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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (April 1, 2011)
1VOICÖS--------------------------- >pi,iu;o OREGON S LGBTO NEWSMAGAZINE " 3 9 je How I Am Hungry “Hey, baby,” I purr into the phone nestled between my shoulder and my ear, “want to come over for dinner tonight?” “Sure!” my boyfriend says, the sound of downtown traffic in the background. “I’ll be by at 7:30.” “Sounds good. Don’t be late!” I say, walking into the kitchen. “I haven’t eaten yet.” Behind me on the wall hangs a whiteboard; “2011 Resolutions” is written at the head o f a list. Some o f the entries— “Eat wild game,” “Structure writing time into week,” “Bigtime sensuality”— have bold black checks next to them, indicating goals already met in the first three months of the year. I pull a brown paper parcel out of the refrigerator, look up at the last entry on the list, unchecked: “Contend with hunger.” People sometimes talk about the “fat kid sensibility,” the effect upon the personality that growing up chubby exerts. As a former fat kid I understand and agree that the extra pounds leave us kind, self-conscious fans of the underdog long after the baby fat drops. However, I posit there is also a “hungry kid sensibility,” one that gets cultivated by having a limited amount of resources available. I was certainly raised with more than enough food— again, I was a fat kid—but something else was not enough; the small town in which I grew up, the life possibilities available to me |v remember to breathe BY NICK MATTOS “You have no idea.” The longing hasn’t gone anywhere. I am hardwired to be the sort of man who, as an angry ex-boyfriend once put it, “always wants more— more food, more sex, more booze, more God.” More life. The fact remains that my ap petite, for its ferocious intensity, will not kill me. However, my frantic pursuit o f sating it might. I have grown into a man who isn’t will ing to lose everything, and I have learned that this entails being willing to live with the hun ger, to hear its anxious cry for what it is— not an emergency, but a suggestion. Necessity forces me to search for what it is at the root of this longing and to learn, day by day, how to live patiendy with its loud cries without thrashing about violendy to silence it. Back in the kitchen, I spoon my Chicken Adobo over rice, garnish with lemon slices. I carry plates out to see my boyfriend sitting cross-legged on the rug, the low table brush ing his knees. I sit across from him, set steam ing plates down and realize that I am com plete in this moment— fed and clothed, loved and loving, soberly contending with hunger. I bring a forkful o f chicken and rice to my m outh, close my eyes as the flavors spread over my tongue, and smile. J#] structured my life around fulfilling each mo mentary impulse. This is what led me to pack all people possess within them an up everything and move to the Northwest sight unseen, to get baptized in a Mormon infinite number of desires, a vast temple in proxy for 20 dead German men, to universe of insatiable hunger. I have walk eight miles in a business suit to inter view for a job I’d never get, to drink whole given the ol’ college try to sate it bottles of whiskey before nightfall, to scan anyway, structured my life around house numbers in a bad part o f town looking for a trick with condoms in my pocket and a fulfilling each momentary impulse. monkey on my back. It is what has led me to within reach of my loving family were not stand barefoot in my kitchen tonight, pouring enough to sate me. I would find myself full of soy sauce and rice vinegar into a pot o f chick longing for things I couldn’t articulate, fright en I will serve to my boyfriend. This is how I ened by its intensity and the prospect I could am hungry: urgently and bizarrely, with all live my entire life without sating it. the force o f my life behind it, as though it is At the counter, I rub slices o f lemon onto an emergency calling for swift intervention. chicken wings, thighs, breasts. They slide off the In my steamy apartment, the door buzzer chopping board into a pot as the rice cooker rings. “Hey, baby,” his voice coos into the shoots starchy steam out of its vents. Standing speaker. I push the button, hear the lock of at the sink, washing my hands, I hear my empty the door downstairs disengage, hang up the stomach rumble over the rush of water. phone. Now he is in the doorway, his arm I grew up and the hunger remained. Bud goes around my back, pulling me in for a kiss. dhist philosophy teaches that all people pos “D inner’s almost ready, handsome,” I say as sess within them an infinite number of desires, I pull away, “and just in time.” a vast universe o f insatiable hunger. I have “Thanks!” he says, taking off his blazer, sliding E m a il Nick a t nickmattos@justout.com i f you'd given the ol’ college try to sate it anyway, a hanger into the sleeves. “You must be hungry.” like his Chicken Adobo recipe. Buddhist philosophy teaches that v H E A M RORTLAND WE CAN! HOST! 1 SHOT MEMBERSHIP - $5 1 D A Y M E M B E R S H IP F O R O N L Y $ 5 U M MORNING WOOD SPECIAL - $5 $ 5 L O C K E R S - 6 A M T O 12 N O O N M - F STEAM'S GOING GREEN - $1 OFF $1 O F F IF Y O U B R I N G Y O U R O W N T O W E L 25 & UNDER SPECIAL $ 5 L O C K E R S & $ 1 0 B A S IC R O O M S SHOW UP! - MEET UP! - HOOK UP! 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