Things I'm Learning About My Poly Heart

1. Per this excellent, multi-layered infographic of poly styles, especially including their overlap with BDSM I have determined that my primary style is "I'll arrange a gangbang for you and you'll LIKE it."  Thankfully there are plenty of people who will, indeed, like it.
2. This rant/helpful list of things-not-to-do entitled "I DON’T GIVE A FUCK ABOUT HOW YOU FUCK: OR, YOUR HOT ASS MESS IS NOT MY REVOLUTION" got a lot of conversations going with my friends & lovers.  I've been really angry about personal stories told about butch misogyny, about practicing poly on an "it's alright for me but not ok for you to actually go sleep with someone else" kinda way.  And part of that anger needs to be pointed back at myself for all the times I fall into that trap mentally, listen to the old tapes, tense up about other butches in a way I do not tense up about non-butches.  There's such a scarcity dynamic at work in my head & my heart and sometimes it trips me up just when I'm trying to breathe into a bigger picture.  (To be fair there is a LOT of other stuff mentioned in that great piece, that's just the part I took home.)
3. Sometimes it's not about the poly.  This past weekend I felt very anxious and focused on a poly situation in my world as the cause.  While there was some old poly PTSD that came up (do NOT get me started about music festivals) what I should have been focusing on was my financial worries exploding in the form of squealing brakes & the search for a new place to live.  All of which was compounded by working too damn much over the weekend and missing out on some social time with friends that I desperately needed.  This is not a recipe for extrovert success and I found myself dwelling on the poly part as the sharp bit that was getting to me.  Was I nervous about a new thing, maybe even a little insecure?  Sure.  But really I needed to breathe, cook myself a real meal, walk the dog and get some other voices in my head.  I was really proud of the way I was able to not go too far down that spiral.  I noticed pretty fast when I started focusing on the process: I should have asked for this, if I'd made this request it would have been better.  It's really never the process (even when sometimes it needs to be addressed).  When I'm focused there it's because I am too scared to just open up, admit my own fears, and take care of myself.
4. And also, old poly PTSD awaits sometimes.  As gracious, loving & happy as I was to enjoy this adventure when the old stuff came up, sparked by things I could not have seen coming, I felt myself revert to an older version of myself where there was not, could not possibly be, enough.  Now I know I have to watch out vigilantly for that script to go off in my head because that is a tough neighborhood to spend time in my friends.  And the truth is there really is enough, it is different now, I'm learning how to be my own enough.
5. Write it out.  Talk to people who know you well.  Don't be scared of being scared, sometimes that happens and it is okay.  Feelings are not facts.  And keep breathing.

And I'm back...

I got a little quiet there, more than a little overwhelmed.  Each night driving for Homobiles is an adventure, each night has lines or moments that could be spun into short stories or, ahem, blog posts.  And I'm a little awed by it and at the same time worrying about the practical end of things - driving all over San Francisco for hours on end is hard on your brakes.  And struts. And steering, etc etc.  I love the community service part of it, the connection with random and not-so-random people (I LOVE it when my friends book me!).  Sometimes crazy stuff happens and I think "Can I really write about that?  Will it get me in trouble?"  When telling the stories out loud I catch myself toning it down, sort of underplaying the bizarre carnival that happens in my car most nights.

Sure there's some self-preservation involved.  And not wanting people to be scared for me or worried too much (did THAT post already!).  I'm scrawling down notes as it unfolds and need to sit down and just write my balls off, some of it not intended for public consumption, other bits just needing some time to pass before sharing.  Also, I don't want to just write about Homobiles, even though it is the gateway drug I have been dying for.  It has uncorked me, made the need to write so apparent in my skin that it twitches, makes me hunger for the pen and the keyboard.  I moved to California with the intention of pushing myself to write, to get published, to use my real name or maybe not.  So thank you late night San Francisco for pushing me over the edge.

You want a few moments, a little taste?  Here's two:

Quote from the back seat "Do you mind if we do mushrooms in your car? They're in chocolate so it's not vegan."  The concern was palpably for the use dairy products more than the hallucinogens.  

