Good Vibrations Magazine

Al Gore should not run for president. I experienced this epiphany at the same moment I realized I would never sleep with a dear friend of mine.

Allow me to explain.

Milly and I were introduced a little over a year ago. We met at a café on Divisadero. I first saw her putting sugar in her coffee. She wore a brown knit cap that was cocked to the side. Looking around the café I thought to myself, “Well, I hope that’s her.” When we introduced ourselves I could see her eyes flash in that way that means, “Oh good, you’re cute.”

Milly had brought along her friend as bodyguard, a woman pulled taut as a tarp who was pouring flax seed oil on her bagel in place of butter. I was new to California but knew better than to say anything. Her friend eyed me with suspicion, as though I could be a friend but I might be an assassin. But Milly and I were off and running.great-sex-mans.jpg

A mutual friend had set up the meeting in the hopes Milly could help me with writing prospects. We did talk about writing but more as a vehicle to try out this bubbly feeling, leaning forward in our chairs, unconsciously bouncing.

A couple days later Milly invited me to her divorce party on a rooftop in the Mission. She had officially declared herself Miss Divorce 2006, a sash across her body, tiara on her head. She was the center of attention in her black kitty-cat dress but managed to find the time to give me a hug and to compliment my writing. I was hooked.

We had dinner in SOMA a few weeks later. We drank sangria. She told me about getting divorced, sojourning in a foreign country, having a fling with a young underwear model. Or, perhaps, he just could have been an underwear model. She also tempted me with tales of her affairs with women before assuring me she was now looking for a man. Little did I know she was right then in the midst of a few affairs, which is why it took so long to set up dinner. As I said, I was new to California.

We drank more sangria. Watched each other as we walked off to the bathroom. As we got up to leave she reached out and touched my velvet scarf. “I can see why women like you,” she said. There was a spark but something else. Milly looked at me as though I were behind glass; something to be experienced through her eyes and ears only.

We climbed on the bus, headed in the same direction but to different destinations. It was crowded. Milly slipped into a seat at the back. She kept her hands in her lap. The light on the bus made everything ugly. When my stop came I reached out to say goodbye. Milly waved, a smile on her face, but our intimacy had been broken.

The next time I saw her was at a Burning Man fundraiser. She tried to set me up with her new roommate. Awkward… This was the kind of girl who is so annoying she should be shipped off to the Yukon, or somewhere cold enough to slow her neuroses down to a crawl. I abandoned her on the dance floor and went and licked my wounds beside a guy with flames on his head.

Milly and I stayed in touch through email. We would catch each other at parties, always thrilled to see one another, always sure to stay in a safe space.

During this time I started hanging out with a community of like-minded folks. It was wonderful except for one thing. I wasn’t sleeping with anyone and this seemed to annoy more than a few people. Often times in my life I have found celibacy to be an excellent choice. But paradoxically such a choice can make you all the more desirable.

Like in “The Life of Brian” when Brian denies he’s the messiah and the crowd cries out, “Only the true messiah would deny that he is the messiah.”

“Alright,” Brian says. “I am the messiah.”

“He is the messiah.”

My experience has been that when I am not having sex women say, “That’s so sexy.”

This community was going to have a weekend campout in the summer. Milly was going to be there. My course of action was clear. I found Milly out on the dirt dance floor. We flirted in motion. I came up behind her and put my arms around her waist. She pulled them away and said, “We have to talk.”

She was seeing somebody. “So what?” I said. I had been in California for six months now. “Really,hotmonogamy.jpg” she said. “We’re monogamous.” I was thrown. It had seemed to me that out here mono meant three. But Milly was serious. And so we began to talk, right into the middle of the night, walking the campground, surrounded by hook-ups. It was one of those honest conversations where it is impossible to say anything wrong.

“You could have made a move,” she said.

“You didn’t really want me too,” I said.

“That’s true,” she said.

Milly is a little older than I am. She thought I was younger than I am. It’s that damn relativity. From where she was standing we were impossible. But we had fun.

“I’ve got to shower off,” I said.

“Can I watch?” she asked.

“Sure.”

Disappointment and sadness had been abated by the joy of honesty.

Back in the real world our friendship morphed into something wholly new. We are like former lovers without the tender spots from having been former, but with the trust of having been intimate. We know we would never hurt one another because in our most vulnerable moment we sheathed our swords and embraced.

When we hug or share a drink or dance there is the beauty of thinking this would have been wonderful. That perpetual promise affords us deep affection and trust. We’ve nethical-slut.jpgever been furious with one another, never embarrassed one another, never offended. In short, we have the affection of those who live together without actually having to face life and all that that entails. We are secretly each other’s favorite person at a party.

The other day Milly informed me that she had ended her monogamous relationship. I had found myself in a relationship with a luscious little temptress but even if I weren’t I knew in that moment that Milly and I would never sleep together. We had little to gain and everything to lose. And that’s when it hit me; Al Gore should not run for president.

Right now he stands as one of the most rare things in politics, a good man. Like Milly and I at the camp-out, he came so close on election night 2000. But then he sheathed his sword and stepped away. He has not spat vitriol and ranted about what he would have done as president. He has brought attention to the environment and global warming. He has started a network for young people to get their voices into the conversation. He now stands as a man with great moral stature, a counterpoint to our grand but flawed, President Clinton. Al Gore is a man who could have been a great president.

His perpetual promise gives his voice great weight. He is someone liberals in America can rally around, a voice of reason, kingmaker. No more awkward dancing on convention stages. No more serving chili to voters. No State of the Union addresses with half the House sitting on their hands. No Justice Department scandals. We have not had to go through the ugly process of lawmaking with Al Gore. We can just imagine how great it would have been.

Too often we assume one role is better than another. We assume it is better to be a lover than a friend. That it is better to be president than to have almost been president. That to attain physically is better than to imagine emotionally. But this is not always so.

Tantalus ached for the fruit above his head and the water beneath his chin. His punishment was to never receive them. But I would venture to say that Tantalus’ true punishment was that the fruit tasted sweeter in his mind, and the water more refreshing, than they ever could in reality. Tantalus’ true punishment was that there was nothing left for him but disappointment.

Don’t run Al. Take it from Milly and I. Your relationship with America is so much more powerful as our imagined President, than as our actual one.