimentality and remorse to a technological showdown of passive-aggressive action. The worse part of these changes is that both sides provoke one another. The exes take on facades, which they use to provoke each other. Why do they do it? I don’t know. I guess they want to hurt each other. They want to make themselves believe that they will be better off or at least unable to go back.

Months ago, I’d argue that the pair should be left in the backyard to fight it out to their emo deaths. I guess time and the emotional depravity of my life have changed me. Looking at my friends’ lives, I don’t see Ricki Lake queens but bitter people. I know who the exes were before when they were people. It is hard to juxtapose my portraits of the people with the disengaged personas they are trying to erect. I have thus decided that either the exes need to stop the emotional warfare or I need to get my own helmet.

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Same place, same people—are we that predictable?

New York City bars used to be my dug out from most people I knew. I thought it was an unspoken agreement between the city and me. Then, something happened on Friday, which made me realize that either the city is shrinking or I am becoming socially predictable.


On that doomed Friday night, I was at my favorite dyke bar, Henrietta Hudson. Imagine your mom’s closet during a middle school seven minutes in heaven session. The bar is exactly like that. Two small rooms, packed with sneaker wearing, messy-haired queers groping each other, while listening to Blondie. It is that scene.

I like Henrietta’s for one main reason: I recognize no one that I know. Ordinarily, this being the largest U.S city, most people have anonymity in city bars. The queer community is however, different. Queers live in a we-know-everyone community, which transcends any and all city and geographic lines. This exists for two reasons. Firstly, we are all hoes in the end; and secondly, we date through our friends. As a result, I consistently find myself in a web of queers I know.

Fast-forward to now, I am standing in the closet, I mean, bar. It is about 11pm, with a medium density of high heels and Doc Martens. Bar access has been pretty good tonight. I have in the place about 30 minutes; and so far, I have made my way to the bar, ordered and have not been spilled on. Three factors that determine whether I will return to the place. These steps in order, I peruse the bar.

Suddenly, across the bar, I see her. I know her. It is not slurred vision; and, definitely not mistaken identity. I am looking at Baker, a person from college I know way too well. As far as I’m concerned, everyone knows a Baker.
There are two distinct Bakerisms that make her, her. Firstly, she will show up to every party and place you go; and secondly, she will always be in a shitty mood. I am not talking about cynicism or public anger. A Baker is a person for whom the sun does not shine.

In the case of this girl, every time I see her, she has just been dumped by her one-night-stand or girl of the week. I wish I could embellish her life more, but it is impossible. Baker has absolutely no luck with women. As if knowing about Baker is bad enough, listening to her rant is painful. I have had enough Baker encounters to know to avoid her and her looming self-deprecation at all costs.

When I think about it, I recall that in college, I could measure if I’d hit rock bottom low for the night based on my proximity to the girl. What!? I’ve just been dumped? Two people I’ve slept with are now making out across the room?! Oh look, Baker is next to me talking. Yes, I think its time to hear about how she has just been stood-up by her best friend who she decided to sleep with.

Anyways, I’m standing there next to the bar, under Henrietta’s searchlights, when my eyes lock onto Baker. For 11pm, Baker looks like she’s doing pretty well—definitely pre-drama. Baker stands amongst a crowd of femme-type chicks, women still in their Lillith Fair phase. On her arm however, is a surprisingly attractive lady, even by straight standards. I immediately scan the girl and think, “how the hell did Baker land this chick?” That question quickly trails into another, “do I want to know?” Unfortunately, Henrietta’s spot lighting does its job. Before I can get my accomplice and run, Baker sees me and makes a beeline.

