This weekend at dinner with friends I was the big ol' 5th wheel. Two butches, two femmes, and well, me. Like many people, especially in this city, my gender is more complicated on the inside than it may seem on the outside, but as with most things I tend to qualify as kind of a: yes, please, some of each and all of those, and..and..., mixed up, not easily boxable weird amalgam of genders. Think of a mermaid-cat with a curly French villain mustache and a dapper hat and you're close. So. Anway.
One of the femmes was Irene, who was proclaimed to have "porn-star hair" that night. It's fun watching her dimple dance while she blushes.
At one point during the meal the other femme turns to me and tells me she was perusing Craig's List Missed Connections at work and found an ad for a Miss Sadie that mentioned a play party and a scene with a submissive and I should check it out. I love this weird little world, where an in-person dinner conversation can lead you to your online CL stalker. We go both forwards and backwards and in swirling loops these days.
So at home I looked up my name under Missed Connections for the first time in some months, and, sure enough, pop comes an ad that really must have been written for me. It references a BDSM party at which I had a fantastic time last fall as well as some hints that were obscure enough that it took me another full day to remember who this person was. The timing also added another layer to the host of strange and unexpected messages coming at me from the past this last great weird weekend. We have since corresponded and I am very flattered.
But that's not the point. The point is, that after oh, say thirteen years of scouring missed connections, from the small print in the back of the Baltimore City Paper to the occasional traipse through Craig's List, fantasizing that there is someone out there, someone whose sticky mind is stuck on me, someone intrigued and interested and compelled enough to toss that message in a bottle out in the hopes that by slim chance or fate it'll end up on my shore....that one of many simple adolescent fantasies has actually come true. Oh happy day.
I'm quite pleased.
Maybe that means this will also be the year I *finally* get fucked in a graveyard. How many fucking goth clubs does it take to make that happen? Apparently more than I've gone to and sadly I stopped going. Years ago. Except when I travel of course, for some reason gay bars and goth clubs are both still interesting and more fun when in a different town. I always feel a little bit like a colonialist, turn-of-the-century anthropologist when I'm traveling and venturing to these exotic venues; one of the kinds of anthropologists that believed in order to fully
understand and document foreign cultures it is necessary to lay them or be laid by them. Not that that necessarily works, but hey, can't blame a scientist for attempting thorough research.
But back to Missed Connections. While I am super excited that it *finally happened to me* ( I feel a little like a middle schooler with her first menses, thrilled and just slightly disappointed) let it be known to future wives and courtiers that this does not mean that appealing to me through MC is now irrelevant or no longer necessary. There are still many points to be gained there, and this is for sure a good birthday/special occasion aide. Frankly, with all the people I've dated in the past and told about my dream of having my connection missed, I'm pretty surprised none of them picked up on that hot tip and got themselves tons of free, easily attainable credit and appreciation. Though if you are thinking about acting on this, remember: I don't check super often these days, so be vigilant.
Of course, there's always W4W....
Showing posts with label missed connections. Show all posts
Showing posts with label missed connections. Show all posts
Friday, January 25, 2008
Friday, January 4, 2008
W4W and Me: You Defy Description
This past year, after each of two tough, but very different break-ups, I found myself turning to Craigs List as daily habit in my life. The first time, last March-June, I scanned the local Missed Connections forum daily, enjoying the distraction and entertainment, hoping to see myself reflected through another's desire (it's been a fantasy since I was 17 or so), finding solace in the hordes of other people lonely and hurting and strange and spewing. I don't own a TV, don't really consume any media except books and the two free weeklies (I am a bit embarrassed by being so poorly informed about current events and the like, but have yet to find a regular relevant source of clear, unspun news), wasn't watching movies, and no longer drink or smoke pot, so Missed Connections became my little escapism fix.
I almost never look at Missed Connections anymore. This time, it's the W4W section, which I've mentioned before. My roommate got me started on it and now I check it, generally several times daily, as a fascinating microcosm of the local gay/queer/lesbian/bi/trans communities. I examine the writing styles, and have learned general trends about what kinds of people write what kinds of ads, who is most likely a man trolling for sex pictures (a hot though amateur pic of a young, very femme girl in lingerie looking to hook up and exchange pics....NO MEN!-generally a dude), how more than any other category W4W is used as an online community/info center beyond just personals, and marvel at how much queers love passing judgement, policing each other and giving each other shit. Irene calls DVDs of HBO shows her "stories" like a grandma at home with Days of Our Lives, and W4W has become my stories. Oh right, and as of 2007, I occasionally get dates from there, though often when I'm not really trying.
When I was actually actively dating the last ex, I rarely perused W4W, and if I did I was usually looking for ladies who fit one or another of our fantasies, in the hopes we could find someone to fill out a particular role or gang up on. But despite, or perhaps because of all the trivial petty shit, name-calling and sizism and trans- and bi-phobic attitudes, beyond all of the ways it's so much like everywhere else in all the most mundane and embarrassing ways, it perfectly feeds my brain's craving for bite-sized pieces of fluffy, arousing, informative and occasionally soulful information.
