Because I’m pressed for time, I decide to go to the coffee shop closest to my house—not the usual place four or five blocks away where they know my name and my coffee likes and dislikes, but the café just around the corner that is frequented almost exclusively by gay men.
I walk in. A fit, muscular, bearded man in a Santa hat takes my order. “Hi.”
“Hi. I’ll have a green tea and … and….” I point. “And I think I’ll have a slice of that banana nut bread.”
“Small, medium, or large tea?”
“Uh … small, thanks.”
He grabs the tea bag. “And … I’m sorry. You wanted something else, right? What was it? My phone number?”
I smile, avoiding eye contact. “I’ll have some banana nut bread, too.”
“I’m sorry.” He turns away, looking let down. “We’re just a little too happy here today. Would you like the thick end slice or the thinner slice that isn’t an end piece?”
“Umm….” I look over my options. “Give me the thin slice.” I search my wallet for my credit card. I can’t find it. Damn, I think, I must’ve left it in the ATM again.
“Visa?” he asks, taking the card I had evidently placed already on the counter.
I now make eye contact. He looks embarrassed. I want to say something reassuring: “I’m flattered, but…. If I were gay, you know…. If I ever decide that I’m not straight, yours will be the first number I….” But instead I explain that I thought I had lost my credit card, but, apparently, I had it out right there on the counter, and … and….”
He doesn’t respond, gives me the credit card receipt to sign. I tip generously.
After I sit down, when he’s busy talking to the other barrista, I size him up. He’s young. Young, tall, dark, and handsome. And, to judge by his popularity with the other customers, he seems to have charisma to go with his looks. I'm flattered. And, because I'm flattered, I wonder how to maintain his interests without actually giving him what he wants--without being dishonest. I wait to see if he looks at me. He doesn't.
I take out a crossword puzzle, but I can’t concentrate. To my right sit three obviously gay males and one female. If one of the men speaks, the group immediately responds with a follow-up comment, question, smile, or laughter. The woman, though, has to work much harder to be heard. She gets interrupted and has to speak louder than the others to get noticed. It strikes me that if the men were straight, the woman would be the focus of conversation, especially if the woman were as attractive as this one is. The men would hang on her every sentence, look to her for approval, compete for her attention, trying to do with words what they wish to do with their hands and bodies. But here it’s reversed. The men seem to thoroughly enjoy each other’s company; they interact effortlessly. The woman is clearly forcing it, being inauthentic. And when the men address her, it’s out of politeness more than interest in her views or comments. She looks foolish.
I’m envious of the men. I’ve never had that kind of power, the power of indifference, over an attractive woman.
But, as I bury my head in a book and try to block out their voices, my empathies are with her—with the outsider, the one nervously folding and unfolding a candy wrapper as she tries to follow the conversation, her legs crossed, back straight, shoulders hunched forward trying to politely impose herself, trying to act as if she’s one of them, trying, with less and less poise, not to be forgotten.
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14 comments:
I remember the first time I went to dinner with my husband and some of his friends and the exact same thing happened to me. With my wedding ring came powers of invisibility. I guess when someone becomes "sexually irrelevant" they are easier to dismiss. Sad sort of. Then again, if I am getting attention for what I might potentially DO or BE for someone else, I don't think I want that sort of attention anyway.
I Get it! Your attention was on the girl. Not only because you were attracted to her. Further, you were empathizing with her. You, too, were the outsider here. In the minority, as it were. How wonderful!
Gorwing up "in the theatre" I was often surprised at how "outside" the mainstream I was. Even in rural Utah the majority of men on the stage were gay. I was "hit on" so many times without understanding. I just didn't have the interpretive devices necessary to translate and "get it." I look back and realize that a few men thought I was mean/insensitive/uncaring. In reality I was speaking Mercurian, and they were talking in Venusian. I really couldn't translate what they were saying into something I could understand. Ignorance made me the fool.
You are bringing about epiphanies by the dozen this week. Cut it out. My cocoon is cozy and safe. For the love of nature... just operate in the white-male dominated nomenclature. Too much stimulation in too short a period.
Trav
1 - Why must you get SO NERVOUS in these situations?! He's a gay guy. So what? Don't get so flustered by a gay guy. He's just a guy who likes guys. I know you know this. Just because a guy likes guys doesn't mean he can't tell a straight guy from a gay guy, or that he wouldn't get the message pretty quickly. I hate to tell you this, but I bet the barista was screwing with you because he knew you were uncomfortable (and a male barista is still a barista, at least in the states, not a barrister, which is a lawyer in England). Why not handle it how you would if a woman you're just not into is flirting with you? Basically, be nice, but don't give out your number and don't make a big deal of it. In the end, even if he was interested in hooking up, all it was was a gay guy flirting with you. Not so scary. Honest.