“Hey, Ezzy,” she slithers. I hate nicknames. Baker has got an “I-look-like-I’m-the-shit” face on her. She and I go through the usual hi, what’s up stuff. I’m eager to avoid drinking with Baker and company, in fear of a return to misery-island. I leave to go to the all-forgiving bathroom asylum. Last time I tried to use a smoking break excuse, and I ended up with twenty minutes worth of lung cancer inhalation and Baker chain-smoking next to me. I figured the bathroom would be a safe haven. Luckily for me, Henrietta bathrooms don’t allow for multiple inhabitants and Baker didn’t seem to want to leave her companion.

When I believed that it was safe to roam the bar, I left my porcelain cubicle. As I have said before, Henrietta’s is a closet so I was able to make my way across the room, to find my friend and nightly social crutch. She pointed out that in my absence Baker had managed to piss off her new women; and, was now sulking by the bar. Hearing that, I was surprisingly comforted. “Yes, Candide, we do live in the best of all possible worlds.” Baker’s debacle reminded me that whether it is New York City or small-town wherever, we are still hanging out in the same room with the same people. No one really changes. We just switch clothes and faces. The best thing we can do, is learn how to cope. “Should we talk to her?” my friend asks. “No, we need to leave I say.” As bad as I felt, well, moreso guilty for Baker, experience has taught me when it is my cue to leave.

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New York is my ex

New York City is my looming ex. When I think of the city, my stomach jerks. I remember my many awful experiences being here. I think of the times that I have been stood up by the subway, the heinous buildings that I am reduced to live in; despite the fact that I lie to myself promising that the flooring and lack of ventilation won’t really be so bad.

As with many exes, after the feelings of contempt and anger fade, I remember all the wonderful things about New York. Picture Woody Allen’s cinematic black and white stills of the city-- the Lower East side in the morning, Central Park in the summer. I have of course, never experienced any of this; however, I cling to the advertisements with a fondness that I could never get from real place themselves. It is this artifical backdrop that I fucking love.

Comparing my versions of the city is like comparing my relationship with a schizophrenic. I admit that there are two different personalities, yet I cannot accept that they share the same face and name. I ask myself, why do I stay in a city that I acknowledge as vile? I do not know. I am in effect, a girlfriend in denial.

The odd part of this situation is, I am not just in denial about why I am in New York. I know that there are other people like me. There are handfuls of twenty-somethings are living around the city, complacent with the traffic, the bad apartments and their misery in this place. They are at the same time, reluctant to move away. We, the transplant generation, are in denial. We are in urban living denial. I wonder what is it about New York City that keeps us here.

Immediately, my own experience comes to mind. In truth, this is not my first time living in New York City. I first lived here, three years ago for a summer. It was the worst experience of my life. To begin with, the city resembled a Grecian bathhouse. Imagine shirtless hairy men and a stench from the sewers that would never leave. To make matters worse, I lived in yet another three floor-walk up apartment with bad central air.

The summer reached its climax when I discovered an abandoned cat left two buildings down. I didn’t know much about the owners. My only memory of them was that they had a “Buy Black” sticker on their front door. Dealing with a forlorn creature in a city where I felt alien, put me over the edge. I ended up having a weeklong break down, in which I spent most of my time crying in the corner of my apartment, rocking my girlfriend’s cat. Yeah, it was definitely a Carrie-esque finale. I ultimately had to be escorted out of the city because I could not ‘hack it’.

I eventually did return, or, well, was forced to return because of a lack of other options, and have grown to appreciate this place. I argue that, like coping with an ex, we temporary dwellers stay in the city because we need a kind of resolution. Many of us know that we don’t want to be in or with New York City forever; however, we stay, believing that it is important to remain here for the time being. Maybe we need to work at our jobs a little longer. Try something different. Be somebody else. We need a period of flux or transition; and the city, the ex, is here, while we decide what we are leaving this place for.

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Young and Committed?

Where do you go when you are 22 and in a long-term relationship?

I don’t know.

In truth, I used to believe that it was impossible to be in your early twenties and in a long-term relationship. I saw dating as an organic process. You meet others. You date others. You sleep with some of these people. You have one or two relationships; and finally, presto, you move in together. This is how I thought everything worked.

