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A Single Year
by Dawn Mueller
Copyright 2010 by Dawn Mueller.
This story is culled from the author’s own recollections, journal entries, and correspondences with friends, family, and acquaintances. Some events, conversations, and exchanges have been condensed or edited. To protect the privacy of others, certain names and/or locations have been changed and characters conflated.
This project is supported by a Community Arts Assistance Program grant from the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Illinois Arts Council, a state agency.
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
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Table of Contents
What others are saying about A Single Year
The agony of dating was so completely described it sometimes hurt my eyes to continue reading. Very brave and excellently written.
~ Betty Dodson, artist, author and sexologist
Compelling and fearlessly honest... sure to be an eye-opener for straight people!
~Ali Davis, author, True Porn Clerk Stories
Thinky without alienating the reader and introspective without coming across as self-absorbed or, worse yet, whiney. And, of course, incredibly well written. Very good stuff!
~Kris Dresen, artist and writer
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Sometimes you have to stand alone to prove that you can still stand.
~ Anonymous
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Acknowledgements
First and foremost I’d like to thank anyone who encouraged me to keep plugging away. I never imagined it would take 5 years to get a story out about one year in my life. Every little bit of encouragement has helped to keep the ball rolling (however slowly). Whether you read early bits and pieces, asked me how it was going, or just listened to me whine about the obstacles I put in my own path, I am indebted to you for your persistence.
I would especially like to thank Nancy Beckett and the Lakeside Writers for enduring countless hours of hand wringing and head scratching as I read draft after draft of chapters in progress. Thank you for your comments, your feedback, and for making me stronger. Thanks to Nancy for your guidance and for giving us all a safe place to be creative and find ourselves.
Particular thanks to Laurie Cunningham for cleaning up my mess and helping to eliminate all the words in between. Thanks also to Carol Crews for being encouraging, supportive, and flattering beyond measure. Whenever I felt like I was losing steam, you were always there to nudge me along.
Corbin, you were my rock when I needed something solid and you continue to inspire me with your enthusiasm and eternally optimist outlook. I really hope Neil Patrick Harris is free to play your part in the movie version.
To the other characters that were instrumental to my development (you know who you are), thank you for helping me grow. I hope my telling of the story does it justice and respects your role. You are forever a part of me.
To those who knew next to nothing about me before reading my story, thank you for not judging me and not only sticking around, but also encouraging me to keep going. Traci Galbaugh, Tracey Wright, Michele Curley, Maddi Leone, Jae Lombardo, and Rachel Grad, I am grateful for your continued friendship.
Thanks to anyone who popped in from time to time to add a note of encouragement to my tediously slow online updates. It helped so much to know that I still had an audience. Thanks to Virgil Zanders for being more motivated about this project than I was at times! Your boundless enthusiasm lit a fire under me on more than one occasion. Thanks to Laura Banick for your fabulous photographs and for unknowingly pushing the ball out of a rut at a time when I didn’t think I wanted to play anymore. Thanks to Ali Davis for all the kind words over the years. I have always respected and admired you even if I know next to nothing about politics and your jokes are often over my head.
Thanks to Amy Johnson for your confidence in my work and for connecting me to the great Betty Dodson. I am incredibly humble for Betty’s words of support. Thank you Betty Dodson for not only taking the time to read my book, but also for offering your insight, encouragement, and experience.
Infinite thanks to Denise Hagerla for helping me see my patterns, my strengths, and my lovability. I wouldn’t be where I am today without you.
Thanks to Helena Coupaud. I don’t know what the future holds, but I hope we continue to love, respect, and support one another.
Last but certainly not least, thanks to my loving mother who raised me right (mostly ;) and loves me through all my trials and tribulations. You have always been my biggest fan. I love you.
For the third night in a row, I’m sitting in front of my computer with the shades drawn, scrolling through profiles on The Reader’s X-Matches. I don’t have an account, but am considering it.
I click on “women seeking women” and scan the subject lines: “Sexy, Bi-Curious Fem,” “Bi-Curious Looking to be Taught” and “Trying to Expand my Horizons.” I view their profiles one by one, discovering that most are of the “educational” variety—one woman looking to be schooled by another in the fine art of girl-on-girl action:
I have never been with a woman before, but I have fantasized about it for quite some time. I’m looking for someone to experiment with who is sensual, open-minded, attractive, reasonably fit, and has a nice personality.
I’m tempted, but decide to skip them, along with the married women looking for “discreet encounters” (I don’t need the drama). There was a time when I would have been interested in teaching, but now’s not that time. I want someone who knows what the fuck she’s doing and isn’t going to lie there waiting for me to start the next lesson.
X-Matches are the dirty version of the regular Matches in The Reader, a free Chicago weekly newspaper. It’s a hook-up site for everyone and anyone: gay, lesbian, bi, trans, straight, questioning or curious. Given my recent dating history, it seems like the fastest way to get what I really want with the least amount of drama.
For the past few months, I’ve spent hours perusing online dating sites: yahoo personals, match.com, lava life, planet out, salon.com, and Chicago pride, to name but a few. They all seem far too tedious. I don’t want to endure endless chitchat or pay for countless dinners before getting anywhere. I just want to get laid. I’m 33 and single for the first time in a long time. It’s time I finally felt what I’ve been missing.
For as long as I can remember, I’ve been in a relationship. It’s called serial monogamy. While there may have been periods of a month or two when I was single, most often I went from one relationship to the next: getting out of one stale relationship by jumping into a doomed one. I don’t know how to leave a relationship when I’m unhappy. If things aren’t throw-yourself-in-front-of-a-train bad, I stay. That’s why I suffered through nine years with my last girlfriend, despite the fact that we hadn’t had any significant sexual involvement for close to 4 years.
