I Was A Gay Bar Virgin

The Setup
I enjoyed the new Kathy Griffin: My Life On The D-List Season 3 opener this week and her latest comedy special. At one point, she's talking with her parents (her father is since deceased) — it's a running joke that they are boozy Suzie's and love to drink boxed wine. They reveal that they've been stopping by the bar RAGE during the afternoon since there's specials on drinks and appetizers. And when you're Kathy Griffin's parents it goes a long way with the gay waitstaff and clientele. Everyone knows that Kathy and her parents just love "the Gays."

The Show
It's 1995 and Kenny G is at his peak. He's blowing his saxophones and clarinets from one end of the continent to the other. Turns out I have friends that are going to see him perform at The Greek Theatre up in L.A. and they want me to go along. Sure, I'm game. It will be my friend from work and I, her best friend (BF), and another friend that has recently come out. This isn't a setup which I'm happy about.

BF assures us she has secured incredible seats. She's a constant concert goer and has developed a special friendship with a certain phone agent at Ticketmaster who always gets her the best seats available. I think she gives him phone sex, but whatever it takes, I'm all for it. As long as I don't have to do it.

We get to The Greek and it's summer so there's still light. There is practically no room for parking. I mean none. The whole thing is difficult to describe but at least the parking attendants have it down to a science. We are directed to follow the cars in front of us where we end up sandwiched into a side street. When I say sandwiched, I mean there is a car in front of us, in back, and on each side. Like 2 feet from us on each direction. Think you're going somewhere? Not hardly. Maybe by ambulance but not in that car. You ain't going anywhere until the jillions of cars parked in front of you leave. Period.

We're psyched and enter the open air venue. The usher guides us to our seats. We head down toward the front. We keep going. And going. We are in the f'ing front row! Waiting for the show to begin, I spot Scott. He's the head of our big time advertising agency. He's one of the founders of the agency formed to serve the new Lexus car account and he later went on to head the entire Toyota business. Remember "Relentless Pursuit of Perfection"? That was them. Well Scott is a good looking guy and reminds me of Ken Olin on thirtysomething. Drool. A good-looking big shot. Always nice and friendly but you knew that he knew that he was hot shit. So as he walks by...

"Hey Scott!" I call to him because I like him, work with him every day, and it was cool to see someone from work.

"Hey how'd you get these seats?" No 'hi', 'how are ya', 'good to see ya', nothing.

"I guess I'm important." At least more important than your sorry ass back in row 15. Take that, bitch!

Now I'm even more appreciative that I have a friend that gives good phone sex. Anyway, the show is great and when we reach the car afterwards we have time to talk since plenty of the people parked in front of us are taking their time.

"What should we do now?" questioned the group.

"Let's go dancing!" exclaimed everyone but me. I'm way too self conscious to dance. At least I was at the time.

"Let's go to RAGE!" exclaimed everyone but me. RAGE is ground zero of the West Hollywood gay bar scene. I've never been to a gay bar and I'm panicking inside. "What am I going to do?" I think to myself, knowing that I'm stuck. Crap.

And so we zoom to Santa Monica Boulevard, park, and make our way down the sidewalk of Boystown towards the thumping music up ahead.

The Bar
So my imagination is running wild. I've never been to a gay bar. I'm petrified that someone is going to approach me. Touch me, even. Yes, poor, poor, naive little me. If I had only known then what I know now.

Mr. Wallflower (that's me) plants his fanny in a spot along the dance floor. I took my responsibilities of holding up the wall quite seriously and managed to stand there for hours and I, I mean "it," never budged an inch. My friends danced and danced, all having a wonderful time, and came over periodically to make sure I was okay and to implore me to join them. I wished I could have but I just couldn't bring myself to do it. So if you ever see me in a bar, know that I walk with confidence and put on a pretty good act, but I'm a big ol' chicken inside.

As I was standing there, a couple of guys took to dancing right in front of me and tried to get my attention. To me, I was overwhelmed and freaking out on the inside. To them, I was a so-so looking douchebag with a unwarranted amount of attitude and questionable taste in clothes.

The whole situation makes me laugh now but I was having some serious anxiety then.
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