2- Pet peeve of mine here, please remember: the reference to a woman sitting at a table with men as a "female" while they are still referred to as men (rather than males) reduces that woman, and that reduction is sexist. We used to fight about this jokingly and I'm not ripshit or anything over it, but I just want you to know that. Calling a woman a "female" if you're referring to men as men is just plain sexist in my book.
3- The assumption that the men at the table must have been gay because they were talking over the attractive woman is not necessarily a correct one. Not being a man and not living in a remotely similar metro area to yours anymore, I can't be completely sure, but I know that around here, no matter how attractive a woman is, a woman has to fight to say ANYTHING in an all-male audience, even a casual one. In fact, usually the more attractive the woman is (or the more diminutive, cute, etc.), the more difficult it is for them. Perhaps this is regionally based, because I most definitely have observed that it's more difficult for women to express themselves in groups of men around here than it is out there, but I'm saying that your assumption may be flawed.
That's all for now. You're probably not even glad I came back to blog-land. :) Happy holidays, to you and the family!
SE. No, I DO want "attention for what I might potentially do or be", if, by that, you mean, sexual attention. But I know what you mean. I don't want to be objectified, either, or ONLY objectified.
HH, yeah I know what you mean about the Mercurian and Venusian languages (I had no idea the Village People were gay when I was young. Didn't understand the language). And I know further what you mean about being outside of the mainstream.
Lisa, welcome back!!!
But you need to visit more often, so you don't make so many false assumptions about what I write here. For one, I wasn't nervous in this situation, not even a little bit. You're referring to a guy who traveled to Mexico with his gay friend, who has been (with the same friend) to every gay bar in Denver, who went to an underground five day drag show in the mountains, who spent the night on a houseboat with twenty five gay men.... I've had gay men kiss me, rub my ass, and grab my crotch, and THAT didn't make me nervous, so being asked for my phone number is nothing. I was flattered by the attention. Not at all scared. But I did feel sorry for the guy. He looked really let down. He looked, and acted, embarrassed. Of course, I may've been wrong, but ... well, I was there. You weren't.
Also, my assumption that the men at the other table were gay was not based on the fact that they were talking over the attractive woman. It was based on the fact that they were kissing each other's cheeks, patting each other's knees, speaking with exaggerated lisps, telling campy jokes, sitting with effeminate postures....
In this post, I was mainly expressing a "moment in a day in the life of..." kind of experience. I wasn't really trying to convey a particular idea, except maybe to say that I was feeling a little alienated, as I do in a lot of circumstances.
I don't disagree that women, in general, have a harder time being taken seriously in a group of men. But, in my experience, the woman, if she's attractive and the men are straight, is still the center of attention. They may not take her seriously, but she's still the center of attention. They want the woman to like them. They want to impress. That dynamic wasn't in evidence here.
I suppose I may have been hinting vaguely at something else in this post, which is that desire is also a type of conformity. We desire things because NOT desiring them can be alienating. It would probably take another full-length post to adequately express this idea, but, in brief, I think our desires, while they give us a sense of belonging, they also enslave us--they narrow our potential by giving a concrete "objective correlative" to yearnings that, I think, are much greater. The woman to my right seemed to embody this slavery--someone who was trying, for the sake of "not being forgotten", to be someone she isn't and to narrow herself, but who wasn't capable, because she was female, of assuming the desirable qualities that the men with her would have responded to. Being authentic seems to necessitate a certain social alienation, a certain unwillingness to be defined in the precise way that social relations often mandate. Being authentic can, like being a woman in the company of people who desire only men, be an impenetrable obstacle to social communion.
As for the female/male distinction. You're right. It does sound sexist. I'll make the correction.
Anyway, STILL happy to have you back in blogland. Happy Holidays to you, too!
Good post. In my single days, I always tried to make it a point to not fawn over women when meeting people at a bar with my friends. I tried to take a neutral interest - the same as I would take when meeting a male friend of a friend. That way, any interest shown on my part would be genuine. It was hard to do, and I was not always successful. Most of the flirting "game" is fake, and it always annoyed me.
yay yay yay - healthy debate :)
I am glad to be back and glad I didn't piss you off ;)
lisa (talk to you soon!)
ps - do you know my friends leslie and trevor? i don't think you do. you'd like them. i'm seeing them tonight. i'm psyched. when are you coming back to town?
I'm intrigued by what you say about desire:
"We desire things because NOT desiring them can be alienating... I think our desires, while they give us a sense of belonging, they also enslave us--they narrow our potential by giving a concrete 'objective correlative' to yearnings that, I think, are much greater."
