That may win the appropriate-yet-ironic title of the year award.

So, every year, for as long as I can remember, there has been an annual gay pride essay that I would write. It was my version of New Year’s resolutions, always set off by body image issues stirred up at the event.

The essay would always commit to how different things would be the next year, only to be followed by nearly the same essay twelve months later. Like I said, just like New Year’s resolutions.

I can sum up every essay written around pride for the past 14 years: need to lose weight, need to write a book, need to get a boyfriend. Some years, the blame would be on me, other years (probably the earlier ones) on society and its rigid standards of blahblahblah. Not sure how I ever put sentences like that together, or when that occurred, but I recall doing it. The blame has been decidedly fixed on me for some time now.

As a result of my hard drive crash, none of those essays exists for me to read. And they were always e-mailed to the same people who had to sift through the same thoughts each time. Life on repeat has been a major theme for me.

Ironically, I didn’t write one last year. Go figure. The only thing I remember from last year is ending up at NTouch, the gay Asian bar in San Francisco, and almost hooking up with a boy who just moved here from Japan, until his female friend (very newly out femmy lesbian, visiting from Japan) seemed to derail things. He wasn’t my type really, but that didn’t seem to matter at that moment.

There is sort of a Pride essay in June 2003 on this site, but the more telling entry is the vaguest thing that is possibly on this blog, from last June. I wrote:

"The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results." - Benjamin Franklin

Tomorrow is Monday, which is the day (each week) when I start my diet. Tomorrow will be different. No details here, but I’ve had enough.

This post is mainly for me, so I can remember when it starts.

The morning after I posted that, I went to Overeaters Anonymous for the first and last time. I don’t feel it helped me do anything but realize I wasn’t quite at that level, nor did I think I ever would be.

The meeting was fine and what you would expect.

Hi, I’m Jeff and I’m an overeater. Hi Jeff.

Only I wasn’t really an overeater, I just ate too much. The distinction seeming to be that I never felt I was eating emotionally for the sake of eating, but just eating too much when I did eat my normal meals. For weeks after attending the meeting, where I put my name and phone number on a list without reading what it was for, I would get calls from strangers saying they were also "on program" and then telling me everything they had already ate that morning, usually a long list of things. The progress is the process for these people, so telling me they did it is helping them on their path supposedly. As a result, I would just try and help them along and end the call as quickly as possible.

I’m not sure if there was a specific turning point for losing weight this last time around. I know that I questioned being halfway to 70 years old and still spending my present living a future life that I was doing nothing to make happen, while also not letting go of my past.

There were Buddhisty books aplenty. But a large part of my decision was boring, practical and sadly uninspiring. I knew that within the next year, I would be leaving my job at Macromedia whether they fired me (which did happen in November) or I quit (which would have happened in February). I knew my goal was to get a job bartending or waiting tables. And I knew it would be harder to do that if I were overweight.

That’s as close as I can come to a moment where I knew it had to occur, although I think the upcoming job removal, book writing, and just unburying myself from a mountain of debt… there was a lot of things resolving themselves at the same time. The weight loss was timed, though, so that I would be skinnier in February, when I knew I would need to get a job in the service industry, which would want me to be skinnier to be considered hirable.

As I learned writing about the main character in my novel, documenting a weight loss journey is really, really boring and best avoided. So, as the book does (save for a better constructed montage), we’ll jump ahead past dieting, gym attendance, and rejoining Weight Watchers in September.

I am now more than 115 pounds lighter than I was at my highest recorded weight ever of 304.9 pounds, nearly 100 pounds of which has been lost since September 2004. The novel is written. And, as fate would have it, this week I begin both looking for a job waiting tables and simultaneously editing the misnamed first draft of the novel. (I tended to not call most drafts a first draft as I didn’t like them, and would later demote them from being considered a first draft).

So, with that massive exposition (as no previous pride essays are not on this blog to link to), it was interesting to approach Pride this year. Of course, in large part, it is approached how I approach everything these days. I’m learning to be comfortable in my skin, so that means not running around all crazy to make up for my 20s, or buying some tight-fitting outfit to cling to my body. I just want to become a normal, gay, 36-year-old man who is at peace with himself. That’s it. Anything that delineates from that will just drag me into a new misguided direction.

