I’m incredibly frustrated. I went to the local dance club on Pride night, which is the best night for everyone to go because the music is the best and the level of creepers is very low compared to all of the other nights of the week. This means we get a lot of straight girls there, and it’s really hard to tell who is a real lesbian. I’m not really upset about straight girls showing up, because they deserve the chance to dance without really gross bros grinding on them all night, but it’s a little obnoxious to try to tell the difference between them and girls like me.
Usually, I’ll just move really slowly when I encounter someone on the dance floor in order to give them time to back off. However, this past week, I was dancing with this INCREDIBLY hot woman who is a friend of a friend. She hit all of the markers for my gaydar, and we were dancing for well over an hour together, arms around the waist and neck, roving hands, legs between legs, the whole nine yards. Then she goes off with this guy that had been dancing near us the whole time, and it turns out that he’s her damn boyfriend! There’s no way that she could have thought that I was straight and we were just dancing together as fellow straight-ladies, by the way. Was I just being used to spice up some breeders’ sex lives? Does she like messing with the dyke’s head? Is it possible that she’s not actually straight and I was being used to explore that? Either way, I’m feeling pretty irritated. Please explain!
I’d sign off with a witty pseudonym, but I don’t really have one, so I’ll just end by saying I love your work!
Anna says: Aw, I wouldn’t take it too personally, Sugar Shoes. It was pretty rude for her to have an hour of uninterrupted floorplay with you only to then turn around and be like, “No homo!” She might be bisexual, and dancing might be her only outlet for expressing her sexuality within the confines of a monogamous, straight relationship. She might be confused. She might simply like dancing with hot ladies like yourself. However, a girl with a boyfriend dancing up on you isn’t the most grievous offense in existence. It’s not like a spin on the floor guarantees you’ll be getting down on another floor later on. Also, you can’t exactly make someone sign a sexual orientation waiver before agreeing to do the Texas Two-Step.
Basically, all flirtation is gamble. Sometimes it leads somewhere, and sometimes it doesn’t. But don’t let it get you down. This gal clearly thought you were hot sh-t. Even though it didn’t work out this time, try not to let a little frustration make you hostile to new, potential dance partners, or “pardners” as we like to say in my gay Country Line Dancing group, The Lusty Lass-os.
Giddy up.
In high school, I came out and started dating my best friend of three years (against the advice of our mutual best friend who is making me write this). We dated for almost two years (into our sophomore year of college), but I recently broke up with her because I need to not be such a serious adult quite yet, and because the love that I felt (and still feel whenever I think of her) is as a best friend.
In a very silly manner, I tumbled into a relationship with a very cute trans boy, and recently, we haven’t been communicating as well as we could be. I want him to open up to me more and show that we are together around others. I want him to show he cares. I really think it’s me wanting and expecting too much, and forgetting that this is not the same relationship as my last one. My ex girlfriend/best friend found out and I also fear any chance of a future friendship is lost now.
One of my problems is that he does not chase me, and that’s just his personality, but a mutual friend (with whom we had a threesome because she wanted me) has been chasing me, and I enjoy being chased. My boyfriend, who doesn’t get jealous by some miracle, hasn’t really said much, other then he’s fine, which concerns me. I don’t think that I like her, but I do love that she will chase me down (physically especially) until I push her away.
I love my boyfriend, but I feel like I should be single, even though I know that “being single” will really be more of being in an open relationship with my boyfriend and hooking up with other people (mainly this mutual friend). I enjoy the comfort of being in a relationship, but I know that I shouldn’t, especially after being with my best friend for so long and then losing her forever. I don’t want to hurt my boyfriend either, especially since he has helped me to make it through this past semester.
I have no idea what to do with my life, especially in this regard. Help?
Love, The Lost Pisces
Anna says: I think this is the first coerced advice question I’ve ever gotten. Tell your friend her check is in the mail.
I wouldn’t say you’re lost per se, my dear Pisces, but I would say that you are kind of all over the place. Let’s try to untangle some of these webs, yeah?
You say you should be single (kind of), or at least in a non-monogamous relationship, but you don’t really say why. Granted, jumping into a new relationship two weeks after the last one ended was a bold move, but it’s hardly farfetched or “silly.” It sounds to me like your last relationship had been over, practically speaking, for a long time. And hey, it’s not called rebounding for nothing.
I think it’d help your confusion if you asked yourself what you’re really looking for at this time in your life, both from yourself and from a partner. Try not to let the “shoulds” creep into this. Be as direct and honest as possible. If what you want is to explore and be with lots of new people, I would suggest you not do that within the confines of a relationship (unless that’s something your boyfriend also really wants, but it seems like he’s just going along with whatever you want). If you want your current relationship to deepen and to establish greater trust, then you need to seriously up those communication skills, and start addressing the concerns you mentioned in your first paragraph. There’s a difference between enjoying the comfort of a relationship and settling for one. Make sure you know that difference.
Here’s the hard part though. Once you figure it out, once you have a roadmap of what it is you truly desire, you have to follow it. You have to trust yourself, even if doing so means you lose some things along the way. Your future relationship success depends on it.
Speaking of losing, I don’t think your ex is lost to you “forever.” She’s probably hurt, and taking time apart from you is how she’s going to cope with that hurt, as well as the loss of her best friend, but it doesn’t mean she’ll never talk to you again. Be patient, and don’t push her. If you respect her boundaries, and try your hardest to spare her any further unnecessary anguish, then you’ll have a solid shot of friendship down the road, whenever she’s ready.
As to your fondness for being chased, I’m not exactly sure how you would continue to chase someone you’re already in a relationship with. You did call him your boyfriend, after all. I’m assuming that’s not a euphemism for an incredibly life-like bobblehead toy or something. What I hear when you say that is you want him to be possessive of you. To keep these would-be threesome go-get-hers away, or at least to feign some jealousy at sharing you with others. The problem with the chase is that it can never really go anywhere. Eventually you’ll get bored, or they will, and you’ll be stuck with the short end of several sticks. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to being desired, or seen as desirable, of course. We all crave that to some extent. But the bulk of those fantastic validation signals should come from within, not from those who want to bang us.
Also, the thrill of the chase, in your case, seems more like a distraction than anything else. You’ll never figure out what it is you really need if you’re constantly being lured away by shiny things (e.g. threesome chicks). I don’t begrudge you your shiny things, of course. Shiny things can be really great, and temporarily nourishing, but until you can articulate whether you want to be single or monogamous or monogamish, such pursuits are just going to further confuse you. Sometimes you have to look at your life not for what it is, but what it could be. And then, once you’ve reached a conclusion, you just have to shut your eyes and jump.
I’ll be cheering you on from the ground below. Best of luck.
Hailing from the rough-and-tumble deserts of southern Arizona, where one doesn’t have to bother with such trivialities as “coats” or “daylight savings time,” Anna Pulley is a freelance writer living in San Francisco. Find her at annapulley.com and on Twitter @annapulley. Send her your Hook Up questions at [email protected].
