Being Single in San Francisco
I am flirting with the idea of bloggily recording my dating and/or horizontal experiences since my arrival in San Francisco. I have thus far found it to be different from any other city in which I’ve lived. And I have a tentative title for this running opus:
In A Fog
If you wish to keep a tally of where we are when this commences, I have gone through two dates and currently have two FBs (what might be termed, in semi-polite society, Fornicatory Buddies). Of the two dates, one was a partnered fellow and the other was single. Of the two FBs, one is in an open relationship and the other hasn’t ever discussed it with his erstwhile partner.
Going back to the two dates…I don’t know what I anticipated gay men in San Francisco to be like, but these two had fundamental Homo Character Flaws. Of the partnered one: He spelled “Tom” with an extraneous and possibly ostentatious “h” between the T and the om. I was willing to overlook this. However, when we began to discuss my background as a choreographer, and how I noticed that San Francisco had tons of Modern dance but virtually no representation of Jazz dance (which is what I do), “Thom” — with apparent humility — mentioned that he had never heard the term “Jazz” referred to regarding a style of dance.
Being a charitable sort, I didn’t stare at him like he had fallen off a manure truck. Rather, I — to my mind, graciously — used that as an example of how UNrepresented Jazz dance is in San Francisco (placing the onus for his lapse of gay IQ on the location and not his own questionable self). Well, the aitch-monger didn’t seem to appreciate this, and flew into a tirade about his worldliness and intelligence. “I read Le Monde every day…in French!” I was tempted to ask if he knew how to say “non sequiter” in French, but I refrained. I think perhaps I made an “ooh” sound (heavy on the Gallic), in hopes of staving off his flipping over la table. But the point he was making was clear: if there was something to be known, he already knew about it. Therefore, Jazz dance didn’t exist. (I didn’t think to ask him if he’d ever heard of “Jazz hands,” a staple of the homosexual arsenal. I suppose this was for the best, as the question might’ve prompted him to scream out that he listens to NPR, in Sanskrit.)
The other date, with the single fellow, had fewer non sequiters but no less befuddlement. He had been a theater major in college, so I thought perhaps that boded well. I mentioned that I had started reading the new book by Stephen Sondheim. This chap countered that — with the exception of Follies and Merrily We Roll Along — he HATES all of Sondheim. [Thunk.] I would’ve been more than happy to stand up and walk briskly away at this point, but unfortunately my mama raised me better than that. (Note to mama: damn you.) After a moment to catch my bearings and remember that just because someone is a homosexual doesn’t also mean that he has any sense at all, I gently asked this fellow if, in fact, he HATED A Little Night Music (a Sondheim show so charming that curmudgeons smile and serial killers change their ways). And here’s HateBoy’s response: “Well, I don’t know the music from that show.” [Thunk thunk.] “But if I hear “Send in the Clowns” one more time, I don’t know what I’ll do.”
By that point, I think I was so amazed that I sidestepped my mother’s etiquette, and asked — with all the monotone I could muster: “So…you hate A Little Night Music, but you’ve never heard any of the music from it?” After JoyBoy made certain I knew that he had heard “Send in the Clowns” — and way too many times — he averred that my statement was correct. And then he quickly decomposed into a puff of obstreperous smoke. No…that’s what I wished had happened. Instead, I sat there wondering how much disdain I could embed in simple statements. Simultaneously, I wondered how this dude had the nerve to consider himself a homosexual; to dislike the Sondheim you know might warrant a pass…to diss the Sondheim you don’t know gets the heave-ho.
Somebody point me to the authentic gay men of San Francisco. I know they gotta be out there.