TheBanyanTree: Raising the Bar

[Maria Gibson]

I don't know how many people are aware of this but you can find some 
really interesting folks in a bar.  I have also come to the conclusion 
that if I really, really wanted to, I could get laid from a bar.  Pretty 
darn easily, actually.  That isn't what I want to do so it turns out 
that little factoid is extraneous information at best and just a sleazy 
idea at worst but still, it is a gaining of wisdom and perspective.  How 
else does one know they don't want to have meaningless sex with a 
stranger unless faced with the option?  Sure, you can say you already 
know this about yourself, and I feel I did know it about myself even way 
before all this got started but I can say it with a certainty these days 
that I didn't possess previously.  Turns out, it's good news.

The only person I have met who was just awful was a really young man who 
thought he'd regale me with his various sexual techniques (oddly enough, 
this phenomenon of regaling has happened three times but I have only 
just recently connected the dots about it being a sign that someone is 
interested) and many assurances that he has awesome powers of prowess 
and could rock my world.  Ohbaby.  Unfortunately, another thing you can 
get in a bar is drunk.  Now...I'm doing better at this with a little 
practice.  I now only have two beers and no shots of liquor but this new 
found skill of knowing when to say when did not come without a price.  
One night last week, finding myself out with a beer salesman who is a 
very decent guy, and a pizza salesman ...the not so nice one with the 
self confidence of a false god, ohbabyohbaby...and his girlfriend, I had 
a lot too much to drink.  I think it was the shot that threw me over the 
cliff but the wine and beer prior to that most certainly played a role 
in the overall outcome.  So after this jerk's girlfriend showed up he 
was still trying to score, which was never going to happen and I had 
already told him that.  We all ended up at the next place because he 
thought he could help the beer guy get another account and then he 
ordered up shots which I stupidly drank.  On a trip to the bathroom he 
found me in the hall and suggested I grab his nethers and, oddly, my 
angry comments seemed only to fuel him.   It is pretty foggy memory wise 
but I actually did grab him; not in a nice way, although reflection 
tells me that it didn't carry the message I had intended.  It's the 
overall haunting feeling that I think I kissed him that makes me gag and 
which has forever crossed getting drunk in a bar off my list of "been 
there done that got the cheap tshirt and hate cheap tshirts" events.  I 
ended up having to sleep in a parking lot for a few hours with the beer 
guy just to be sober enough to get back to my car and home...at 2:30 in 
the morning.  Randy was pretty understanding under the circumstances but 
I think I'll probably bypass any more stunts like that.  I'm sure I'll 
see the beer guy again when he comes to town to drink for a living 
because he was a really neat person, but the drunken debauchery will be 
bypassed. 

A girl's gotta cut back somewhere, right?

Maria