I don't want you to get the wrong impression of my straight roommate Jake, or of me.  He's not a total cad, and I'm not a total queen.  When I harp on about some aspect of our Odd Coupling I want you to know I'm telling you in lieu of him.  Because it's a delicate situation we're dealing with here.  On the one hand I feel the need to represent, yo! On the other I don't want to queen-out on the kid and scar him for life.  I'd hate to be the one responsible for turning him off good taste forever. 

And the fact is, feng shui is not something you can beat into someone.  That's Zen.  It's totally different.

So far, Jake and I have been engaged in a kind of silent power struggle.  The Force may be strong in him, but, honestly, he's no match for me.  And I have to admit, the struggle is a little tedious, knowing as I do how it all must end.  He has not yet accepted me as sensei, but submission will come.  The sooner the better, as I have much to teach and he has so much to learn.  And our time together — pray God — is short.

But up to now we've mainly been carving out our little kingdoms in the common spaces.  The first battle was over the living room set. I realized then that compromise was not an option, and that swift,decisive action was in order. So I staged my own little surge....


Yes, I've heard him grumbling about how my little armchairs are uncomfortable.  Well, that is exactly how I want them, grasshopper. 

In order to put his stamp on the room (as if the doggy bed in the corner wasn't enough), he hauled out his tailgating chair and plopped it down right in front of the TV when I wasn't there.  I fully expect to come home one particularly cold winter night to find him watching the Bruins with his buddies like so...


I have offered him the use of my favorite snuggie (my exquisite limited edition Thomas a Becket hair-shirt snuggie), but I think it may be too soon for sharing snuggies.  He must know I'm naked underneath. 

Y'know, I don't want him (or you) to think I'm poo-pooing his idea of a bachelor pad so much as preparing him for the love nest that I am sure awaits him.  I figure if he can take orders from a gay man he's not even sleeping with, how much easier will it be with a wife?  I am really housebreaking him.  Training him to be the ideal husband.  Future Mrs. Jake: no thanks necessary.

But it's not going to be easy.  At 29 he's a bit behind the curve.  While I've had a couple of awkward opportunities to see that he is well-developed in certain ways (the other morning he asked me into the bathroom in nothing but his towel, the little minx, to check on the plumbing), he is sadly lacking in others.  What he doesn't realize — and what 29 year-old does, come to think of it? — is that he needs to develop the charm before he loses the looks.  Charm is a much more valuable social commodity, no question.

And another thing he doesn't realize:  in some ways middle-age spread is already creeping in.  I think mostly it's that he hasn't shaken off the suburban upbringing and doesn't fully understand that city life requires different skills and strategies.  This is Jake's Big Urban Adventure before settling back into the suburbs of Swampscott. 

He's not a big guy — I'd put him at 5'8" — 5'9" tops — but he tends to buy everything in super-jumbo size.  His bed is about the size of a Hollywood sound stage — I have taken to calling it the Spruce Goose.  And his bedroom set would give Biedermeier a hard-on.  That was part of the problem with the recliners.  No apartment living room in the city can accommodate five la-z-boys, a tailgating chair, and a doggy bed for a golden retriever.  Something's gotta give.

Given the quaintness of our kitchen and the utter lack of any storage space in the flat it's just impractical to buy in bulk, or even in bulky sizes.  We're lucky to live within comfortable walking distance of four supermarkets.  The physics of city life are such that you just have to shop more and buy less.  This is part of the daily adventure for me.

Aside from his being a total size queen when it comes to groceries and bedroom furniture, his tendency toward suburban spread started showing itself as soon as he moved in. The first clue came with the coat pegs just inside the apartment door. Thank goodness I had hung up my jacket when I did — I had actually been wearing it, and popped it on a peg for the night.  I wake up the next morning and all the remaining pegs — snapped up — bing bang boom!

You know, I don't even have four jackets, much less all of them the same except for the team insignia (he's got one for the Sox, one for the Pats, one for the Celtics, and one for the Bruins, with scarves and foam fingers to match).  I realized I would have to hang a decoy so that when I took my real jacket off, I still had a peg to hang it on when I came home that night.  I mean, I wasn't sure how he'd feel if I hung one on top of one of his.  He could totally get the wrong idea.

The same with the towel rack.  If I take my towel off, the rack will be lost forever. 

It's not that he isn't welcome to the pegs and racks around the house, it's that he tends to take them all — immediately and irrevocably. And then you know it'll be a big-ass controversy if I take one back.  I mean, nothing will happen, but I will come home to glares and grumblings, and the dog will slink around instead of greeting me with his usual enthusiasm.  That's how people like Jake communicate, innit?  Through their dogs?

Once you get things under control inside, it starts spilling out into the stairwell.  I'm trying to respect the standards of the place.  You know, it's not The Orphanage anymore.  These are respectable people. 

What happened was our landlady asked us to leave our boots on the landing when coming in from the snow, so as not to muck up the hard wood floors in the flat.  So when it snowed last week, I did.  And so did Jake. 

OK.  So far so good, right?

Once the weather cleared, my boots came back inside.  Not only did Jake's not, but they were soon joined  — inconceivably — by three more pairs of sneakers (which, like the jackets, all look more or less the same to me).  Then a grungy towel he uses to dry off the dog appeared draped over the banister.  And there they all remained. 

Now, as you can imagine, I agonized over this all week. I had nightmares, flashbacks to the unchecked squalor I had just escaped.  I tried to understand what was going on in his head.  Four pairs of shoes of his out on the landing?  Is this normal?  Who knew straight guys were such sneaker queens?  And then the ratty towel flung over the railing?  And just left there for the next rain?

Finally I told him another tenant had complained, and that seemed to do the trick.

But it's not over.  Late last night there were rumblings outside my bedroom door.  Jake tends to stride around the apartment late at night, barking in his outdoor voice on his cellphone.  Last night one of his buddies shows up.  And they're moving furniture.  I thought, ah, no.  Please, God.  He's not going to move his recliners in under cover of darkness, is he? 

I checked my impulse to burst out of my room and throw a big queeny fit, and early this morning I checked the living room, and it was as I'd left it the night before.  But I'm worried.  I'm frightened. 

A dark plan started formulating in my head as my sleepless night wore on.  If he dares to insinuate one of those dastardly easy-riders in (God forbid he tries to stuff both of them in there) I will have no choice but to have a huge assortment of queens of all description over every mother-loving night to watch whatever's on Logo.  And if there's nothing on, I will bring in a piano and start my own friggin piano bar, and we will sing show-tunes into the night, every night until he begs to be let out of the lease. 

And if that doesn't do it, there will be bodily fluids spilled.  No, not blood — no violence — I'm a lover, not a fighter.  The sticky white stuff.  And I'm not talking about marshmallow fluff here.  I'm talking Bob's Discount Bukkake.  All over those pretty recliners of his.  They may be microfiber, but they're no match for forty horny home furnishing queens. 

You'll all be getting your e-vites soon.

I'm not a bad guy, but don't mess with my feng shui.