To NOT desire what is "desirable" is often a very painful experience. I've been thinking, as I said today at lunch, that about how capitalism structures our desires. No energy for a lengthy discourse on this, but I have to say it pisses me off when someone/thing messes with my very own desires. I feel a bit violated.
And I think you are right on in contrasting our constructed desires, the objective correlative, with the larger yearnings we have. Of course this is probably why we are often unhappy as we pursue a desire which turns out to be only a fraction of our larger yearnings.
A note for Lisa: I often enjoy your comments and I'm glad you are back in the blogosphere--congrats on the engagement--but I think you owe shane a bit more than "a YayYayYay a healthy debate." You got this one wrong and should admit it.
Rod, yeah the flirting game is "fake"--but not quite as fake as my marriage was. LOL.
Would love to head out to NY again, sometimeslisa. I haven't abandoned the idea of moving there, either. This passed Fall I looked into some job openings, but didn't get much further than that. I'll keep you posted.
Counterintuitive, the way our desires are manipulated is a big issue with me. The fact that you're pissed off "when someone/thing messes with your desires" shows that you're a lot more aware than most of how insidious and efficient modern power can be.
A note for Ron:
Thanks for the congrats. I like your blog, too.
You're right, I could have said more, although I still don't believe I got it wrong. I didn't say more because I wanted to reread the post before I continued, and I haven't had time to do so; I made that comment you didn't like about the debate so I could acknowledge Shane's comments and not make him think that I'd disappeared again. I never mind admitting when I'm wrong, although I still haven't decided.
Furthermore, in the "getting it wrong" category, In my comments, I wasn't seizing on the entire post, only certain elements of the post that irked me. I was going without sleep the night/morning I commented on the original post, and perhaps there should be a law forbidding sleep-deprived commenting. (That, too, made me think that perhaps I should read more carefully and on more sleep before commenting further.)
So now instead of just going back to debating with Shane about the original post, I'm advocating for my own lame-ass comment. Eek.
Lisa
PS - Shane, this is completely unrelated to the discussion at hand, but I have a picture of you and Sara from your visit this summer. I'll post it on my blog so you can see it and grab it. I can also e-mail it to you, but I don't want to bog down your system. This way, you can copy it and save it locally if you wish...
Umm ... well ... if you're saying I was nervous about being hit on by a gay man or that I based my assumption that the men at the adjacent table were gay because they were talking over the attractive woman, you were wrong. Wrong and, though I excuse it, a little arrogant in assuming that you can judge my thoughts and emotions better than I can. I wouldn't really call that healthy debate.
But I understand that you were tired, and, well ... it's not that big of a deal to me. STILL happy to have you back!
Please do email me the picture. My computer skills aren't quite savvy enough to import material from someone's blog. Plus, I need a new picture for my facebook account (one that isn't two years old!).
Now, we all know I'm more than a little arrogant.
Hmmm, how many times can we go back and forth on this before I actually reread the post? :)
I put it up on my blog, but I'll e-mail it, too.
Okay. I have reread the post. Here are my thoughts:
1 - I was reading into your first paragraphs, about the gay barista. I was assuming too much. I was criticizing you based on conversations we've had in the past and was not talking about the writing. I'm sorry, that's unfair. I will chalk the obnoxious tone of my note up to both giddiness at the hour (I recall it was around 4:30 EST when I commented - that's AM) and feeling perhaps a little too free to use an overly familiar and teasing tone in a public venue, one which could have worked in an in-person conversation between the two of us, but not, perhaps, in this forum. My apologies. If I were reading this again and trying to comment more fairly, I would take most of what I said back, although I still don't feel like it was really that bad. I feel like if I keep harping on it, it'll start to seem worse than it was.
2 - Thanks for fixing that. Again, I was doing the "you always" thing, though, to you, which was probably inappropriate.
3 - You're right, I was completely off-base with that assumption. That was the hour. I wasn't reading carefully. I think this last paragraph is particularly beautiful, by the way:
"But, as I bury my head in a book and try to block out their voices, my empathies are with her—with the outsider, the one nervously folding and unfolding a candy wrapper as she tries to follow the conversation, her legs crossed, back straight, shoulders hunched forward trying to politely impose herself, trying to act as if she’s one of them, trying, with less and less poise, not to be forgotten."
Okay, now I'm going to STOP TALKING! I am glad I'm back, too, and I'm glad you don't think it was that bad, what I wrote. Still, I'm going to be more careful in the future!!
You wrote:
"I still don't feel like it was really that bad. I feel like if I keep harping on it, it'll start to seem worse than it was."
Amen to that!!!!
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