<\/p>\n
I went to a training for the Gay Men’s Health Collective at the Berkeley Free Clinic, hereafter referred to as GMHC and BFC respectively, on Robert’s rules (thank you APhiO) and collectivism (thank you cmuOUT). I ran part of the meeting, where we were doing robert’s rules. I think it was pretty cool. Robert’s rules are used in abbreviated form for all-clinic meetings. I also find it amusing that just as cmuOUT acquired it’s collectivism from the Women’s center, the GMHC picked it up off the Women’s health collective (though, actually, while I encountered to organizations in that order, I’m pretty sure it happened in the other order). Anyway, it was cool.<\/p>\n
Walked home from that. No Aaron, assumed he’s already left. Bum around the house, reluctant to leave. Phone contact with Josh and Aaron. Aaron is walking back home from hanging out with coworker. Josh is already in the Castro. I’m planning on being Josh’s designated driver home to Mountainview. I make some pasta (knowing that it won’t be ready by the time Aaron is here.) I don’t pack. Aaron arrives, we hang out for a bit. I eventually pack, and run back into the house for earplugs. Then I want to go back in again, because I forgot my cell phone. Or, at least, I thought I did. It was actually in my bag, but I didn’t discover that til Sunday. Aaron is annoyed and says he’s leaving. I leave ‘without’ my cell phone. <\/p>\n
Getting into the castro area is uneventful. It’s so weird to me that within walking distance of an area so densely urban as the castro, there is a section of road with a curb that is just dirt and weeds. Anyway, we walk to Badlands, and find Josh and Tom. Tom talks to me at a club, for like the first time ever, and is friendly and what not. Josh seriously offends Tom at some point in the evening, by a comment I half caught. Tom says Josh will pay for it later. I’m around for the phone call the next day. =) I am largely bored, because bars are not the right “lighting” for me (my best foot is not my looks). I meet few people. I am bored. Aaron gets me a drink, I consume my like 6th drink of the year. It helps with my headache, and some muscle tension, I’m nowhere near buzzed (unlike my compatriots). =) Too packed to dance. Meander, meander. We get out of there. We start walking towards the bagdad cafe. Aaron borrows Tom’s cell phone, as we walk up market. Aaron falls behind, nobody notices. We get to bagdad, can’t find Aaron. I go back looking for him. He’s coming out of cafe as I’m about to pass it. We head towards bagdad. Somehow I get the cell phone. It starts ringing, and Aaron tries to wrestle it away from me. After I answer he wanders off. It’s Tom on the phone. He wants his phone back NOW. Okay, alright. No sign of Aaron (I figured he must have gone back to cafe, he did). Walk over to bagdad, deliver the phone. Table for 3? Bitches, there are 5 of us total. Fetch Aaron (who is most of the way to bagdad), get us a table for two. Aaron hangs with the other guys, until the 6top next to us frees up. We migrate there. Food is consumed (potatoes & toast for me). Then we head home. On the way back to the car, it is announced that Tom will be driving back to mountainview, not me. I raise an eyebrow, but whatever. It’s been a little while since his last drink (of which there were I don’t-know-how-many), and he seems fairly sober. I figure since Josh’s car and life are on the line, I’ll trust his judgement. He doesn’t bat an eyelash, so I don’t worry. We drive back. Onramp is clogged, but we pass the accident and things open up. Tom is doing 70-80mph. Which left me a little uncomfortable, especially when he was playing chicken with people’s bumpers. Don’t know if he was fucknig with Josh and I, or if he shouldn’t have been driving. Next time I’m the dd, I’m going to be firm about it. <\/p>\n
Josh’s place. Crash on couch. Unconsciousness reached at like 4-4:30am. I wake up at 9am, and don’t get to sleep again until sometime sunday morning. Ugh. Saturday afternoon is spent largely on warcraft and livejournal, and elaborate plans to become a bike messenger and take over the world, though I did mail in my application for testing to become an actuary. <\/p>\n
Aaron comes down to the southbay for Craig’s party in San Carlos. They’re at Josh’s, and I haven’t bothered to pack yet, because I’m a lazy bitch. Pack everything up. Get tacitly exhasperated with Aaron for not bringing my cell phone (if he’d said he couldn’t find it, I probably wouldn’t have been exhasperated. If I’d found it when repacking my bag, I would have been downright sheepish, oh well. =) Collect #’s and they’re off. I hang around Josh’s for a bit, prepping for the first party of the evening, Artman’s birthday, “I love a man in uniform” party. It was cute, people were creative. I was lame in my camo pants, boots, white tshirt. I was told from the getgo, by everyone I knew going to this party (and I knew several<\/i> people going to or specifically not<\/i> going to the party, 1 degree of separation from the party by three general groups of friends.) that there would be several illegal substances consumed, and probably much sexual foo going on. I’ve never been to a party like that before. I wanted to go for the personal growth experience, and I got one. <\/p>\n I’ve been curious about drugs for awhile. Largely because I haven’t done them, and they have this huge mystique built up around them. Once you meet your first person who does drugs responsibly, you know that the anti-drug industry isn’t telling the whole story. It’s also pretty obvious that drugs are not harmless. Neither are knives, but we still don’t restrict access to them. Anyway. I don’t do them, largely because I was drilled in not doing it, and I was scared of becoming an addict. That’s why I didn’t drink until I was 23. I now know I won’t become an alcoholic. If I really really worked at it, I probably could, but the stuff tastes like crap, and dehydrates me, and isn’t much fun, though it is occasionally useful in relaxing me\/loosening me up. It wouldn’t surprise me if other drugs worked out the same for me. I have a hard time imagining E being ‘not much fun’ from what I’ve heard, but I can easily see me saying ‘not worth it’. <\/p>\n Anyway, so I went there. I was still dressed in my camo pants, and tshirt (with a small, light salsa stain on it from the earlier party). I ran around looking for Aaron, so I could get my change of clothes out of his car. Last place I looked, of