Knowing Me, Knowing You

Hey everyone, hope everyone is enjoying the week.

I know that I had a smile on my face after I saw the final result of the Broncos and Patriots game, finally a couple of weeks and months without reading about Tebow and his cult.

I also read somewhere that CBS ran another focus on the family add during Tebow's game this past Saturday. I don't really have anything to add, besides being disgusted with what this group represents and the backing that Tebow and his family give this anti-gay group.

Besides that I saw a small article on ESPN, where the Chief of German soccer calls for gay soccer players to come out, interesting to hear his opinion on the subject.

I actually wanted to go back and talk to you a little about my last summer and what has happened since. I wrote about the great guy I met over the summer and spent a couple of weeks with and what happened after.

The fact that we lost touch and basically we both felt it would be too hard to keep in touch, not because of lack of ways to communicate, but that it would just hurt too much to be away and be and touch will we aren't able to see each other at all.

Anyway I never stopped thinking about him, but it wasn't too painful, just the memories and the good times and the first time that I really felt a guy really wanted me, I mean wanted me for who I really am, for a relationship and to spend time together, and not just for sex, because of my outer appearance.

Anyhow, the time moved on and I continued with my life and last month, as I wrote and asked for your advice on the blog, the guy had a birthday, I was thinking back and forth about sending him a message, should I do it, or should I not. In the end I decided to send him a message on facebook, just a short happy birthday.

I didn't hear back, to be honest, I didn't really thing I would. I know I hurt him, not intentionally and not by doing something mean, but just by "showing up" in his life and leaving.

I remember that the first night we spent together he didn't have any idea as to my personal life and I didn't tell him when I was leaving, because I wasn't sure how I feel about him. Something that when I look back means that it was something healthy, because it wasn't just a five minute crush.

Anyway, I was doing OK, feeling a little lonely, but nothing out of the ordinary after not hearing back, but in the last couple of days I'm just going crazy. I mean, I just really really miss him, I know I can't do anything about it now or maybe in general, but it just hurts. I check his facebook page once in a while, even though I don't like the profile picture, LOL.

I know it would just be mean to try to contact him and I don't really have any great news to tell him. Even if I was out we don't even live in the same continent, so the best I can offer him his two months a year? Doesn’t sound like a great deal to me, but what do I know.

I haven't even decided about the summer, if I will try to see him again or not. I really want to, but I don't really think anything good will come out of it, so it might just be a lose lose situation. I have enough time to think about it and see what the day will bring and how I will feel as time goes by.

For now I have my thoughts and memories and all the days when I just really miss being with someone like that same guy I met in the summer. I'm sure it will happen again; in the meanwhile it just hurts.

Enjoy your week my friends…

A List - New York

Well, what can I say? we have been working hard so far, the team looks cool and so are the guys and the coaches. I'm feeling my muscles everyday and spend most of the time either at the gym or at home, but i'm feeling good about it.

However, the main thing this week has been finding and watching the show : A-List New York, if some of you haven't heard of it, well it's a reality show about a group of gay guys in NYC.

I usually don't watch reality shows, but for some reason I have started to watch this and I have watched the whole first season (9 episodes) in two days and i'm moving on to season two, classy ah?

For those of you watching, I will give you a short opinion of the guys in the show, I would be happy to hear your thoughts about it.

Derek - don't know why, but I kind of like him, even though he is a little bitchy and dramatic as are most of the guys on the show, he still is kind of cute, with the boyish look, a look that I have to admit I really like in general, he is not bad, but not sure a guy I would go out with.

Austin - Well, look ways, Liked him in his old version, now he is mostly fat (compared to the way he was three years ago) and annoying, but really annoying. I like his kind of guys, but guess I like the old him. His marriage is so fake that it's amazing, looks like he just cares about Reichan and nothing else, besides the fact that he comes off like a big asshole who just feels good making problems for others.

Reichan - Haven't heard of him until this show, even though he is supposed to be well known. He is a good looking guy and seems nice also, not my type, but all together he seems more calm and mature than most guys on the show. Besides the fact that he always has to have someone with him.

Ryan - Usually I have a kind of problem with the flamboyant types, and he is one of them, but besides him wanting to hear a little gossip, he seems like a good guy and someone that cares about others. Also a successful guy and a good friend and a caring person. I'm happy that I can feel good about him, makes me feel better with the gay in me.

T.J - funny kid, not really my type and a lithe annoying, but seems like a easy going and a guy that basically says what he thinks and acts like he wants, which is something to always respect, again, bothers me a little sometimes, but all together harmless.