As I scroll through the list of kinks you can include in your profile (ass play, bondage, domination, tit torture), my Labrador retriever, Mousse, stirs in her crate behind me. I look back and see her waking from her slumber and groaning softly. My one-room condo—filled with a futon, TV, two bookshelves, racks of CDs and the desk where I’m sitting—is tight and her crate takes up a good portion of it. I often joke that she lives in a crate within a crate. The CD in my five-disc player clicks over to a new album and Missy Elliot starts to sing: “Is it worth it, let me work it/I put my thang down, flip it and reverse it.”
If the queer police ever investigated my CD collection, I’d lose my lesbian license for sure. I have several Melissa Etheridge and Indigo Girls albums, but the misogynistic rappers far outnumber those deemed more appropriate by the lesbian elite: 50 Cent, Eminem, Dr. Dre, and Ludacris, to name but a few. Not even my Ani Difranco CDs could save me from excommunication. I love hip-hop. If I’d been confined to listening to nothing but lesbian folk music, I’d have killed myself a long time ago.
The bass thumps as I scroll through the ads, but not loud enough to drown out the ongoing argument in my head.
I shouldn’t be doing this. It’s wrong.
Why?
I don’t know. It just is.
But God gave you a body to enjoy, shouldn’t you enjoy it?
Yeah, but this is stuff sick people do. What if the lesbian community finds out?
I’ll never get a date again.
So what? Nobody has to know.
I had a friend through college who I would expect to put an ad like this in the newspaper. His name was Dwight. He was a burly guy who wore combat boots and camouflage gear and shaved his head, but grew his beard and mustache long. He opposed everything in the world and would tell you exactly why if you expressed more than a minute of interest. If he were Native American, they would have called him “Dark Cloud.” When he wasn’t talking about sex or hitting on anything with boobs that moved, he was hanging out at the local skate park mentoring the skate punks who clung to him like baby possums. He had a love of all things loud and would make his own firecrackers and ignite his thunder whenever the mood struck. He was downright scary, but he had a huge heart underneath it all. Ultimately, he ended up killing himself on Valentine’s Day 2000 after a girl broke his huge heart. He left his life in as dramatic a fashion as he lived it.
Dwight would have been proud to see me looking at sex ads in The Reader. He was always trying to get me to have sex with him, to no avail. One time I let him jerk off in front of me because I’d never seen anyone ejaculate before in person and wanted to see what it was like. I wasn’t impressed.
I start to build my own profile by checking off my favorite kinks: (ass play, bondage, dildos, dominant, latex, masturbation, rope, rubber, slave, spanking, strap-on, toys, vibrators, etc.). I move on to “preferences,” where I have to chose between two options like “Astroglide or Liquid Silk,” “Finger or Vibrator,” and “Rubber or Vinyl.” I’ve never heard of Astroglide or Liquid Silk but I assume they are brands of lube. Liquid Silk sounds nice.
I’m one of the few people I know who truly “lost” her virginity—meaning I don’t know who took it or where it went. There was no event, no moment, no memorable night to mark my passage into womanhood. Not that I remember, anyway. That could have been because most of the time I was sexually active with men, I was drunk.
My “first” could have been my high school boyfriend who mashed my breasts so hard there wasn’t enough liquor in the world to mask the pain. We’d hang out in his basement, listen to Guns ‘n Roses and drink rum straight from the bottle while groping each other. I remember lying on the floor wondering if this was all there was to sex and, if so, why was everyone so crazy about it?
A drinking buddy from community college could also have been “the one.” He went so far as to put a condom on and attempt entry, which felt like I was being thrown down a dry Slip ‘n Slide. He stopped and said I wasn’t reacting the way other women do. At that point I think I suspected I would never have an interest in sex with men, but I wasn’t ready to admit I was a lesbian.
Instead, I screwed around with more men to prove just how un-lesbianlike I could be. But even when I was drunk out of my mind (my natural state in high school and college), I was keenly aware of what was going on between my legs. Anytime a guy got close to penetration, I’d stop him. I was paranoid about getting pregnant like my mom. She was 18 when she married my dad but already pregnant, hence a speedy wedding. Being good Catholics, they continued to rely on the rhythm method for birth control once they were married. Two more of us came along until my mom got fed up and had her tubes tied at age 23.
In the lesbian world, many pride themselves on the fact that they’ve never slept with a man. They even have a special term for it: gold stars. They have no respect for lesbians who’ve succumb to men—even if it happened years before they came out as lesbians. This, of course, leaves me in lesbian purgatory since I can’t say definitively whether I’ve been with a man. By my college graduation, I finally admitted I was a lesbian and started sleeping with a woman. I still drank, only then it was because I wanted the stigma of being a lesbian even less than I wanted to sleep with men.
As I continue building my profile, I get to a filter that lets me narrow my options by checking off what I’m looking for: woman, man, couple, group, or transsexual; dating, playing, relationship, or discreet encounter; age, hair color, eye color, and race; smoking, drinking, and drug preferences. I don’t bother with most of the filters because I don’t want to limit myself. Besides, I don’t have a specific type. I don’t prefer blondes to brunettes, blue eyes to green eyes, or black skin to white. I just want someone relatively fit and young. I check off various filters and fill in the age requirement (26-40), but still end up with a bunch of profiles I don’t want.
Some are from people I know wouldn’t consider me:
I’m a sexy, feminine girl with long dark brown hair and brown eyes. If you are an attractive, feminine girl who takes care of herself, I’d like to meet you and we can see what adventures we can get into!
