A few years ago, I was hired by a third-party delivery service that had just been appointed to deliver packages exclusively for Amazon. Originally, I was looking at this job like a temp job but what was supposed to be a short-term gig was somehow stretched into 23 agonizing months of shit.
I had just turned 30. A female coworker I was attracted to was in her mid-twenties and NO, this story is not going where you think it’s going… so, take that finger of your’s and wag it at someone else.
For the sake of this writing, let’s call this female coworker, Umm… I dunno. How about Magellan?
Anyway, Magellan and I were hired the same week. We had been relatively friendly for the few times we did talk — and there seemed to at least be a subtle, yet noticeable, spark of chemistry between the two of us — at the beginning of evening shifts. She and I were both film/music nerds and she was, well… unusually open about not currently being in a serious relationship. She and I were recruited with a few other employees from our location to work as drivers a few hubs away in Austin for 2–3 full days with paid hotel, breakfast… basically, all that expenses-covered corporate shit that makes you think for about 2 seconds that you have a job that’s just as important as everyone else’s.
You know how… There are those guys who can get rejected a hundred times in a row and are not phased by it at all…? Once they’re knocked down and humiliated, they get right back up...? The same guys that are unironically lacking in self-awareness and have complete disregard for consequence or accountability — and that level of delusion serves as their reward, which grants them the power to inflict their overly-confident behavior in-front of people that they’re attracted to, with the hopes of winning them over…? Yeah, well, I’m the complete opposite of that. When it comes to people I’m attracted to, usually… I’m one of those other guys. Where— the more attracted I am to someone, the more shy that I am around them.
I was shy around Magellan. A couple of co-workers called me out during the weekend recruit. They could tell I was attracted to Magellan based on how abnormally nervous I was when she was around. I had never admitted to being attracted to her to anyone — but they still knew. Some people are just observant like that.
The 2nd night in Austin, the drivers and various staff at the hub were having a small gathering of about 15 people or so at a dirty motel, a “hotel party,” if you will and I was invited along with my co-worker (uh, let’s just call him Don) who had carpooled with me roundtrip from the hotel that the company had provided for us.
By this point in my life, I wasn’t much of a drinker anymore. I could babysit a light beer or even a cocktail but that’s about it. Magellan was at the party, which I thought was great because now maybe I could find the courage to talk to her for longer than 2 minutes. Everybody was chilling in one of the (I guess it was vacant) motel rooms, getting pretty loaded… but not me because I was the *fake coughs* designated driver. Magellan said she was cold and so I offered, “I have a spare hoodie in my car…” Magellan accepted. As the night continued, things were going just as boring as I had expected them to go…
Before Magellan showed up to the party, she had told me prior that she “very rarely smoked weed” and almost never drank so whenever she did either, she believed that she could be “kind of obnoxious” when under the influence. Well… that turned out to be an understatement… but at least she had the decency to warn me up front.
Well into the night, in a sort-of inebriated slur of random curiosity — and without any sort of build up nor relevance to whatever the conversation was that we had been having, that would elevate to such a fast ball from out of left field — Magellan asked me point blank, “So Jesse, are you gay…?”
“Uh, what,” I laughed nervously.
“I’m just wondering…”
“Well, uh, no actually…”
“I think you are,” she insisted. “I think you’re gay.”
“…No, I’m actually Not. I would know,” I laughed uncomfortably.
“…Yeah, well, you should think about it…”
Essentially, Magellan was baselessly accusing me of being a closeted homosexual. Or to add insult to injury, a person so repressed, that they have absolutely no idea that they’re a homosexual — as in, “I am someone who is so dumb and confused, that it didn’t even occur to me that I just might be gay.”
I had never had a conversation with Magellan about sexual orientation, prior to this most unorthodox gotcha question. As I’m telling you this story, I idenitfy as pansexual. But at the point of the confrontation in this story, I had already openly identified as bisexual for the past 12 years — until learning that pansexuality was not only just a thing, but that it was also the correct description for the way that I had felt my entire life.
For anyone who doesn’t already know what a pansexual is, it’s someone who is attracted to people, regardless of gender. Unlike a bisexual, which is someone who is exclusively attracted to people who identify as either male or female. I could get into all the technical shit about what separates pansexuals from bisexuals along with everyone else, but I’ll save that for another day.
I don’t remember much of what happened in-between the time Magellan incorrectly outed me publicly at a dumpy hotel party in north Austin — for something that said much more about her than it did about me — and Don and I leaving in my car, to drive back to our hotel before going back home the next morning (forgive me, I was still [a little] in-shock… and I’m not going to lie, somewhat hurt, about that level of embarrassment brought on by someone I was attracted to). What I do remember — is that I wanted to leave the party sooner than anyone else up to that point.
“That was fucked up,” said Don, with total sincerity from the passenger seat of my car.
“What was fucked up…?”
“What Magellan said to you. It was fucked up. You obviously liked her.”
