Reason-mother

I had a busy day today. After a haircut I went to my work's holiday party, which was held at a restaurant. A couple of the waiters, especially the one that was serving our table, were extremely attractive. You could tell he works out, he had some big guns. I couldn't help but look at him every time he walked by.

Then I went over to my sister's house for a party. A couple of her friends had kids over, and I spent much of the time playing with my niece and the other kids. My nephews are teens now, so I don't see them as much at parties anymore. They go off on their own, usually with girls. Both of my nephews have girlfriends, something I never had. Hard to believe that, at least in the realm of relationships, my little nephews have more experience than I have.

Anyways, I enjoyed the party. I've always gotten along well with kids, and they usually really like me. There was one kid who I remembered from a previous camping trip out to the desert. He had hung out with me while I played guitar. He was obviously pretty bored with the adult festivities at the party, so I hooked up the Wii for him and we played a little bit. His parents were appreciative that I spent time with him, and his mom said, "You should have children some day." Of course I was flattered, but at the same time that activated the ol' worry system that is my mind. Maybe I'd be a good dad . . . but will be? If I end up with a guy, should I be?

Long after I became comfortable in my mind about the morality of homosexuality, I still struggled with the idea of same-sex couples raising children. It didn't seem fair to the child to make them so vulnerable to ridicule and to deprive them of both a male and female parental figure. Now I think I'm more comfortable with it, largely because I realize that many of the potential negatives that come with having same-sex parents can be compensated for, as long as the most important elements are there (love, support, security). This actually came up in my conversation with "Janice" the other night. She suggested that the female role model in a child's life didn't need to necessarily be the mother. It could be a close friend of the family. "Like a godmother?" I asked.
"Yeah," she said."
"Janice, if things were to play out that way for me . . . would you be my children's godmother?" I asked with a smile.
Janice doesn't believe in God (nor do I, I guess you could call me a secular humanist maybe?) so she jokingly responded that she wouldn't want to be called "god"mother.
"What about science-mother?" I asked.
"Reason-mother?" she suggested.
"Sure, Janice, will you be my kids' reason-mother?" We laughed about that.
I won't take having kids off the table, no matter who I end up with.

Glimmers

Thanks for the comments on the last entry. It's true that not being a horndog isn't all bad. For one thing it decreases the risk of me doing something I regret, haha. And even though it doesn't happen often, there are instances when I experience a glimmer of sexual attraction.

Case in point: tonight I decided to grab dinner at a Philly cheesesteak place near my place. The primary reason for this decision: it seems every time I go there at least one of the guys on the staff is smoking hot. Tonight I walk in and am immediately disappointed. Behind the counter are a slightly chubby girl and an older guy, neither of whom ring my bell. Bummer.

I order and start waiting for my sandwich to be made. Then guess who walks out to the counter from the back? Smoking hot guy, haha. When he walked out I felt a bit of the butterflies and decided to test myself with a little imagining. Lo and behold I got a little aroused. Reassures me that with the right context I should hopefully be fine.

In other, possibly related news, the doctor's office called with my latest testosterone blood results. It's increased significantly, and is now much more in the normal range for someone my age. Suddenly I have the urge to smoke some doobies, drink some brewskies, and watch football, all while masturbating. Ok, maybe not. Still, nice to know.

Stranger in a sexual land

I had a good visit with my friend "Janice" tonight. We went and got food at a food truck and then came back to my place to hang out. She's the friend with whom I'm able to talk about deep topics like politics, religion, and philosophy. She's also the only friend I'm "out" to. I filled her in on the most recent happenings on my self-discovery quest: going to the gay bar in Chicago, my anxiety issues, the talk with my mom, and my concerns over my sex drive and attempts to improve it. She offered some helpful advice, reminding me that not being quite as driven toward sex as some people isn't the worst thing in the world. She was also optimistic that once I was in a relationship with the right person I would be able to figure things out in the sexual realm. I hope so. There has been some times when I felt what probably was some sexual attraction, so it could be that I really just need the right context (as some commenters have suggested in the past). At this point I am more upset by the sex drive issue than the prospect of being bisexual or gay. Hopefully if I ever manage to be in a relationship with someone it won't be too much of an issue, or it will improve before then. It's not like I don't want to have sex. I just wish I wanted it more than I do. I don't seem to be all that driven towards having it, the desire to get naked with someone and go to town just isn't very strong. Janice described me as being not very "instinctual." I don't really notice the testosterone gel the doctor prescribed having that much of a noticeable effect on my libido (though unless I'm imagining things I feel like I'm seeing better results from the gym than I have for a while, haha). I'll keep at it and hope for the best. Meanwhile, I'm getting all self-conscious just writing about this. I crossed the "attracted to men" hurdle long ago and these blogs make me feel less alone about that, but every time I write about having a lower than average sex drive it makes me feel like an alien.

