Jump in! The water's just fine...

Welcome, Anderson Cooper!

In light of Anderson's recent coming out, I felt compelled to address this issue. As a matchmaker, I've heard countless coming out stories over the last 7 years. Most of our clients are pretty much "out", but there are some who have chosen to not come out to their families, or at work. They have various reasons, but it always seems to come down to this: because no one asks, my client doesn't say anything. But because he doesn't say anything, no one asks. It's a very weird cycle that doesn't stop until he or she decides to say something.

Based on the coming out stories I've heard, the majority of the time, it always ends up better than you think it's going to. Certainly not always; and we've all heard about the awful bullying that goes on. But the majority of people I've talked to have said, "It was so much easier than I thought it would be."

Additionally, you have to look at this from a generational standpoint. Different generations surprise us. For instance, take Cher. An entertainer with so many gay fans, but yet when Chaz (then Chastity) came out, she freaked out! One of my clients had, in her words, "hippy parents" - it was so liberal in her house growing up that she could have coed sleepovers and such. She finally comes out to her mom and dad, and they are upset! However, her grandmother, who was 75 at the time, pipes up and says "leave her alone!" Perhaps it skips a generation sometimes. No matter how liberal the parents seem to be, they always start thinking, "What did I do wrong?"

But parents seem mostly concerned with the downside of it. "Oh my poor baby is going to suffer because he/she is gay." They see the hate crimes, the bullying, so that's the first thing that comes up for them. As the person doing the coming out, we take that as a rejection. Tyler Clementi, after coming out to his parents before leaving for Rutgers University, told a friend that that his mother had "basically completely rejected" him. In later interviews, his mother says she was grieving; realizing that he would never marry and have children. She also said she felt betrayed that he did not confide in her he was gay sooner than he had. The point here is that she did not feel that she was rejecting him, but that's how it felt to him.

Most of you have now read Anderson Cooper's email to Andrew Sullivan, but there was one paragraph in particular that stood out for me:
"...I’ve begun to consider whether the unintended outcomes of maintaining my privacy outweigh personal and professional principle. It’s become clear to me that by remaining silent on certain aspects of my personal life for so long, I have given some the mistaken impression that I am trying to hide something - something that makes me uncomfortable, ashamed or even afraid. This is distressing because it is simply not true."

He totally gets it. And he's exactly right.

That being said, I truly believe that everyone has their own path when it comes to "coming out." It's an individual decision. I have clients who are very high up at Fortune 100 companies, and some of them aren't out at work. They've basically said to me, "Look, I've got a good thing going here, I make great money, I've been here for 20 years, and no way am I going to do anything to mess this up." I hear them loud and clear. I've been out to everybody for so long and I come out to people so quickly that I don't know what I would do if I was in their situation. Do you risk it all? Cross your fingers that it will be fine? Or do you stay in the closet? And then the cycle starts all over again.

There is no easy answer here. But I am very happy that Anderson has made his voice heard. Sure, it was something that most of us knew already, but it still makes me happy that he will open the eyes of some straight people who could use a little bit of enlightenment.

Bleeding Hearts

I've been pondering this question for a while now. I feel like I'm seeing a lot of lesbians lately "settling" for someone that's really not a great fit for them. It seems especially prevalent in my life right now (thankfully, not for me). This whole idea of "she checks off 3 of the 5 boxes, so I guess we'll be girlfriends" doesn't sit well with me.

Now I know that no one's perfect, but there appears to be a lot of settling going on. The attitude seems to be "we have a lot of fun together and even though she's not ultimately what I want or cannot bring what I need to the table, I'll be her girlfriend anyway - until I meet someone else." This logic of biding one's time with the emotions of another until something better comes along seems awfully flawed to me, and a recipe for an emotional disaster. (Not to mention, yet another reason to DATE, rather than immediately become committed to someone.)

Having said that - I DO believe that we are with people for a reason. I think we learn things from each other that better shape us to become the human beings we were meant to be, and when those lessons are learned, we move on. Sometimes easy, sometimes very, very hard; but the key words are "move on." What's the saying? "Leave the person better than you found them" or something to that effect. But can you do that when it's a poor fit to begin with? Is that possible, when the two of you shouldn't even be together at all?

I feel like these women are trying to make something out of nothing. And I wonder: do they think there isn't anything better out there? Do they think they will never find that one true love again? I posed this question to a friend of mine, and her answer was, with no hesitation, "Yes. That's exactly it. Cannot imagine getting that lucky twice."

Which begs the question: will the universe conspire to help you in getting what you want, if the message you send is "this is fine for now, actually; thankyouverymuch" ?

I also think lesbians, in particular, tend to overlook "deal breakers"; attempting to convince themselves that particular "big deals" are not, in fact, big deals at all. Not attracted to her? Oh well. I'll just try and overlook that. You want a relationship, but she is not and will not be at any time in the near future ready or available to be in a relationship? Ok then, I'll still hang around.

