Halloween Weekend

Boys and girls of every age, would you like to hear something strange?

I had a good weekend.

I said it, I had what I would call a good weekend. Given it wasn’t glittery and perfect but the past few days have been good to me, and I’m feeling that much more buoyant as a result. My drive to write fizzled out for the past few days but now I’m back, and hopefully will return to a more regular schedule.

Thursday, I ended up coming out to about a dozen people in the course of an evening. I went to a gay club for their college night with a bunch of people from the first floor and by the end of the night, three people ended up coming up to me and asking if I was gay, promising myself at the end of senior year I would be honest if asked that question, I said yes every time. Apparently I was a topic of conversation on some cab rides back.

Am I glad I said yes? Well, I guess I should be. I want to be more comfortable with myself, to not try and have to hide everything, but even now, I feel hesitant to say one simple word. The fact that every time someone asked it was preceded by “Not to be offensive of anything….” or “I’m not judging you but…” made everything that much harder and that much worse. I know why they do that, that just in case, they don’t want to offend me, but in their attempts to be calm about everything I end up just being more stressed. Now though, I look back and feel a little more comfortable about saying what I did. It was hard, but it does show progress for me that I actually am becoming more comfortable with myself.

On Friday afternoon, I went trick-or-treating down on embassy row with friends and other people from my school. The promise of ethnic candies was for the most part a bust (exception: the three Korean embassies/cultural centers, they rocked and had Asian candy). It was a good time though, I got to meet up with my friend M who was visiting from Princeton for a conference this weekend and we had the best semi-reunion one could wish for in front of the embassy for Cote d’Ivoire.

Friday night I decided to stay away from Mark and give him his space as well as give myself some space. I went out with people from my old orientation group and we actually had a blast, probably one of the best nights I’ve had so far. Three of us were in costume, I was a masquerade baller, my OA friend was a flight attendant and her friend was a bunny (the playboy kind). We first got in to a sophomore/junior party thanks to the sweet talking of my friend and then later on to another party where I met this really cute guy from Georgia who was up visiting. His name my Taylor and his costume was “dick in a box” from SNL haha. We talked for a while but then me and my friends left. Finally, we hit up our old Orientation group leader’s apartment for a party he was holding and that was really cool as well since none of us had seen him in almost a month. When I got back to my dorm the scene wasn’t quite as pretty unfortunately, the guy Mark has been trying to get with drank too much and was sick and him and Maudry along with the first floor RA were attending to him along with many other people. It put a little damper on the evening overall but in full, it was a good night.

Given the festivities of Friday, I decided to take it easy Saturday. My friend D had a friend visiting from Cornell and with both D and her friend being international students, D’s friend wanted to see DC and all the monuments. We took her around DC, hitting up the Georgetown neighborhood, the national mall, the White House, down town and the Washington Monument. We spent an entire day out in the city and it felt great to just get around and walk. Plus, I got to see things I haven’t seen since I was in elementary school despite being a local, heck I don’t even remember seeing the White House in person.

After we sent D’s friend back to her bus stop, me and D headed back to campus. Earlier that day the Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart rally was held on the National Mall and the metro was absolutely packed and delays were everywhere, it was miserable, but by that evening things had calmed down a bit. I had a movie night in Saturday, me and a few people watched Slumdog Millionaire in my room and had candy and chips. We went back down to the common room afterwards and chatted. It was a surprisingly calm evening for a Saturday and the regular drunken parade didn’t appear for the most part. Near 2AM, Mark arrives back with the guy he’s interested in and not to subtly intimates he was getting some that night. Given he isn’t out and that there were a number of us in the common room, I’m hoping it was the alcohol that made him to blatantly open in his intentions. When his roommate came back later, he told us he got a text from Mark saying he was “talking with a friend until three and needed the room”. Well another guy in the room called bullshit and ratted Mark out regarding coming back with the other guy. The first floor RA (who is openly gay himself) caught wind of this and asked Mark’s roommate if he was bi which he replied with a “I don’t know”. Now Mark and his roommate hadn’t been getting along very well since Mark accused his roommate of being gay (truthfulness unknown) and recent inflammatory statements about how straight guys shouldn’t go to gay clubs. Mark’s roommate decides to head back and wait outside the room before three to see what was going on. I fire Mark a text warning him which he got later and said all was fine and I also warned him about the loose-lipped guy in the common room. He was pissed saying the guy “didn’t know him” and the like and I tried to calm him down a bit but also told him that things have the possibility of getting complicated in the near future.

I hope he took everything I said seriously. He can blame it on the alcohol all he wants but if he really does want to remain in the closet he might need to do some damage control now or end up coming out under imperfect conditions. Hopefully the actual answer will be that this whole thing will fall off the face of the earth and he will have to do nothing except be more cautious. I was able to get his back this time, I don’t know if I will be there the next time.

I think I’m making progress in getting over Mark. While time definitely is a factor, I’ve been trying more to separate myself from his dramas and give him space as well as give myself more “me time”. My friend Anna said that the best way to get over someone is to fall for someone else, the only problem is, that despite there being more potentially available guys around me than ever, I can’t seem to find them. Maudry finds them in spades much to her displeasure but my luck is decidedly low.

This upcoming week looks relatively busy, I have a theology quiz tomorrow I need to study for, I have a tutorial paper I need to start along with a presentation I need to work on. Also, Tuesday is Election Day and I intend to vote for the first time back in VA for my House representative.

I hope you had a fun and safe Halloween weekend and be sure to get out and vote come Tuesday, you actually do make a difference.

All the best,

JP