Monday late night/early morning it is often just me out there and I was running late having mistaken 15th Street for 15th Avenue when agreeing to pick someone up from the ER - a fairly big difference in driving time.  I swing around Dolores Park in the dark, brakes squealing, and pull up to fetch two men and two small children on the way to the airport.  People on airport pickups really don't like to be late.  Nor should they have to be!  So I was very apologetic and just kind of tried to disappear in the traffic flow and music from the speakers.  The guy in the front seat started humming along to an old school Price jam.  We talked music a bit, what's good to listen to at dawn versus earlier in the shift, nice and easy chat.  We pull up at the terminal, they decide to pay with a credit card, I whip out my newly purchased iPhone plug-in for exactly that purpose and open the app, which displays my name across the top.  The guy sitting in my front seat pops out with "Hey, you're Holly Fogleboch, you went to Hampshire."  I stare at his face, shocked and trying to roll back 19 years, and guess wrong (totally embarrassing but not a bad guess, Michael I'll bump into you one night!). He tells me his name, and of course it clicks into place, we've actually been Facebook friends for a while, I just was not looking for him in the front seat of my own car.  He was the first person I saw do really subversive, mindbending drag and his Div III show (Hampshire for senior thesis) has always stayed in the back of my mind.  It was a delight to see him, so I hopped out of the car for a hug.  I look a little more carefully at each face now, presume connection when there might not be any but really, would it take even two degrees to find a link?

Homobiles Quote of the Night (So Far)

One guy standing outside The Stud: How old are you?
Young guy shrugs, twirls his hips, pouts, exhales smoke.
First guy:
I know, that's a hard one isn't it?

a comment on comments

Please do! This is a very personal blog so I've retained approval over comments but I read them all and post most. They mean a lot to me so please, chime in.

Thanks for reading! -Holly

Notes From a Full Moon: A Homobiles Adventure Story

Before the night really got started I received my warning.  I was driving towards Wicked Grounds to drop off some fliers for FetFest and then get rolling on my shift and I cut through an alley, really a small street.  At the end of the block the building met the sidewalk in such a way as to create a blind to my left and I got closer than I should have to a pedestrian.  I was going under the limit, wasn't texting, being careful and still scared her.  She walked behind the car, gave me the stink eye and then as I was rolling down the window to apologize for our (totally legal but still scary) near miss she whacked my car twice with the bag she was carrying.  It was apparently full of tin cans and small rocks from the noise it made.  I was speechless, not angry, but not happy about my car/livelihood/work space getting messed with while at the same time knowing she was reacting from fear.  I drove off, unsure about doing anything, feeling like there was nothing productive to say and just decided that it was my warning from the universe that tonight was going to be special and I needed to keep my head up & eyes clear. (Clear eyes, full heart, can't lose - right Coach?)

Boy howdy was that right.  After an hour of odd interactions, near misses & general chaotic behavior all around me it slowly sunk in - full moon.  Right after the first of the month.  So money to get loaded, buy favors, get extra wasted and the strong pull of the lunar bloom on our animal hearts & bodies - yes, San Francisco was flavorful last night.

There is no way to bottle & share the weird vibe out there last night so I'm going to give you some fortune cookie vignettes.  All quotes are as I remember them.  All stories are true and frankly have been toned down a little because I'm afraid you won't believe me.  But trust me, it was like that.

"And how did that crackhead Marion Barry get re-elected after getting busted?"

He's drunk, sitting on his bicycle, resting his front tire on my car and looking like he might fall off onto my hood at any moment.  I'm parked in front of a bar in the Tenderloin waiting for my passenger to emerge.  There's a sketchy van lurking ahead of me.  He picks up the sign that falls out of my window and waves off the dollar I offer in return.  He says he likes my smile & somehow tells me he's from Philly, I say I'm from DC and of course we're talking about Marion Barry.  My fare doesn't show up, dispatch asks me to go inside, my spidey sense tingling I reply that I'd rather not get out of the car just now.   He says "Good idea."  I concur, and he takes the dollar bills I hand him as I drive off to the next stop.

