Published in the June 28 issue of Creative Loafing Atlanta.

He was Colombian, with olive skin, dark brown hair, and green eyes. An engineering major, we met my freshman year of college. He was the second person I ever had sex with. Before our clothes even hit the ground, he spoke frankly: “I don’t want a girlfriend.” There was no way I could misunderstand what he was saying. After all, he told me point-blank. (Read: “I don’t want you as my girlfriend.”) Most important, however, his actions were in line with his words. We didn’t go on pseudo-dates, nor did we text or speak on the phone. Aside from parties with friends, and sex here and there, we showed no mutual interest in each other’s lives. It was, in short, easy.

But nowadays, things are different. The older I get, the more I miss my college days when everyone was still respectful as they came into their own, when hearts had yet to be chewed to a bloody pulp, and casual sex was honest. Now casual sex is wedged somewhere between brunch and that show Facebook said you were both attending, most likely with other people but that would be awkward so you just go with each other instead. It’s not that casual sex partners can’t do lunch or attend the same event with or without each other’s company, so much as people can get hurt when the casual sex is veiled behind the term “dating.”

Full story at Creative Loafing Atlanta

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Published in the June 14 issue of Creative Loafing Atlanta.

Dear Betty Everett,

Perhaps it’s selfish to write you a letter, considering you passed away more than a decade ago and will never read this, but I need to get this off my chest: Betty, you lied to me.

OK, technically, you didn’t. After all, you were just offering some advice. I didn’t have to listen to you, but what did I know? I was but a young girl roller-skating in my parent’s garage to your 1964 hit “The Shoop Shoop Song (It’s in His Kiss).” I was singing along to lyrics about foolish girls who hurry love, asking if he will be her baby, and wondering whether or not he will still love her tomorrow.

My parents weren’t divorced yet. I hadn’t loved yet. I hadn’t vomited my heart onto a steel cutting board yet. I didn’t know any better.

“It’s not in his eyes,” you said. “You’ll be deceived,” you said. It’s not in his face (that’s just his charm), nor his warm embrace (that’s just his arm). You said, “If you wanna know if he loves you so, it’s in his kiss. That’s where it is.”

Full story at Creative Loafing Atlanta

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Published in the June 14 issue of Creative Loafing Atlanta.

Dear Betty Everett,

Perhaps it’s selfish to write you a letter, considering you passed away more than a decade ago and will never read this, but I need to get this off my chest: Betty, you lied to me.

OK, technically, you didn’t. After all, you were just offering some advice. I didn’t have to listen to you, but what did I know? I was but a young girl roller-skating in my parent’s garage to your 1964 hit “The Shoop Shoop Song (It’s in His Kiss).” I was singing along to lyrics about foolish girls who hurry love, asking if he will be her baby, and wondering whether or not he will still love her tomorrow.

My parents weren’t divorced yet. I hadn’t loved yet. I hadn’t vomited my heart onto a steel cutting board yet. I didn’t know any better.

“It’s not in his eyes,” you said. “You’ll be deceived,” you said. It’s not in his face (that’s just his charm), nor his warm embrace (that’s just his arm). You said, “If you wanna know if he loves you so, it’s in his kiss. That’s where it is.”

Full story at Creative Loafing Atlanta

Follow on Facebook.com/areyoushaved and Twitter at @areyoushaved.

“Love is the answer to everything. It’s the only reason to do anything. If you don’t write stories you love, you’ll never make it. If you don’t write stories that other people love, you’ll never make it. Love. Fall in love and stay in love. Write only what you love, and love what you write. The key word is love. You have to get up in the morning and write something you love, something to live for.”
- Ray Bradbury ♥

Saturday night I was a judge at the Exotic Dancer National Championships at the Pink Pony. When I met the other judges (all male), one of them said to me with a quizzical look, “You’re a judge? It’s always male judges.” To which I replied, “Well, not tonight, because this bitch is gonna make it count.” Creative Loafing gallery of the night’s craziness this way:

Gallery: Exotic Dancer National Championships 2012 at the Pink Pony.

Saturday, Saturday, Saturday!!! I will be a judge at this year’s Exotic Dancer National Championship at the Pink Pony. Y’all should come and holler at the girls and get sloppy with yours truly.

Have you ever fallen in love in the summer? There’s a feeling that lingers with summer love — like when you can still see the sun’s glow dance inside your lids after you shut your eyes, or how you can still feel the ocean waves rocking your body hours later while lying in bed. Even after the fantasy peels away like the skin on our sunburnt shoulders, we feel it.

You don’t find romance in the summer, it finds you. It pretty much sets it up for you. The way you’re always half naked in a bathing suit or shorts or a summer dress, or the way your skin feels wet and sticky with sweat before you even get under the covers with a lover (or blanket of stars above). In the summer, sunblock acts as a pheromone. Its smell triggers delusions of freedom and wet make-out sessions. Everyone is drunk and happy and thirsty.

In the winter, you weave fingers and arms and legs because the truth is your apartment is old and has a shitty heating system and all you want is to go to sleep without shivering. But in the summer, the heat is your wingman. The world melts under the sun, and you both melt with it, binding bodies in bed as you drape your arm and wrap your legs, hair matted and wet. Someone inevitably whispers, “I feel comfortable with you,” before falling asleep sticky and tangled and happy.

Full story at Creative Loafing Atlanta

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Published in the May 24 issue of Creative Loafing

My chest felt tight. My arms tingled. I just sat at my desk and cried. I felt overwhelmed. I was having an anxiety attack. I emailed my editor. “I don’t feel well,” I wrote. “Going home.”

My breakdown began the evening before, right after a friend emailed me a link to a Rolling Stone blog post about the lead singer of the punk band Against Me!, one of my favorite bands, whose angsty, political, socially conscious lyrics and raucous sound still make me feel like a rebellious teenager.

I clicked the link.

The headline read: “Tom Gabel of Against Me! Comes Out as Transgender.”

Full story at Creative Loafing Atlanta

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Published in the May 3 issue of Creative Loafing

We met at a local bar on a Monday night, as friends do, to talk about the meaning of life and such. As we finished our second beer, he cleared his throat.

“We should probably discuss what we like to make sure we’re on the same page,” he said.

“Agreed.”

This was how my first BDSM relationship began — with a conversation.

Full story at Creative Loafing Atlanta

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Published in the May 3 issue of Creative Loafing

We met at a local bar on a Monday night, as friends do, to talk about the meaning of life and such. As we finished our second beer, he cleared his throat.

“We should probably discuss what we like to make sure we’re on the same page,” he said.

“Agreed.”

This was how my first BDSM relationship began — with a conversation.

Full story at Creative Loafing Atlanta

Follow on Facebook.com/areyoushaved and Twitter at @areyoushaved.