Dating is so different than it was twenty-three years ago.  Like I said before, I met Danielle through my friend Natalie.  Now, the friend who’s going to introduce me to my next love has weird ass names like Bumble, OK Cupid, and Jdate.  Even weirder, they all live on my phone and they constantly bug me about new girls and matches that I have.  They entice me by telling me that someone flirted at me.  That someone likes me which is bizarre because I don’t even know this woman.  Also, I have to pay these “friends” if I want more details about these “flirts” or “likes” so maybe they’re not even friends.  They’re more like salesmen who are just pretending to be friends in order to get my money.  On the other hand, I kind of need them too in this new world.  I am the shark and they are the remora.   So I’ll stand them… for now or at least until a human friend throws me a bone or two.

The biggest obstacle to dating for me is that I’m still way attracted to Danielle.  In fact, I’m more attracted to her now than I ever was.  A lot of marriages where the husband and wife lose attraction to each other and don’t grow together seems like the norm.  There’s less sex, less romance, and it becomes either more a friend/companion thing than anything else.  The problem is that I never got to that point.  I’m still extremely attracted to Danielle.  I was more attracted to Danielle at year 19 than I was at year one.  Before the coming out, when we would fight, I would sometimes get an erection.  It’s the truth.  When I wasn’t angry and she was laying her grievances on me, I have to admit, it turned me on.  Why?  I’m not 100% sure, but what I think is that I loved that someone cared about me enough to be hurt enough by me to have these emotions attached.  So when I disappointed Danielle or made Danielle angry, the fact that I had affected her made me realize and horny because I knew how much she cared for me.  If I did this to her as a random person, she would either dismiss or call me a dick for a second and then walk away.  But Danielle was in this.  She wanted me to understand because she wanted to stay in whatever we had.  She was invested and that made Bocky* happy.  But now she’s gone.  She’s gone and my heart has that hole.  

*You already know…