And, I realize while writing this, although I often mourn the lessening of quality connections with empathy, compassion and sensory satisfaction between people that this world of cell phones and instant messenger and MySpace and blogs is weaning us from, I guess that the W4W forum also gives me the sense of belonging to an ersatz community, without facing the scorn of the Lex or running into my ex's or feeling invisible because of my generally femmey, weirdo presentation and male-oriented history and expansive desires. Being actually invisible can give you the freedom to be exactly who you are with confidence. It can also dehumanize people, inspire new heights of deception, and without accountability, bring out the worst.
Funny, that.
So this evening during my casual scroll, I came across a thread about a well-written ad. I love following the threads especially, they are a bit like anonymous exquisite corpses. So I went back and found the "OP" which is original posting in CL speak, and discovered it to be not only well written, but really resonant with many of my own feelings. So I emailed the poster and asked if I could re-print the ad here. She gave me her blessing so here it is for your reading pleasure. She is quite a bit older than me, and felt the age gap too significant to date, which was fine by me. But I feel the ad to be very apropos to what I am looking for.
My notes would be these:
1. I may put more importance on looks and interests than the author, though I have a very wide spectrum of what I find appealing in both those arenas.
2. I consider work to be anything on which you spend time, energy and hopefully some passion. In my (very privileged and also creative) world, work and finances are not necessarily corollary, though hopefully there is some of each.
3.Although I have practiced polyamory (much more difficult than the piano, which I gave up years ago) for about eight years, I am imagining my wife to be probably single. While I envision a poly marriage, with perhaps some periods of monogamy to help through rough patches, I want to get involved with someone who has the room not only in their hearts, but also in their bits and schedules to really fall deeply in love and intimacy, sometimes quickly sometimes slowly. To me this indicates someone who has had good practice with poly life, but happens to not have any super significant (in terms of romance and time commitment) partners at the moment. Perhaps some very casual, or occasional out-of-town lovers, but no relationships that would make her feel not single.
And here it is:
You Defy Description
Your looks and interests don't preoccupy me. What matters to me are your experiences, perceptions, and states of mind.
You know idiocy. What it is for you to completely screw up. Lose a chance. Miss a deadline. Blow a fuse. Lose your mind. Slip on a peel for real. Wound a lover. Lose your star. Sign a contract you know you’ll pay in blood.
You know many kinds of love. Romantic and silly. Unyielding and loyal. Coarse and exquisite, jealous and forgiving. Stirring-the-oatmeal love. Ancient, deep, recognition-love. Unrequited and tearing.
You know loss. Lover, family, goddamn body part stopped working, whatever it was. Crying in the shower. Getting through the days. Wincing away from the photographs, years later.
You know bliss. Music finding the heart of your ears. Touch. Image, sculpture, and narrative in visual motion. A glance, a smile, the simple phrases that wing the heart and make it sing. The body pushing against gravity to a great pleasure, to a finish line, beyond pain to submission, through silence to a timeless space of luminous ground.
You know surrender. To accept, in the big ways, that you’re not who you thought you were, or wanted to be, or thought you would become.
You know work. A steady hum. Combat and loyalties, crisis and crap, and even so, getting things done.
You know nature. Not just the elemental joy in rivers and mountains, kinship with that doe in the woods. Now, Being unconceals itself everywhere, you feel rapture in the concrete at Bush and Van Ness, a lost button, the rusty car hood.
You know connection. So you find it odd and hard to feel so much a-part-of-things -- not important, not unimportant, just a infinitesimal part of a whole -- in a culture peopled with many (not all) peripatetic, disconnected individuals, subjects who feel like objects, many of them scared and unhappy with who they are and what they’ve (not) got. You know you can’t hug total strangers, but sometimes you want to.
You have a job, a life, a family you talk to, friends. You have problems, you’re not perfect. You’re single. You’re thinking about “dating” and maybe in some moods you’re reluctant, in other moods optimistic. You’re more cautious than you used to be. You think if you meet the right person, something will click, there will be an opening of a sort. This frightens you a little but you’re willing to be open to it.
Me too.
If this post describes you, I have lots to learn from you. And maybe I have something to offer you. Though who knows? We'll never know unless we meet.
-A.J Waterborne
I almost never look at Missed Connections anymore. This time, it's the W4W section, which I've mentioned before. My roommate got me started on it and now I check it, generally several times daily, as a fascinating microcosm of the local gay/queer/lesbian/bi/trans communities. I examine the writing styles, and have learned general trends about what kinds of people write what kinds of ads, who is most likely a man trolling for sex pictures (a hot though amateur pic of a young, very femme girl in lingerie looking to hook up and exchange pics....NO MEN!-generally a dude), how more than any other category W4W is used as an online community/info center beyond just personals, and marvel at how much queers love passing judgement, policing each other and giving each other shit. Irene calls DVDs of HBO shows her "stories" like a grandma at home with Days of Our Lives, and W4W has become my stories. Oh right, and as of 2007, I occasionally get dates from there, though often when I'm not really trying.
