I met a kinda hot guy named Azeem the other day at the Y.  We struck up a conversation at the ol' bench press.  I'm not a real chatty cathy at the gym.  I get my three sets of eight reps in and move on.  It's kinda wussy but it works for me. 

I'd been worried because I've been so lazy this winter, and lately feeling a little bloated and battling a mild case of body dysmorphia, so it was nice to get some attention.  And I like the Y a lot better than BSC — there's a lot more diversity, first of all —and that is the spice of life — and there's that up-with-the-people atmosphere that goes with it.  Folks say "hi."  

Drag Racer.

And sometimes they just keep going.  Azeem was a talker and had a nervous verbal tick, and whatnot, you know, but it's all good.  I mean, that was the tick: "and whatnot, you know, but it's all good."  He said it after almost every sentence.  But I have a friend who says "in point of fact" every chance he gets and one that says "and et cetera" at the end of every sentence, so I think I can handle it.

The thing is I still haven't ventured too far out of my hardened winter chrysalis, and I was being a little aloof to him.  I don't know that that's really the best way to start off with me.  I had an artist friend I met a couple of years ago who liked the aloof me a lot better than the more affable me that emerged after some months of friendship. 

And he wasn't the first one.  It's something I've struggled with as a guy who looks like maybe he should be tying you to the bedpost and verbally abusing you, but is actually too polite to verbally abuse you. (And apologizing to them for not verbally abusing them doesn't help matters.) 

I long ago abandoned any sense of responsibility for the unreasonable expectations of tricks.  But I remember when I was first coming out — this was before the internet, boys and girls — and there was a butcher at the local supermarket who would flirt with me mercilessly.  He was young and swarthy, with big, hairy forearms and manly hands, and there was always blood on his apron. 

I mean, he was a butcher.

I would stop by when I was shopping and we would flirt while he butchered something for me, and one day, after this had been going on for weeks into months, he contrived to get me to visit him at home, right around the corner.  I was looking for an apartment at the time and he said he would show me his to give me an idea of what I could get in his building.

It was transparent but necessary.  If he had come right out and propositioned me I would have squeaked like a panicked mouse and run off, never to return.  I was only just venturing out at that point.  Any loud noises or sudden moves and I was out of there — pa-CHOOM!

Anyway, he got me to his place, but I really had no idea what to do, and it was obviously annoying him.  I was acting oblivious, like I was really there to see the apartment.  I mean, he answers the door in his jockstrap with his ball gag already in, and I'm like, mm, nice crown molding!  Is heat and hot water included?

He played along bitchily but no one made a move.

Finally he pulled out the ball gag and snapped: "are you gay?"

"Well..." I hedged.

He took a different tack: "You wanna fuck?"

I was like: "sure."

He set upon me, tore off my shirt, but suddenly stopped and stood back.

"I thought you'd be hairier," he said with a sneer.

Whaddya gonna do?

Killed it for both of us. 

It's even worse these days, with the mail-order mentality of Manhunt and Grindr.  I'm not shy with my photos online, and I clearly have no fetish gear, no piercings, no tattoos.  Nor have I ever even hinted at a dark side — no master-slave references, nothing germane in chat — and yet I still get guys expecting to be led to the dungeon and bound to the spanking bench.

I'm at my wit's end, people.

Back at the Y, Azeem caught up with me on my way out.  I let him flounder about a good deal, clumsily hinting at what he wanted.  Truth is, I still hadn't decided what I was going to do with him, myself.  He was ridiculously good-looking but seemed a little crazy — and not good crazy, like, I dunno, wearing flip-flops in February, or something.  Crazy like one of those crazy-eyed horses foaming at the mouth in a Delacroix painting.  Not that he was foaming at the mouth, exactly, but, man, that verbal tick was starting to get to me.

Out in the parking lot I was like, "well, here's my bike."

His eyes got crazy big, and he was like, "dayumn."

There were a couple of motorcycles parked along the bike rack.  A hot little Ducati and a stripped down Kawasaki.  I could see he thought I was talking about the Ducati.

"Um, no," I corrected him, walking past them both to my rusty old bicycle.  "Here's mine."

"I was gonna say!"  he said.  "And whatnot, you know, it's all good."

Killed it for both of us.   

I still got his number, of course.  Gotta keep your options open.  But it got me to thinking.  If it's really that easy to impress 'em, maybe I should grab up a stripped down little Scrambler, get a neck tat, and pierce my taint.  It could be my Midlife Crisis gift to myself!

But the question is: if I went to the trouble, would I believe it?  There's nothing worse than a drag queen in doubt. 

There was a notorious transvestite in another neighborhood I lived in years ago who annoyed everyone, not because of her neck poppin', finger snappin' ways, but because she didn't believe.  She crept out of her apartment every day and hobbled down to the 7-11 for cigarettes, looking right and left, clearly thinking, "do they know? Can they tell?"

Now, let's see.  You're 6'7" with shoulders like a lineman and you're dressed like Tootsie.  Um, yes, they know.  That's not the point.  What they know is not as important as what you believe.  And if you believe you're Tootsie instead of just dressing like her, then no one can fuck with you.  No one. 

But if you don't believe, then don't expect anyone else to.  Oh, and do expect everyone to fuck with you.  Because they will.  Because that's what people do.

I'm thinking with a little road-time I could swing the Scrambler.  A mature guy can look pretty bad-ass on a motorbike — and, I might add, look like a total goofball on a bicycle.  Heck, I'd  totally buy me on a motorbike.

I'll probably hold off on the neck tat and taint-ring for now.  You don't want to use all your lifelines for one lousy little mid-life crisis.