Real love -- I'm, like, searchin' for that Queer Love -- LGBTQIA+ Love // A Thread for the Real Ones

ahhh

and how is your dating life these days if you don't mind me asking?

at the moment i’m on scruff and grindr. on the former my profile is like “hey let’s chat and maybe meet up and if it leads to the boudoir then cool but friends are great too”; hardly anyone talks to me on it. the latter one is more like “yo let’s do sex stuff” and i get a lot more messages there lol. the people i’ve met on scruff tend to be more interesting generally, at least where I live - last night i hung out for the second time w/ a sweet bearish guy i met there who runs in similar circles as me and with whom i have some mutual acquaintances.

i am much too lazy to do dating apps— the fact that i never met anyone worth it in them only seals the deal for me. they’re useless

xp that sounds nice!

i feel like my dislike for slc really hinders my desire to be social in the gay scene here. the boys who are from here are all out to their mormon families who are "accepting" on the surface and they're involved with the siblings and nieces and nephews and blech i just don't relate. the people who have moved here - it's like, your reasons for doing so mean we probably won't get along. idk it's complicated.

i've hung out a few times with a friend i met here several years ago, who is from southern utah, he's an exception, really articulate and charming. one friendship i feel good about. he's monogomous with his current partner. my partner doesn't really relate to his partner. so i just get coffee with him on saturday mornings sometimes and a few weeks ago we went out dancing. i'm happy to keep it platonic. still not sure what "openness" looks like with my partner tbh, we're trying a few things. he has hangups, i have hangups. just trying to see what feels good.

Not in recent years, but I've met several boyfriends and good friends on dating websites/apps. No bad experiences to speak of.

and how is your dating life these days if you don't mind me asking?

― ꙮ (map),

I haven't been trying the last couple months after a decent late spring and early summer. I'm still learning how to navigate this pandemic world.

I'm like - post-date

no I'm really not but this idea is shocking to me of like - are you supposed to have a date BEFORE you hook up? something about it just feels sort of ridiculous

i tend to agree with that.

i had my first hookup in forever a few weeks ago with a guy who lives in the condo complex across the street from me. i went over there during his lunch break, first time meeting him and all that. a little nervous and awkward at first, then kinda fun, then nice to talk to him for a few minutes afterward. i genuinely look forward to the "talking for a few minutes afterward" part now, whereas i used to just want to get out of there. hookup sex is less urgent now, a little more of a chore than it used to be i think. exception is with my partner thankfully! connection and trust keeps it rich. still finding ways to let loose even more etc. maybe polyamory is about having that with multiple people? i don't think i could do that - i hardly have the time to keep everything that is currently in my life from falling out of the picture.

I do think it's a nice part of the experience too - depends on the chemistry obvioso

I just am ready to meet like a prince type - I've been seeing very Brooklyny guys which is great but I need an elevated moment

I don't think polyamory has to mean any one thing apart from having love with more than one person

i don't think i've ever made it with royalty! no royalty here as far as i can tell, just unctuous sons of provincial corporate tycoons. sounds dope tbh. my idea of royalty is like a dancer from old money or something.

hookup sex is less urgent now, a little more of a chore than it used to be i think.

This.

no I'm really not but this idea is shocking to me of like - are you supposed to have a date BEFORE you hook up? something about it just feels sort of ridiculous

― Swen,

I don't know if I'd call it a "date" but pre-pandemic and a couple times since we've met for a beer before a hookup -- especially if safety worries me.

omg a dancer from old money

well Alfred you're a very stand up guy

highest up the ladder i’ve gotten is a CFO i think

!!!! i want to hear that story

lol it happened the first time i visited LA. way back when i had a much stronger tolerance for alcohol than i do now, i went on a solo WeHo bar crawl since I’d never really been to the area before and also didn’t know very many people in town. i had one drink each at five different bars. at bar #5 a man who was drunker than i was started aggressively flirting with me, and, well, he was handsome so i yielded. he drove (😬) us to his house in Beverly Hills where we did the deed (twice!). right as i was about to drift off to sleep he asked me if I wouldn’t mind leaving because he had to catch a flight the next day and wanted to get a good night’s sleep. this was around 2am and i was living in the valley (ie far) at the time. he gave me a couple twenties for cab fare (this was pre-rideshare) after I told him where I lived and he sent me on my way - it wasn’t enough to cover the cab ride.

he shared a first and last name with a former US president. he also absolutely couldn’t remember my name and kept calling me “trouble”, like “ooh, you’re trouble.” obviously i never saw him again after that, and they all lived happily ever after.

lol that's great

I went out with a guy a couple times years ago who'd mumble "mmm you're trouble."

right here in river city

with a capital P

he shared a first and last name with a former US president

living for this blind item!