This woman isn’t interested in a lesbian like me with short hair, a boyish figure, and a preference for men’s clothes who strangers often call “sir.” To clarify my sex, I’ve tried to look more feminine. But no matter how much pink I wear, I’m still mistaken for a guy. I’m not sure why. Lack of make-up? Boyish build? Square jawline? Short hair? The way I carry myself?
Whatever it is, I’ve learned it’s not something I can change with a new haircut, a new blouse or a little blush. I try to accept myself and wear clothes I’m comfortable in.
The women seeking feminine women are interested in the traditional type of girl-on-girl action that men dream about or watch in poorly done porn. They are typically bisexual:
Mature, hot and sexy bisexual woman looking for another bi, or bi-curious woman for hanging out and playing together. I’m very beautiful, and I desire someone very beautiful and feminine as well.
It doesn’t take a genius to realize that the women in porn movies are not real lesbians, which is probably the reason men feel safe fantasizing about them—they pose no threat. A real lesbian knows better than to allow her fingernails to grow into long, pointy daggers. Plus, the women in porn basically make faces and moan like something amazing is happening. They are straight women well versed in the art of faking it.
Mousse comes out of her crate and stretches—an indication that she’s getting ready for something. It’s after 11 p.m. and she usually gets her evening walk at 10 p.m. She comes over and sits by my side, looking up expectantly.
“OK.” I say. “Let’s go.”
She waits as I put on my coat, hat and gloves, preparing myself for a cold February night in Chicago. I put on her collar and leash, stuff a poop bag in my pocket, check for my keys, and head out. She pushes her way down the stairs pulling so hard I have to let go of her leash so I don’t topple after her. She waits for me at the bottom and I regain control of her leash. She pulls me to the door, I push it open, and she yanks me out into the night.
A month ago, a friend suggested I read The Artist’s Way. While my career as a production editor involves a certain level of creativity, I’ve always really wanted to channel my creativity into writing. One of the exercises in The Artist’s Way is what the author, Julia Cameron, calls “morning pages,” which is writing three pages of stream of consciousness the moment you wake up. This is supposed to help purge you of the need to whine about mundane things so that your real creativity can shine throughout the day. Another exercise is taking yourself on “artist dates” to nurture yourself. I’m normally not a bubble bath person. But since they make good artist dates, I’ve gotten more intimate with my bathtub and, in the process, more intimate with certain aspects of myself.
Besides the morning pages and artist dates, I’ve been writing affirmations. Today mine were: “I matter,” “I’m a channel for God’s creativity, and my work comes to good,” and “Creativity is God’s will for me.” The first one I wrote myself. The other two came straight from the book. Despite their New Age cheesiness, these exercises are helping me get more in touch with myself. Trouble is, instead of encouraging me to write more, they’re encouraging me to explore my sexuality. Having written the affirmations this morning and then looking at the X-Matches, I couldn’t help but think that God’s will for me was not to put a sex ad online. I feel guilty.
It wasn’t until I started looking at X-Matches that I realized just how ingrained my fear of God is, especially when it comes to sex. I didn’t grow up in a religious family, so I’m not sure where all this fear came from. My dad became an atheist after my mom converted to Catholicism to marry him. She tried to send us to church for a while, but my dad grumbled about it so much she gave up. I never even read The Bible. Still, I managed to internalize some surprisingly rigid beliefs about God and sex.
Apparently vague second-hand threats from friends, relatives, and television evangelists were more than enough to instill in me a healthy fear of God. I always knew that my lesbianism didn’t score high in God’s book of heavenly deeds, but I had no idea just how deeply I had let the fears and beliefs of others permeate my entire being. Until now.
I follow Mousse as she sniffs every blade of grass and every drop of pee on the side of every tree. I feel safe walking around at night, even though my neighborhood is a little rough. One of the benefits of my androgynous appearance is that people tend to leave me alone. It also helps that I have a 70-pound dog pulling me around the block. Even without Mousse, I don’t feel vulnerable. I don’t act scared or give off vibes that I’m an easy target.
My sister would probably be considered an easy target. She’s a year older than me and all the things I’m not: feminine, straight, and busty. Growing up in her shadow, I was constantly put down by classmates for not being more like her, the result of which is the tough girl attitude I still carry with me. Unfortunately, my thick skin is not as impenetrable as I want people to think.
My sister was 16 when she started having sex. I remember my mom giving her “the talk” so she wouldn’t make the same mistakes and took her to the doctor to get birth control pills. I can’t remember if her face was always daintier than mine was, but at some point, I started to believe it was having sex that made her look more feminine. While I wasn’t that eager to have sex, I became more interested when I started to believe that it would make me pretty like her. I wasn’t sure how it worked or how long it would take, but I was convinced it would happen once I “became a woman.” Armed with this misinformation, I wandered the halls of school, guessing which girls were sexually active based on the femininity of their facial features. “She’s done it. She’s done it. She hasn’t done it. She has.”
We’ve been standing at a tree for a while when I realize someone has thrown breadcrumbs for the birds and Mousse is inhaling everything in sight. I have a tendency to get lost in thought sometimes when I walk her. Other times I’m too impatient to wait for her to sniff every crack in the sidewalk so I pull her around the block, whining, “Come on, Mousse!” She’ll look up at me with innocent eyes and I’ll feel guilty and let her sniff a little longer. But not tonight. I pull her away from the breadcrumbs yelling, “No, Mousse!” and we’re off.
Back at the house, Mousse and I race up the stairs, she wins, and I open the door. I remove her leash and collar and she follows me into the kitchen for a treat. My collection of CDs is still spinning in the player and I realize it’s too loud given the late hour. I turn it down, fill my water glass, and sit back in front of the computer. Mousse jumps on the bed, looks at me, and grunts. She’s gotten used to me spending so much time in front of the computer, but that doesn’t mean she likes it. She’d much rather have me throwing toys around for her, but she resigns herself to her second favorite activity: sleep.
