how does this happen?

So I gave up on working last night and decided to go to this event. I'd never been; in fourteen years in San Francisco I think I've only been to one specifically bi-oriented event. Years ago. I know how strange that sounds, considering that I moved out here so I could live someplace where being bi was No Big Deal, but that one event put me off the scene pretty thoroughly. I was trailing in the wake of the woman I was seeing at the time and feeling really uncomfortable, and everyone looked like a RenFest escapee, and I just couldn't handle it.

But last night I thought, what the hell. Maybe that cute girl from the Red Elvises show will be there, and I can stop wandering around the Berkeley campus trying to figure out where she works (kidding, really, I'm not stalking her. Yet.) And even if she wasn't there, maybe there'd be another girl, or maybe I'd meet the bi boy of my dreams... because I've always thought that would be kind of fun, and easier for me than dating straight men, who don't know all the things bi guys do. Whatever the case, I'd be surrounded by my own kind (even if they tend to look like RenFest escapees), and that would be a welcome change from clubs full of straight people (where dirty dancing with a girl is taken to be something you're doing to turn men on, not for its own good reasons) or gay men (no action) or lesbians (don't trust bi-girls).

No disrespect to straight people, gay men, or lesbians! Some of my best friends are straight. Or gay. But there aren't many places bi-folk can really let down their hair, know they can dance with anyone, talk to anyone, have similar history. And you're not aware of the lack until you're surrounded, as I found tonight. Everyone I looked at I could flirt with and not worry that I was crossing someone's comfort threshold. Boys dancing with boys dancing with girls dancing with girls. Ran into friends of Snufkina's, recognized a beautiful and famous domina BunnySlope had pointed out to me, saw a few people I knew I'd seen somewhere before, started to feel like I was in the bi groove, dancing a little catch-the-bats-release-the-bats, a little "aren't all bi girls belly dancers?" snakiness, and so on.

So how is it that I ended up drawing the attention of the one straight man in the place? Why does this happen to me? Why? I mean, some of the other men might have been. I suspected they were there with their girlfriends fishing for bi-girl adventure. But of the unattached men, the one who started talking to me about Star Wars at the bar while the bartender drew me a tonic water instead of the club soda I'd asked for was definitely straight. He was there because he cross-dresses. That's it. Otherwise, not attracted to men.

Sigh.