"It's like you're the sun and I'm the moon and they write songs about us."

He was drunk enough leaving the bar that he didn't quite understand what I was offering at first.  He opened the back door, squinted inside and said "Are you going to preach at me?" Reassuring the drunk Marine looking high & tight guy that I was not about to ex-gay minister to him, he got in & we set off towards his next destination.  After a moment of talking he busts out with "You are like the sun, your smile is so bright and your light is so strong.  I am like the moon, I am beautiful and mysterious and they love me.  But I am nothing without you, I need your light to glow."  Then he confesses that he was loaded (I'd figured that one out) and goes back to singing the praises of the Sun & the Moon.  At the end of the ride he asks how old I am, and it finally dawns on me that he's cruising me.  I tell him I'm 38 and he visibly starts.  Walking across the intersection he shakes his head and yells, "Keep doing whatever you're doing."  I will man, I will.

"Three black men robbed my building. If someone grabs me from the dark honk your horn and don't stop."

This is how he starts the ride.  I am speechless but keep the Jay-Z pumping from the stereo, a little discomfort is all I can offer against his racist blurting. When we get to his building he tells me to defend his honor with my blaring horn.  As he walks the ten steps into the lobby he really looks like he wants someone to jump out of the dark and make all of his fears come true.

"My eyes aren't blue." "I changed it to green." "My eyes aren't green."

You don't get full context on this one.  Only this: a couple taking about karaoke songs sung in each other's honor. And it made me like them a lot.

"Was it the guy with one feather earring or two feather earrings who hit you with the bottle?" "One earring and the hat like the guy from Digital Underground."

A convo outside the club between the door guy, a bar guy, and the one who got clocked. Told you it was intense out there. 

"I love you baby"

Mouthed frequently in a very wasted condition to me by the bartender making the surrounding patrons squint and stare at me.  The ones who read me as male have a very different reaction to the ones who read me as female.  I get out of there, smiling.

"P Street Beach in Washington, DC?"

We're talking about our trips to the East Coast last weekend, he was in DC, I was in North Carolina. He mentions growing up & coming out in DC.  We start talking pre-ball park DC, Nation's and the rest.  He said he was young & coming out as a teeneager in that scene.  I told him I had mc'ed Youth Pride - he mentions Cookie Buffet.  I tell him I mc'ed with Cookie, that I was the Reverend, and he squeals loudly enough that someone on the sidewalk turns their head.  He says he was a teenager with his bio & chosen queer family at those shows in the early 2000s and he cannot wait to tell them he met me.  Once again, moving to the Bay is like the queer family reunion I didn't know I needed.  Later I grab some of my old performance numbers off iTunes, dreaming about maybe dusting off the numbers.  

"Just one look at you, and the world's alright with me."

This one is Bill Withers singing "Lovely Day" and the sun is breaking through the clouds in a little crack of pink in the gray sky and we are flying across the Bay Bridge to SFO and everything is indeed alright.

Adrenaline Rush: An Update from the Cab

I am love love loving driving for Homobiles.  Learning the city by night, meeting all kinds of lovely beings, finding the 24 hour croissant shop, the perfect places to catch the sunrise, it's all been pretty amazing.  I started driving two weeks ago and already there are things that would have been headlines but are now, "oh yeah, that happened too."  Last night I put a dollar into a held-out cup and was greeted with "Nice panties." There was an incredibly drunk visiting sister bemoaning the fact that none of the gay boys at the bar wanted to kiss her, quite perceptive that one.  There were two cell phones left in my seat & reunited with owners,one via Twitter.  And I have plenty more stories to tell.  But there's only one I have to write, so I'm going to tell you that one.