With all the filters I’ve added, I’m down to 30 profiles, and they’re dwindling fast as I narrow them down manually. Unfortunately, lesbians aren’t like gay men when it comes to sex. They might claim to be, but in my experience, it’s nearly impossible for women to separate their emotions from sex. I should know since every time I thought I was having a one-night stand, it turned into a relationship. I tell myself things will be different now.
As I continue to browse and delete, it becomes more and more apparent that I’m a minority within a minority within a minority. Casual hookups are just not something a lot of lesbians want. I’ve heard that the new generation is more sexually liberated, but I don’t see the lesbian sex drive approaching that of gay men anytime soon.
In my remaining choices, several of the profiles are from women who have boyfriends willing to share them with another woman, provided they get to watch and/or participate. I consider this scenario for a moment and click on the “Ads from Couples” section to see what’s there:
Attractive female seeking a MFF or FF experience with hubby watching. Discretion is very important. We are a clean profession couple looking for a good time with no strings attached. If you’re real and ready contact us.
Not many include pictures. I imagine if you’re looking for casual sex, you don’t necessarily want your neighbors or coworkers to find out.
Two brave souls have photos though, and I’m drawn to one couple in particular with three pictures: One of a large, scary-looking man who reminds me of Dwight, another of the same large, scary man holding someone upside down, and a third of a lovely Hispanic girl with cropped hair sitting at a computer desk looking demurely at the camera with round, dark eyes. Their profile reads:
Devoted couple looking to spice things up with another woman. She is a bisexual Hispanic-Filipino mix with reddish hair, brown eyes, and athletic figure. He is a cuddly bear of a southern gentleman who can go all night, knows how to please a woman, and loves the challenge of pleasing two women at once. Both enjoy sex where everybody gets plenty of attention and no one ever feels left out. We are disease free and anxious to meet you. We have some piercings and tattoos and think it’s great if you do too!
The guy scares me and if it weren’t for her, I would definitely take a pass. But those dark eyes prompt me to add, “Couples seeking women” to my search criteria, just to see what happens. Instantly, my pool of candidates doubles, and I decide that if the situation were right I could be persuaded to try a threesome with a man.
Despite my disinterest in men, I’m intrigued by the penis. Then again “intrigued” is probably not the right word. It’s more a mixture of fascination and revulsion—revulscination, if you will. I’m interested in what it does and how it works, but not enough to want one in my face. Growing up, I discovered my dad’s porn magazine collection in his closet. I’d sneak into my parent’s bedroom and search the top shelf for whatever smut rag I could get. Penthouse was okay, but I preferred the raunchiness of Hustler. The standard Penthouse pictures of women sitting in a sheer negligee with their crotches splayed didn’t do much for me. I wanted to see something happen—doctors doing nurses, teachers doing students, wardens doing prisoners.
These days, it’s frighteningly easy to get porn online. You can download video snippets for free and if you compile enough of them, there’s no need to join any sites that make you pay. It might be easier to join, but I still have the idea in my head that it’s wrong to look at porn and even more wrong to get a membership for it. So I download enough to get some pleasure, delete it, and then start over.
Sometimes I worry what my interest in heterosexual porn means about my sexual identity. There are a lot of unspoken rules to being a lesbian: “Don’t sleep with men,” “Own lots of folk music,” and “Don’t be turned on by straight porn” are just a few. But because I’ve never engaged in intercourse (or so I think), there’s a certain mystery about it for me. It makes me want to experience heterosexual sex, if only because I want to know for sure, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I’m a lesbian. I’m not sure why I need to have sex with a man to reach that conclusion because I’m 98% positive that I’m a lesbian. But a threesome might be the perfect opportunity to explore that nagging 2%.
To respond to an ad, you have to have a profile of your own. It doesn’t cost anything to post a profile or respond to someone who contacts you, but if you want to initiate contact, you have to purchase a membership. You can join for a day, a week, a month, or ninety days. Because of my history of not paying for such things, I’ve spent the last three nights debating whether to just post something and hope I get a response, or shell out some cash, and let the world (at least the person in charge of the accounts there) know I’m a sexual deviant.
I finally decide to sign up for one day, respond to a few ads, and see what happens. I’ve been a follower long enough. If I want to change, that means I have to do something different, right? Why not start with this? I’ve already chosen Liquid Silk over Astroglide and some standard kinks (no medieval devices, thank you). The only thing left to do is write the essay. I agonize for far too long, but finally settle on:
Looking for lesbians who are interested in sex without the tremendously dull build-up and all that comes with it. I’m 33 years old, 5’8”, 135 lbs., and very active. I run, bike, swim, and stay in good shape. I don’t drink, smoke, or do drugs and am disease-free. I take good care of myself and you should too. I will not answer ads from single guys, but would consider a couple (man and woman) if the situation is right. Photo exchange a must.
I hit “publish” and wait for the alarms to go off and the porn police to bust down my door. Nothing happens. Instead I get a message from The Reader stating that my profile is being reviewed and will be published shortly. I wait. And wait. And wait some more. I hit refresh 10 times, not really expecting someone to be in the office reviewing ads at 1 a.m., but hoping for some instant gratification nonetheless. Suddenly, my profile does appear, although the essay portion reads “review pending.” I debate whether to go ahead and contact people without having an essay up and decide to go for it. If it’s meant to be, the essay will get published before people get to their email. It’s already late and everyone else in X-match land is probably busy getting laid anyway.