Rodney - WOW, can someone teach him english? I can't stand his accent and he is annoying all the time, with the broken up english, don't know why but he really gets to me. I mean, it has to be a reason, I just don't really know it yet.

I also have to admit that i'm jealous sometimes when they show one of the guys or someone else in a relationship, for some reason since I started watching it, I have flashbacks and I think about the guy I met in the summer. I started to miss him and I wish I could see him or talk to him, but I know it's not going to be healthy or get me anywhere.

I hope that some of you out there are watching this show, if you are, I would really want to hear what you think. I know it's trashy and stupid, but i'm addicted to this show. So lets hear you, if you got something to say.

Hope everyone has some plans for the weekend, enjoy!!

Wondering

Hey everyone.

Hope you are all enjoying the summer, even though I'm sure that the hot wave across the U.S.A isn't helping anyone at the moment.

As for me, getting ready for the season, spending a lot of my time at the gym with the weights and the other half on the court working on my game. I like this time when I can work on things I don't get to do during the season, but it's also a lot of work and not an easy time to get prepared for the upcoming season.

In around a month or so I will be joining my team and starting the pre season, which usually is mostly un related to basketball. Working more on the psychical aspects, working on our shape and on our athletic skills, got to hate that, and boy do I hate that. Always a terrible feeling to run and work and practice without a ball and without the baskets, but just on other departments of the game. Of course it's a must, but no one said that I can't complain right?

As for the contract, I got more or less what I wanted, as I said before, it's not the same money that they have in the N.B.A, but I'm happy with what I signed for and it's for sure more than I expected to make when I just started playing as a kid. So now there is only the basketball part left.

Before that, I wanted to talk about something else, I'm going back to the guy I wrote you about, the guy that I spent my vacation with this summer. For the first time I felt really great about everything, but since I got back it's just been a whole bad month or so, not that I don't behave the same or do the same things I did before. It's just that I think about him all the time, at least when I'm alone with myself, listening to music or just thinking.

I know I can't do anything and I know that I went through this with other guys, guys who weren't worthy of my hearts and thoughts, unlike this guy who is worthy of everything. Usually after a week or two those other guys were gone in my head also, but this isn't the case, it doesn't get any better, it just hurts all the time.

We talked one or twice after I got back and I even started thinking about going back to see him again, but once we started talking about it, I started to realize that it's not something fair to do, at least not to him. Even if I did go, it would be for ten days or so and in the end we would be in the same place, sad to leave and not being able to do anything about it.

It's not like I could go for a month or two and see what happens, so why just hurt him more by seeing him and then leaving him. We stopped talking after a week or so, I emailed him my thoughts and feelings and that was about it, but there isn't a day when I don't look at his number and want to dial it, look at his facebook page and want to message him or just look at the picture and miss holding him.

I know there is nothing to do and I just want the time to pass, it doesn't matter that I'm a closeted man, it's just that I play basketball and we don't live in the same continent, I can't bring him over with me, even if I was out, cause he has his own career and life. I can't join him because I can't give up my career, it's just a lose lose situation with no solution to it, at least not one that I was able to think about.

We promised each other to stay in touch, but it just hurts too much and it's not happening, so I guess sometimes when life gives you lemons, you can't make lemonade. Which basically just means that sometimes life sucks and as I wrote him : "In a perfect world I could stick around and see what happens, but sadly enough life is far from perfect.

I'm still happy I met him, even though It brings me a lot of pain and bad days also, that's part of life, and as one of my favorite songs says :


Picture perfect memories
Scattered all around the floor
Reaching for the phone 'cause
I can't fight it anymore

And I wonder if I
Ever cross your mind
For me it happens all the time

It's a quarter after one
I'm all alone
And I need you now
Said I wouldn't call
But I've lost all control
And I need you now

And I don't know how
I can do without
I just need you now

Another shot of whiskey
Can't stop looking at the door
Wishing you'd come sweeping
In the way you did before

And I wonder if I
Ever cross your mind
For me it happens all the time

It's a quarter after one
I'm a little drunk
And I need you now
Said I wouldn't call
But I've lost all control
And I need you now

And I don't know how
I can do without
I just need you now

Whoa, whoa
Guess I'd rather hurt
Than feel nothing at all

It's a quarter after one
I'm all alone
And I need you now
And I said I wouldn't call
But I'm a little drunk
And I need you now

And I don't know how
I can do without
I just need you now
I just need you now

Oh baby, I need you now

Middle Of The Summer - Part 3

After waking up the next morning I just walked around a little, took myself to a movie and just waited for the day to complete it's natural course.

