Posts Tagged ‘transgender

22
Mar
21

Like Meets Like

By risquedivorcee Leave a Comment
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I have to admit, I haven’t been meeting too many new people during the past year or so. My household and I have taken pandemic isolation very seriously.

The new people that I have gotten to know while sheltering in place, have been almost exclusively online connections. Even colleagues from work are now “remote” and meetings take place by phone or Zoom.

Interestingly, I have reconnected with a lot of old friends and relatives that I hadn’t spoken to in quite a while. It’s been strangely easier to discuss past decades than past weeks or months. Probably because there are actual stories to draw conversation from. Talking to my current close friends sometimes sounds a lot like this:

“What are you up to?”

“Not much.”

“Yeah. I finally got the golden watering can in Animal Crossing.”

“Oh cool. We went to Costco. It was crazy. Four people without masks.”

“Seriously. That’s crazy.  I had a panic attack last time we went.”

“I know, right? I was just thrilled to get away from my children.”

 “I hear ya…”  

Talking to friends about the monotony of daily life in isolation can be tedious. There are also days when I simply feel toxic and don’t want to talk because I feel like such a downer.

Still, I have really tried to get involved with online activities. I started a Facebook group about cooking, and joined several others about art, polyamory, travel, music, and a couple of support groups. I have even been playing trivia online pretty regularly.

Through these various “virtual” activities, I have “met” several new people this year, and I started to notice an interesting pattern. Many of my new acquaintances and I have quite a bit in common. Sure, this makes sense if we’re in a cooking group together, but I was surprised to discover that two of my new online pals were openly poly.

Which begs the question – does like find like? Is there something that inherently exists among poly folk that causes us to find each other organically? I’m in a number of poly groups and the types of people (politics, social class, education level, type of poly that they practice,) seem to vary broadly. I guess we tend to be liberal, openminded, and outgoing, but that’s a generalization at best.  

One person that I discovered to be poly was an existing “electronic acquaintance” that I had been following an interacting with for a while. I don’t usually accept friend requests from people that I don’t personally know (and also decline many that I do know personally.) In the case of this guy, (let’s call him DM,) we have some friends in common, he’s smart, witty, nerdy, and has a gift for terrible puns. We’d engaged in some online banter and at some point, a couple of years ago, we became friends on social media. For some time, I had suspected that he was also poly. I’m not sure what caused me to think so, but he’s a sexy, outgoing, charming fellow who seems to have an active social life and no primary partner. I didn’t really care one way or another – he lives on the other side of the country and it’s not like I want to date him, but I had a little “ah ha” moment when DM recently put the word “poly” in his Facebook description.

I “met” a queer, poly woman a few months ago when she and I were both actively objecting to a transphobic joke that a mutual friend of ours had posted. It wasn’t a terribly ugly joke – in fact, it poked fun at a rather nasty person. Unfortunately, the “fun” punchline was that she had a dick. Not cool. If the insult is about their weight, genitals, illness, religion, ethnicity, or the like, I don’t generally find it funny. This gal (let’s call her Viv,) and I both voiced our “not cool, man” objections, and our friend pushed back a bit. Everyone doubled down, conversations were had, and our (male) friend eventually agreed.

Viv and I then messaged back and forth for about three hours and had a wonderful exchange. She showed me photos of her partners, and shared how much she missed being separated from one partner due to COVID. She was very forthright about the fact that one of her partners was a trans woman, which she mentioned as part of her argument against our friend’s joke. She was fierce.

I’m not super secretive about being poly – many of my friends know, as do some family members. I’m happy to talk about it if it comes up. However, I’m not “out” as a general rule, and live a “passing” life as part of a heteronormative couple. Honestly, other than some messaging and chatting, the past year has been monogamous for my nesting partner and me. Safety has been our top priority.

Still, I really admire people who are open and out. I think it’s important to have representation, but I worry about it impacting my work, and honestly, I just feel like it’s nobody’s business. I don’t mind sharing, (ha ha,) but I do mind having a label slapped on that causes a lot of speculation or inappropriate questions. That may change at some point, but not right now.

Much respect to people living their truth!

And much love to you all,

RD

15
Jul
14

But would you really date Peter Dinklage?