I send out 11 initial contact emails explaining that I’m a lesbian looking to revive my sex life without getting into anything serious. After sending the first few, it gets easier. Now there’s nothing left to do but wait.
Before I got to the point of checking out the X-Matches, I took a brief dip in the dating pool. Having spent a good deal of time with gay men, I realize they have a different mentality about lesbian dating than they do about their own. It’s rare to find lesbians in the bars most gay men frequent, so gay men assume that lesbians can’t afford the luxury of being picky. Anything that resembles a woman at a gay bar is a choice cut to a gay man looking to set up a lesbian friend. My gay boyfriend, Corbin, is the number one offender when it comes to this. He’s a perpetually happy red head who has astoundingly good parking karma and a sickeningly optimistic view on life. He is the yang to my yin, and if we were both a little more heterosexual and had I a few more maternal instincts, we might have made some exceptionally pale, beautifully balanced children.
Corbin, the gang, and I frequently visit Big Chicks, a friendly north side gay bar that has a free barbecue on Sunday afternoons. The gang consists of John—Corbin’s penny-pinching, Simpson’s-loving, muscle-bound best friend; Edwin—a big-hearted, baking fool who concocts cakes and cookies on a weekly basis and brings them to Big Chicks for us to sample; and Sunil—a smarty-pants graduate student who hangs out with us when he needs a break from all the thinking he does at school. Our unlikely gang all met through Frontrunners, a gay and lesbian running club in Chicago. John is the oldest, then Corbin, Edwin, Sunil, and me. Together, since there are rarely any women to ogle at, we ogle at the other boys as they get in line for the meat of the day. I’ve become quite an expert at picking out boys for Corbin because he has a very particular type: young, Latin boys, with nice, well-proportioned bodies who look like they came from the cover of a Menudo album.
My type is a little less obvious since I haven’t yet been able to pinpoint it. Not that it matters to Corbin. With the selection of women being so meager, he makes a big show of pointing out any woman who happens to walk by. Furthermore, if there are more than three women in the bar, he considers that to be “a lot of women.” When he sees one he’ll say (often loud enough for her to hear), “See... She’s cute, right?” Then I’ll roll my eyes at him and say something like, “Corbin! She’s 20 years older than me and wearing an eye patch!”
Then I’ll tell him that just because there’s a woman in the bar doesn’t mean I’m going to sprint over and start my mating dance. Pickings may be slim, but, unlike him, I’m looking for someone who’s at least from my generation and can cut a rug now and again without having to worry about running into someone in her blind spot. Having gone through this spiel with him several times, I think he might have finally gotten it. So, when we were running together one Saturday morning and he told me about a girl that he met at the bar, I was more hopeful than usual.
“She’s very cute,” he insisted.
“Yea, right. Cute. I’ve heard that before.”
“No, really. This time it’s true. She’s cute. You’d like her.”
“What does she look like?”
“Longer hair, about shoulder length. Brunette. She was wearing a cute shirt that showed her bra strap because the collar was so wide. Very sexy.”
“Keep going,” I said.
“She said she just moved here from California and is looking to meet women. I told her about you.”
“And?”
“And she wants to meet you. Her name is Allison. She said she might come to the barbecue on Sunday so you better be there.”
“I still don’t even know if I’m ready to date yet! It hasn’t even been three months.”
“Come on! It can’t hurt to meet her.”
I tried not to get too carried away in thought, but as the conversation continued, I couldn’t help it.
“She just got out of a relationship a while ago too so she’s not looking for anything serious either.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, and she’s horny.”
That was all I needed to know.
* * *
Before heading to the bar Sunday, I thought about what to wear. There’s a fine line between trying too hard and not hard enough. I didn’t want to scream the desperation I felt, but it was the end of October, and I had been free from my virtually sexless 9-year relationship for close to three months. Desperate? Who, me?
It may seem strange to stay in a long-term sexless relationship, but in the lesbian community, sexless relationships are fairly common. The phenomenon is known as lesbian bed death. With no testosterone-laden man to move things along, sex frequently becomes an afterthought. It’s something to do when all the stars are properly aligned and neither partner is busy, tired, or preoccupied.
The death march for sex in lesbian relationships usually begins roughly around 6 months, which is about the time reality starts to set in and the newness wears off. It doesn’t completely die out then, but what remains is a crawling, suffocating, remnant that gradually dies a slow, miserable death. The sex graveyard in my nine-year relationship was overgrown with grass and weeds and the tombstones were deeply embedded by the time it finally ended.
Through it all, I convinced myself that the lack of sex was acceptable because I didn’t have the desire. I didn’t feel sexually attracted to anyone. I thought there must be something wrong with me. I thought she was equally apathetic. At one point, I tried to get us both turned back on, but after so many dormant years, all the counseling and sex toys in the world weren’t going to exhume our sex life.
I settled on wearing a red hooded sweatshirt, jeans, and my faux bowling shoes—one of my favorite outfits. Unfortunately, my hair was another story. I was trying to grow it out and it was untidy, to say the least. Normally I could spike it up and the dark roots would come through and give me a bit of edginess. It was too long to spike at that point but I did anyway, only this time I ran my fingers through it after it dried so it would stick up in an unkempt, bed-head sort of way.
When I got to the bar, I casually looked around, passed a couple women, then meandered over to Corbin.
“Hey,” I said
“Hey.”
“Is she here yet?” I asked.
“Not yet. But I saw Charlie and he said she’d be here.”
Charlie is Allison’s gay boyfriend and a friend of Corbin’s who had introduced them the other night. Corbin introduced him to me and we exchanged pleasantries. I got some food from the back room and started the ritualized ogling. I tried to stay calm, but my nerves were getting to me.