 It has been on my mind lately that no one really knows where I am when I am out driving around the city.  Of course our dispatcher has a general sense of where I am & what I'm doing, and could help me out in some potentially hairy situations.  But I mean a little bigger than that, there is no one in my life who knows when I'm working or when to expect me home, no one to touch base with and say I'm safe after working as what a friend called, "the ferryman of San Francisco's queer nightlife, navigating those waters nightly."  And to be clear, I am a heads-up, paying attention, city-seasoned queer.  I lock my doors when I have the cab light on for paperwork, I keep my head up, I greet people so someone knows me the next time I swing through.  So when I tell you I got scared, really really scared, hear it through my voice as someone who does not scare easily, who trusts in my ability to handle many an intense situation and who does not live in a place of fear.

It was 3 am and the shift was about to change, leaving me the only Homobiles driver on the road for a few hours.  Also, I happened to be dispatching as well as driving for those hours, no one sitting in an office looking over my shoulder, just me, a couple of clipboards and the car.  And San Francisco is still so new for me, I don't recognize "bad neighborhoods," not a concept I put a lot of stock in but still, good to know when welcoming a stranger into your car in the middle of the night.  I didn't need to be told this place was troubled, my hackles went up as soon as I turned onto the block.  This place didn't feel good, that's a vast understatement, this block of houses felt bad, real bad.  It was late enough things were quiet but I had the sense there were folks around (there almost always are if you look closely enough, I'm finding).  The street had ended abruptly and dumped me in what was almost a cul de sac but I was pretty sure I could see an exit in front of me. But the lines of sight were all messed up and I had a little voice yelling at me the way you do when a character in a scary movie does something stupid.  So I locked the doors and texted my friend & fellow driver that something was setting my spidey sense off.  She was moving towards home in the East Bay but at least someone would know the address I was at if shit went down.

When I looked up to double-check the address I noticed the door.  It had very recently been taken the hell off its hinges, in the way that only cops or firefighters do.  It was battered & barely hung closed, someone had added big loops of spray paint to cover up the rawness exposed by the violent moment.  There was a mail slot in the door, the door to which hung bent and open. I was willing to give the client a chance.  We all have our moments and lord knows I could have walked out of a door that looked like that myself at various times in my life.  When a woman appeared who looked very much like a young baby dyke I let myself relax for a half a second, breathe.  But she was on her cell and didn't quite come all the way out of the house and I was on full alert, watching the door crack for signs that someone was waiting to come out unexpectedly. There was enough cash in the car after hours of driving that I was feeling very vulnerable to robbery, let alone the type of things people do to humans they don't consider human. Call this number and a homo shows up, even in San Francisco that can take some brave.

She came out, confirmed her name, slid into the back seat and said "he'll be right out." Oh, ok.  We often don't know how many people we are picking up.  She asked me a little about how Homobiles worked and I told her the same thing I tell everyone: we're a non-profit organization and all the drivers are volunteers committed to getting people home safely even if they can't pay, with a suggested donation of $1 a minute for the ride if you can afford it.  She was really relieved at the "no one turned away for lack of funds part" and said that was good, because the guy we were waiting for had just been released from jail & probably didn't have any money.  Ok then.  I'm on high alert but still nothing has happened to make me think that this is actually dangerous, not just a complicated night in someone's life where they reached out for some random help.  But I can feel the blood pumping in my ears.

And then he walks out the door, carrying what appears to be a dust buster it kind of looks like he just took off the wall and some other random stuff in his hands.  Behind him framed in the crooked door frame is a woman who would be listed in the movie credits as "Bad Landlord" or "Neighbor in Kimono."  She was on the phone with the girl already in my car at a distance of 6-7 feet away - what did they need to talk about that I could not hear?  Mitchell introduced himself, I gave the whole rap about Homobiles again as we pulled away, texting my friend to tell her it was ongoing and could she please stay in touch? At the end of the first block the girl said to stop here and got out of the car.  If I had to guess I think she was the queer cousin who knew about us as a way to get a free ride home and set it up herself afraid I wouldn't just take him.  He didn't read as gay at all.  But here he was, in my car, sitting directly behind me so I couldn't even look in his eyes.