That said, pride was not about new outfits, rainbow beads, drinking to excess, doing drugs, or sleeping with any stranger I could find. Although, for the Pride festival on Sunday, I did wear the Radiohead T-shirt that was previously the only shirt I owned that didn’t fit me because it was too small. That was intentional and a personal victory, coming within the same week of my online BMI calculator saying "Acceptable Weight" for the first time.

The thing no one understands about massive weight loss, and I didn’t either until it happened to me, is how different the mental and physical aspects are. Physically, I know I weight under 190, but mentally I’m not there yet. I still see myself as fat. Part of that is my personality, in that I have less than 10 pounds to get to my goal of 180, so it is more about having eight pounds to lose instead of thinking about the 117 that have already been lost. Another part is that I have no frame of reference for being thin.

A few weeks ago, I was walking in the Castro and this cute guy looked at me and my first reaction was going through a litany of wondering if my zipper was down, if something was on my face, etc. But I was being cruised. It happens more often now, and slowly I’m smiling back and starting to work that into my life as something that happens.

Many people asked what my goal was for Pride this year, and I honestly didn’t have one. There was no angst to burn off, time for which to make up, none of that. I was just going to go and try to live in the moment. Going in with new expectations based on some thinner body I’m still not entirely used to yet would just set me up for a new set of goals to not achieve.

Pink Saturday was spent with my friends Chris and Jeremy. Chris and I began our night seeing eXposed, a rather bad documentary shot behind the scenes on the set of the Colt Studios porno BuckleRoos. Of course, it was a bad documentary that included lots of shots of hot, naked guys in a porno, so the eye candy made the time go by easier.

When we exited the theater, Jeremy was waiting and we made our way to Nirvana, pretty much where I exclusively eat in the Castro (there and Pasta Pomodoro). Chris and I had dinner there earlier, but now the front was converted into a street-facing bar with rum sangria and, well, whatever else everyone else got to drink. It was all rum sangria for me, although I only had two glasses as well as Jeremy’s alcohol-soaked fruit from his (for the extra fiber, of course).

Some years at Pride are extended reunions where I see people that I don’t see enough of, or lost touch with, and other years of Pride just seem to be… running into no one else I know. This year was definitely the latter, although that was fine.

The sangrias did their job, although I never did seem to dance drunk on Castro Street for whatever reason. But when Chris was ready to leave for the night at one in the morning, he dropped Jeremy and me off at NTouch for the last hour of dancing there.

I had enough alcohol in me for the night at that point, but Jeremy got another drink and while he was finishing that off, I hit the dance floor. Again, there is still too much intellectualizing on my part about things like this, especially when dancing solo. Everyone seems to be with someone, but not. Are people cruising you, or not? Are those two a couple, or two friends looking to meet other people?

One cute Thai boy with longish hair also seems to be alone, although every so often a taller white guy shows up and seems to be with him and clinging to him (and there is a definitely cling between a lot of rice queens and their Asian boys, like they think the boy is always looking to jump ship). I can’t figure these two out, but then the white guy disappears again.

Jeremy finishes his drink or comes over to me, or I go to him, or … who knows, I was drunk. Anyway, we chat and he says he thinks I have a chance with the long-haired boy. I figure he has better perspective than me, so I go closer to the Thai boy and we seem to be dancing alone, near each other, although there is some acknowledgement that we know we’re both alone and dancing near each other, if that counts as some sort of connection.

Jeremy comes out dancing, too, and he dances with the Thai boy some, while I’m near the sweaty, shirtless guy up on the cube who keeps unhooking the front of his pants, and then acts all shy and hooks them up again. He’s definitely not wearing underwear. That much was obvious.

Last call comes early, the lights come on even sooner, and seemingly before two, we’re out on the sidewalk. We end up talking with the Thai boy, while his friends, a cute Asian guy (half Cambodian, half Vietnamese) and the white guy, wait for us. The Thai boy is in a long-distance relationship, as is Jeremy, and is just looking to be pushed into doing something. It wouldn’t be a difficult push. He seems to like the notion of both of them being in the same situation and simultaneously letting their monogamous guards down. It doesn’t happen.

