SUNDAY, BLOODY SUNDAY...BUT UP WITH TROLLS!

So there it was Sunday morning, and having stayed up way too late re-working my last post until it put me to sleep, I then got up too late to make coffee AND get to church and...

made coffee. I have been spending a fair amount of time wondering why I have not reached out more, have not put more effort into finding a local church, well, have just been focused so relentlessly on...

Wait! Stop! I've posted this before!

Yeah, well. That's what happened this morning, too; I could have just have made it to the closest church if I had bounded out of bed and hit the road immediately... but I didn't. I rolled over and chased Z's, and then went and... made the coffee. Hmmm. But I did go out after lunch and walk two miles for the first time in weeks. That was nice, even if walking along my "road" bears a strong resemblance to walking along an interstate highway -- lots of high-speed traffic, lots of trucks. At least the wind was strong enough that the exhaust was not a factor. And the cup of coffee I had on arrival home tasted really good. That's two cups with pretty much opposite preludes...

Then The Silver Fox left a message on my cell phone, and I called him back, and we had a long talk, even though he said that he had to leave "soon." It was really nice. There was an undercurrent of something, but he has actually told me flat-out that when he approached me on Leather Night, it was just an attempt to reach out, not an attempt to reach out and grab ahold -- and I don't know whether I am relieved or not. Probably not. [There is the small matter of my heart stopping when he entered the room.]

But this phone call did contain a lot of pertinent information, such as the fact that he is in relationship -- with the very guy whom I was going to call for the straight dope on TSF when I thought he was hitting on me, and I wanted to know where I stood. [Talk about the one time in my life I have actually managed not to put my foot in it. And boyoboy, am I glad my guardian angel was working overtime that day!] A little while later, along comes the fact that the relationship is "open," and somewhere further along the line some of the other people he is currently nailing crop up -- and it hits me: this guy is a one-man Slut Phase. Maybe I can just go along for the ride and see where I need to go [rehab, AIDS hospice, whatever] after that...

And while we're talking about adjustments, I got a very polite e-mail from NBM, begging off dinner... MAYBE it's just the complications of Thanksgiving and approaching Christmas -- both of which involve very complicated arrangements between himself, his ex-wife, her current husband and his ex-wife -- but in my "what cue did I miss?" mode, I am sure that I have done something incredibly stupid again.

And I asked the Professor for a post-mortem; his reply was candid, all right, but it was so riddled with misunderstandings [at least of what I thought went on between us, that evening and online] that it made me want to write a long, explanatory letter. I didn't — I am learning a few new tricks. On the other hand, it pissed me off enough that I will now rat him out here:

We clearly connected when we met. I thought (mistakenly) you were interested in taking it further, albeit slowly. You ultimately indicated that you were actually not interested in taking it anywhere and, in fact, you weren't even sure you wanted to be with a man. Ultimately, the cock-tease persona and the over-psychologizing got tedious. I know it wasn't me who called you an "arrogant academic asshole," but you obviously elicited some pretty negative reactions from someone else.

If you are still so conflicted, you might forget the getting together part now and focus on probing your own feelings with a therapist. To do otherwise, if you have remained the same, is to court disaster. People on these websites are not simply interested in befriending a guy with coming out problems. Life is short, time is precious.

Leap out of the closet [!] and start participating in the rest of your life.

Why is it that the only person on earth who doesn't tell me to go take a flying leap after we have a long conversation, lives several time zones away? If this trend continues, I am in real trouble. Actually, what we are looking at is no trend: it's just me. I was a precocious child who loved twigging grown-ups with my [oh, so thorough] knowledge, and that bratty core is still a Ghost in the Machine somewhere alongside the Inner Girl...

At a recent gay social gathering, I managed to have arguments [excuse me, ahem, adult discussions] with several professionals on the topics on which they were supposedly expert. Now on the one hand, nobody is as expert as they claim to be, and I know that from having a field of supposedly unassailable expertise myself, but the real problem in an Underlying Failure to Grow Up. [Not to mention an Underlying Failure to SHUT Up.] You would think that at fifty-plus I might have figured out that behaving like an annoying ten-year old was something to "lay aside." But then, I have not had such good luck laying much of anything "aside" in the last thirty years...

I just don't want to alienate people I like; do I have to not be myself to do that? Dear God, tell me it ain't so...

Oh. And the other Coffee Appointment Guy [the one heretofore called "A"] showed up at the end of the gay dinner and was what I would call underjoyed to see me. I wanted to talk to him just to show that I wasn't avoiding him, and hoped that that wouldn't be sending the wrong signal, but the president of the group sailed by and asked if we knew each other, and the other CAG looked a little chagrined when I allowed as how we had met before. Should I have let him answer? Let him answer "no"?

Here is the real issue: it's the feeling I cannot shake that I missed out on the Orientation on Orientation, the meeting where they explained how it all works, what signals mean what, how to read someone, how to stay friends with people whose hots for you you don't return -- I mean, how am I ever going to settle down and enjoy this crazy life of mine if I can't figure out where I stand?

So, please let the NBM show up again. Whether or not I ever decide to take him home to Mother, I like his company, and would be really sorry to miss it.

Oh, and here's this: I found myself telling The Silver Fox that I was four months into my Simmering Down Period, and the last two months remaining didn't look so bad from here... Must have been an "up" day today [as opposed to Sunday night, say...].



Stat Counter Trivia for Thanksgiving Week:

Courtesy of what seems to be the usual dreadful word-by-word internet translation, I am now available in Vienna as Ein Troll am Meer [though a better translation might be Ratlos: Troll in Seenot] and in Italy as Un Troll in Mare [which sounds like something I might order in a restaurant].

We have had hits from Mt. Laurel, NJ; Wellington, NZ; Hamilton, ONT; as well as Portugal, Bristol (UK), and Kuala Lumpur. Our friend at the Bureau of Labor Statistics, who came looking for Greasetank, has returned to check in again, while Tagame-sensei has brought me into the North Carolina Research And Education Network, whatever that is, which joins Bear-Stearns and Bank One Columbus [apparently both able to countenance employee time wasted] as one of the more puzzling entries.

Hang in there.

And when you give thanks this week, remember all the blessings of living in this country -- a country where we can take freedom for granted, where elections happen and actually change things, and where incredible changes in society can take place over a mere decade or two...

Well, here's to Supreme Court justices everywhere...

"Do good work. And keep in touch."