I was about to go home in three days and I felt like those three days couldn't come any faster, it was such a big disappointment to me, not as much because of this specific person, but more because it was the first time I felt different.

I was so happy to find out that I'm capable of something like that and that not all the guys I find myself attracted to are doomed to be assholes, and all that blow up in my face after those last couple of days.

That night I decided to go back to the bar I met him in, just to have a drink, try to enjoy myself, knowing that this wouldn't happen anytime soon, or to be more specific, not in the next year at least.

After around an hour, I picked up a drink and leaned back on the wall and was just thinking. Suddenly I saw him come in, the second I saw him I started to feel not so hot. He saw me and came straight up to me, he told me that he knows I'm really mad, and I asked him if we could go outside and talk.

We ended up sitting on the stairs of a house near the bar. I told him more or less what I wrote here just a couple of paragraphs ago and that I just was really disappointed and that I deserved at least to hear from him, even if he decided that it's enough.

He was cute as always and said some things that I couldn't argue with, besides apologizing and saying that he was been selfish, he said that we spent a lot of time together, that we are both getting attached and he knew I was going to leave him in less then a week and probably never see him again and he didn't want to get hurt any more then he already will just by me leaving.

I know it's also selfish on my part, because this has no future and I'm just coming to have fun and enjoy myself and move on, so I could completely understand him. I got emotional in that conversation, and I think that was around the first time that I knew I had feelings for someone who was a good guy and good to me.

We decided to spend the last couple of days together and we did, he still made an effort, even though things did change after everything that happened, but he did try, but at that point it was just a feeling that he is trying to be with me, but worrying about not getting hurt at the same time. He still came after work and still spent a couple of nights.

After that talk I even showed some PDA with him, walking to my hotel, nothing huge, but something I hadn't done before.

He didn't want to stay and spend that last night with me, and I understood. I saw he was feeling it was getting to be too much and I was feeling just the same. It was a really sad goodbye and a real emotional one for me, not in the sense that I showed it, but I was just feeling a lot of emotions inside and so was he.

It was hard for him to leave and it was hard for me to let him go, we decided that we would stay in touch and maybe see each other again, We even had a long talk before I got on the plane to go home.

Since I got home it's been difficult for me, I know we can't be in touch. I want to, but it hurts me, I'm happy when we talk, but after that I really miss him and I have to understand his situation. He can and needs to meet other guys and move on with his life and me calling or wanting to be in touch would just make that unfair towards him.

So as much as it hurts me, we stopped being in touch. If i'm being honest, it's one of the most difficult things I had to deal with, I really really miss him and I have been quite down since I got back home.

I know he really liked me and I felt and feel the same, but it doesn't matter, cause no matter how I try to spin it, there is no way we can spend more than a couple of weeks a year together, at best, and that surely isn't fair for him.

I have been trying to put all of myself into the basketball and into getting ready for the next season. When I don't, I think about him and think about all of the situation and that it was the first time I actually had something meaningful with a special guy, even if it was short, it was the first time it meant something both for me and for the other guy.

I guess life goes on and eventually I will move on, not too much I can do anyhow, but in all of this, even though i'm feeling like shit now, I know I can feel great about the change in me and my ability to meet guys who deserve me and I deserve him. I haven't figured out yet if all this emotion is because of just him, or because of everything that happened and the knowledge that i'm not doomed and good times my still be waiting for me.

So that's my summer story, I couldn't hold it in for two more months, so I decided to share, I will be happy to hear anything you have to say and enjoy the rest of your summer.

P.S - Almost forgot, Great news about NY and gay marriage, I was so happy, I followed it very closely and read a lot about that matter. Not sure I will get married there, but so happy for those who want to do it and never got the chance until now.

It rocks!!!!!!

Middle Of The Summer - Part 1

Well, it wasn't planned or anything, as always didn't think about writing will I'm at home and not during season time, but had to share with you a little of my summer. To be honest, there aren't too many people I can tell this to, so I guess you are the chosen ones.

First of all, I will just say that i'm close to signing the deal I wanted and told you about, it will happen in the next ten days, if nothing surprising will happen. I feel great about it and about the opportunity that has been given to me, but that's not what i'm here for.

Writing this now will probably take some of the ideas I had for the beginning of the season, but I'm sure I will find something else to write about.

As any year in the last few years, after the season is over and before I sit back at home resting and getting ready for the new season I went on my yearly vacation.

