Happy Valentine's Gay

**This post originally appeared in 2013 as part of  a challenge to write about your "Most Memorable Valentine's Day"**

Since Opie and I have only been married a year and a half people are probably expecting me to write sort of a sappy, emotional tribute to the ultimate fabulosity of our lives together.  But sappy emotional tributes aren’t my style (unless, sadly, I’m writing about Peek-A-Boo, The Amazing Miracle Dog) and, besides, if I wrote that kind of public post about Opie, he’d break out in a rash…

So, instead, "The most memorable Valentine's Day I had was when I had the WORST VALENTINE’S DAY DATE EVER."

It was about 4 years ago; I had just gotten out of a bad relationship and I hadn’t reconnected with Opie yet.  I was a little down and crabbing about how it sucks to be alone on Valentine’s Day.

Then I learned what sucks worse: Having a so-called friend set you up on a date on Valentine’s Day with a gay guy.

I’m trying to give her the benefit of the doubt, like maybe she didn’t KNOW he was gay…but that would mean that she’d never spent more than five minutes in his presence…and I don’t know which bothers me more: that she set me up with a gay guy or that that she set me up with a complete stranger.

For the record, he didn’t actually come out and SAY that he was gay…but he was.

And for those of you who are horrified at my lack of political correctness, for my cruel pre-judgmental outing, please note that my friend Eric has already lectured me on my blatant breach of the liberal code.  He has reminded me that sexuality is a deeply personal issue and one of the few things in life that a person is allowed to self-identify. 

And then, after I told him the following story, he said “Yahhhhh, that guy’s gay.”

First of all, he was more feminine than I am—and I consider myself a fairly girly girl.  Second, he couldn’t keep his eyes off our waiter.   I’m not exactly Sherlock Holmes but when one man blatantly and continuously checks out another man’s perky behind, I suspect more than a passing interest. 

Which, in itself, isn’t definitive.  But then he turned every conversation into an oblique reference to the “desperately immoral lifestyle” he had previously been involved in.

Like I asked him how he knew my friend Sarah (who arranged this travesty of an evening) and he said he met her when he joined the same church she’s a member of.  “It saved me,” he said.  “I had immersed myself in a desperately immoral lifestyle.” And then he nodded meaningfully and took another peek at our waiter’s butt.

I decided not to pursue that and instead changed the subject and asked about hobbies.  At which point I learned that he has taken up running because he had to quit his gym after giving up his “desperately immoral lifestyle.”

And so on.  After about the tenth reference to this lifestyle, it was pretty obvious he wanted me to ask what it had been.

So, I sighed and asked “Drugs?”

“Worse!” He said.

“Murder?”  I suggested.  “Paid assassin?”

And then, like he was in some horrible over-stereotyped movie, he put his fingers in front of his mouth and tee-heed daintily.

It was one of the most bizarre things I’ve ever been forced to witness.

“Not that bad,” he giggled. “But close.”

Which I thought was incredibly sad—I mean, come on!  If you’re gay and your top ten list of evils in the world goes:

1.   Murder

2.  Homosexuality

I think you have some pretty deep-seated emotional issues. 

But I also think you shouldn’t be dating WOMEN.

Anyway, he looked at me eagerly, waiting for me to ask more.

And you know what?

I didn’t do it.

Instead I smiled and said “Good for you for getting out of it, whatever it was.” Then I told him I had to go.

Because Eric is right, sexuality IS a deeply personal issue and not one you should discuss on a first date.