When I was actually actively dating the last ex, I rarely perused W4W, and if I did I was usually looking for ladies who fit one or another of our fantasies, in the hopes we could find someone to fill out a particular role or gang up on. But despite, or perhaps because of all the trivial petty shit, name-calling and sizism and trans- and bi-phobic attitudes, beyond all of the ways it's so much like everywhere else in all the most mundane and embarrassing ways, it perfectly feeds my brain's craving for bite-sized pieces of fluffy, arousing, informative and occasionally soulful information.
And, I realize while writing this, although I often mourn the lessening of quality connections with empathy, compassion and sensory satisfaction between people that this world of cell phones and instant messenger and MySpace and blogs is weaning us from, I guess that the W4W forum also gives me the sense of belonging to an ersatz community, without facing the scorn of the Lex or running into my ex's or feeling invisible because of my generally femmey, weirdo presentation and male-oriented history and expansive desires. Being actually invisible can give you the freedom to be exactly who you are with confidence. It can also dehumanize people, inspire new heights of deception, and without accountability, bring out the worst.
Funny, that.
So this evening during my casual scroll, I came across a thread about a well-written ad. I love following the threads especially, they are a bit like anonymous exquisite corpses. So I went back and found the "OP" which is original posting in CL speak, and discovered it to be not only well written, but really resonant with many of my own feelings. So I emailed the poster and asked if I could re-print the ad here. She gave me her blessing so here it is for your reading pleasure. She is quite a bit older than me, and felt the age gap too significant to date, which was fine by me. But I feel the ad to be very apropos to what I am looking for.
My notes would be these:
1. I may put more importance on looks and interests than the author, though I have a very wide spectrum of what I find appealing in both those arenas.
2. I consider work to be anything on which you spend time, energy and hopefully some passion. In my (very privileged and also creative) world, work and finances are not necessarily corollary, though hopefully there is some of each.
3.Although I have practiced polyamory (much more difficult than the piano, which I gave up years ago) for about eight years, I am imagining my wife to be probably single. While I envision a poly marriage, with perhaps some periods of monogamy to help through rough patches, I want to get involved with someone who has the room not only in their hearts, but also in their bits and schedules to really fall deeply in love and intimacy, sometimes quickly sometimes slowly. To me this indicates someone who has had good practice with poly life, but happens to not have any super significant (in terms of romance and time commitment) partners at the moment. Perhaps some very casual, or occasional out-of-town lovers, but no relationships that would make her feel not single.
And here it is:
You Defy Description
Your looks and interests don't preoccupy me. What matters to me are your experiences, perceptions, and states of mind.
You know idiocy. What it is for you to completely screw up. Lose a chance. Miss a deadline. Blow a fuse. Lose your mind. Slip on a peel for real. Wound a lover. Lose your star. Sign a contract you know you’ll pay in blood.
You know many kinds of love. Romantic and silly. Unyielding and loyal. Coarse and exquisite, jealous and forgiving. Stirring-the-oatmeal love. Ancient, deep, recognition-love. Unrequited and tearing.
You know loss. Lover, family, goddamn body part stopped working, whatever it was. Crying in the shower. Getting through the days. Wincing away from the photographs, years later.
You know bliss. Music finding the heart of your ears. Touch. Image, sculpture, and narrative in visual motion. A glance, a smile, the simple phrases that wing the heart and make it sing. The body pushing against gravity to a great pleasure, to a finish line, beyond pain to submission, through silence to a timeless space of luminous ground.
You know surrender. To accept, in the big ways, that you’re not who you thought you were, or wanted to be, or thought you would become.
You know work. A steady hum. Combat and loyalties, crisis and crap, and even so, getting things done.
You know nature. Not just the elemental joy in rivers and mountains, kinship with that doe in the woods. Now, Being unconceals itself everywhere, you feel rapture in the concrete at Bush and Van Ness, a lost button, the rusty car hood.
You know connection. So you find it odd and hard to feel so much a-part-of-things -- not important, not unimportant, just a infinitesimal part of a whole -- in a culture peopled with many (not all) peripatetic, disconnected individuals, subjects who feel like objects, many of them scared and unhappy with who they are and what they’ve (not) got. You know you can’t hug total strangers, but sometimes you want to.
You have a job, a life, a family you talk to, friends. You have problems, you’re not perfect. You’re single. You’re thinking about “dating” and maybe in some moods you’re reluctant, in other moods optimistic. You’re more cautious than you used to be. You think if you meet the right person, something will click, there will be an opening of a sort. This frightens you a little but you’re willing to be open to it.
Me too.
If this post describes you, I have lots to learn from you. And maybe I have something to offer you. Though who knows? We'll never know unless we meet.
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