February 24, 2012 - Befriending a Man, as a Man

Moving into a relatively unfamiliar city, comparatively far from your alma mater or hometown, brings about some challenges. Most of them easy to accomplish; moving in, assimilating into a new culture, acquainting yourself with a metro system, or lack thereof. Then there are your more difficult challenges such as finding a grocery store with produce that doesn't look like it was used as a sporting tool, handled by feet, in a third world country. Another difficult task, finding employment, if you were dumb enough to move somewhere without any prospects. The hardest of all, and it relates only to the less fairer sex (males sadly), is befriending guys.

There was a film in 2010 that shines light on this topic called I Love You Man, starring Paul Rudd and Jason Segal. A truly hilarious flick that captured the awkward, humorous, and challenging act that is, the "man-date."

I moved to Washington, DC in the end of 2010. I sort of got myself into a rut by working late, going out solely with my roommate whom was a college buddy, and traveling. In one years time, I realized that I had acquired about 4 friends, two of which were gay and had moved out of town to a small town in Missouri, I would be interested in following up on how that is working out culturally. Regardless, I found myself in Rudd's (pistol Pete) situation.


It is honestly an awkward thing to do. I have been sarging girls as Neil Strauss would call it, since I was four years old on the playground, telling girls their chin looked a little chubby when I held the sunflower underneath it. Getting girls to come home with me, or at the very least adding her number to my roladex of female contacts was simple, but the game changed when it came to a "dude." I found myself getting worked up about asking a guy for his number because I had enjoyed the conversation at the bar/house party/book store. I was over-thinking a very common question, "Hey man, nice to meet you, we should get together and grab a drink sometime." I felt like when I said it to myself it sounded like I wanted to see what he was working with down by the belt area, thinking left or right hanging? While this was most definitely not what the guy would think, it was what my hyperactive thought process was repeating back to me.

I would make it worse by adding crude comments into the question to deliver the fact that I was not gay. Not that there is anything wrong with being gay, but I really did not want him to think I was in fact interested in poking his tonsils with my member. Comments starting coming out of my mouth like, "Hey man lets get together some time, fuckin' drink some beer and go hit on bitches." Not only is that comment uneducated, vulgar, and unpronounced, but it was totally unnecessary. He would have given me the number anyways, but now he just thinks I am a sexist freak who may be fun to hang out with, in dirty dive bars.

I have since then gotten over this hurdle and have bolstered my list of guy friends in Washington, DC to call up and go out with. This is much needed when assimilating into a new city. So if you are someone grappling with this struggle, just relax, shake hands, exchange numbers, then go our sarging together. You may want to pump the brakes on the man-hug during the first meeting. Rest assure that after a night out, and and empty bottle of Johnnie Walker Black, you will be dancing, hugging, and sarging the night away like you were friends for 12 years.

Here's to bromance!