Bisexuality

I was thinking about bisexuality today. I wonder if there's different types of bisexuality. I was reading on a forum, and one person described being attracted to somewhat androgenous people of either sex (so, feminine guys or masculine girls) because they represented a little of "both worlds." However, I feel like other bisexuals prefer guys that are masculine and girls that are feminine. Maybe you could say the former group are "convergent" bisexuals and the latter are "divergent" bisexuals? Then maybe there's another group, more one-directional bisexuals that prefer either masculinity or femininity, but some of the preference spills over into both sexes. All this is pure conjecture, but I wonder if studies have been done about that. I guess it's a Google Scholar search away . . . but it's late and I'm tired, haha.

YouTube guy and rock and roll

Back in November I messaged a guy on YouTube whose coming-out videos I watched. He was inspired by Randy Phillips, the gay soldier who came out to his dad over the phone. This guy is a bisexual who has recently become more open to trying things with guys. He's also a neuroscience PhD student, which is the path I almost went down. Suffice it to say, I figured we had quite a bit in common so I messaged him. He was busy with lab work and went away to a conference, but he finally messaged me back last week. We traded a few messages and then last night had a good conversation on gchat. Turns out we really do have a lot in common, which is cool. We talked about neuroscience, US cities we've been to, and of course our paths toward figuring out our sexuality. From talking to him and others online its clear that I'm not the only one who suffers from analysis-paralysis due to thinking too much. It's comforting. I won't share his YouTube name since he has since taken his videos down. I definitely would like to talk to him more, he seems like a really cool guy.

The feeling of urgency to move forward with getting some experience out their in the real world hasn't gone away, I've just been busy lately with the holidays and other things. Facebook Guy's lack of responsiveness was a setback, but I probably shouldn't have put all my eggs in one basket anyway. Time to figure out how best to proceed.

Even though my email for this blog is "socalrockfan" I feel like I haven't talked much about music. I know it's not the point of the blog, but it might be nice to mix it up a little. This week I've gotten really into Breaking Benjamin. They're a rock band from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania who have been quite popular during the last decade. Apparently they've recently broken up due to a legal dispute unfortunately. I picked up their greatest hits and have been listening to it non-stop in the car. They have a cool mix of heavy metal aggressiveness with pop accessibility and catchiness. I love music that you can both head bang and sing along to! :-) The singer, Benjamin Burnley, is pretty good looking too. Here's a link to their video for "Breath," which is one of my favorite songs of theirs. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQ3qJmgktS0 Also good is "Skin" from their first album, which is the song that got me into them in the first place. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuCemcYJa-c By the way, what the heck is the bass player doing in that second video, haha. He's done that in a couple of the performances I've seen on YouTube, guess he likes to play low to the ground . . .

Doubts and ruminations

I got this link from another blog, A Gay Athlete's Life. a very interesting read: http://www.salon.com/2011/11/16/the_coming_out_story_i_never_thought_id_write/singleton/

Wow. That story sounded frighteningly familiar at times. Especially this paragraph:

"My confidence would swell each time I convinced myself a girl was attractive – and it would crater whenever a guy provoked a much stronger, more instinctive response. I searched for loopholes. What if I’d rather sleep with an attractive member of the opposite sex than an ugly member of my own? Would that make me straight, or at least straight enough?"

I have tried that exact justification before. "Am I really gay if it's only the most attractive guys that I like? There's certainly some girls that I find more attractive than some guys . . ." It's nice to read about other's experiences with doubt over their sexuality.

Now, I am trying to get over any and all of my OCD-type thought processes. No more excessive doubting, no more over-thinking, no more ruminating. And each time I have the intrusive thoughts or regrets (lately it's been a lot of, "I wish it was 5 years ago, i just wish I was 22 again, I'll do it right this time") I try to snap myself out of it. That kind of thing is the path to nowhere.

