Tonight at the gym, there was this guy I’d seen before. Handsome, very masculine, and in good shape. Not a pretty boy by any means but someone who exudes masculinity. I’ve noticed him before but he’s not someone I see often. Tonight, I found myself frequentyl gazing in his direction. I’m not sure but I think he noticed as I caught his gaze a few times as well. Then what always happens happened. I started over-thinking the situation. Every time he noticed I was looking his way, I’d look away for fear of offending a straight guy. Then I started feeling silly about it and stopped looking away but I couldn’t get up the nerve to talk to him. Then I started feeling like a weird stalker so I went on with my workout as if he wasn’t there at all.
What keeps holding me back from going up and saying hi to a guy like this is the fact that I’ve never had any success with it. Translation: They always turn out to be straight. This little fact has gotten me feeling very insecure about the people I’m attracted to.
So, how does one go about finding out if a masculine guy is gay? I know for me, I’ve had enough people, gay and straight, tell me they thought I was straight. The gay ones have admitted to keeping their distance because of incorrect assumption. Knowing that, I don’t want to continue missing opportunities of meeting cool men. I want to be confident enough to just show a guy I’m interested but I fear my track record has really screwed me up.
How would you go about talking with a guy you’re interested in when you’re not sure is gay? Tell me what to do and I’ll do it.
Ross
January 18, 2010 at 11:25 am
Well, its clearly impossible to tell for sure whether some people are gay are not. You say that people often do not pick up on your sexuality.
So its now equally difficult for both parties, if he is gay, he may not want to offend you. Alternatively, he may be straight and is looking at you, because you were staring at him. If I was a straight guy and another guy at the gym was looking at me I may feel a little sexually intimidated.
There’s no specific do or don’t, however if you make your own sexuality more obvious, maybe he would reciprocate, or take action. Try wearing a rainbow wristband or something. That sounds really stereotypical, but I always get mistaken for being straight and sometimes the easiest most inoffensive way is to do something subtle like that. Good luck and please feel free to check out my blog, you may find it useful
Ken
January 18, 2010 at 3:59 pm
Yeah, I’m not big on advertising for the sake of advertising. I am what I am and prefer not to “adjust” that just so people know I’m gay. Maybe I just need to stop worrying about how others react. I mean, this particular gym has a lot of gay men so I would imagine straight guys should be used to it.
Anyway, looks like you and I decided to blog about similar things recently. At least I’m not alone out there.