I was wrong.

My past reads like a deranged version of this process. I meet people. I sleep with people. I have awkward encounters with these people; and, from the small pool that I do not alienate, I move in with immediately. I am almost twenty-four years old and I have gone “full circle” in this process. It is at this point that I wonder where do people like me go?

I see a lot of people my age, people who have been in long-term relationships, looking around, unsure, about what they are supposed to do. If you have had a two plus year relationship with someone, you are in the stale phase, the wear your old laundry phase, the limited sex phase, the domestic phase. The funny thing is, as I have said before, this phase does not coincide with being in your early twenties.

To begin with, the average twenty-something has the emotional stability of a middle schooler. We don’t know what we want let alone what we need to do to support ourselves. The early twenties character is not prepared for serious commitment choices, such as whether to move in or to change cities with someone, but to make meaningless decisions like what should I drink tonight?

The early twenty-something is not shallow but in a state of rapid transition. We are the children of America the day after Halloween, riding sugar highs and insulin lows. We don’t know whether to go back to school or to take a job with our old man—so to speak. Our minds are skewed and so is our ability to make rational choices about the future.

I don’t need advanced research to prove my point either, just look at my life. I have one friend, “Jonathon,” who broke up with his yearlong girlfriend to take a job across the country. After being away two weeks, he decides that he misses her and drives across country to get back together. One week later, he breaks up with her. Two months later, he gets fired and returns to his old city. The pair are living in the same city again but this time not together. Another friend, “Linda,” broke up with her two-year girlfriend because she wanted to be free to play the field. Linda and her girlfriend went threw a weeklong fight to get to this point. A month into the decision, the pair still talk everyday and have plans to be together this summer. These are the choices I am talking about. These are the what-the-hell-are-you-thinking decisions that come a dime-a-dozen amongst my friends.

Under other relationship circumstances these choices would be fine, weird and stupid but fine. This is not the case. These are instances of adults choosing to fuck long-term relationships not because of bad luck but because they can. It is like building a house of cards and then testing whether the house can survive an Earthquake. It does not make sense. These decisions do not make sense.

Now we are back at the beginning. Why are semi-adults, i.e. sugar-high middle schoolers, placing themselves in choices and relationships that they cannot handle? We are greedy. Our recent access to 24-hour bars and no school has fucked with our heads. We believe that because we have a little freedom that we are suddenly able to skip the baby steps of decision-making. Wrong! We are still getting sick at bars, still getting screwed by out inability to make good decisions. Just because we can keep someone for a year, does not mean that we are capable of being in a real long-term relationship. I argue that until we earn and keep health insurance, or some other symbol of dependability for a year, we should leave couple-dome to the big-kids.

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Dating Friends?

The other week, my friend, Mary, told me that she wanted to date her best friend, Steve. My initial reaction wasn’t good. I was about as optimistic for her as if she had told me that she wanted to get pregnant for the hell of it. As you can guess, I don’t trust friend dating. It is an epidemic that I know all too well.


Back in college, my friends and I saw ourselves as tied to the Pioneer Valley dating tree. People were shameless. Our college was small and, worse, dating and sleeping with our friends and their ex’s was a normalized trend. We lived in our own social solar system, in which we were connected in more than one-way to everyone we knew. Much of the time, we would rationalize our predicament. Where else would we go? Dating through friends was easy. Senior year however, everything backfired. A chain reaction of break ups had begun. Soon, certain places and people were off-limits because one couple or another was no longer together. Friend break-ups brought on a maze of awkward social interactions. The year turned me off to “dating within the circle” completely.

Now a semi-adult, living in one of the largest cities in the world, I recognize that old social habits, such as dating within the “friend circle,” are now viewed as obtuse. We are in a social pool, in which most people have no connection to us, our friends, our exes or some combination of these roles. We, in theory, should be able to maneuver healthy relationships with people separate from our “friend pools.” But, let’s be honest. This doesn’t happen.

