How to Fit in at the Gay Party

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Let’s say you are one of those people who thinks that we fall in love with the soul, and the body is just a covering.  A shell of attraction, if you will.  I am not one of those people.  Chicks are hot, dudes are not.  But I’m here to help you enlightened womenfolk who fall in love only with the soul, and may someday fall in love with a female soul.  Because eventually you will need to meet her friends.  Her gay friends.  And the gay women are a serious group, so you better not take this meeting lightly.  I don’t know why, maybe because we don’t do drag shows and we don’t like Barbara Streisand and Broadway as much as our male counterparts, but in general we are not always a fun-loving, live-and-let-live type of people.  Some of us are very serious and we can spot a poseur a mile away, so you need to be prepared.

 

In order to avoid 5,000 pervo hits on this blog and more crazy spam emails than I already get, I am going to refer to the female gays as “my teammates.”  And I will say that this is all very stereotypical, and potentially upsetting to my teammates; but in the interest of helping you enlightened ones fit in at the gay party, I am risking the ostracize-ation of my own people.  No need to thank me.

 

Appearance:

 

Obviously don’t wear skirts, heels, blouses, short shorts, jeans with heels, or ultra-tight jeans.  All of these forms of apparel mean “bowing down to the patriarchy” (BD to the P), a carnal team sin.  Another sin: shaving.  If you shave, don’t tell the world.  There is a real problem with shaving, having long hair, waxing or tweezing your brows, or wearing makeup, so just be aware that you may be ribbed about those things if you choose to partake in a little beautification.  These things qualify once again as BD to the P or worse, trying to pass as straight among strangers and coworkers, a real annoyance among my teammates.  It’s a kind of “riding the coattails of other people’s hard work” kind of sin.  If you must have long hair or shave your legs, just don’t admit it, and try to come up with good excuses.  “My ears stick out too much for short hair,” and “I can’t afford regular haircuts” are pretty good ones, although  I bet you can get more creative.  You could try “My regular hair lady is in a coma,”  but really, these things are personal, you’ll need to work on it on your own.  There is no acceptable excuse for the teammates who shave, by the way.  As a shaving teammate, I can tell you that nobody cares if you say you are as hairy as the Geico caveman, you will be told that you need to embrace your hairiness and stop bowing down to the patriarchy!  This is a regional thing; shaving is okay in Reno, but not okay in Oregon or New Mexico, so you may be off the hook depending on where you live.

 

Don’t have too many chotzkes on your key chain.  Essentially, you need guy keys, so avoid the girly accoutrements.  Your keys should fit in your pocket, because, hello, the keys are not going into your purse.  DO NOT bring a purse, by the way.  Don’t even try to bring one of those purse backpack things.  It’s still a purse, and carrying one will give you away faster than talking about how you just can’t stop buying shoes.  Back in the day you needed to have a pocket knife on your keychain or a Leatherman in your pocket to fit in at the party, but these rules are getting softer in my circle.  When I was 22, I was publically chastised for not having a knife of any kind on me, and I subsequently received one for my birthday from one of my teammates.  I still didn’t keep it in my pocket, but at least I owned one, and I could say things like, “Oh, ya, it’s in my other pants, sorry.” when someone couldn’t open a beer or needed to pick a lock or something.

 

Behavior:

 

Don’t talk about ex-boyfriends or ex-husbands.  If you talk about how cute a male is, you must qualify it with “well, you know, for a guy…” after.  Don’t say that you are bisexual.  Many of my teammates just view that as a cop out.  A sort of lowfat cookie, a sugar-free chocolate cake.  It’s non-committal.  It’s wussy.  You either are a cookie or you’re not.  No middle of the road with this team.  Teammates may think you are trying to reap the rewards of both sides, and you will be chastised.  You karate do halfway, Daniel-san, get squashed, just like grape. 

 

Practice being outraged.  You must be politically correct and slightly mad at the world, or at least know how to pretend to be.  So practice phrases like, “That is ridiculous,” “How politically irresponsible,” “We absolutely cannot put up with it anymore,” “We should protest,” “We should boycott,” or even “I am outraged.” That last one is kind of obvious but still acceptable. 

 

Know what The L-Word is.  It’s a show about my teammates, and if you say you don’t watch it, or worse, you’ve never heard of it, you’ll be kicked out so fast you won’t even have time to grab your purse. 

 

Whatever you do, don’t admit that you think Gay Pride is a strange phenomenon that slightly confuses you.  Don’t say things like, “why do I have to march in a parade to be gay?”  Ya, they don’t like that, especially the older ones who have paved the way for the younger ones.

 

Acceptable vehicles:  Trucks, SUVs, Subaru Outbacks, trucks, motorcycles, and trucks.  No cute cars and no minivans. 

 

That should be enough to get you started, my enlightened new teammate.

 

In other big news on my Yahoo home page:  The WHO says flu victims may be infecting others!  I am outraged!  (See, I’ve had more practice than you, it comes very naturally, this being outraged.)

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