A Day in the Life...

I have the kind of job that requires me to meet with the CEOs, COOs, and HR VPs, and then I meet with the next layer of managers, and then I meet with their supervisors, and then I meet with their hourly employees. By the time we get to where we are now I’ve collected my data and we will soon part ways.  Today, I was responsible for a community gathering that brought 1700 people together.  I was on my best behavior—even after Love Heroine hid the most important forms and I went into a cataclysmic meltdown on the inside—, and everything turned out great.

I can do bold things in the name of a paycheck. I can stand in front of 500 people and corral them with soft strengths as long as my job description is written in black ink.  But lesbian dating has no documented norms; therefore, I am lost.

I have been interacting through email and phone calls with a particular woman.  She’s been great when I need specific costs and measurements with inexact info that will inevitably change.  It’s funny how you can get to know someone so well through one-dimensional conversations—but that wasn’t the case with her.  We had been shuffling data and making decisions but not really building a camaraderie.  

After 12 hours of watching lines of people serpentine, she and I bumped into each other at the entrance to the great hall.  We had a first opportunity to summarize our six weeks together and assess Plan vs. Fallout. You can imagine that after watching 1700 strangers interact with other strangers in a high-pressure situation there were a few fun stories to swap.  Our easiness, or utter fatigue and fear of moving to a place where people would ask us questions, led to a trading of stories about previous crazy jobs and the people who come with it.  She, my contact, had really crazy stories—circus elephants, rappers, and drunk high schoolers who released biologically processed liquids from one or the other open orifice—because that’s what she does. She shuffles hundreds and thousands of humans through the community center. 

My attraction rose gradually.  I wasn't expecting any of that while walking through the magical game of Straight Land.  The shift in awareness surprised me when I realized that I hadn’t bailed when I normally bail.  She started to remind me of a college friend who had always reminded me of a cousin.  And so, I began to feel a sort of kindred spirit build as we pushed through the fatigue to sound coherent.

I always get nervous here—after two or three swaps of random info—because if "we" continue to talk the hetero female will soon offer details about the significant male that is or isn’t in her life.  Usually, I look for a reason to bail immediately before or after the second set of info swap.  I hate that I have to say my partner, and I hate more that I have to say my ex-partner.  Neither are comfortable because the admission inevitably shifts the conversation so much that it never returns to two girls talking about nothing-that-matters stuff.  All of a sudden the “lock-down” sirens swirl around, the concrete medians rise and divide, and then I’m on the isolated side of the continental drift.  The only thing I can hope for at this point is that she’ll have a gay sibling or besty that will immediately become a useful litmus for relating to my foreign ways.   

My attraction increased, as well as my suspicion, while we continued to share a conversation that didn’t turn into a conversation about her most significant male—or female—lover.  I glanced across the chasm between us for wedding diamonds that my memory couldn’t remember inventorying.  “No ring,” I noted. Hmmmm. At this point I would have bailed, but I didn’t leave because I wasn’t particularly wanting to advance the situation and I wasn’t wanting to end it.  I remembered how uncomfortable I was in the bar the last few times, but I was okay in this (organic) exchange.  However, I might have been too tired to be nervous.

Tomorrow I go back and get to see if we were just being exhausted together or if my community-center contact is straight, gay or partner’d.  Either way, I’m glad that I maintained enough eye contact to promote an hour of (stolen) conversation.  I didn’t talk to her friend and scare my target off the bar stool and then out of the bar.  I stayed the course through my increasing interest.  I’ve missed so much by pre-selecting myself out of friendships because “she would never get me.”  That was a stupid way to check out of life and miss meeting someone's gay sister or besty. 

Right now, I’m typing this with one eye open.  That ankle that I cracked a few months ago is throbbing. I have to get to bed because tomorrow is equally crazy for a different reason.  I was serious with my offer to let someone tell their story.   Certainly, you have days like me?