The rise and fall of romance in the Concrete Jungle led me down a tortuous trail. In an environment where potential suitors committed relationship crimes or just plain committed, finding love became more complicated than the New York subway system. Chivalry was somewhere over the rainbow while impropriety and promiscuity paved the yellow brick road to my gay marriage.
For many New Yorkers, it’s considered romantic if someone offers you a seat on the subway. Dating in the city that never sleeps, is like a game of musical chairs, where you dance in a circle until the music fades. What happens when the music stops and there is no chair for me, and I’m ceremoniously tossed to the floor?
I desired an old-fashioned date that seemed archaic to romance-intolerant New Yorkers. Dinner and a movie in the age of debauchery had me reeling for the carefree days of enjoying happy meals ― until I met Bobby.
Bobby and I enjoyed each other. We dined downtown, in restaurants with waiters and cloth dinner napkins. We were kindred spirits, talking for hours, ranging from my struggle as a writer to his journey of becoming a train operator. Each night ended with the inevitable goodnight kiss.
Then BAM! Bobby and I went from fine dining to fast food in a New York minute. Oh, how the mighty have fallen. According to Bobby, restaurants were like Secret’s deodorant, strong enough for a man but made for a woman. I went from boyfriend to homeboy.
Just when we thought we couldn’t go any lower, he wanted to take me out to Boston Market for a date on a buy-one-get-one free-coupon, like he was taking me out to the ballgame. He tried to entice me with low prices. The meal-deal was the deal-breaker.
“You’re acting like a woman,” he said. “You are not entitled to the rights and privileges of a woman.”
I may not be a woman but I’ll show you a woman scorned. Delusional excerpts, detailing ex-girlfriend drama from the previous decade, ruined my present. He thought he could pay less because I didn’t have breasts.
Was there an edict, entailing the faster you eat, the cheaper the meal gets? Our romantic outings quickly turned into speed dates.
I craved a fulfilling, long-lasting relationship like a Cornish hen on a summer afternoon. Melancholic memories wrought on the boroughs of the city like ghosts. However, those painful reveries will no longer keep me from finding Mr. Right.
As a gay man in the pursuit of happiness, I prefer my chicken fried. Until I find that thick and juicy relationship, you can catch Bobby at the Boston Market on 23rd and 8th Ave, enjoying two rotisserie chickens for the price of one.