Men I've dated, part n of a series

A former lover invited me to brunch at a local tavern on New Year's Day. We ended up being a small enough party that we all just hung at the bar: myself, him, and 3 friends of his from the local dance and film scene. While we were there, other acquaintances happened by, because the tavern had been a favorite haunt of his when he lived in Philadelphia.

He's since moved to New York and is often in California. He's often in California not for film industry reasons, though he's a national award-winning film editor, but because the love of his life moved back to northern California last year after getting out of academia. They can't live together, but they can't quit being in each other's lives.

But that's not the point of this post. The point is, after we'd been at the tavern a few minutes, I noticed that the barback was someone I'd had the distinct pleasure of taking home from my local one time a couple of years ago. (A pleasure, that is, until after he'd left and I had to change the sheets, air out the mattress, and leave open the door to my bedroom for a good four hours to get rid of the cigarette reek that he'd left behind.) I asked him to re-fill my coffee and wished him a happy new year.

Later on during the meal, I saw another man walk in whom I'd dated very briefly last spring. He was with some other people, one of whom looked like a date, so I didn't interrupt their meal to say hi. He was a little young for me, anyway; we couldn't keep a meaningful conversation going for long.

Philly really is a small town. This is why you should be excellent to the people you sleep with, even if you don't click and can't see each other more than once or twice.

My former lover gave me a lift home a little while after the love of his life showed up and the party dispersed. She said I should sit in the front seat because I don't get to see him as much as she does.