While we are chatting, he motions to his friend and says if I want to hook up with him, I could. Jokingly, I go over to him immediately then and start chatting, while the white guy is off starting his car to get it heated up. The Asian guy’s actually nice, cute, and totally ripped from working out at the gym.

The white guy (it seems strange as a white guy to be referring to other people as white guys, but at this bar, that’s kind of our role) wants to go get some breakfast, so we all head in the direction of a 24-hour café near my apartment. The cute Asian guy and I rejoin our friends at the café before their meals even arrive. At one point, he asks me why I am so cute but don’t have a boyfriend, and I just say I’ve been off the scene for a while. No clue what that means, but it is always difficult to navigate around the weight thing.

It comes up a lot. I recently met this nice guy off of Craigslist, not to expressly hook-up, but just to make friends, see where things go, etc. And, conversationally, I would just hit these walls where his not knowing about my body image issues wouldn’t let my story make sense. Basic gay conversation starters: who was the first guy you dated, first relationships, psycho ex’s… I don’t have a repertoire to use here. So, I basically came out and said I just lost a ton of weight and am basically just starting, to which he said, "Well, whatever you’re doing, it obviously suits you."

I think getting feedback from people who never knew I was fat, and just experience me for the first time as height-weight proportionate are going to help me accept myself quicker than my usual support system. Mainly because there is no motive to read into it. Well, no negative one anyway. Heh.

Ultimately, Jeremy and I crawl into bed together at around five in the morning. And, keeping with tradition, nothing happens.

Jeremy bails for the train at eight a.m., and I jump back into bed and set my alarm for 10:40, as Chris is coming to do the Festival between 11 and noon. I am ready to go on like four hours sleep by 11. At 11:30, he calls and says he slept in and is just leaving San Rafael. Ack. So, we meet at the festival an hour later.

With no performers we care to see, we just go through the festival and check out the booths and merchandise, as well as the boys of course. Pride seems under-attended compared to previous years, but fills up later in the afternoon.

Once again, I barely run into anyone I know, which is strange. But I tend to like Pink Saturday more than Pride Sunday anyway, so it’s no big deal. We bail from the festival around 3:30 and catch an afternoon showing of Bewitched (blah), and I force myself to stay awake until 10 p.m., so I don’t crash immediately and wake up well-rested at 3 a.m.

This really isn’t my traditional pride essay. There was nothing monumental about the weekend. Or at least nothing that should stand out as part of my new life. That’s kind of the point.

Pride was just a weekend this year. It only confirmed I’m on the right path, as well as provided moments to keep me focused.

By next year, my weight loss journey will be long over. And I’ll have had nearly 52 weeks of living in this new body by then. Will I be holding someone’s hand the whole time? Avoiding an ex? Will I have sold a book by then?

No clue.

And I have no concern whatsoever as to what happens between now and then.

As long as I’m enjoying myself doing it.

This hereby concludes the final essay ever in the annual Pride essay series.

This post is being written from Texas where, for less than a week, I might possibly be the country’s only vegan cattle rancher. Then again, you never know.

Been in Texas for a bit, but I’m coming back to San Francisco soon. If anything, the trip has confirmed that I am indeed an urban boy. Most of this trip was spent in the suburbs outside of Dallas and it seemed that if we didn’t go out or do something every two days, I got a bit antsy and needed to go out for dinner, drive into town, see a movie, something.

Actually, the ranch (even further out in the sticks) where I am now has been an easier transition than the burbs, because doing something isn’t as much an option. Although, we have been to the movie theater twice in our first two days at the ranch. But knowing I’m not 30 minutes away from great restaurants, gay bars, anything cultural really, makes it easier.

The main reason for the visit was the first birthday of my nephew/godchild. The ranchsitting sort of happened because I was going to be here anyway, and then there was a window of time in between the two, so I’ve been here for about two weeks at this point.