I was at Webster Hall back in December, for the Curve magazine party. It was a big event. The hall was flooded with sensitive, moppy-haired guys and hoards of lesbians. One of my close friends had managed to drag me out of my apartment to mingle. The event itself wasn’t that great. Dani from Tila Tequila, was the headline. She however, was piss drunk and struggled to say a coherent sentence on stage. I instead, focused my attention on the crowd around me.

Similar to college, everybody stayed within their clique. You could tell who knew each other because, well, each group of people looked exactly alike. I told my friend that being there was like being at another college party. Even though I didn’t know everybody in the hall, I knew everyone in the hall. What the hell? Could our age group not grow up? Were we all too comfortable with remaining within our set bubbles?

It was at this time that a lanky girl approached me. At first I was startled that my supposed protective shield of friends hadn’t blocked this strange intruder. Weirder, this person, who didn’t even know me, wanted to dance. What was I supposed to do? I hadn’t had this kind of social training. I followed the girl a few feet away. We began to awkwardly move around each other, while she tried to get to know me. It was a disaster in heels. She saw me as potential. I saw her as a predator. All I could think was, “Why does she want to talk to me? I don’t know her. Freak.” In actuality, the only freak in that situation was me. I was just as bad as Dani. Both of us were staggering in the spotlight, trying to get out a declarative sentence.

After that disastrous night, I realized something. I concluded that I was in, what I describe as, college vision that night. In college vision, you are an adult trapped with the social skills of an 18-year-old. When that girl approached me at the party, we spoke different social languages. She wanted to meet me and I wanted to know how many degrees of partners separated us. It was a mess.

The debacle made me realize that our generation needs help. We need to be able to transition from being awkward college kids into less awkward semi-adults. For example, in semi-adulthood, people keep references of friends to a minimum. In college, friends are your psychiatrists, assistants, bodyguards and small-army. It is ok to mention them because they are your entourage. In semi-adulthood, you pay professionals to do these things for you. While it might be normal and true that you see the same four faces every the twenty-four hours, the semi-adult world does not want to know this. In effect, talking about your friends in every other sentence carries the same effect as if you consistently talked about your mother. People, well, mentally stable people, want to see us as solo players not a social cripples.

The second rule of thumb is that we should want to meet new people. The concept that our support systems will not evolve is antiquated. It is not our fault. We have been brainwashed by our generation’s pop culture couples. The Kevins and Winnies, the Corys and Tapengas modeled to us that all we needed was our next-door neighborhood to be happy. As I have come to learn, that is just not true. If I thought and acted on this rationale, I’d be co-habitating with my pre-school friend, Pete, whom I used to push around during playgroup. Come to think of it, I am pretty sure my mother told me that Pete became somewhat of an effeminate homosexual. Had I “stayed in my own backyard,” my domestic gender stratosphere would be completely out of whack.
What do I suggest? My advice is to say no to dating friends. A friend is not a used pair of shorts that can have more than one purpose. Friends are intended to hear about your significant other, not to be him or her. This doesn’t mean that you need to entertain every new Tom, Dick and Mary that talks to you. Instead, the next time you are intercepted at a bar, give the person the benefit of the doubt that they are doing something socially acceptable. Once those two minutes are up, you are completely relieved to return to your fortress, your friends.

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What up, gay?

So, you walk into your corner coffee shop and see a lanky twenty-something year old wearing a Dave Matthews shirt, sipping his mocha. Immediately, you know one thing. That guy has got some cream in his cup. Confused? Don’t be. I am not talking about dairy supplements. What I am saying is that homeboy is a gay. That’s right, a gay. Until recently, I was never afraid to call them, the homos that is, as I saw them. That girl with the Birkenstocks, lezzy. That guy with the bull-cut, total queer. How did I get my knowledge? I am part of the club and as they say, “it takes one to know one.”

