How to Keep a Guy (for at least 10 days)

Catching up on some recent movies I missed, I rented How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days starring the lovely Kate Hudson and the lovelier Matthew McConaughy. Even if you haven't seen it, you're probably familiar with the plot. Hudson, a "how to" columnist with a popular women's magazine, dates ad agency hunk McConaughy with one objective: to drive him away then write an article about what NOT to do when smitten with a guy.

Since it's a romantic comedy, McConaughy must have a surprise up his well-tailored sleeve, too, and he does: he's accepted a challenge to make a woman fall hopelessly in love with him in the same period. Of course, no matter how dishonest the scheme that brought them together, he falls for her and she falls for him. In the end, all is well, and the world keeps spinning, powered by love, baby, nothin' but love.

In the real world where most of us struggle through life without the aid of a Hollywood screenwriter, love is more complex, especially for gay guys. Finding a man you want to keep for more than 10 days is a challenge, and keeping the man you want can be equally difficult. There's a catch-22 quality to much of the available advice: Act too needy and he'll run for fear of being smothered. Act too cool and he'll flee for fear that you don't love him. But some advice is so practical, it can't go wrong. So, for my fellow gay guys hoping to keep a guy for at least 10 days, I offer the following pointers:

Change Your Underwear: Whether you're a butch in briefs or a fem who favors women's panties, you should have a fresh, clean pair to slip into everyday. Unless your man has a fetish for undergarments that reek of your perspiration and other bodily fluids, he'll likely bypass the headache he claims to have when he's not in the mood and feign an inoperable brain tumor instead. If you expect him to put his mouth on your genitals, and if he loves you he'll want to do that, you want that area to always be as inviting as possible. Keep it clean, and keep the garments that cover them clean as well.

Be Tidy: One of the most popular stereotypes about gay guys is that we're impeccably neat, always fluttering about with feather dusters to wage war against the slightest sign of untidiness. Some of us are exactly like that, but many gay men are interchangeable with the heterosexual slob in need of a gay makeover on Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. Again, unless your man has a fetish for dirty socks and achieves a transcendental bliss from sniffing them, wash them and tuck them away in a drawer. Don't leave them scattered throughout your house or apartment unless you're performing a striptease as a prelude to lovemaking. Keep crumbs off the table and especially off the bed. No man wants to be distracted from his orgasm by the piercing, painful remnant of the peanut butter cracker you ate in bed the night before when your only companion was a rerun of "The Golden Girls." And don't let dirty dishes pile up in the sink. Your guy may think you're expecting him to wash them for you. If he aspires to be a domestic goddess, perhaps he will, but don't make assumptions so early in the relationship.

Be Patient: It's your first date and you've been lucky enough to bring him home. Instead of chit-chat or nibbling on his earlobes, you bring out the photo album. As you show him snapshots of everything from you kindergarten graduation party to relatives so distant they might be Adam and Eve, he may feel a chill, the kind inspired by a spooky ghost story. He starts to sense that there is no future with you, only a past sealed beneath the plastic pages of your Kodachrome cemetery. Not only are you bringing him too deeply into your life at a time when you're still getting acquainted, you may be depressing him with all your memories of bygone days that are never to return. Focus on him - and you - and the present. Only when it's clear the two of you have a future together should you start to share your past.

Don't Stagnate: If you've only recently come out, it's understandable that your homosexuality will dominate your life. It will ALWAYS dominate your life, but don't think that the only thing you need to have in common with the men you find attractive is your sexual orientation. Being gay is great. But what else are you? A movie fan? A history buff? A stamp collector? A political activist? Even if he doesn't share your interests, if he finds your interests interesting, the more interested he'll be in sticking around.

If you follow the above advice, I can't guarantee that you still won't lose a guy in 10 day, but the 10 days that you do have him will likely be ones to remember with a smile. Even if he's not the man you want to spend your life with, he may know the guy who is. Don't blow your references. Then again, that may be the surest way to keep him around.

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