When she arrived, I didn’t need Corbin to point her out. Her wide neck shirt and the black bra strap it revealed were all I needed. Plus, he had done a surprisingly good job of describing her. She looked like Melissa Rivers with shorter hair and bushier eyebrows. Sadly, I was a bit disappointed. She was too femme and had a certain Melissa Rivers attitude to go with the look. Maybe it was the California in her.
Instead of introducing each other, we stood around, politely not crossing an imaginary line. It was me and Corbin and our group at the table and Charlie and Allison and their group clustered at the bar, waiting for one of us to make a move. I felt like I was on an Animal Planet special documenting the dating rituals of lesbians. It was awkward and uncomfortable, especially since I wasn’t as interested in meeting her anymore.
I made my way towards the bathroom. She was directly in my path. I strode down the narrow, smoky hallway.
“Hi,” I said, as I passed her.
“Hi.”
When I returned, the groups had merged and Allison was near where I had been. I went to her and we were promptly introduced. I sat on my stool and swung my legs, feeling warm and horny. I happened to have tickets to David Sedaris that night and told Allison. She was impressed.
“I love David Sedaris.”
“Me too! I saw him when he was here last year too! He’s great.”
“Yeah. He is!”
I leaned against the wall, swung my feet a little more, felt a little warmer and hornier. Things were going well. Maybe I shouldn’t have judged her so harshly. She seemed nice enough, even if she couldn’t shake the California attitude. There were worse things, right? It’s not like I wanted a relationship, right?
The conversation flowed. She had a dog, which surprised me since she didn’t strike me the type. We continued talking and laughing. My caustic wit was at an admirable level and I joked with Charlie about kicking dogs out of beds and we all laughed. Allison was more impressed.
As the afternoon wore down, I panicked about what to do next. I tried to pull Corbin aside and ask him what I should do, but before I could, Allison handed me a card from the little snap purse she hung on her shoulder near her bra strap.
“Call me,” she said, with more confidence then I could ever hope to have.
“I will,” I said, beaming like a raccoon with a crayfish.
Nothing could have capped my day better than a night with David Sedaris...Well, maybe one thing could have, but I hoped that would come later.
Once I got her number, I was at a total loss. I knew there were certain dating rules to follow, but was totally ignorant of them. It made more sense to me to just call when you wanted, but apparently that’s not how it’s done. With lesbians, it’s even more confusing since, lacking a definite aggressor (i.e., a man) both tend to dance around the first move. Some lesbians get mad at straight people if they innocently ask who the man is in the relationship. (In case you haven’t figured it out yet, lesbians have a lot to be mad about and a lot of ongoing feuds to keep straight in their heads. Of course, don’t let them catch you calling anything other than straight people “straight.” In lesbian speak, things are “organized”, never “straightened” and you drive “forward,” not “straight.”) Lesbian sensibilities aside, the truth of the matter is that someone has to be the aggressor in a dating situation, otherwise lesbians would never get dates. Whether you choose to label the person who initiates the date as “the man,” “the aggressor,” or “the butch,” the bottom line is that someone has to put herself out there first and risk rejection.
In any case, I found myself with a phone number and the fear-inducing task of calling a stranger and asking her out—my first official lesbian date. One-night stands that migrate quickly into fucked-up relationships require but a small set of dating skills. Take copious amounts of alcohol, add two lesbians, stir in a U-haul, and voila—instant relationship!
A wave of sympathy for all the men of the world washed over me. How do they do it? How do they face rejection over and over? Does it get easier over time? My respect for men deepened from the moment Allison’s card was slipped into the folds of my wallet to the moment I took it out that night and looked at it more closely. As it turned out, it wasn’t even a real business card. It was a personal card with just her name, email address, and phone number on it.
“So, how long before I call her?” I asked Corbin via email the following Monday morning. I told him I was thinking of taking her to one of the movies that was coming to the gay and lesbian film festival the following weekend.
“I like that idea,” he replied. “Pick out a good one and then maybe give her a call (I’d say tomorrow.)”
A good one? That was easier said than done given that a lot of the gay and lesbian movies make it to the film festival simply because they’re geared towards the gay community, and not because there’s anything particularly good about them. The community as a whole is so starved for a movie that recognizes our struggles that we accept shoddy filmmaking, overwrought acting, and flat scripts just so we can see people like us on the big screen. Sadly, we will plunk our cash down for just about anything if it has some kind of gay twist. Looking through the movie descriptions, I found Mango Kiss which sounded decent:
Lou and Sassafras are San Francisco-based performance artists and best friends who decide to risk their relationship by becoming lovers. They take their performance art personas into the bedroom, resulting in one of the most creative and charming sex lives ever captured on film!
If nothing else, I hoped the movie would stimulate our hormones in such a way as to make it impossible for us to contain ourselves. (She had roommates so we’d have to go to my place since they tend to get in the way of raw, unbridled sex.) I ran the description by Corbin, and he agreed that it was a great fit. There was nothing left to do but wait the appropriate number of days to call her. Good thing I had Corbin around to teach me dating etiquette.
Later that same day, Corbin forwarded me a copy of an email that one of Charlie’s friends had sent about my meeting with Allison. I felt like I was in high school all over again, only this time I was popular!
The note said simply, “So, Allison’s into your friend. Is she gonna ask her out?”
I couldn’t wait another day to call her. If I waited too long, she might make other plans for the weekend. Plus, I didn’t want her to get tired of waiting and lose interest. I called her later that night.
There was no answer, so I left a message.