By risquedivorcee Leave a Comment
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sexy peter Okay, just shut the fuck up. Of course you would really date Peter Dinklage. He’s insanely popular, rich, famous, sexy, funny and presumably quite wealthy. Of course we’re just casting aside his lovely wife and daughter, but I’m actually using him as an archetype rather than as a real person. I freely admit to getting a little ego boost from having a sexy young thing want me, but usually it’s not as comfortable as someone a bit more quirky – interesting – seasoned – weird. I had a mad crush on chubby Ricky Gervais. Fit Ricky Gervais is still a panty-dropper, but mostly because of his wit, sense of irony, causes, close association with Muppets, self-deprecating humor, charm and completely unattractive bathtub selfies!

RickyBath_02_1652145a

 

Don’t get me started on Seth Rogen (epitomizing the chubby, hot, sexy nerd,) or Eddie Izzard (deliciously sexy in any language whether wearing a dress and lipstick or a full beard!) Of course Bill Murray is in his very own class of weirdly sexy and has been rocking that shit for nearly five decades! I like people. I find individuals of all kinds to be interesting but I tend to be most attracted to people who are weird and who aren’t afraid to be different. This is true of women as well. I find Margaret Cho, Kathy Najimy & Queen Latifah to be delicious. While I love men and consider myself to be at least 73% straight, I don’t think I would kick any of those ladies out of my bed! All this imaginary star banging brings me back to my point about attraction.

When I was dating regularly I wasn’t focused on a body type and at first I wasn’t even focused on a personality type. But…attraction needs to be there. I talked to a number of men that I just wasn’t attracted to. In fact, I met some of them and probably even slept with a few as well. (I think I had a bit of a learning curve to master and a lot of rejection to overcome! Overall, it was a satisfying slut phase!)

Yesterday while I was driving, someone walking on the other side of the street caught my eye. I’m not sure why exactly, but I think it was because I thought it was a kid and it was an unusual place to see a kid walking alone. I soon realized it was a man about my age – maybe a bit younger. Late 30s, early 40s. Very attractive, well dressed and with a pleasant outward appearance – the kind of person who would normally catch my attention because of his looks and the way he carried himself – but who had caught my attention because he looked like he had been shrunk to 2/3 size. I would guess he was about 4′ 8″ tall and looked like someone who has the type of dwarfism that makes your body proportionate. If he was a dwarf at all that is. He was a bit tall for a dwarf, but my point still remains.

Would I date someone 10-12 inches shorter than I? What about someone who is Trans*?

When I last had an OK Cupid profile, I had someone rate me highly and add me to their favorites who was clearly someone who was transitioning from female to male. This challenged me. I consider myself to be a huge LGBTQ ally & outspoken advocate. But…I didn’t find this person attractive. To be fair, I didn’t meet this person or engage in any communication other than peeping each others’ dating profiles but if I’m attracted to people and can even include women in that attraction, why not a Trans* person? It might surprise you to know that it has little to do with penises. I like penises but the smallest one I ever had was connected to a really fun guy who made up for his shortcomings with fingers, mouth and enthusiasm. Trans* men get to pick their own size anyway, right?

I think that my lack of interest came from the fact that this person was clearly still transitioning and at the time, I felt like I was too. Not in terms of gender, but in terms of self-discovery. I was in a bit of a selfish phase and not willing to take on major challenges with a romantic interest. But I like checking my bias too. I’d never had a Trans* friend until a few years ago when suddenly I had two friends reveal that they were transitioning. One of them, a local friend, shared a lot of his community and friends with me and I learned a lot. I also went to several Trans* events, had my first FtM crush and met several very sexy men who used to be women.

So yeah, if I were dating again, I think I might consider the Trans* man, the short guy, the guy with a lisp & certainly a fat guy. Are they funny? Willing to be an idiot? Are they into me?

Seriously though – attraction plays a huge part. I have had men get livid with me for “misrepresenting myself” when I said “no thank you.” Just because I say I’m open to dating you doesn’t make me obligated to sleep with you or date you after we have talked or met. Similarly, if you are someone of a different race, culture, ability, height, etc – you may very well still be an asshole. This was a bit of a struggle for me for awhile. I want to support this gay friend but oh, hey – they’re a dick. I’m not a bigot because I don’t want to take their bullshit. In fact, I’m less of a bigot for treating them the same way I would anyone else.

This is a weird blog entry. So I guess that suits.