These are big deals, people! These flags are so red they look like they're bleeding.

One of our tag lines is "Someone is waiting to meet you." I truly believe this: whether it's through IGC or not - someone IS waiting to meet you. But you have to be available to meet THEM. You have to get rid of the old to make way for the new. This goes for shoes and partners. :)

I know the reason I'm comfortable saying this is because I see the database of people we have at IGC every single day. I KNOW that there are so many more "fish in the sea" than people in our community think there are. Personally, I know you can find that love again - the love you thought was only going to happen to you once. You have to be open to it, you have to trust that it will happen. You have to welcome it into your life with open arms; and I don't know that you can do that when your arms are around someone else.

I also want you to be grateful for that "once-in-a-lifetime" love; because now you know what it feels like. And if you are someone who has "settled", you know it's different than how you feel now. Don't settle until you find it again! And you will - I know this.

You don't have to sue us to get a date

Oh boy do I have a lot to say about this eHarmony/Compatible Partners thing.

For those of you who don't know, eHarmony has been sued a couple of times for discrimination. As best I understand, it has fallen under the state laws that say you can't discriminate against anyone because of their sexual orientation. eHarmony hasn't admitted any wrongdoing, but they have started to allow gays and lesbians to use their site, calling it "Compatible Partners".

For years I've had clients ask me about eHarmony, and why they didn't allow gays and lesbians. eHarmony's stance (I was told) was that they believed a "healthy" relationship existed between a man and a woman (Heidi and Spencer notwithstanding). I just figured eHarmony didn't need or want any more money.

So now, under duress, they've opened up their algorithms to our community, after shunning us for years. They've finally said, "Ooooook, we'll match you up, even though you know we don't agree with your 'lifestyle'." Is this really what my community has been waiting for?

Let's not forget too - that you can be anyone you want to be online. You can be single, outgoing, and funny; you could be a C-level executive instead of a part-time barista at Starbuck's; you could be a straight man who has a deep, abiding, religiously-born desire to bring harm to anyone who would dare label themselves as "gay". Of course, this is true of any online service. You have to be careful.

It's just so different here at In Good Company. People actually ARE who they say they are. Plus, they have to get through me first ;) It's been 5 years for us, and we have yet to have anyone misrepresent themselves (aside from removing a few years from their age - you know who you are! But that's ok - I do too ;) My clients who are HIV+ have told me they are; my prospective clients who are still married to women have told me (even though I couldn't have them join). I also don't think anyone who's dropping the cash for our fees wants to be dishonest - you can lie for a lot cheaper.

It also disturbs me because I think they are going to make a killing, cash-wise. And here we are, taking it day by day in this difficult economy. Where we opened solely for the gay and lesbian community and have kept our focus on that, they have begrudgingly - finally - decided to take our money.

So where will you go, current or prospective IGC client? Will you continue to spend hours online each night, hoping the information you are reading about someone is accurate? Then hoping one of you has the nerve to suggest a meeting? Or will you hire someone to do all that for you - to let you focus on your professional life, while we find great matches for you, give you factual information about them, even set up the introduction in a casual, low-stress environment. That's what In Good Company does for the Chicagoland gay and lesbian community, and what we've been doing since 2005.

Want to date within the gay and lesbian community? You don't have to set a legal precedent; just set an appointment with In Good Company.

Welcome to Gay Chicago!

I remember coming up to Chicago back in 2003 - 2004 for improv classes (yes, that's actually why I moved here) and all the times I wanted to go out and try different restaurants. The problem was, I didn't really know anyone here. But because food and I are BFF's, I would walk down the street, find a restaurant that looked good, march inside and sit down to a nice meal and glass of wine all by myself. Now, I can do that; but I know a lot of people who can't, or wouldn't dare. And certainly, I would've rather had company.

So I have an idea that's been rolling around in my head for a few months now, and I'm interested in your opinions about it.

I was thinking about all the gay men and women who travel to Chicago on business, and how I bet it would be nice if they had someone to have dinner with that was also a gay professional. They likely don't know anyone here except their straight colleagues, and they're tired of eating alone in their hotel room. I think it would be great if we could set something up where IGC provides a dinner companion. Not a "date", because the two people live in different cities/states; but someone they could talk to and have a nice dinner with, knowing that the person was educated, intelligent, stable and secure.

It wouldn't cost anything extra for my current clients (the ones who reside in the Chicagoland area) and these dinners wouldn't count towards their introductions.

I would have to be able to interview the out-of-towner in person so my Chicago clients would know that he/she is A-OK. But once I did that, for the rest of the year all the out-of-towner would need to do is call or email us ahead of time, and we can get to work on setting up the dinner(s).

Obviously there's a few kinks to still be worked out, but I feel like it might be a nice service to offer.

Thoughts?