So I started driving efficiently & swiftly towards the stated destination.  He had a lot of questions about Homobiles, which I answered, and he got really excited about it.  We were having a pretty cool conversation for two people who might otherwise never had a reason to talk to each other.  He told me about his band, about how he was supposed to go to Miami to perform in a show, then added he was a little scared cause he'd never been to Miami or really out of San Francisco much.  As this very easy and re-assuringly human conversation is happening he is messing with the odd assortment of things in his hands, then lays it all on the seat and starts taking off his belt - actually come to think of it he must have been putting it on post-police custody.  All I know is I heard a belt & a belt buckle and was sort of bracing for it to come over the seat and aim around my neck.  All as we are talking, talking.  I tell him there are multiple other drivers out tonight and we all keep in close touch, talk about where we're at.  (lies)  He says he'd like to drive for Homobiles, says he can "get us people" if I give him an hour.  I told him we're pretty booked tonight.  My blessed GPS is telling me we are closing in on his destination.  He starts telling me more about his band and then, out of nowhere, says "I've always wanted to sleep with a fat white girl."  This makes me laugh a lot, like a lot a lot, and then I don't want him to be insulted so I add "Mitchell, me too."  We pull up at the address and he gets out, then leans back in to hand me something.  It's his t-shirt, the one for his band, and he's literally giving me the shirt off his back as payment for the ride.  We smile at each other and I drive off, back towards SoMa, and the queer bars and the known un-safe, feeling the adrenaline release and this story start to compose itself in my head.

Homobiles: Breaking My Cherry

I hustled into San Francisco last night to go to Dixie de la Tour's birthday party - it was a big freaking deal, all the Bawdy Storytellers long-time community folks telling Dixie stories, loving on her, roasting her a bit.  I was really nervous about telling my Dixie story because I thought I didn't have one, but as so often happens around her I discovered that I did indeed have something to say, most of which was Thank You.  Dixie has been such a big part of me finding homebase & community here in the Bay.  The fact that she can take my high-pitched enthusiasm about Bawdy & the magical things that happen there and absorb it and want to still be around me for more makes me smile.  We've been offering each other a lot in the way of mutual admiration and we work pretty darn well together.  Dixie & Bawdy have given me a way to find my voice and I can't thank her enough.

The party was a lot of fun and I ended up at a table of rowdy queer troublemakers, so you know I loved that.  But as soon as the party broke up I went to my car, unbuttoned my dress shirt right there on the street & changed into my Homobiles uniform for the night - nerd core T shirt & an Ani Difranco hoodie.  My first call ("a tag") came right away and I was consumed with nervousness about everything - the windows were all smudged, a bird had pooped on the car during the show, the drag queens would maul me for infractions, these sorts of thoughts.  But I quickly settled into an easy rhythm and the dispatcher was very gentle with me.  Thank you to Mitch for still liking me when my phone kept autofilling "min" into "mom."  Somehow this turned into a very unlikely joke between two masculine of center folks who have never met!

Some highlights: talking about the different film versions of Sense & Sensibility with a passenger, a customer telling me to turn the GPS off because "she was the only alpha in the car" and then doing a pitch perfect impression of a GPS from the back seat all the way home.  The drunk straight girl placed carefully in my car by her lesbian friend who proceeded to act as if she was in a more normal cab & complained multiple times to the guy she was on the phone with about how "all the lesbians at the party hit on her" without really clocking the fact that she was being driven around by a butch dyke.  I decided to fully explain what Homobiles was when she asked how much the ride was - that flustered her a bit cause she was expecting a quote & not a mission statement. And the guys who were talking about porn so I decided to chime in by telling them I had repped both Chi Chi LaRue & Colt Studios for years.  I think I have new friends.

The last fare of the night were 5 self described "skinny bitches" who crammed themselves into my car at 5:45 am and proceeded to direct me all over town looking for the after hours club they wanted to go to.  The guy riding up front hijacked my music system with hilarious results - all six of us ended up singing "Careless Whisper" together while flying down the hills.  They found the place after a false start - I had no idea there were parties that started at 6 am but I think I have a lot to learn in that department.

