Blackouts and Breakdowns by Mark Brennan Rosenberg Page A

home. I continued standing in the corner alone, until someone walked up to talk to me.
    “Hi,” the guy said, “my name is Chuck.”
    “Mark,” I replied. Having already embarrassed myself in front of the A.O.F.’s I decided short, to the point answers were all anyone was getting out of me.
    “What do you do for a living?” I had only been in D.C. for four months, but I had already figured out that people would introduce themselves and follow the introduction by asking what your profession was. It’s protocol in these parts.
    “I work for the gay phone book.”
    “Really? I use that thing all the time. It’s a great service,” Chuck said.
    “ Really? ” I asked quizzically. Having not used a phone book since I was in middle school to prank call the rape hotline, I was shocked by his response.
    ÒYes, all the time. Every business I frequent, I found from the gay phone book.”
    ÒWow,” I said, wondering what all of my cool friends in New York were doing. “What do you do?”
    “I work on the Hill.” This was a typical response to this question. All “power gays” in D.C. work on the Hill. The first time someone had told me they worked on the Hill, I misunderstood them and thought that they worked on the TV show The Hills . Much to my disappointment, they meant Capitol Hill.
    “Oh, what do you do on the Hill?” I asked.
    “I work for a Republican Senator from Tennessee,” he replied.
    “Really?”
    “Yes.”
    “You work for a Republican? But you’re gay, right?”
    “Yes.”
    “Then, why do you work for someone who is totally against everything you believe in?”
    “It’s a job. I want to work in politics, so I have to make concessions. He does not know I am gay, so it’s totally ok.”
    “Even if he did know you were gay, it would still be OK. He can’t fire you because you are gay. Are you even a Republican?”
    “Yes.”
    “Really? Why?” Chuck fascinated me. He was everything I never wanted to be.
    “Because I believe in the Republican way of dealing with finances in the government.”
    “What about your basic human rights? Most Republicans don’t really like gays.”
    “That’s not true.”
    “Dick Cheney doesn’t even like his own daughter and she’s a big fucking dyke!”
    “It’s not true, there are a lot of Republicans who are gay-friendly.”
    “Just because they are gay-friendly doesn’t mean they will ever support gay-rights.”
    Chuck looked at me with anger. I guess no one had ever called him out on his bullshit before. It absolutely amazed me that this guy would go around pretending to be something he is not to get a job, working for someone who would most likely rather see him dead than alive. No one in New York ever pretended to be something that they weren’t. Except rich. Everyone pretends to be rich in New York, but that’s status quo.
    “I don’t really want to have this conversation right now,” Chuck said as he walked away. I was not having a good time making friends in this city. I knew that the best way to feel bad about yourself was to be in a room filled with gay men, but nothing had prepared me for this. I couldn’t believe the ridiculous shit that went on in D.C. The gay phone book, the AOF, the gay Republicans. I couldn’t find Jonathon so I left without him. I couldn’t be in a room with these people any longer. I had to walk home by myself and it took me an hour because I got lost seven times.
    “That’s what you get for hanging out with a bunch of homos!” my co-worker Andre said the next day. Andre was the graphic designer for the gay phone book and was one of the most racist, homophobic black gay guys I had ever met. “You know, the gay guys down here really need to their priorities straight,” he continued, “they had to lay off half of the staff at the AIDS clinic down the street due to lack of donations. But, the gays down here have enough money to throw a gay pride pet parade. They threw a God damned gay pride for their pets.