During my time caring for my parents in Alabama, I met my friends James and Barb and Annetta for dinner at an Ethiopian restaurant in Homewood. As they sat down, I blurted out “I just had a fling with a closeted former NFL linebacker. His thigh was the size of me…”
Barb looked at me disbelievingly, “You had sex with a stranger?”
“Well… his kids were at school and we…”
“Wait… Kids? At school? He’s married?”
“Well, separated, but…”
“And he’s closeted?”
“I assume so. So when I arrived he led me quickly to his basement where…”
“His basement?? You went to a complete stranger’s house and let him take you into his basement? He could have been an axe murderer…”
I hadn’t even thought of that. I started to get a little frustrated. I hadn’t had any sort of intimate relations in how long? and was eager to share my adventure with my friends. My linebacker was a very sweet man, so seemingly eager to connect. He lived only a few miles from my childhood home and told me of orgies that he’d arranged when he was a kid in middle and high school (middle school??) with the other boys in the neighborhood. I listened dumbfounded, remembering my fairly chaste adolescence and almost constant unfulfilled desire. And orgies were happening down the road? That I actually could have gone to?? I was mesmerized by this alternate vision of childhood.
Barb is a teacher, in a business college, and Annetta as well, instructional design and group dynamics stuff. They co-teach a class that integrates principles from Harry Potter and Hogwarts. They balance each other beautifully, Barb the gentle lecturer with lingering midwesternisms and Annetta from Salt Lake City but with what sounds like a Brooklyn maybe? accent, and an endearingly aggressive disposition, Marissa Tomei in My Cousin Vinny with a huskier voice. James was my gay buddy in high school and is one of my closest friends still. James was very out by the time I met him, my first role model. Nobody messed with him, he was like Liberace or John Waters, fabulous and fearless and entertaining and smart. At the Miss Poinsettia contest in 10th grade, I wore a sexy strapless gown but forgot the words to my song when I stepped onto the stage, Leon Redbone’s “I Want to Be Seduced.” James appeared on stage blowing bubbles and giggling, just brilliant. James, Barb and Annetta are this dynamic trio of wit, intelligence and delight and I savor every moment with them.
The food arrived and my linebacker’s thigh faded from the conversation, the brief pleasure we experienced eclipsed by the comfort of beloved friends and great food.