Gaydar or lack of ..

[Guest RushNY]

Hi guys,my first 'proper'thread be gentle with me ;-) ,as someone who has been a lurker here for a while trying to get the balls to post something ,hell ANYTHING,i thought this might do.

As someone who came out in my early 30's and has been out now for about 7 years the one thing that i still cannot get my head around is telling whether someone who is straigt acting,masculine etc is gay,point of fact the guy who is now my lover tried for six months to make him notice me but because i was so stooopid i didnt realize this cute,funny gorgeous guy was even interested in me,it took one of my closest friends a STRAIGHT WOMAN to tell me 'look dummy he's interested in you do something'it was a real mind fuck for me luckily i did do something and the story had a happy ending :-).

I suppose what i am trying to say is does have a working gaydar come with experience age or just pot luck,would like to hear your thoughts.

[Will]

Dear Rush, Welcome to the fray! If you've been lurking for a while, you've learned that responses ("reactions" might be a better word) come in all shapes and sizes. The most inflammatory thread can stir up nothing whatsoever, whereas the most innocuous one can start a cyber-forest fire.

 

You raise an issue that has bugged me for years, and I'm well beyond my late thirties. When I'm tired and discouraged and lonely, my mind sometimes wanders back to the occasions, almost always when I was young and naive, when some attractive guy came on to me and I didn't have a clue. When I'm very, very tired, discouraged, and lonely, I can even work myself into a state of fantasizing about a future (i.e., the past twenty or thirty years) that began when I rode off into the sunset with the Marlboro Man of the Moment and lived happily ever after. This sort of day-dreaming is not good for my well-being.

 

It was only in middle age that I figured out two things, and they have made a huge difference in my self-esteem ever since. For what they're worth I pass them on to you here, although your present situation may gainsay their usefulness.

 

First, I realized that my lack of gaydar wasn't a lack of gaydar at all. It was the lack of conviction that any man could possibly be interested in me romantically or sexually. Little by little I came to realize that what is true of me is true of other people. That is, I find myself attracted to all kinds of men, of all kinds of ages and types, for all kinds of reasons. No one, least of all I, would be able to predict whether I would or would not be turned on by someone until I've seen or met him. When I allowed myself to believe that the same kind of ambiguity and unpredictability might be true of other people, and that -- contrary to my expectations -- every now and then a lustful eye might fall on Little Moi, life took on new, and more interesting, possibilities.

 

Second, as a strategy to maintain my sanity after a really serious heartbreak, I decided on a principle and, come what may, I have acted on that principle ever since. Only very rarely has it proven to be false. The principle is this: If, on repeated occasions I sense in myself a kind of force-field around me and another man, regardless of his behavior, I assume that there is something there. In other words, I released myself from the prison of self-doubt and self-hatred in which I was confined by the certainty that I was "just projecting" when I acted on the sense that I was a blip on somebody's radar screen. The other man may deny it; he may break off our friendship; he may be hurt or angry. But I do truly believe that a mature, sensitive, caring man like me, a man who keeps a close eye on his emotional life, is usually responding to something real when he senses that something is going on, even though he may not be sure of what it is. Yes, I have on occasion been wrong. But if I was, I promptly admitted it, asked to be excused for a mistake, and went on about my business. If it turned out that the other man was mature and caring as well, there was no interruption in our relationship; if, on the other hand, he remained frightened and upset even after I acknowledged my mistake, I've let more and more distance come between us. That's because his behavior shows me that he isn't really an adult.

 

In your case, you landed on your feet with your BF. However, you might have saved yourself a lot of time (to say nothing of those agonizing moments of longing and wondering!) had you simply taken the bull by the horns. That doesn't mean that you would have had to be forward -- God knows I'm the most circumspect man in the world when it comes to initiating anything -- but at least you know you're standing on your own feet rather than on wishful thinking.

 

Hope this helps. Welcome aboard!

[vers7]

Rush, coming out late in life, I find myself in the same boat. But I would characterize things a little differently. I've developed decent gaydar; namely, looking for the little clues that indicate that an individual is gay. It takes time and observation. However, what I still have difficulty in recognizing is when someone might be flirting with me. As with you, my straight female friends have been helpful there, but I still often remain clueless and I probably miss many opportunites. As Will mentioned, I suspect it might be related to years of bad self-image. Perhaps the key is that my friends (who have no self-image issues) often assume that everyone is flirting with them. They may act foolish on occassions and risk rejection (with which they have no problem dealing), but they never miss any opportunity. That's tough for me to do.

[Will]

>Perhaps the key is that my friends (who have no self-image

>issues) often assume that everyone is flirting with them.

>They may act foolish on occassions and risk rejection (with

>which they have no problem dealing), but they never miss any

>opportunity. That's tough for me to do.

 

It's tough for me, too. I had a friend once who went away, I think, because I didn't realize until too late that he had more in mind than friendship -- a triple loss because he was also handsome, charming, and a billionaire. He once said something I've never forgotten: "If you can take 'No' for an answer, you can ask for anything."

 

Wiser words have never been spoken and I've been practicing ever since, though with limited success.