Well, it was a delightful and exhausting weekend with the Iowan (a nom du porn he does not approve of at all, it should be noted, with good reason, since he is actually a Michigander — and yes, Virginia, that is the proper demonym).  I was in recovery all day yesterday (except for a break for cocktails at Brasserie Jo in the afternoon), nursing my blistered lips.

Because of the nature of the thing, I can't go into details (look for them in my memoirs, to be published posthumously, unless all of my friends, family and lovers happen to die before I do, in which case I'll dish).  The Iowan, who was a Friend of the Blog before I alluded to him in it, was also cool to my posting any pics of him I took last weekend (even the few in which he was fully clothed) anywhere on the web.  What can I say?  Sometimes life and porn have to part ways. 

I will say that, as expected, the weekend was not without its wrinkles and rough edges.  Still, there's been an intense (and seemingly intensifying) post-game analysis, of the "where do we go from here?" variety.  It's like unwrapping a very well-wrapped gift-box of heartbreak while trying not to tear the ribbons and paper.  Even when you know what's in the box, you just can't resist.

Once in a great while you get this sort of thing right, and things unfold without the fuss.  I'm thinking of Le Parisien (though there have been others).  Life and love are for giving and taking, not for keeping. 

I will say that the fight for gay marriage (if not the institution itself) has had the effect of making something very special about gay social mores (yes, that's right  — I'm talking about sluttiness) seem suddenly very suspect.  It may be that the era of "giving and taking, not for keeping" is over.  All the sluts are out slutting for The One and trash-talking the sluts who are aren't.

That's not to say that fidelity is impossible in gay society, but it is the fidelity of full (and passionate) friendship, a concept that in this age of Facebook "friends" (and frenemies) seems to have lost the luster it had back when Cicero called it "the greatest of all things" (outside of virtue, without which friendship is impossible).

"In view of the instability and perishableness of mortal things," Cicero wrote, "we should be continually on the look-out for some to love and by whom to be loved; for if we lose affection and kindliness from our life, we lose all that gives it charm."

Of course, the idea of affection and kindliness in love is also fading, as "love" becomes a conversational tchotchke, another souvenir of a supposedly well-lived life, but one, alas, without much charm.