I got in on a Monday evening, I was tired, but decided to go out anyway, it was nice, always nice after such a long time. I had a drink and danced a little, not too much, but just a little bit, again, it's so fun after such a long time that I didn't see a reason to wait too long.

I actually saw a nice looking guy dancing near me. I decided not to make a move and just to see how things play out, after a while he came up to me and we started talking and dancing, he was a nice and good looking guy and it was a great way to start my vacation, so I defiantly felt great after arriving there.

The next night I went out, had fun, danced and just relaxed, I got hit on, but there was no one I really liked so I didn't see any reason to go back to my hotel just for the sake of it, so I just grabbed some junk food on the way back and went to my hotel.

On my third night out I went to a nice local bar that I found, was small and crowded but with my kind of music, so it was great. After an hour or so, I saw a cute looking guy, he passed by me and stopped and looked at me and I did the same, but since I really had to use the bathroom I just smiled and stayed in the same place I was.

After 20 minutes or something like this he walked next to me and stopped to talk, we were talking about why none of us stopped to talk before, nothing major, was just some small talk, he was really cute, after a while we decided to leave together.

My hotel wasn't to far from the bar, didn't know that before, but that was nice to find out. He stayed the night and left for work in the morning, I took his number, I got the feeling he didn't think I would call, but I did, and from there on, a roller coaster started.

Since I don't want to write such a long post, I will just split it up to a couple of parts and you can decide when to read.

Go With The Flow

Well, first of all I want to thank all those who left a comment or emailed me, it's always a great pleasure to hear other people sharing the thoughts and wishes they have. Along with all the nice complements and kind words that always put a smile on my face, I will remember it when I start writing a book :)

I can say that while I'm sitting down and writing this post I have no idea where it's headed and I don't really have any topic on my mind, so I will just go with what over comes out.

I already mentioned that like the NBA and most leagues around the world we are slowly heading to the deciding stages of the season, and it's always a fun time. like any other competitive sports there is a reason they always say you are as good as your last game, in this case maybe it's not a game, but it's a period of time and we are heading there.

The later parts of the season usually show a team's true character, cause suddenly the pressure is much bigger and everyone around , of course usually the players are the one who show it the most.

The players begin to be nervous and under pressure because everyone wants to bring achievements to his team and be known as a player that can contribute in the money time.

Through the years I slowly found out that each one deals with things differently, some show the same ability and behave the same, some find it hard and either close themselves out or just don't play the same level of basketball they used to, and of course there are some who raise and shine at the money time, I guess a guy by the name of Michael Jordan is a good example :). Guess it would be up to other people to say what kind of a player I am, so i'm sure to ask them for an answer, I will just tell them I need it for my blog,lol.

Leaving basketball aside, I'm starting to get excited about the yearly vacation, there is still time to go and there is still things that need to be decided, but just the thought of it gets me excited.

I'm already waiting for the first party I go out to, it's kind of the opening of summer, or as I described it, my 10 days of letting the other person in me have it's due time.

I'm waiting just to step in a pub, get a drink and sit back and enjoy looking at other guys, dance, get drunk or whatever I feel like, without needing to think basketball or to care if anyone is looking or if anyone knows who I am. Just to relax and take a load off after a long time that I played nice :).

Like I said before, since we are headed to the last period of the season, I guess it's always fun to enjoy the most action filled couple of months before I go on vacation, it's just lets me put all I got in this period and knowing that my "prize" is waiting just around the corner.

Not forgetting the gay side of this blog, I had a discussion about the Ohio state coach interview and his acceptance of gays, I don't remember if I mentioned this, while I appreciate what he had to say, I know that there are a lot of coaches out there who think differently and for them gays shouldn't be involved in sports or it least not on their team.

If you take a look at NBA coaches, just as an example of course, most of them used to be players, just like me and just like others, so I guess they come from the same back round and same homophobic locker rooms and natural responses of a lot of athletes.

I'm not saying that all NBA or sport coaches are homophobic, I'm sure that a lot wouldn't mind, I'm just saying that there are a lot of opinions also on this subject. It might be a subject worth a discussion, I still remember some of the comments about John Amechi coming out, for example Tim Hardaway and likes, for me those are just primitive and homophobic people, but unfortunately there are a lot of them.

Finishing off with a couple of sentences from a nice quite song :

It's like I've waited my whole life for this one night
It's gonna be me you and the dance floor
'cause we've only got one night (one night)
Double your pleasure
Double your fun and dance
Forever (ever, ever)

Maybe instead of one night I should write down ten :)