course. I ran across Antone, and Jim [note, not the one that resides there. This one actually _is_ gay ;)](cute friend of his he wanted to introduce me to. Like me he’s smitten with Antone. Unlike me, he’s monofocused on Antone) and was kinda stressy-\/crisis-mode-me, so didn’t chat much. Found Aaron in the absolute last part of the house I could have checked. (Very big house for the bay area). Got keys off Aaron, found his car, opened trunk, pulled out my clothes. Changed on the street \ud83d\ude09 Came back to party. Felt more like I fit in. <\/p>\n Bryce had had alot to drink. Had earlier in the evening had a ‘take me home’ moment, before we left mountainview. He rescinded it shortly thereafter, though I pondered the wisdom of it. I enjoyed having him around, he’s fun and enthusiastic, and not shy about casual physical affection. Anyway, he gets to the party, and he’s having a good time. He comes up to me much more stable saying he’d recently emptied his stomach. He later tells me that he’d also just had dropped E before barfing. He’s not sure if he’ll get an effect. Then he says he needs to leave, or he’s going to do something he’ll regret. I’m sad to see him go, but understand and respect his decision, and think it was the right one.<\/p>\n Started chatting with people here and there. Not alot by way of stimulating conversation for me. Found this Jim person again. Didn’t seem very chatty. He later developed a make-eye-contact-then-leave-room habit with me. <EYEROLL> I started deliberately avoiding eye contact with him. I have no idea if he then got over his little problem. Probably not. Pity, he was cute, and seemed like he could have been charming. Probably hung up on Antone. Whatever. <\/p>\n Chat with other interesting people. Nothing too interesting. Tour the grounds. Nice house. Very big for bay area. Hot tub. Carpeted Garage(???). Incredible view. Owner is no older than 30, I think he’s actually in his mid to late 20’s, but I can’t remember. Pass by hot tub, thinking of getting in soon. Someone invites me in. I say “Maybe”. They say “‘Maybe’ means ‘No’.” I say “Not always”, go upstairs, find nothing entertaining, come back down, grab a towel, head off to the sidelines of the hot tub, under the porch, strip down, put my speedos on & get in. Someone, Chat briefly with Allen at multiple times during the party. Chat with ambiguously E’d guy, a few times. Meet a moderately cute complete stranger, who seems sober (did I mention that I really can’t tell?) and insert myself into the conversation between him and some other guy. conversation is moderately enjoyable, but goes nowhere. Aaron and Andrew get in the hot tub. Talk awhile with hector (came with aaron, gap coworker of his). Despite Aaron’s urgings, I don’t get back in the hot tub with the many nude and\/or hot guys. Someone tries to close the blinds in the dining room. Is having trouble, so I help out. Right after I bring the last of the blinds down, he starts cutting up a powdery white substance with a razor blade. I maintain an outwardly calm appearance while feeling like a deer in the headlights. Antone comes back from long drive away. Sees this, and, as he told me at lunch today, thought for a split second I might be involved, then invites me to go down to the hot tub with him, which we survey. He talks to the pool people, but I go up to the couch, fall into one of those neat sleeps where you are gaining sleep time, but still maintain some level of awareness of your surroundings, and waking up isn’t a shock. I like those. Ambiguously E’d guy, and Allen come by and ask me how I’m doing. I tell them that I’m just catching some shut eye, and I think I share my little revelation that I am happier not partaking of the club-drug-party scene.<\/p>\n Drugs make you feel good. Probably really<\/i> good. I find that a little tempting. I’m very much not hedonist. I do like sex, but I think that’s as much for the human connection, and the deeper harmonizing it can bring as for the sensation. Probably more for the connection\/harmony, actually. E, I’ve heard, can bring the same thing. Still, who doesn’t like pleasure? I mean, really. But then there’s the aftermath. And even while you’re doing it, there are bad trips. And managing the alphabet of substances you’re putting inside yourself, I can’t help but to think that it isn’t worth it. Not to mention what E, K, and G would do to your EKGs (can’t resist the bad puns but my point is simultaneously serious). More to the point, few of the guests seemed really happy. Only ambiguously E’d guy seemed to be of my tribe, on drugs, and happy at the same time. And there’s something about maintaining my own personal straight edge that appeals to me. <\/p>\n Anyway, eventually Josh comes up to claim me, and says we’re leaving now and we should pick up Aaron and Andrew out of the tub. I say okay, and go down with him to pick people up. The host follows us, and wishes us well in our departure. He also expresses frustration over one of the effects of something he’s on. Hector and I walk out to the car, chatting for a bit. Followed by Josh, and then Aaron and Andrew. We get in the car, Aaron and Josh up front. Andrew resting on one shoulder, hector leaning against the window on my other side (something about the need for independence v human contact to be read in there?). Drop Josh off. Get home to oakland at about 6am. Aaron drops me off first. I have Gay Men’s Health Collective training at 10am. Do I make it in time? Stay tuned for the next installment.<\/p>\n \n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-284","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cheerfulchaotic.crazycrew.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cheerfulchaotic.crazycrew.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cheerfulchaotic.crazycrew.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cheerfulchaotic.crazycrew.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cheerfulchaotic.crazycrew.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=284"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cheerfulchaotic.crazycrew.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cheerfulchaotic.crazycrew.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cheerfulchaotic.crazycrew.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cheerfulchaotic.crazycrew.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}The Other Party<\/h3>\n
Me & Drugs<\/h3>\n
Homeward Bound<\/h3>\n