There’s Only Seven of Us

On the imperative to be kind

My ex girlfriend recently texted me, “My ex just got engaged to my other ex’s ex.”

I’m frequently referred to as the Mayor of Los Angeles by friends. Everywhere I go, I run into people I know. (Just moments ago in the coffee shop I’m writing at in Highland Park, a dear friend from synagogue walked in and came to me saying she was there to meet one of our mutual friends for a work meeting.) I’m heavily involved in both queer and Jewish community in Los Angeles so I run into queers I’ve met on dating apps at synagogue on Shabbat, I run into temple friends including our rabbinic intern at leather dyke events, and so on. I also grew up here, so the people I run into are often not just the people I’ve connected with as an adult, but also the kids of my parents’ friends at yoga, people I went to elementary or high school with at the farmer’s market, or people I did ballet with before the age of 12 at Stud Country, our queer line dancing event.

When it comes to queer community, we all date each other’s exes because we can’t afford to eliminate so many people from our already small dating pool. This is somewhat forbidden in normative hetero- monogamous circles. So much so that a friend of mine told me she’s writing an article about how she, as a straight married woman, can’t be friends with straight married men. This makes me really sad! Not to be able to have close friendships with an entire group of people because they’re theoretically the demographic you might potentially be attracted to or would be attracted to you? We simply don’t have that clarity of who to restrict from our close circles in queer community.

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