I'm legit terrified of sex with strangers. I remember a Grindr-happy friend once expressing confusion about the act of "picking up at a bar", like he couldn't even process the idea that you might want to first converse socially with somebody you intend to be intimate with

In the early 2000s I picked up somebody in a bar in Austin who drove me back to his place, we hooked up (it was lame), and then he drove me back to where I was staying, pointing out all the fragile parts of the South Austin moraine landscape that his development company was intending to steamroll over. Me at age 23 in the passenger seat nodding as he talked about his problems with "environmental activist lobbyists" etc.

I just finished a draft on Erotica (30 years old tomorrow) and tried not to lean too hard into the terror of sex in the early '90s. But it was difficult. And I didn't succeed.

I have had sex with online hookups, but only bad and unfulfilling sex. The only fulfilling hookups I had were with people I met in bars. I met my husband at a Kink Bound in Public shoot in a bar, ffs.

I say this with love ... that tracks :)

https://www.slantmagazine.com/music/madonna-erotica-retrospective-review/

I say this with love ... that tracks :)

why does fetish footwear have to be so goddamn uncomfortable?

First line in your memoir!

Hooked up with a 21-y-old at a Halloween party on Saturday, introduced to me by my friend the host. He was pretty drunk, I mildly drunk, and we were going at it in the bathroom 20 minutes later.

that sounds fun!

oh my the queers and their halloween costumes and photos. i'm supportive fron the sidelines. i stayed home all weekend and i'll be in bed by 8:30 tonight. it's spooky season for many but it's depression season for me.

haha, anyway, alfred did you have a costume this year?

New Romantic FIU Footballer. I hope the subtle makeup isn't too subtle.

https://i.imgur.com/KOwM7dS.jpg

very handsome

today i dressed up as 'office worker on casual friday' so i could give even less of a fuck than usual

oh my the queers and their halloween costumes and photos. i'm supportive fron the sidelines. i stayed home all weekend and i'll be in bed by 8:30 tonight. it's spooky season for many but it's depression season for me.

― ꙮ (map)

I hear ya. Normally I can't stand Halloween

i do get an idea or two for a costume every year but it just seems like another project i have to do. i swear one of these years i'll just go for it. maybe i need to do mushroom / ketamine therapy and a little bit of magic queer pixie dust will rub off on me.

yesterday i had a strong image of me djing in a dress. like a nice designer dress. putting that one on the 'maybe some day when i have less baggage to carry around all the time' list too.

We were supposed to do an Airbender themed couples costume this year, but my weekend in hospital dashed those dreams— I can’t even eat any candy at the moment, on a “full liquids” diet until Friday

Negronis!

oh no, i hope you're feeling better soon

table, I hope you got my message on the other thread. Hugs.

I did, thanks Alfred and map! staying away from booze for a bit as i believe it might have been a booze-induced chowdown that caused the obstruction in the first place, but i am planning on hitting the vape for the first time since Friday, longest i’ve gone in years without weed ?!?

I'm not sure taking someone younger and more inebriated than yourself into a bathroom for sex, moments after meeting them, is the way you want that hook-up story to sound

We didn't have sex. It's fine -- we talked yesterday, we're meeting for coffee tomorrow night.

i've never really loved halloween - the pressure to think of an original/funny costume, running all over town to get the stuff you need for it, then actually executing the idea (and in my case, more likely than not doing a shitty job of it)...i know some gays treat it like it's their christmas and i'm happy for them but it's not really my thing. i'm also really ready for those spirit halloween costume memes all over IG to be over and done with lol

i agree very much with all of that, except the doing a shitty job of it, i don't think that's possible for you

i look forward to the day i can hire my own temporary costume designer to execute my halloween costume for me (must have seen one too many of those vogue look back videos today)

I'm not sure taking someone younger and more inebriated than yourself into a bathroom for sex, moments after meeting them, is the way you want that hook-up story to sound

you aren’t allowed to have drunken bathroom sex until you’re at least 22

xp yes, that was uncalled for imo.

shit, hope you're ok table and wish you a speedy recovery.

i've worn the same costume every year for the last 5 or 6 years, initially it was based of a playful yijing reading ("someone tethers his cow; the traveller's gain is the townie's disaster", no particular question). I had this great 1890's fringe jacket that i bought to flip but never got around to selling. a year later i added a hobby horse.

can we see the jacket?!

omg i love all of that xp

apropos of nothing here's a hobby horse from wikipedia

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7b/Morris_dancers_Thames_at_Richmond.jpg-

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7b/Morris_dancers_Thames_at_Richmond.jpg