Maybe I Don’t Want to Have a Kiki

Confession: This is the only reason I watch this music video.

I have some confessions to make.

I kinda like the Scissor Sister’s new club-track turned homo-anthem single, Let’s Have A Kiki. Sometimes when I’m alone I watch RuPaul’s Drag Race. One time I tried to read The Trials of Oscar Wilde because I thought that’s what “intellectual gays” read. I own several sets of “sexy underwear” because someone once told me that gays don’t wear boxers. I once watched Eating Out on Netflix and was convinced for months that every gay guy was an underwear model who doesn’t own a single shirt with sleeves. Consequently I bought several tank tops and then never once wore them in public.

Then again, I don’t scream “gay.” I don’t wear rainbow bracelets or tank tops (see above). I’ve never been to an event specifically targeted towards GLBT audiences, unless you count a college production of Aida. I’m not some hetero-normative “macho man” either; I can’t stand professional sports, l don’t shoot things with guns, and I’m not that into Scarface. I’m neither a purse nor a billfold. I’m more of a messenger bag.

But the thought occurred to me today, “Am I gay enough?”

I went to Gap today because I have given up hope of ever moving out of my parents’ house and have just decided to stock up for the long cold winter that is the next 15 years of my life. While I was there, wandering among the slim-fit chinos and half-zip sweaters, I was approached by Sales Associate Nic. Sales Associate Nic was cute. Sales Associate Nic was beardy and blue-eyed and friendly and short. He didn’t call me “boss,” “chief,” or “man,” and he wore a tie with little anchors on it. He had a full blond beard. Let’s just say I wanted to move into that beard and hang up my posters and order-in Chinese.  I wanted to make that beard my fourth husband then bitterly divorce it and split half my assets with it. Sensing an opportunity, I applied the my failsafe flirt techniques: prolonged and unnecessary physical contact; brief and furtive eye contact; self-degradation; incorrect sentence construction; incoherent mumbling.  It must have worked a little bit, because I did get a “Stop it. You’re so thin.” out of him. I also got him to bring out a rack of clothes that wasn’t supposed to go on sale until tomorrow and let me sift through them. So for those who were wondering, I do have minuscule amounts of “mad game.”

Flirting skills aside, I was thinking one thing nearly the whole time: “Does he know I’m gay? Am I acting gay enough?” Then I caught myself. What does “gay enough” even mean? Am I talking about conforming to stereotypes of gay guys with high-pitched voices and limp wrists and Louis Vitton murses? I am not that guy. Neither was Sales Associate Nic. We weren’t connecting over our lisps and love of Bette Midler. He wasn’t singing “It’s Liza with a ‘Z’, not Lisa with a ‘S’…” and I wasn’t wearing jean cutoffs. But there was a unspoken physical attraction there. We were talking, shopping, and flirting without a single “Legalize Gay” t-shirt or rainbow wristband to guide us.

I realized then what I meant by “gay enough.” I meant confident. I meant comfortable. I meant that I was able to look this guy in the eye and express (through socially acceptable channels) that I wanted to pin him to a wall. It’s a feeling that has been desperately lacking in my life. So when I slapped myself on the cheek and said, “Be gayer, dumbass!” I was really asking myself to drop the act. Quit pretending like you don’t want to take that beard out behind the middle school and get it pregnant. I didn’t mean drop the wrists and raise the voice an octave or two. I meant stop trying to hide who you are. Then of course I understood the “Legalize Gay” t-shirts and the rainbow wristbands. It wasn’t conforming, it was confidence. It was a way to say, “I’m gay and I don’t give a hoot and a half what you think about it.” I had always understood ‘pride,’ but Pride had finally become personal.

So maybe I’m not gay enough. Maybe I’m not proud enough or confident enough or comfortable enough. Because being gay rocks. I don’t know why I don’t act like it sometimes.

So I don’t really want to have a Kiki. I’m no good at “Lip-Syncing for my Life.” I wear shirts with sleeves and I didn’t major in Queer Studies in college. But I am gay, dammit! It’s time I started acting like it.