It is interesting to hear everyone say the same things about the baby, that he is such a "good" baby. But, everytime I hear that, I think back to an interview with Eve Ensler that appeared in the program for "The Good Body," her amazing one-woman show about body image that I saw when she performed it in San Francisco. In the interview, she said something to the effect of how people misuse the word good in our society. I mean, every instance of people calling the baby good means he is basically happy, contented, quiet, and sleeps through the night. But none of those things make him "good" in and of themselves. Most of the time, good refers to the burden on the parents than the state of the child. The parents get to sleep through the night, therefore the baby is good.

The only downside of a baby-themed visit with a lot of people visiting is that I hear the same information repeated ad nauseum throughout the day. Every day, about eight to ten times a day, I hear the information relayed as to when the baby woke up that morning. And, the odd thing is, it always seems to be within the same 45 minute period, usually between six and six-thirty. But despite the consistency of the baby, everyone always seems to relate that to their desired wake-up time and consider the baby to be the same as a barking dog in a neighbor’s yard.

It seems like no one lives in the moment much anymore. If the baby wakes up at six, accept you are waking up around six, go to bed early to compensate, and get on with your life. It is so much easier than waiting for him to sleep longer or later. Pretty much everyone says the same thing, though, that the baby got them up at (insert time), rather than it being inclusive and saying "we" got up at (insert time).

The visit has been a mix of our side of the family, my brother’s in-laws, local relatives, and their friends and neighbors. As a result, I seem to hear nearly everything on an infinite repeat. It is like an endless game of telephone based on the minituae of our days. No information seems too minor to be shared with everyone. If the baby just drank the last of the whole milk, and we will need to get it soon, it doesn’t inspire anyone to immediately just jump in a car but rather mention to one another that the baby drank the rest of the whole milk and that we will need to get some. If someone else joins the group on the patio after this was said, someone will invariably share this information with them. On several occassions, I have offered to just go get the milk and, each time, was told it wasn’t needed just then, the baby was sleeping. I figured if I had gone, the new bit of information could be relayed in my absence (the baby drank the last of the whole milk and Jeff went to get more) and I’d miss a round, but that rarely happened.

I guess I am used to living alone, and in my head primarily, so it has been interesting to see how people fill their day with text regardless of their interests. Upon my return to SF, and after gay pride, my days will be about editing my novel finally (after having it sit there waiting for seven-plus weeks). I would say that of all the people in my life that know the story of the novel, no one knows more than a bird’s eye view of the text and read a few chapter excerpts here and there. So, I have created 650+ pages of original text that only I have seen. And unless something interesting happens to me during my day, I tend not to share it. What would the point be?

So, it just seemed strange to think that I am focusing my life on creating text right now, most of it spent in my head and then releasing it when it has congealed into something interesting, but that everyone else also fills their day with text and, in the absence of narrative, it is often just the play-by-play of what just happened to them. I don’t say this to be mean or judgmental, but when I was first here, people would start telling me something and I thought of it as the beginning to a "story," some anecdote:

"I was just going to get ice from the dispenser on the refrigerator and one of the ice cubes fell onto the floor."

To me, that sounds like a setup to an amusing story, until they stop talking and you realize that was the whole story. I just stopped doing that in my life for the most part. I’d just pick up the ice cube, toss it in the sink, and go about my day.

I was actually at a loss most of the time, as I entirely forgot how to have that type of conversation. Finally, I observed other people, and they would say back, "Yeah, you got to watch those things sometimes. They can shoot right out of there." Then, both would just turn back to the TV.

I was both struck by how every event in people’s lives had turned into "weather" talk, and surprised how I had just stopped doing it, to the point where I didn’t even know how to respond to such quips.

I think this has always been something I have done. I always think we’re supposed to sit around and have big Breakfast Club-type bonding, philosophical discussions, and question the big issues. I want that to the point where I often don’t lay the foundation with people that is built on their day to day events, their workplace, etc., which are the things that will lead to those larger conversations.

I’m not saying I want to hear when people drop every ice cube in their lives, but I think there is somewhere I can meet them in the middle.