Not That There's Anything Wrong With That

Once upon a time, I had to wait to go on my first "official" date until I was 16. For the blessed event, I was going out with "C," who I'd been crushing on since I was 12. For four years I'd watched him in church and basically planned our entire wedding (I had the date picked out and everything). Yep, not jumping ahead at all...even at that young age. So, the night of our big date comes and everything's perfect - he picks me up, brings me a pink rose, and takes me to my favorite Japanese restaurant. During dinner, he says there's something he has to tell me. My little pink heart was all aflutter waiting for some declaration of love, but alas, instead he told me he was gay. Um, OK. Happy Sweet Sixteen (?) to me (prick!). I mean, really? He couldn't have waited until another day? Did it really need to be revealed on my freaking birthday?!!?! Sheesh. Needless to say, from that day on, I've never met a straight guy I was attracted to who that I didn't think was gay. My defense mechanism jumped 1000% that day in relation to my lack of gaydar (actually, I think I have reverse gaydar - if I'm attracted to someone, they must be gay).

Why did I share with you my heartbreaking story, you ask? Well, when I was at the Gateway today, there was this guy doing caricatures of people. McHeidi and I had just been talking about finding someone to do this, so I thought it was a perfect time to have someone try to characterize "the Pink." Well, the guy was really cool and was talking to me the whole time, but I would've bet large amounts of money that he was gay. Why did I think that? I'm not sure. He was artistic, spoke a little femmy, and just seemed rather dainty (oh, and I was innately attracted to him, so that sealed the deal). I don't know how to explain it and of course there's nothing wrong with that in the slightest, but I was surprised to hear him say he had a daughter. So, of course, I asked him if he were married, and he said yes (for 20 years, in fact!). For whatever reason I then blurted out, "To a woman?" Um, yeah, that wasn't very polite at all. Bad Pinky!

I seem to do that a lot - make snap judgements of people who might display certain general stereotypical characteristics. I don't mean to, but it just happens. I should probably learn how to shut my mouth, even if they seem obvious. I've asked the "Are you gay?" question more times than I care to admit and I'm sure I'm just offending people the world over by making a snap decision, but I can't stop myself. Perhaps there's a buzzer I can get that'll go off anytime I'm about to do something stupid. Like shock therapy. Yes, that's a great idea....perhaps it'll stop me from running my mouth too much.