Gay Friends

We found out sometime last year that there is a group based in Morgantown called "G2H2," or "Gay Guys Happy Hour." They meet monthly at a different restaurant/bar in town. Up to that time, we had not met many gay folks in town, certainly not other couples in our age group. People would say to me "There is a gay student organization." Yes, but they are all twenty and still worried about what their parents or roommates will say. So G2H2 looked to be our group. Only they meet from 6-8 on Friday evenings, and we have to be at services before 7:30. I went once without Joe and met some people, and we attended together once last summer when Shabbat was late. Still, we had to leave before seven.

The December meeting was on the Thursday night before Christmas, because the restaurant was booked for several large parties Friday. Perfect for us. We had drinks (non-alcoholic in my case) and stayed for dinner. We chatted up a couple in their early sixties  (older than Joe, younger than I) named Dave and Joe Bart. We had met them at one of the earlier mixers.

This month, the party was again on Thursday night, and although I was tired, not feeling great, and having an important medical test the next day, I went with my Joe. We were in a trendy new bar, with not much really edible food, and fairly high prices. We spent most of the evening with Joe Bart and Dave, and another man named Doug, who now runs G2H2 with Joe Bart. We all adjourned to Mother India down the street, where there is a plentiful buffet of recognizable food. Joe Bart and Dave invited us to their farm in Pennsylvania, just over the border, for dinner Saturday.

So we went. I took Robitussin and whatever else I could find to mask my deteriorating health. We have found lots of people in this area, including gay people, who live way off main roads, in virtually inaccessible places. I always imagine gays congregating in a "gay ghetto" in the center of a city. That doesn't work here. Joe Bart and Dave live six miles east of the first exit on I-79 in Pennsylvania, just north of the West Virginia line. The directions didn't include street names, just "turn left at the church" and "look for the red barn." We passed fracking wells and coal mines on the way. It was seventeen miles from our place in Morgantown.

The house is beautiful and modern, set far off the road. They have a barn and goats. Doug from G2H2 was there, along with his mother, a Presbyterian minister, and Bill, a Jesuit priest. They had all been to see the opera at a movie theater in Morgantown, streamed from The Met in New York.We'll pause here for the "a priest, a minister and a rabbi walk into..." joke.

Anyway, we were totally comfortable with everyone there. We had food and drink and bonded with two dogs and one of the two house cats. They asked us if we had met many people socially in Morgantown, and we almost cried. "This is the first time we've been invited socially to the home of a gay couple in this part of the world." True. We've dined with many of Joe's congregants, and they have been just lovely to both of us, more than we would have imagined before we came, but we really have no gay friends.

I should say "had," because we now have Joe Bart and Dave. Our house is tiny and a disorganized mess, thanks to my lack of Executive something-or-other and Joe's life in a more ethereal world. Still, we will get more organized, clean up and cook dinner for our friends, as soon as my now full-blown cold is over. The test from the doctor Friday resulted in good news, a great relief.

Hopefully, this is a sign that we will be more comfortable with our lives in Morgantown over the next few years.