Throughout college, I was unabashed about my skill. I outed strangers and called men in nylon “girl.” Why not, their exterior implored me to. However, since then, something has changed. The outside semi-adult world is different. Most of us are chained to these weird-obstacles called “jobs” and the strange social environment that they create. Oh, the gays are still there; but, due to this weird thing called “professionalism”, YOU and I must now pretend these people, or better said, these identities don’t out-rightly exist. A new hurdle now has arisen, specifically, when do we know it is ok to recognize that someone at work is gay?

A friend of mine had this very quandary a week ago. Let me elaborate. My friend and a co-worker spent some time together over the weekend. They had dinner, he outed himself and then, as is expected, they went to a bar to check out guys. The following week, my friend saw her co-worker eating lunch with what she assumed was one of his close peers. My friend sat down and recounted the events of their weekend to the peer—men, bar—all of it.

Later, she said that she was surprised when the co-worker asked her not to out him to fellow employees. What could she do? My friend was stumped. Had her co-worker signaled that his sexuality was an untouchable topic? Were there hints? What was she to do?

Reviewing the situation, I have decided to say, no! No, there are no standards for this kind of shit. We cannot be expected to mix the moors of when it is or is not acceptable to share our gay-consciousness. Instead, I have decided to put together a review of inner-office gay code.

In this code, the first step is recognizing your gay at work. This can be a hazy issue. Let’s be honest, contrary to popular opinion, gays don’t just divide into Melissa Etheridge followers and Gloria-Estefan want-to-be’s. Gays come in all forms and haircuts. However, as is the same with any community, there are some reliable clues to look for if in question about whose team your buddy bats for. First and foremost: haircuts. This is the cheat sheet to your gay, or should I say your sexually anonymous co-worker.

My rule of thumb is to compare this person’s haircut to your peers. Without the body, ask yourself would this haircut go better on a boy or a girl? If you find yourself crossing genders, thinking that Jill’s haircut would seem more ‘’normal” on Jake, then that’s a pretty good clue that something is a little queer. Some people might bring up the new trend of men in shaggy do’s. I say if you’re unsure, ask your co-worker if he likes Tori Amos. If he says yes, you know Tori isn’t the only fairy.

My second rule of thumb is shoes. What type of footwear does your friend prefer? For women, loafers and sneakers are a dead-giveaway. Ask yourself, does she look like she would wear these shoes in middle school? If so, she’s a homo. For men, most any shoe that is well cleaned is evidence of him siding same-sex tendencies. Does he look like he has put time into his footwear? If you think yes, or maybe, or even if you are re-reading this passage for clarity, most likely he has a gay-vibe.
So, now you think or know or hope, that your co-worker is a gay. What do you do? In college, I would have said act but, unfortunately, this job world calls for something called “privacy.” Until this person outs themselves to you, you have to bit the bullet and wait. If you are like me and like to expedite conversations, I’d suggest dropping hints about your acceptance of gays and or gay issues. That way, if your friend feels inclined to share, she or he knows you are ready and waiting. Whatever you do, DO NOT talk about your “gay friends.” No one wants to be your new “gay friend.”

If your co-worker, in the case of my friend, has come out to you, give yourself a pat on the back. Half your quandary is solved. Your co-worker evidently feels fine, or at least ambivalent, with you knowing his or her “private life.” At this point, it is acceptable to ask your gay how he or she feels about work privacy. If you want to play it aloof, you can survey what your friend reveals about himself or herself at work. For example, if lesbian Lisa talks to George about her girlfriend. It is likely safe, for you to reference Lisa’s sexuality to George. If Lisa does not directly talk about her sexuality at work or refers to people by vague pronouns or as ‘friends’; then, leave Lisa’s private life alone. Over all let the gays pop their own coming-out cherries. As Judy said, “It’s my fucking rainbow anyway.”

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