Coming out to my straight Irish friend in an European city center pub
We had already been together that February Friday night for at least two hours. Since I'm not much of a drinker, I had asked Andy to pick the first spot for our TGIF night together. He had selected an Irish pub in the city centre where we each had had at least one pint of Guinness: a proudly Irish drink. Because I've got social anxiety, I always plan ahead for my meetings with people that I'm not yet familiar with. So one of those pre-meditated questions which was also one of the first that I asked Andy at the pub was: "Did you grow up eating a lot of Irish potatoes"? Surprisingly, his answer was yes! Yes, actually I was surprised as I'd expected that he'd answer in the negative because I've encountered a lot of scenarios where stereotypes of a place end up being far from the reality. Hence, I'd actually imagined that the popularity of that food (Irish potatoes) might fall into that basket of outdated stereotypes.
After spending the better part of an hour at the Irish pub with Andy, sharing stories about the hardships of life in a foreign (and different official language) country and about career growth, we headed on at his prompt to a place of my own choosing. Even though I was relatively new in the city, I had been to this pub in the European city centre to dance my heart out several nights before that one. It was my very first hangout with Andy and all the previous times we had met, it had been at a group language class. We were both foreigners in the city where we lived and we'd also connected based on the fact that we were in the same line of work. I was really glad that Andy had suggested we hang out a few days before that because I doubt that I would have made that first move. It never gets easier to face rejection for me and I'd avoid it altogether in most cases, irrespective of how trivial its actual consequences for me might be.
About one hour into our time at "my dance" pub and a couple more pints of light beer after (I'm an alcohol novice, so I was basically just taking anything which Andy took - what is good for the Oyinbo is good for the Dudu I guess), I was taking a break from one of my episodes on the dance floor and sat by Andy when I revealed my sexuality to him. I don't remember what we were talking about or what he must have asked me, but it happened that as a natural part of the conversation, I had the opportunity to tell him that I'm not straight. Of which he shortly after asked further if I was not into women at all, and I confirmed that my telling him I'm gay. For some (apparently self-hating) reason, I tend to hesitate to say I'm gay except it's absolutely necessary.
The highlight of this article though, and why I considered it worth writing at all is in the peculiarity of my approach in coming out to Andy. Right after telling him, "I am not straight", my next imperative was to ensure that Andy didn't suddenly start fearing for his arse like the typical Nigerian man when they hear the word "gay". True I was enjoying his company, and admittedly, a good degree of that enjoyment was just from looking at him 😈.
But not in a thousand years did I actually harbour any hopes that Andy would end up in my bed. He had told me about his girlfriend earlier on in the meeting anyway and even if he hadn't, I actually don't go around hoping to hook up with guys in my everyday life. No. I understand that the odds of any man I'm attracted to being gay are squarely against me. "I need to make my stance clear to Andy immediately if I am not to risk ruining this beautiful new connection between us", I thought to myself. If I can't get a boo, I can at least try and having fulfilling relationships in the form of friendships!
"Don't be scared Andy, that's not why I'm here. I'm just here to hang out with you and enjoy your company as a friend. I promise I have no ulterior intentions". I went on with some variant of that phrase for about ten seconds, and then I waited for Andy's response. "It's not a problem, LBB", Andy replied to my utter relief. My relief came from knowing that I hadn't by my own dogmatic insistence on honesty and openness with people, destroyed what could potentially morph into a mutually-enriching lifelong friendship.
Sometime after midnight, after I had come out to Andy and after he had suggested we go over to another place to get food (he had not had dinner that night), he came over to me on the dancefloor where I was obviously having the time of my life. He was leaving for home and he just wanted to let me know. As I watched him vanish towards the pub's exit, I felt a surge of gratefulness in my heart for the fact that Andy did not suddenly want to have nothing to do with me just because of my sexual orientation.
