Re-rooting

There can be a time where you become too gay.

Yes.

I said it.

Too gay.

Not too feminine.

Not too pro-gay rights.

Not too much of a stereotype.

Just too gay.

And I am that gay. I have lived in the same apartment for four years, which is a decent amount of time in the greater Los Angeles area. I work for a gay boss who has many gay friends and ideas. I have a weekly housekeeper. I saw seven movies at Outfest. I have two small dogs with soft-back harnesses and pet insurance. My 2010 resolution was to see one musical a month, minimum. Straight people have to come out to me as being attracted to the opposite sex, and sometimes they are nervous about it. I scream at people who ride their bikes on the sidewalk along Santa Monica Boulevard. I, ladies and ladies, am a mega-faggot. If I'd been an adult in the 80's, I'd have been in porn in acid washed, hip-hugging jeans with bleach blond tips.

I live in the hearth of the gay flame near Hamburger Mary's, city hall, and Gelsons. In my neighborhood you can buy designer lube at CVS at discount prices. People will walk to their cars drunk shouting, congratulating themselves because they have straight friends. They walk with their o-beasts (drunken, straight, fat hags) and drive home drunk to the Inland Empire or the Grove singing the same Paul Oakenfold remix of Allejandro that they heard at O-bar 20 minutes ago. It's annoying and it's tired.

My building no longer has Crystal Meth addicts but does have a fair number of angry, Russian taxi drivers and old queens who are angry at their irrelevance. The carpeted hallways reek of online hookups, and worst of all, children are moving in. gaybies live here. They're louder than the pool parties and I can't deal.

I never thought Johnny Carson or Jerry Seinfeld were particularly funny, but one thing that has always stuck with me, is that while no one remembers a single bit from their stand-up, a common compliment to both is "Well, they knew when to leave."

A wise soul said to me recently, when I threw out my thoughts on possibly leaving, "I there should be an ordinance. At 29 you should have to sign a letter of intent to move out of West Hollywood."

My time has come.

I respect what West Hollywood means to gay people. I recognize the significance it has for the Midwestern outcast who just has had it with being a minority and wants to feel included. My problem, is that I've always been an outcast--but not for being gay, for being a weirdo. And I've always been able to make that a strength without attaching it to a street name like Larrabee or Dicks Drive.

I think after the first of the year I'd like to re-root.