Starbucks: Part One

Him: Let’s grab a coffee. Oh, ew, nevermind.

Me: What?

Him: It’s not Intelligensia.

Me: Oh yeah. I’ve read that name a lot. What’s Intelligensia? It sounds like a philosophy about fair labor practices, or something.

Him: Um, I don’t know about that. I just know that Intelligensia coffees are fresh roasted daily in vintage German roasters. This is a Starbucks. That’s not the same thing.

Me: It’s not, but it’s New York in February.

(long pause)

Him: Okay fine, but I’ll get a tea. I’m kind of a coffee snob.

Me: That’s becoming clear.

Him: Oh, sorry. We don’t all have blogs about progressive gay thought.

Me: Don’t apologize. Some of us are coffee snobs. That’s cool. It takes a village.

Him: What?

Me: It’s a saying. “It takes a village to raise a child.” Although I might amend that statement so say “It takes a village of gays to raise a child right.”

Him: Ew. Gays don’t want children.

Me: Ew. Yes they do.

Him: Ew. Who told you that?

Me: Ew.

Him: Ew, what?

Me: Just ew we keep saying ew.

Him: Who told you that gays want children?

Me: I guess I told myself that.

Him: Sounds so heteronormative. No thanks.

Me: No thanks?

Him: I don’t want to live in a world where gays want to have children. Why should we emulate the behavior of people who oppress us and treat us like there’s some sort of sex hierarchy, where their sex is perfectly normal, and in fact wonderful, and our sex is shameful and dirty?

Me: That’s a good point. We shouldn’t emulate that sort of behavior. But what does that have to do with having children?

Him: To want to raise children is to support the narrative of that sexual hierarchy. That’s how their sex is so pure and gentle, because it leads them to their precious children. Meanwhile, we keep having sex for the fun of it, because it’s all we can do, and they label us as ‘forever adolescent.’

Me: I think they’re just jealous. How’s the tea?

Him: It’s mundane. Starbucks Chai. I’ve been there, done that.

Me: So, how –

Him: It’s trite.

Me: I get it. I get that you don’t like Starbucks. I actually really like the coffee here.

Him: Ew.

Me: Ew. So, wait. Can I ask you a question?

Him: Okay.

Me: What about adopting? Doesn’t that not-support the heteronormative paradigm?

Him: Wow that’s terrible grammar.

Me: Ew.

Him: Ew what?

Me: Correcting grammar in an interesting conversation.

Him: Oh. You think this is interesting. That’s cute. Okay. No. It doesn’t not-support the heteronormative paradigm.

Me: Why’s that?

Him: They’ve been using us for thousands of years to clean up their messes. To write their philosophies, their theater, their music, to cut their hair, to design their living spaces, to make their clothing, to act in their movies, to fight their wars, to farm their fields – they’ve been using us to clean up after them.

Me: Okay…

Him: Now they’ve gone and overpopulated the world – vanity. Their own vanity has driven them to overpopulate the world. And now they want me to pitch in and love their children and raise their children? No. I’m sorry. No thank you. I’ll keep my job as a graphic designer, and I’ll go to Fire Island in the summer. I’ll sleep with twinks and I’ll do too much blow on the weekends and I’ll get along just fine. Yep.

Me: Wow. You, uh… You have some opinions.

(pause)

Me: Can I say something? Can I make one observation?

Him: I don’t know, can you?

Me: Right. Grammar.

Him: It’s important.

Me: Not as important as where your heart is. Hey – if you did adopt a child – wouldn’t that be like taking a child away from their influence? Wouldn’t you in fact be taking a child and raising him to be less heteronormative?

Him: I don’t know. I just don’t know if I could take the heart break. What if the child turned out straight?

Me: Best case scenario she doesn’t.

Him: She? A girl? Jesus.

Me: Maybe a girl. Why not a girl?

Him: EW.

Me: No ew. I did some research. There’s sound evidence that girls are actually just people.

Him: EW. EWEWEWEWEW!!!

Me: No ew.

Him: Yes ew.

(pause)

Him: There’s gum under this table.

(pause)

Him: Starbucks.