How Bromantic
Valentine's Jay: Why I'm OK with a little guy love
From "Sesame Street," best buddies Ernie and Bert
Going where no man has gone before, "Star Trek" stars Spock and Capt. James T.Kirk
Han Solo, right, and his big (and protective) "teddy bear," Chewbacca (or justChewy)
"Scrubs" guy loves Turk and JD
“Just remember who he’s spending Valentine’s Day with.”
That was the text message my best friend sent to the beautiful young woman I’m dating just before he and I boarded a plane to London for a nine-day trip. Funny, funny guy. I don’t want to embarrass anyone, so for the sake of this column, we’ll call him “Jay.” Why? Because that’s his real name.
Now Jay and I have known each other for about nine years. We’ve been more or less inseparable for the past three; drinking beer, watching sports (typical guy stuff) and supporting each other through employment drama, bad relationships and everything in between. We’re close the way that siblings sometimes are. I’m lucky enough to have two older brothers for whom I share genuine fraternal affection, and it’s kind of like that. There’s nothing gay about it; at least not to us (not that there’s anything wrong with that).
Guy relationships do offer up opportunity for their fair share of unintentional comedy. Up until recently, Jay and I were roommates, living in a gorgeous home in River Oaks. At a charity event – of which I was not in attendance – our friend Jenny offhandedly described the atmosphere at the house we were sharing as “very bromantic” to Jay’s mother, who was not familiar with the term. She didn’t look at me in the eye for almost three weeks.
Then there’s the time that we stumbled upon Houston’s (unbeknownst to us) notorious make-out bar, Marfreless. We had just been to the symphony and were dressed to the nines. “Okay, this is how this is going to go down,” Jay said with a look of revelatory terror after realizing where we were. “I’m going to drink my beer while you use the restroom. Then you’re going to drink your beer while I use the restroom. Then we’re getting the hell out of here.”
Women refer to their girlfriends as “girlfriends” even if neither of them owns a Subaru. Hetero female relationships frequently blur all sorts of boundaries. Get a couple of sorority girls drunk and see what I mean (no really, it’s awesome).
Strong heterosexual male friendships, however, still remain somewhat taboo even though they’re a major part of pop culture: Turk and JD, Kirk and Spock, Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, Jerry Seinfeld and George Costanza, Han Solo and Chewbacca, Turtle and Johnny Drama, Bert and Ernie . . . Okay that last example was bad. Pretty sure at least one of them was gay. My money is on Ernie — no self-respecting gay man I’ve ever met would sport a Bert-level unibrow. Ambiguous Muppets aside, the list is endless.
Although frequent in its depictions, Hollywood, by and large, hasn’t helped demystify the hetero guy relationship. Rocky and Apollo’s notorious beach frolic in Rocky III comes to mind. Then there’s pretty much every single minute of Top Gun’s 110 minute runtime. Yes, I’m including the love scene, because I’m still not convinced that Kelly McGinnis hasn’t spent at least part of her life as a man, and given that she recently came out as a lesbian, there’s a fairly good chance that neither participant was enjoying it. But I digress.
Straight male friendships have been a major part of human history, yet we still can’t help but make fun of them. I’m as guilty as anyone. I make inappropriate jokes about guy friends all the time, and am in turn teased on a regular basis.
That doesn’t mean I don’t value those friendships; quite the opposite, in fact. There’s no substitute for a best guy friend. Following a breakup last year and a subsequent attempt to drink all memory of the offending woman out of my consciousness, Jay was the one who was there to make sure I didn’t swallow my tongue.
So as this month of love draws to a close, head to Kenneally’s, West Alabama Ice House or whatever your favorite watering hole may be and buy your best mate a pint. It doesn’t mean you like him “like that.” Who cares if people look at you funny; it’s better than drinking alone.
“This is why people think we’re gay together,” I frequently tell Jay after he’s deliberately done something to make everyone around us slightly uncomfortable (always for his own amusement).
“Well that, and because I tell them,” he typically responds.
Funny, funny guy.