I shrugged indifferently, “It doesn’t matter. I’ll get over it.”
It had not even occurred to me until the point that I had said, “I’ll get over it,” that everyone at the party had overheard Magellan’s humiliating jab at the one thing that no quote-on-quote straight man ever wants to be suspected of — let alone publicly accused of — by a woman that he’s genuinely attracted to: his apparent lack of masculinity. Or, his comfortability with just being himself.
The following Tuesday, I received a text message from Magellan at 7:15 in the morning. She actually apologized for how she had demasculinized me the previous Saturday at the motel while she was wasted. She also admitted that all of my coworkers (who would later confirm this at my next shift), male and female, that were still at the hotel party after I left, had confronted her and told her that what she had said to me was both wrong and uncalled for and that she should apologize.
Now, this was ALL a lot. A Lot — For Me to unpack.
First, I couldn’t believe Magellan apologized to me. I was stunned. No one goes out of their way to apologize to me for anything ever. Not even my closest friends — yeah, I know it was through a stupid text message — and yeah, I know my co-workers had put her up to it — but still. You have to take what you can get nowadays, unfortunately. And to me, That actually says more about her… than something juvenile and hurtful that she said to me while she was belligerent. Because… She didn’t actually have to apologize. And people are so shitty and proud and ignorant and self-sensitive nowadays, and they so desperately don’t want to damage their own feelings nor do they want to bruise their own ego nor do they want to erode their own self-esteem on any level — that they don’t even believe in apologizing, even when they know they’ve hurt someone because — It’s much too painful and torturous for them to have to admit that they were in the wrong… but Magellan did, and I’ll never forget that.
Second, I couldn’t believe the outstanding level of humanity in Don, and my fellow coworkers at stupid fucking Amazon. They all knew I was a decent guy and they defended me — AND when I wasn’t in the room. Again, they didn’t have to do that. None of them did. Even my closest friends throughout the years, and up to that point in my life, would’ve never done that. Instead, they would’ve laughed along with Magellan and called me a fag or something. I’m not even kidding.
Third, I used to believe that I must’ve always been a shitty person… which is why I say that close friends of mine would never have defended me when I needed their support. Turns out, I had just had shitty friends my entire life. What a twist. In fact, I was always used to having to defend myself, in front of a room full of my friends (who would mostly pile on me) because… they had always given the impression that my sensitivity doesn't have quite the fragility of others — thanks to my intellect, and therefore, I don’t need defending. Plus, it’s fun to watch me squirm until I lose my temper.
This situation was in no way the sole reason, nor was it the turning point for me, but it was the first time that I had started to become very aware of the dating landscape that was changing just as much as said landscape’s personal/physical preferences of those that they would consider dating. I can’t even count how many times I’ve been told that my true sexual orientation is a mystery to people… because I don’t behave like a stereotype of any kind… I’m not the most effeminate guy but I’m certainly not the most masculine. I have a slim, athletic build but I’m still below the average height for an American adult male. Although I’ve only completed some college, I am still quite articulate and can command, enough of an expansive vocabulary to effortlessly trick people into thinking I graduated from one. I do make a lot of honest mistakes… but I’m not a complete fucking idiot.
It just really blows my dick to a whale— we live in the year 2021, and the unrealistic expectations of what an everyman is supposed to be to the rest of society is just pathetic. Now, I finally understand what women are so angry about, or — at least as much as what I’m capable of understanding… the unrealistic expectations society has had — and still has — of women. It’s kind of bewildering that deep down, they aren’t all secretly lesbians. I feel for them.
When I say that I “gave up on women,” it doesn’t mean that I’m no longer attracted (not by a long shot) to women. It just means that I generally have absolutely no idea what they want anymore and I’m all out of ideas. I’m stumped. For shoddy humorous effect, I guess I could generalize women’s wants but — Yeah, I know it’s something that actually can’t be generalized. It seemed like the trick answer to this particular realization for me — was to just be myself.
And, well… at least I’M comfortable with being myself… So that’s all that really matters, right…? RIGHT…???
Exactly.
(for now)
The story of my female coworker, “Magellan,” is something that happened to me over 4 years ago. FOUR years ago. It marked the beginning of an era for me, where it started to become apparent that my “presentation” had — somewhere down the line — become completely undesirable to the women that I was attracted to. Maybe that’s just what turning 30 does. I’ll have to check my sources on that one.
Fortunately, for me, I’m pansexual. So, I have far more options of who I can date than most other men will allow themselves, thanks to their obedience to the role that society in their country has (un)officially written for them. For quote-on-quote straight men who are ready for a reboot of their own sexuality simply because they are sick and tired of the ongoing pressure and rivalry brought on by their bros who have had no trouble getting dates with women and are always rubbing it in their other bros’ faces — simply because the winner bros are much more comfortable lying to women than their lesser bros are — I’ll have an article just for them, later…