“Hi, uh... Allison? This is Dawn. We met at Big Chicks the other night? Uhh. I was thinking that since the film fest is coming next week, maybe we could catch a movie or something. Give me a call and let me know if you’re interested. Uhh.. Thanks. OK. Bye.”
I always sound dorky on machines. I like to think of it as a charming dorkiness that is both endearing and irresistible. She called back an hour later.
“Hello?”
“Hi, this is Allison”
“Hi!”
“You called?”
“Yeah. I uh... the gay and lesbian film festival is coming up and I was wondering if you’d like to catch a movie with me Saturday.”
“What time?”
“Well, there’s this movie called Mango Kiss playing at 7:00 at Landmark Century on Clark. How does that sound?”
“Good. I can meet you at the theater at 6:45.”
“OK.... I’ll see you then.”
“Yeah. OK. Bye.”
“Bye.”
And that was it. Short, sweet, and to the point (and incredibly awkward). The next day, I emailed Corbin and told him the news and that I was afraid we’d have nothing to talk about on the date. I also wasn’t sure if I was supposed to pay. I figured I should, but didn’t want her to feel pressured.
Corbin:
Wow! Look at you calling someone for a date! Congratulations! Don’t worry! The first phone call is always awkward. You’ll have plenty to talk about! Pay for the movie. That will spur her to either pay for coffee afterwards or treat you the next time. Get it? Next time?
Me:
Yea, I get it.
Corbin:
Send her an email on Thursday to say hi, confirm plans, and ask a question or two. It lets her know you’re still interested.
I followed his suggestions and asked her if we could meet earlier to make sure we got tickets. Movies in previous years during the festival had sold out. I also asked her some questions about her family and told her that I was looking forward to seeing her.
I got no response from her Thursday or Friday and started to worry. What if she decided she didn’t want to go out? Would I be stood up? Couldn’t she at least call? Send a quick note? Had I come on too strong? Was it stupid for me to want to get there that early?
By the time Saturday rolled around, I was trying to do too many things at once and worrying obsessively about not getting tickets. I reasoned that lesbian movies don’t sell out because lesbians don’t go out, to no avail. Mango Kiss was showing at a prime time and location and I decided it was better to be safe than sorry. I hopped on my bike and headed down to the theater about 4 miles away from my condo in Edgewater, (a twenty-minute ride).
I haven’t had a car since I moved to Chicago. Biking is now both transportation and exercise, though I mostly view it as transportation. When it’s warm, I commute to work, which makes me feel thrifty and environmental—just like a good lesbian should.
I got the tickets, which eased some of my anxiety. When I got home, I called Allison and let her know that we could meet later if she wanted.
“Hi, Allison. This is Dawn.”
“Oh, Hi.”
“Uh... I just wanted to call to let you know that we don’t have to meet at 6:30 anymore since I was afraid tickets would be sold out so I went and got some.”
“OK. See you later then.”
I had expected some show of happiness and excitement from her or at least a “Hey, that’s great.” Instead, my worries escalated. I sensed she was coming now out of a sense of duty rather than a genuine desire to see me.
With a little time to spare, I thought I would change the black ink cartridge in my printer. This was not one of my better ideas. After wrestling with the cartridge, I came away with several black splotches on my hands that no solvent in the world could remove.
Soon I was running late. I still needed to shower, shave, and figure out what to wear. I resigned myself to ink smears on my hands and jumped in the shower, hoping Allison would find them artistic.
After my shower where I miraculously managed not to cut myself shaving, I stood in a towel in front of my small closet full of clothes. Some lesbians don’t shave their legs or armpits at all, others shave in the summer but not in the winter, still others shave just like heterosexual girls. I tend to shave in the summer more often and in the winter only when necessary. Now that I’m dating, I’m hoping it’ll be a lot more necessary. I’ve tried at various points in my life to be a hairy feminist and see what it’s like to subvert the paradigm, but I found it to be rather uncomfortable. I like to feel smooth. I like my deodorant to work. I like to be able to see what’s going on between my legs. Plus, I like being with women who are soft and smooth and feel like women, even if it’s society’s twisted version of what a woman should feel like.
I picked out a pair of jeans and a white t-shirt with a gray button-up shirt over it, un-buttoned. My hair was again an issue, but I managed to tame it without too much trouble, watching my splotchy hands work with my hair as they moved back and forth in the mirror. Make-up? To a lesbian such as myself, a make-up collection might consist of a black eyeliner pencil, some dried-up mascara from high school, blush from the same era, and maybe some sort of lip gloss. Having thrown out the dried-up mascara and unflattering blush years ago, I was left with an expensive black eyeliner pencil from Whole Foods that didn’t involve bunnies getting shaved and blinded. I also had some Burt’s Bees lipsheen that tended to wear off before I ever got anywhere.
I checked myself in the mirror four or five more times before taking Mousse out and feeding her. She wasn’t interested in my date either. She was just glad that I had stopped yelling and bathing my hands in solvents. I did a key check, a wallet check, and a ticket check. Then I gave Mousse her standard farewell treat and put on the hippest coat I owned—a pseudo garage mechanic jacket with a patch on the pocket that said “Taz.”
When I arrived at the theater, I noticed her waiting at the elevators right away. She looked good in her jeans, light blue jacket, and white shirt. She wore a funky belt with vibrant colors that was textured like an African relic. It was probably very trendy.
She smiled when she saw me, but her smile dipped a little as I approached. I sensed that there was something about my appearance that she didn’t like. Was it the make-up? The outfit? The hair?
“Hi,” I said, cheerfully. “You been waiting long?”
“No. Just got here.”
“Well, that’s good. Here’s your ticket.”
I proudly reached into my back pocket and fished out my wallet with the tickets safely inside and handed her a ticket.
