I MET A BOY

Alright, so the title of this substack installment is a bit of a misnomer. You may even call it “clickbate,” if you are of my generation and had your brains putrefied by a handful of YouTubers during those formative years of middle and high school. But I will make an effort to refute and deny such accusations. I did in fact attend a very “LA” party, where I did in fact meet a boy. I know that the phrasing of the above title imbues the encounter with an implied reciprocal romantic tone. I can assure you, there were no butterflies. I should also point out, for accuracy, that he was not so much a “boy” but more so a balding fifty-something with a vague career description and an embarrassingly fancy designer denim jacket. But that is too many words to fit into the allotted Title box, and if I’m being totally honest, I love me a little clickbate. My life is woefully monotonous these days, and manufacturing drama where there is none is exactly what my ancestors (Trisha Paytas) would want me to do. Anyway, back to the boy. 

I’m standing in the doorway of some West Hollywood apartment. It’s nearing midnight, people are smoking cigarettes indoors like Goldie Hawn in The First Wives Club, only it’s not nearly as chic or third-wave feminist when they do it. There is a DJ on a pedestal blasting a playlist so loud I can’t even decipher what is exiting those speakers. Is it Drake? Chuck Berry? Hilary Duff’s 2005 earth-shattering masterpiece Wake Up? No, it isn’t that last one, I would feel the vibrations of that chorus through my bone marrow. I can’t hear, I can’t see, my hands are wet from digging around the ice chest for my fifth La Croix and an incredibly intoxicated and very tan Elvis impersonator keeps bumping into me every time I turn around. The friend who I came with, (the actual recipient of the invitation, I am a plus-one through and through) is a magnetic and wildly talented photographer/stylist extraordinaire, who knows everyone everywhere all the time, and was immediately swept up in a million cheek kisses and chats the moment we entered the building. 

So I’m standing in the doorway of some West Hollywood apartment. There is a tattooed couple breaking up on the sofa to my right. To my left is a graveyard of pizza boxes, cigarette butts, beer cans and polaroids, most of which feature blurry and blown out images of peoples shoes or the backs of their heads. Turns out even greatly talented and wildly popular artists all revert back to a summer camp, slumber party aesthetic when inebriated. I’m haunting the entryway, watching. Then he appears. I swear it was from thin fucking air. Frodo-putting-on-the-ring style; there one minute, gone the next, leaving behind nothing but an empty bar stool and a crowd of dropped jaws. Only what this dude did was significantly less cool. He just showed up all of a sudden, stood way too close to me, and let out a rehearsed and weighty “...and who might you be?” 

Now, I am admittedly a bit of a stranger to being hit on. The arena that I occupy does not have a rotating door of hopeful suitors attempting to court me. Part of the reason why four years of celibacy have flown by is that my boundaries aren’t actually tested very often. Sure, I’ll get the occasional flirtatious DM. Some dude did stop me at the mall yesterday to tell me I looked like Rihanna, although there is a high likelihood that this was some YouTube prank video, and his roommate was crouching in a nearby bush with an iPhone camera fixed on our figures. There is also the possibility that he was just kind of racist. I would advise, dear White people, that you refrain from comparing the physical attributes of random Black celebrities to the real Black people you live your life around. I know you mean it as a compliment, but your coworker does not want to be told that he “looks just like Michael B Jordan” every time you bump into each other in the break room. He doesn’t. They’re just two Black men wearing Banana Republic half-zips and a gold chain. Don’t be weird. And if you read this and say to yourself “No, I swear that James from Sales absolutely looks like MBJ,” then you are more than welcome to email me with photographic evidence. And his phone number. 

What am I talking about again? 

Oh! So this man, nearer in age to my father than myself, teleports himself into my lap and rattles off some sticky, eye-roll-inducing questions. He’s wearing too many rings. I think I spy a Gucci belt. The distressed denim jacket is airing more on the side of mid-life crisis than laid-back-blue-collar-desert-dweller. As I said, he is using the volume of the music as an excuse to lean in way too close, like he’s worried some of his poetic wisdom will be drowned out by the bass. I fumble through his questions the best I can, but most of them have no real answers. “What does your heart want today?” “Where in the world do you call home?” “What are you doing later tonight?” Pseudo-spiritual and horny is an obnoxious and exhausting combination. Also, note to self: rewatch that Psych episode where Gus falls in love with some woman wearing gauchos and joins a cult. If you have ever wondered what the childhood of Dronme looked like, just watch that episode. Questions, pity and concern are all welcomed. 

So while he’s doing this whole song and dance, I am dueling it out with my own inner compass, trying to decide if I am enjoying the attention, or if I want to call up my girl Olivia Benson and be airlifted out of that building. On one hand, he could be performing this little flirtatious show for any of the countless stunning blonde women in the room, but he has chosen me! What an honor!

