BORROWED FRIENDS >>

Loneliness is the root of a large trunk of my disharmony, discontent in SF. Lack of tangible community. I cannot live without it. School, gaming, therapy, student organizations, dinner parties, movie nights, dating -- all of these things are scarcities in my days and nights in SF. What's an extrovert to do when his world is forced back into introversion?

I go out. I meet people. I started chatting online again. I put up adverts for fellow gamers. I get more involved at work. So far, the effort is more than the return.

Most of my acquaintances, new friends, are borrowed friends. Or it seems like I'm borrowing them and have to return them when the due date is up. I met a UMCP alumnus named Nathan (his girlfriend Wendy and roommate Collin) through Carol Bushar when she visited on her cross country move from Rockville to Seattle. I've met a number of people from online chat socials as well as simply meeting people out on the town. My new friend Rob is a good example; I met him while chatting on gay.com (again, see later). Another online friend turned real life friend is a guy named Roman, whom I've known for almost 5 years virtually; we met for the first time on my birthday.

Nathan, Wendy, Collin, and I have gotten together a handful of times including a few dinners, BBQ, and a rally/concert in Dolores Park. Rob, his partner Murphy, and Rob's throng of coworkers and friends are people I see once in a while, usually at Pow. Roman and his roommate Angie come up from San Jose to hang out with Sarah and I from time to time.

All of the fledgling relationships are becoming more and more concrete. Everyone is making the effort to include me in the circle and to call me when people are getting together. It's a good feeling. And I hope things continue to grow. It's just so hard to break into an established circle of friends -- especially ones who've known each other for years and years. In fact, most of them moved to SF with their friends from college or whatnot. I just have to convince some of you Marylanders to come out here. When all else fails, import your friends. I'm serious.

I miss simple pleasures that I had grown accustomed to having in my life. One is gaming. So far, my attempts to create a sustainable gaming group has failed time after time. The group I started playing with last year fell apart as people's availability and interests wandered. I was left with just Sarah and one player named Chris. We played for a few months and then Chris called one gaming Sunday to tell me he wasn't coming back; he missed his old group and he missed their AD&D game and he wanted to go back. I felt like I was breaking up with a boyfriend. Since then I haven't been able to muster even a single additional player. I've invited the guys next door (who are into computer RPGs and who've played pen-and-paper RPGs before) but they have yet to follow through. I've invited Nathan to play; he's expressed a lot of interest, we still talk about it, but we still haven't sat at the table.

SF is just not a gaming city. I couldn't figure out why. It's a college town. It's young and hip. It's into alternative activities. But, there's only one gaming store in town. Finally, I figured it out. It's too nice here; the weather's good for most of the year. Most gamers I know are from places where it gets too cold or too dark or too wet or too hot. SF offers a lot to do that is antithetical to sitting indoors, around a table, dreaming up things. It's sad, but true. Eventually, I hope, I'll find a stable group. I keep trying. Heaven forbid I go canvassing at the live-action Vampire game in SF. I shudder at the thought (no offense to those WoDers in my readership).

I miss having confidants most of all. I miss having long talks with good friends about what's going on in my life. I miss making dinner and watching a video and then talking about life, the universe, and everything till late into the dark. I am a creature of expression. And I cope by conversation. I like to talk. I like to share. And I miss knowing that there is a living, breathing, thinking person who knows me, my history, my dreams, and who visibly and psychically cares about what I'm saying, doing, thinking, feeling.

For those of you who are connected at home or at work and can access the web, feel free to download Yahoo Messenger or AOL Instant Messenger; my nickname is 'writerpunk'. I spend a lot of mornings, while I'm at my desk, chatting with people like Kate and Skinner. I noted to Kate the other day that our internet conversations have been very meaningful to me. In a way, we have had more communication now (simply because I am three thousand miles away) than when I was in the same state. Our chats are a very stretched and thin lifeline, but it's been comforting and wonderful to know I can access someone I'm close to.

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I am not sure how telling it is that I started this letter with a description of my favorite place to get drunk. I guess I didn't want to start with the same-old same-old about my job or my grousing about having no friends. I think there is a lot of resistance in my life to the idea that all I do is "work." Is that the lot of later 20-somethings and newly baptized 30-somethings? I am distraught that the one thing in my life that is remarkably stable is my job. I guess if your life's work was your occupation, then it would be wonderful to talk about loving your job. But being the morning receptionist for a nonprofit organization (though as noble and people-person-ly satisfying as that may sound) is not what I want to be at the center of my existence.

I like my job. I like my workplace. I like the fact that I can be myself and get paid enough to survive in SF. There is something to be said about working in an environment that is caring, nurturing, and conscientious.

I have had many opportunities at CompassPoint Nonprofit Services (formerly called the Support Center for Nonprofit Management/NDC). I currently wear multiple hats in the organization. I am the morning receptionist. I am the Workshop Publicity Assistant, contracted to do in-house publicity materials such as flyers and forms and whatnot. I am the Internet Publicty Assistant, whose job is to search the net for instances of our old web address and contact webmasters to update their links to our new website.

Furthermore, I was given the opportunity to be a workshop instructor. In April, I taught a 3 hour workshop called "Starting on Page One: The Basics of the Newsletter." It was a crash course on how to put together a 4-page newsletter on PageMaker. I spent hours putting together a course handout outlining basic format, manuscript style, design elements, and a little newsletter philosophy. Being in front of the classroom again was wonderful. I miss teaching so much. But, I don't really care for teaching in a computer lab. Each participant had their own station. I tried to stir up some interaction, but people were more interested in how to do things and not necessarily why to do them. It seemed very clinical. Though, overall, the response to the class was good. I'm slated to teach a full day's workshop in August combining an introduction to PageMaker and the newsletter curriculum into one class.

Since my workshop, I really long to be back in the college classroom. I applied for an English instructor position at City College of San Francisco. I went through the rigamaroll and institutional redtape to prove to them that I was experienced and qualified even without my Master's. But, they rejected me anyway. It's no surprise. I live next door to the best university in the nation, Cal at Berkeley, with PhD graduates who can't find a job. How am I supposed to compete?