I'd like to say I've been making more progress, though. I felt good back in July when I reached out to Facebook guy. Unfortunately, he seems to be quite a flake. A couple of back and forths and a live FB chat later, and I can't get him to return any of my FB messages. After he not once, but twice said he would "definitely" meet up with me. And when we ended that FB chat he said we'd "talk soon." So . . . WTF? He's always updating his status so it's clear he uses FB a lot. I sent him one final message asking him if he didn't think it would work for us to meet up to please just tell me so I'm not left waiting. And . . . nothing. SOOOO aggravating. Is he not receiving them for some reason, is he ignoring me, is he forgetful, or just a flake? As it just so happens, it's a major pet peeve of mine when someone doesn't respond to a message, especially after they responded previously. So as is probably apparent by now, it opens the door for more ruminating.

I'm probably just gonna have to forget it and figure something else out. I have another sort-of friend on FB who lives up in LA that I might contact. We'll see.

Closed-mindedness

I'm back home in California. The week with my parents went pretty quickly. It was a good visit, and even though it's only the second time I've ever been to their new house, it feels like home. I didn't talk with my mom any further about my issues. There's really not much new to discuss with her. Knowing she's okay with it is good enough for now. At one point the thought crossed my mind to open up to my dad, but that didn't last. I did tell him about the testosterone gel prescription though, since he overheard my mom and I discussing it. I just told him that a blood test I had showed my hormone levels to be a bit low. Far from the whole story, of course.

I took an airport shuttle service home once I got back to California. Sitting next to me was an old man who was quite talkative (and a little odd). We talked a bit about the college I went to, then the driver asked him where he was from. He said Pennsylvania, and made reference to the Penn State sex abuse scandal. For those living under a rock, the former assistant coach for the school's football team was found to have sexually assaulted or molested a number of underage boys, and various school officials (possibly including the head coach and the school president) helped cover it up. So, a really messed up situation, and at the center of it a really messed up individual. Anyways, while discussing the scandal with the driver, the old man said something along the following lines about his interpretation of how the school was reacting to the scandal: "Penn State is sending a message out: No pedophiles or queers."

My mouth nearly dropped open when he lumped gay people with pedophiles (not to mention his use of the word "queer" . . . I'm not a fan of that word, even when used in a less derogatory fashion or by gay people themselves). Suddenly this nice, if slightly strange old man had taken a turn and become an intolerant, ignorant and bigoted individual. This was the first time in recent memory that I'd witnessed such blatant homophobia, and he had done it so casually. Now, I know this guy is a product of his generation. I know that his way of thinking is declining. But it still makes me sad . . . and angry.

I guess you could say this entry is a thematic cousin to the last entry, because the core problem here is closed-mindedness. It irks me how so many people come to definitive conclusions about things that they know very little about, refuse to consider things from other points of view, and then become so set in their opinions that they are very hard, if not impossible to change. This one tendency lies at the root of so much human suffering, whether you're talking about a family squabble at the dinner table or wide-scale persecution of a religious minority.

I try very hard to keep an open-mind. I don't know if it's my personality, my upbringing, my scientific background, or a combination (probably most likely), but I always prefer to gather evidence and consider multiple sides before I reach a conclusion. Not to sound conceited, but I feel like humanity would be a lot better off if more people were like this.

Of course, it does have to be a balancing act. This blog is a good example as to why you eventually have to make up your mind. Evidence-gathering can't go on forever. One of my favorite quotes, by Carl Sagan: "It pays to keep an open mind, but not so open your brains fall out." We all need beliefs to get by in life because there are few things that we can really be 100% certain about. Life is all about working with limited evidence. Perhaps the middle ground is to make decisions and form opinions, but always be open to the possibility that you could be wrong. That's why I've long called myself an agnostic rather than an atheist. If I was given credible evidence in God's existence, I would certainly change my mind (lately I'm not sure whether this really bars me from being considered an atheist, but that's a topic for another post).

Anyways, feel free to sound off. Is there such a thing as being too open-minded? Would the world be a better place if everyone were a scientist (as a world-view, not as an occupation)? Any run-ins with homophobic idiots and their ridiculous generalizations?