Please don’t anyone be mad at me but I’m about to start another story and not finish it. It’s just how it goes! Life happens and I’m easily distracted. I will bring you Roman Holiday pt. II in the near future. I will also finish this story. I promise. In the meantime, enjoy this little nugget about my romantic life. It’s equal parts tragic and hilarious.

Gather ‘round little children. Tis story time with Uncle Patrick. This story has unfolded over the course of several weeks. There is a definite beginning, kind of a middle, and no foreseeable end. This is the story of how Uncle Patrick struggles with bravery and courage. Sure lots of people struggle with this but I appear to have a rarified case of the extreme scaredy-cats. Like the Cowardly Lion in Wizard of Oz but even more of a punk ass little bitch lion. So relax, get you some popcorn, and put on elastic pants…

Twas July 7^th at (approximately) 11:24 a.m. EST and I was casually lounging at my local gay Starbucks. Okay, I know that’s redundant. Obviously all Starbucks are gay. This one is a particularly gay Starbucks due to its gay proximity to the gay gym in the gay neighborhood (“gayborhood” if you’re hip). It’s gay mecca around these parts. We break for prayer five times a day, which involves turning in the direction of the setting Beyoncé, taking a selfie, and saying “yasss Qkween!” But I digress.

So there I was at the Gaybucks minding my own business pretending to write things. Pretend writing is a fantastic placeholder for actual writing. It’s like a wet nurse for my creativebaby. Anyway, I’m sitting there deeply contemplating a non-thought when out of nowhere a real life Greek God walks into said gay Starbucks. Panties. Dropped. I can’t say this is a completely uncommon occurrence at this particular coffee shop but I was very struck by this dashing chap.

Greek God (or GG as I am wont to call him) vaguely looks like John Cena. I’d say he’s classically handsome, complete with oiled/buttered muscles. GG isn’t as gargantuan as Cena though. He’s more human-sized. However, he is clearly a gym rat because hello arm muscles. He was about to go to the gym or had just finished with the gym or was thinking about how much he loves the gym (I’m not sure which). That Greek body of his was clothed in a sleeveless shirt, gym shorts, and a sports bag. For my uninformed reader, this is commonly known as the gay uniform. GG ordered an iced coffee and sat down. Then…he looked at me. (ellipses used for dramatic effect)

First off, I’ve had my fair share of eye contact experiences. After almost 30 years on this earth I pride myself on giving good eye. So I “lean in” like Sheryl Sandberg told me to do and I gave GG some eye contact because YOLO. It was well received, in that he didn’t vomit nor did he call the cops. That’s a nice initial landing. I’ll take it. Over the course of the next 10 minutes we kept having both accidental and intentional eye contact. There was light smiling. It was a very heady experience.

All of the sudden, the most miraculous of miracles happened. GG moved to a table closer to me! There appeared to be no impetus other than to get closer to yours truly. Cue the palm sweat and dry mouth. Okay. He moved. The ball was now in my court. I wanted to talk to him. I mean how often is one this close to a real life Adonis? However every time I attempted to speak, my man bits would shrink back up into my body and I would forget every single word of English I had once known. This was particularly disheartening as English is the only language with which I am familiar.

There we sat and continued our game of eye contact Russian roulette for a lengthy 45 minutes. He smiled. I smiled. No one spoke. It was how I imagine hostages try to silently comfort each other. Finally I just wrote my name and number on a piece of paper. The plan was to throw it at his face and then trot run away real fast before my mortification set in.

Okay, paper is in hand. Heart is actively palpitating. You can do this. Now is your shot. This is your only opportunity for happiness in this godforsaken wasteland of a dating pool. Just do it. It’s throwing paper. You know how to do that. You can manage throwing paper. Okay…wait…GG is gathering his things. Fuck. Oh god. You have to do it now. He’s about to leave. Throw the paper. Just throw it you dummy! He’s almost to the door. Throw. The. Paper. He’s grabbing the door. The door is open. He’s walking through it. He’s…he’s gone…it is finished.

I was left with my mouth gaping open and my dignity evaporating into the ethos. GG leaving that Gaybucks without my number was one of the lowest points in my life. Maybe not the lowest but it’s definitely in the bottom 5. We had nonverbal flirtation for a solid 45 minutes and neither of us could consummate our relationship with actual words. Happiness had walked out of my life. My shame was mounting by the second as reality set it. My true love’s kiss (TLK) was possibly gone forever and he would never know the impact he had on me, how he changed my life. I wanted to bury myself into a dark cavernous hole of emotional eating and Netflix binging. And bury I did.

Fast forward a few days and I eventually crawled my way out of the food cave. Yes, I was a few pounds heavier but something had shifted inside me and it wasn’t just my internal organs making room for macaroni product. I had become determined. I was certain/assumed one thing: GG must be a regular at the gay gym. He had to be. This meant he was probably a regular at the Gaybucks as well. The answer was simple and it was staring me in the face: I had to go to the Gaybucks at the same time every day until we were married. It couldn’t have been more obvious.