“Thanks,” she said, half-heartedly.
There was no line outside the theater and when we gave the usher our tickets and went inside, I was surprised at how empty it was. I felt a little silly for having fussed so much about the tickets. I’ve never been able to predict what lesbians will do. I’m much better with gay men, but hanging out with them is an activity lesbians frown upon. Gay men, while allies in the fight for equal rights, are far too different from lesbians to waste time with. Women need “womyn-only spaces” where the dreaded m-e-n have been stricken from the world and we are free to dance naked, commune with nature, and worship tulips.
Once we sat down, I felt even more uncomfortable and awkward. She, on the other hand, was brimming with so much confidence that I could almost hear her wondering aloud what she was doing there with me.
“Have you heard of this movie?” I asked.
“No,” she said.
“I guess the director’s here and they’re having a question and answer session afterwards. Might be interesting.”
“We’re not staying for that, are we?”
“Oh. Well, no. We don’t have to.”
“Those things are always too long and boring.”
“Yeah. I guess.”
I spotted a woman sitting in front of us who looked familiar. From the back, it looked like a friend of mine named Leah who sometimes ran with us in Frontrunners. I wondered if she was there alone and thought for a moment that I would rather be alone too.
We were spared the agony of more small talk when previews mercifully got rolling. The movie itself was cute and had some funny moments, but it was a typical independent LGBT film—one that probably wouldn’t have been made without the lesbian angle. It centered on role-playing in sex and relationships. The acting was not great and the cast featured beautiful lesbians with pretty hair who wore lots of makeup. During the film, I wondered if I should hold Allison’s hand or try the arm around the shoulder trick or act in some way like this was a date. However, the vibes I got from her muttered through clenched teeth, “Touch me and die,” so I kept my splotchy hands to myself.
When the lights came up and the question and answer session began, I followed Allison’s cue and gathered my coat to leave. Leah got up too, which made me feel better about leaving for some reason.
“So, what’d ya think?” Allison asked as we walked out of the theater.
“Well, uhh... it was interesting,” I said.
“Yeah? And?”
“Well, I just don’t know that lesbians are really like that. They were all very femmey.”
“That’s how they all are in California.”
“Really? Wow. I guess I’m not familiar with all that. Most of the lesbians you see in the Midwest are the more stereotypical butch or androgynous ones.”
“Well, there are all kinds of different types of lesbians in California. Nothing like what I’ve found here. There’s high femme and low femme and ultra femme and a whole lot more.”
“Oh, my!”
An unfortunate habit I’ve picked up is the tendency to parrot other people. Corbin, being so Pollyanna, often says, “Oh, my!” in a high-pitched voice. I became acutely aware that this probably wouldn’t go over well with Allison. Instead of coming off as queeny and amusing like Corbin, it came off as prudish and naïve.
“Well, I mean, I know what femme is,” I tried to recover, “but I don’t know much about the different levels of femme. What makes them different?”
“It’s hard to explain. They’re just not like they are here, that’s all.”
“What do you mean?”
“They are nicer, more open there. Lesbians here are closed and seem sheltered.”
I didn’t want to be offended, but saw no way not to be. We were walking down the ramp from the theater and I stopped to retie my shoe. When I stood up again, Leah was heading towards us. I was a little too happy to introduce her to Allison. It occurred to me later that I was using her to prove to Allison that I was well liked and had friends. See? Here’s one now. Likewise, I was showing Allison off to Leah. See, I have a date!
“What did you think of the movie?” I asked.
“It was cute,” she said, matter-of-factly
“Yeah,” I agreed. “You didn’t want to stick around for the question and answer session?”
“Nah, I’m tired and ready for bed,” she said. “Have a good night.”
“Yeah. You too!”
In an attempt to salvage the date, I asked Allison out for a drink. She was hesitant, especially when I told her I didn’t actually drink. She suggested a coffee place instead, but I told her I didn’t drink coffee either. I was beginning to annoy myself.
“We can go to SideTrack, if you want,” I insisted. “I’ll just get a 7-Up.”
“I don’t want to drink if you’re not going to.”
“Honestly, it doesn’t bother me. It’s fine. Let’s just go.”
“Well, OK.”
SideTrack is a gay bar nearby. There aren’t a lot of lesbian-only bars in the city. Lesbians don’t frequent bars quite the same way that gay men do. They probably drink just as much (or more) but they do it elsewhere. This is another area that puts me on the outs with the lesbian community. I haven’t had a drink since July 3, 1995.
From the experimentation phase with men, my alcoholism only got worse. A string of relationships with women followed an established pattern—meet, mambo, move-in. The worst one was at the height of my drinking and happened while I was at Northern Illinois University getting my bachelor’s degree in Drunken Paper Writing. It was a relationship of the throw-yourself-in-front-of-a-train variety but I was too drunk most of the time to bother finding a train schedule and instead opted for the take-all-the-pills-in-the-medicine-cabinet route.
When I awoke from that failed suicide attempt, my head was encased in what felt like a giant grapefruit. Touching it gave me strange tingling sensations. My hearing was also muffled and I was afraid I had done permanent damage. Thankfully, everything returned to “normal” after a few days. In retrospect, I should have gone to the hospital, but was afraid. I also didn’t want my mom to find out how bad things had gotten. She had always been very supportive of me. She knew I wasn’t in a good relationship and probably had an inkling that I was learning more in college about how to drink than I was about English literature. She didn’t need any more to worry about.
Unfortunately, that relationship continued until it finally got too dangerous for both of us. My memories of it are so hazy that I don’t know who broke it off. It may have been the only mutual agreement we ever reached. My relationship with alcohol, however, went on for longer, wrecking a few more relationships along the way.