My entire life I have been told that I will begin to live the day that men begin to want me.

Remember in Bride Wars? When Candice Bergen’s character, a daunting and very beige wedding planner, says to our protagonists, two wide-eyed new brides, “A wedding marks the first day of the rest of your life. You have been dead until now. Were you aware of that? You’re dead right now.” She then nods towards the door, where on the other side of it sits her frazzled, average-looking assistant, and says “Angela, for example, will die dead.” I have spent a great deal of my life as the frizzy-haired, deceased assistant, enthusiastically setting the stage and floofing the flowers for the hot girls (my traditionally attractive friends) to waltz in and be showered in praise and free drinks. But now, standing in the doorway of some West Hollywood apartment, I am the one being sought after. 

I am the one being wanted. The devil on my shoulder rejoices. 

The other half of my brain, the half that has read Audre Lorde and delivers impassioned rants about toppling the patriarchy at most dinner tables, knows that this situation is, for lack of a better word, wack. I like that half of my brain the best, and am hoping to usher her into more of a leading role this year. The other half, the “tell me you want me” half, has gotten us into plenty of trouble. Goodbye and good riddance. 

In “Girlhood” by Melissa Febos, the acclaimed author writes that in her mind lives a house occupied by two women. One spends her days polishing the silver, preparing feasts for her visitors and checking her lipstick. The other woman is a sort of shadow, following her counterpart around and sabotaging her attempts at domestic perfection. She spits in the sweet tea. She sticks her gum on the fancy European wallpaper. She drops the newly-shined spoons down the garbage disposal and smokes in the linen closet. It’s been over a year since I read Febos’s collection of brilliant essays, so forgive me while I paraphrase sloppily, but I believe her point is that womanhood is an inherent duel.

Sure, we are fighting with the outside world, the villains, the legislation, the dating app prompts, our fathers, but we are also constantly at war with our own nature.

Our brainwashed, Stepford Wife parts battle it out with our progressive, angsty, P!NK fan parts, and it is unfair for us to expect that we always operate from an enlightened, empowered place. Sometimes we cave. Sometimes the attention, the cat-calling, the praise, the eyes roaming our form, feels good. Even though we know how wrong it is, how twisted and synthetic it is. We are very aware of all the cruel ways it can manifest and dangerous places it can lead to, and still, sometimes, we let it in the door. 

Because it feels so good. 

There I am, in the doorway, feeling anonymous and overwhelmed, and then there he is, telling me that I exist. Reminding me that I am being seen, that someone in this loud and foggy room has in fact taken notice of my presence there.

He’s a messenger, coming to me with a momentary self-esteem boost in one hand and a hammer in the other. 

I listened for a while. Nodded when it was appropriate. He said he was an artist and I asked what his medium of choice was. He gave me a blank look and then launched into a monologue about being an “Artist of Life,” and how we all need to find our passion and “hope it makes us famous or kills us in the process.” When I repeated my question, “what kind of art do you make,” he pivoted to complimenting my hair and my face and my lips. He said I looked like a baby cherub, and I wanted to crawl out of my skin. 

Pay attention to when people choose to fling such flatteries at you. I have met many men who withhold compliments until they have been caught in a lie, then, and in an attempt to distract you from their flimsy ideology, suddenly become your biggest fan. The moment that the foundation of his argument began to disintegrate, his “mysterious stoic art dude” image crumbling before both our eyes, is when he really went all in on trying to woo me. And the compliments themselves all seemed to have a similar theme; I look young and he likes that. Que the SVU theme song. 

The encounter ended shortly after that, my friend rejoining us and rescuing me. I spent the rest of the evening eating cold pizza on the breakup couch and feeling paranoid that people were judging my posture, my shoulder width, the fact that I was eating the pizza provided instead of chain smoking or doing shots with Elvis. Eventually I was back on my hard bed in my cold apartment, Salt & Vinegar chips in hand, watching Broad City and wondering if I’d made a huge mistake by coming here. If I’d made a huge mistake by not going home with him. 

I like it when people tell me I’m pretty. I’d like to like it less. 

I want men to notice me in public, to pluck me out of the crowd and shower me in praise. I want to flee the country and abandon my body the moment they do. 

This duel is exhausting, and I am so fucking lucky that I get to do it. There were many years where I didn’t know that tearing down the wallpaper was an option. I thought that womanhood was inherently shackling, that I would be trapped in this pink-toned pre-fab house forever, without any hints as to how to get out. The exit route, while littered with recyclables and spooky creative directors, does exist. I hope to one day be able to spot such characters from a mile away, jump ship immediately and never again get tangled up in a boring and uncomfortable conversation that leaves me feeling more like prey than prize. 

Dronme met a boy. She also needs a lobotomy.

Leave parties early and be well, 

Dronme