The Small-Town, KS Slump

I am back in my hometown and bored outta my mind.

You see, in Emporia I had a new guy every week or so. Mind you, these encounters did not lead to any great relationships, and the guys usually sucked (because I heart guys that suck), but it kept my life interesting.

Here in Small-Town, KS there is a beautiful lake just a few blocks from my house where I go walking, ther is a beautiful countryside view out my bedroom window, and there is absolutley NO social life.

However, this Fourth of July weekend also happened to be the All School Reunion for my HS and so people I haven't seen for years came from all around.

Including Shawn.

We spent the whole weekend together, he even went to the Alumni Dinner with me because I was performing a song with my Step-Dale (my nickname for my Step Dad, Dale). Shawn was a great date, even though we can't seem to spend any length of time together without bickering like an old married couple.

Out and about we ran into one of Shawn's best buddies who he used to live with back when we were dating. At one point in the night he pulled me aside, "What have you done to him this weekend?"

Totally confused by the question I said, "What are you talking about?"

"I heard you were moving out of state." Was his reply.

"Yep, in September." My face lit up as it has been latley, whenever I talk about my upcoming grad school adventure.

"Oh, that's what you did to him." Was all he said.

It was like taking a bullet. I guess I didn't think Shawn really cared, or at least he didn't seem to. I was always so blind. Moments that night had felt like old times, and I had looked at him the way I saw him 6 years ago when he was my world. It felt really nice...but the kind of really nice that's like starting to feel warm again just as you succumb to hypothermia. I can't succumb, right?

But the most important man I saw this weekend, who is, and always will be one of the most important men in my life, was Bo.

We just laughed and laughed, and put our hearts on our cynical, designer sleeves.

Bo, the male, gay, asian equivalent of my mother. The guy who sees the good in me when even I haven't found it yet.

We were talking about when we first met. He asked me to tell my side of the story to see if it was the same as his.

My side was thus:

We were in choir together and you were being a total snob, using your big vocabularly and trying to make me feel stupid, basically using your smarts as a defense mechanism, when I finally said, "Bowen (his full name), I know you're used to being the smartest person around, but I know what all those words mean, and you're not making any sense." Oh, Snap!

Then he told me his side of the story:

All he said was, "I can't remember a time without you in my life."

I almost cried, but all I said was, "You bitch!" And we both burst into a fit of laughter.

Sometimes the best dates aren't romantic at all. And as I watched my best girlfriend from HS stumbling around the bar because she had talked her mom into watching the baby, and as I sang "Don't Stop Believing" at the top of my lungs with her uncle Corey, and as I caught up with people I hadn't seen in years, I realized that sometimes the best dates are old friends. And that's what Shawn is too, an old friend.