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On New Year’s Eve, a haze casts over the city, everything looking a little different, more romantic. It’s during special occasions, a veil of champagne pulled over our eyes, that we remember how charming New York can be. We put on our very best—for example, a silver sequined top and velvet blazer by Michael Kors. (Both still hang in my closet, for special champagne-drunk occasions.) New Year’s Eve also puts a lot of pressure on...
I dropped in on N every now and then to see how things were going. Most of my trans friends transitioned before I met them, so N was my first case of seeing how it worked—and it looks harder than anything I’ve ever been through. First, coming to terms with the fact that you were born in the wrong body is something I can’t imagine. His mother and siblings stopped talking to him entirely. To...
Growing up, I wasn’t bullied much. I know: effeminate me, growing up in small town Iowa. Sure, there was some taunting; snickers when I said I wanted a Scary Spice doll for Christmas; a black eye from a bully who called me a “fag” on the bus. But mostly, Iowa was a very friendly, and progressive, place to grow up. One place I wasn’t accepted, funny enough, was band. The other flautists took to me...
The same week I ate bodega pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving (re: last week’s column), I was lucky enough to be on the cover of this very magazine you’re reading now. The Thanksgiving issue was a week shy of my one-year anniversary writing for Get Out! Magazine and featured me, entirely nude and barely cropped, staring right at you. My column that week was something new, a very solemn look back on my first Thanksgiving in...
Last year, I decided to stay in New York for Thanksgiving with my boyfriend. I’m from Iowa, so going home can be a hassle. I have to get time off, travel during the busiest time of the year, spend $600-plus on a plane ticket… It’s not easy, to say the least. I was happy to spend our first Thanksgiving as boyfriends together. Something about me: I’m a planner. I need a plan. I like to...
I’ve written about Sleeping Beauty before—called so because, after inviting me over to his place at 1 a.m., he fell asleep, and I couldn’t get into his apartment. But I barely talked about what it was actually like to date him. See, I really liked Sleeping Beauty. I liked that he was an editor, which seemed the perfect boyfriend for a writer. I liked that I had to go on my toes to kiss him,...
I wish that my story with G was different. I wish that he had never contracted HIV, never had to deal with doctors and meds and stigma. I wish I asked questions when he told me he was undetectable. I wish I asked him on a second date. I wish I wasn’t the character that was afraid to be with someone because they’re HIV positive. I wish I was the character that was understanding, and...
I couldn’t stop thinking about G. I knew I fucked up. G was so handsome, and so funny, and so smart – and I avoided him because I was too embarrassed to ask any questions about his HIV non-detectable status. Six months after meeting G, I went on a Grindr hiatus, forcing myself to focus on work and writing. For some reason, that just made me think about G more. I thought about all of...
Mike Greenly is a fascinating person. A former Vice President of Avon Products, Greenly is an incredible journalist, a lyricist writing songs for artists such as Kim Davis, and an incredibly talented speech writer/ speech coach. Greenly has so many relevant accomplishments that it would be nearly impossible to list them all. He was also such an interesting speaker that I became mesmerized with his words and lost inside my own interview. In certain instances,...
I think it’s about time I wrote about G. G was an editor at a magazine with headquarters in Hell’s Kitchen, just a few blocks from his apartment. One night, while I was out drinking tequila and he was in drinking tea, we were close enough that Grindr brought us together. I honestly don’t remember which of us messaged the other first, but I have a feeling it was me. G was exactly my type:...