As the hour ended and no new fares popped up I wanted to see the water.  I was planning on watching the sunrise from somewhere devastatingly beautiful and instead ended up driving the one-car Pride parade during the early blush of dawn.  But I found my way down to a fishing pier so I could walk out and really hear & feel the tug of the Bay.  I was underneath the shadow of a ginormous cruise ship which earlier in the dark had startled me, looming up above me like a docked spacecraft all lit up or a small city looming in the water, dazzling in its brightness.  Now it just looked like a massive cruise ship but that's still pretty cool to look at, as much as I would like to never be on one. So I took my pictures (like the one above) and breathed the fresh air, loosened my back & legs, stared dazedly at the sprinklers dousing the flowers and sat in the car to count my money (not bad, by the way).

I still don't really know what this job is going to feel like - will it be too much for my nearly  40 year old body to take this upside-down schedule a few nights a week?  Or will my life-long night owl tendencies plus the pure joy of so much very random social contact, flirting, and meeting new people keep me high enough to avoid the bad crashes?  I know that it will provide a lot of material!  So now I need to go clean a large amount of spilled coke out of my floor mats, take the car to the wash, get a haircut so the back of my head looks sharp from the back seat and get ready for another round tonight.  I can't wait to see what unfolds.


Notes: things I found out I need - more breakfast & over-night coffee & food recommendations, a list of bathrooms & a new Pack & Pee, and a digital camera to capture the things I see in the night (when an iPhone just won't do).

Homobiles Magic Night One

In fifth grade I told my mom that I wanted to be a truck driver or a taxi driver and I don't remember how that was received but it probably was not her first choice.  Tonight I managed to live out my dream: I'm going to try my hand at being a cab driver for Homobiles.  More accurately I will be a volunteer driver for this non-profit which provides safe rides homes for the queer community and their allies. I will gladly accept donations for my work (which is how we pay for our own gas, car upkeep and it is where our take home pay comes from).

Tonight was my first full shift doing a ride-along with another driver.  She was an amazing trainer, having spent years as a yellow cab driver in her hometown of San Francisco before joining Homobiles shortly after they opened.  I'll write more about the history & premise of Homobiles another time (it's a good story) but want to thank my kind trainer for a night full of good conversation, driving all over the city teaching me connective tissue of roads and on-ramps while talking about the Bay, the queers, and all the other things.

The reason I'm staying up a few more minutes before crashing into bed is that pure magic happened at the end of the night. There has been this thing happening since the moment I moved here (and other people report similar phenomena) where I frequently, unexpectedly and delightedly bump into people I have known in all my past lives (well, most of them).  The dyke who I really connected with when we all got snowed in over President's Day weekend in DC after the True Spirit conference, long-lost friends from college, people I haven't seen in years have all surfaced in unexpected but understandable ways.  We've all rolled downhill towards the Bay, drawn by similar and diverse reasons to call this area home or to come for visits.

So when we pulled up outside our destination in the early-model Prius I was both astonished and not at all surprised to see him standing there.  I haven't seen Ghalib in 15 years - approaching 40 allows for sentence like this to start cropping up in alarming fashion.  He arrived at Hampshire College from Jordan, a Palestine 17 year old who rapidly emerged as a fierce queer artist and activist.  And I loved him like a brother.  And there he was in the late night and I could hug him and call him habibi.  It was instantly familiar in the cab, like it was last month that we'd last chatted.  Facebook keeps us up on each others lives, he lives in Hawaii but is here to watch his sister graduate.  And when we dropped him off I got out to hug him again and did not want to let him go.

We'll see each other soon and be able to talk more about what we meant to each other as young queer activists trying to make our way in a world neither of us knew. My heart is full and I teared up when we left - feeling like a benediction had been bestowed upon my shift, my new gig.  Driving home across the bridge to Oakland felt like wild freedom and the taste of something new in my mouth but grounded by these things, the queer community people I meet who instantly feel so familiar plus those long lost familiars coming back around. Pure magic.