I reached out to Andy via WhatsApp a few days later just to check on him and since then, we've had more meaningful interactions, howbeit not in person. We even discovered some more mutual interests apart from being in the same line of work. Like most of my friendships though, I suspect that this one is already on the path to dissolving into the past, with the only potential for its reactivation being in the blue moon scenario. Why? Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Andy has had to travel back home to Ireland and for me, out of sight is often out of mind even for the people with whom I had the most intense and intimate relationships when we were within close proximity.
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| Photo by Engin Akyurt from Pexels |
After spending the better part of an hour at the Irish pub with Andy, sharing stories about the hardships of life in a foreign (and different official language) country and about career growth, we headed on at his prompt to a place of my own choosing. Even though I was relatively new in the city, I had been to this pub in the European city centre to dance my heart out several nights before that one. It was my very first hangout with Andy and all the previous times we had met, it had been at a group language class. We were both foreigners in the city where we lived and we'd also connected based on the fact that we were in the same line of work. I was really glad that Andy had suggested we hang out a few days before that because I doubt that I would have made that first move. It never gets easier to face rejection for me and I'd avoid it altogether in most cases, irrespective of how trivial its actual consequences for me might be.
About one hour into our time at "my dance" pub and a couple more pints of light beer after (I'm an alcohol novice, so I was basically just taking anything which Andy took - what is good for the Oyinbo is good for the Dudu I guess), I was taking a break from one of my episodes on the dance floor and sat by Andy when I revealed my sexuality to him. I don't remember what we were talking about or what he must have asked me, but it happened that as a natural part of the conversation, I had the opportunity to tell him that I'm not straight. Of which he shortly after asked further if I was not into women at all, and I confirmed that my telling him I'm gay. For some (apparently self-hating) reason, I tend to hesitate to say I'm gay except it's absolutely necessary.
The highlight of this article though, and why I considered it worth writing at all is in the peculiarity of my approach in coming out to Andy. Right after telling him, "I am not straight", my next imperative was to ensure that Andy didn't suddenly start fearing for his arse like the typical Nigerian man when they hear the word "gay". True I was enjoying his company, and admittedly, a good degree of that enjoyment was just from looking at him 😈.
But not in a thousand years did I actually harbour any hopes that Andy would end up in my bed. He had told me about his girlfriend earlier on in the meeting anyway and even if he hadn't, I actually don't go around hoping to hook up with guys in my everyday life. No. I understand that the odds of any man I'm attracted to being gay are squarely against me. "I need to make my stance clear to Andy immediately if I am not to risk ruining this beautiful new connection between us", I thought to myself. If I can't get a boo, I can at least try and having fulfilling relationships in the form of friendships!
"Don't be scared Andy, that's not why I'm here. I'm just here to hang out with you and enjoy your company as a friend. I promise I have no ulterior intentions". I went on with some variant of that phrase for about ten seconds, and then I waited for Andy's response. "It's not a problem, LBB", Andy replied to my utter relief. My relief came from knowing that I hadn't by my own dogmatic insistence on honesty and openness with people, destroyed what could potentially morph into a mutually-enriching lifelong friendship.
Sometime after midnight, after I had come out to Andy and after he had suggested we go over to another place to get food (he had not had dinner that night), he came over to me on the dancefloor where I was obviously having the time of my life. He was leaving for home and he just wanted to let me know. As I watched him vanish towards the pub's exit, I felt a surge of gratefulness in my heart for the fact that Andy did not suddenly want to have nothing to do with me just because of my sexual orientation.
I reached out to Andy via WhatsApp a few days later just to check on him and since then, we've had more meaningful interactions, howbeit not in person. We even discovered some more mutual interests apart from being in the same line of work. Like most of my friendships though, I suspect that this one is already on the path to dissolving into the past, with the only potential for its reactivation being in the blue moon scenario. Why? Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Andy has had to travel back home to Ireland and for me, out of sight is often out of mind even for the people with whom I had the most intense and intimate relationships when we were within close proximity.
----
PS: Thanks for reading this far. If you enjoyed this, you can sign-up to be the first to get future posts from this blog by using the Follow By Email section down below.
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