Blendship (or Meeting Your Boyfriend's Friends is an Awful Lot Like Jumping into a Game of Double Dutch

Saturday night, after a week of intense needling and prodding (is that redundant?), John introduced us to Mr. Wonderful (aka Justin). I'll be perfectly honest when i say that i was terribly nervous meeting him (as i always am, whenever i meet a friend's new beau). there's always that worry that you'll take an instantaneous dislike to them, despite your friend's infatuation, prompting you to worry what to tell your friend (is there a nice way to tell them that they're dating a complete schlemiel?) or (more worrisome, at least for me) vice versa (is there anything worse than meeting your boyfriend's nearest and dearest and wondering how they could ever spend more than 15 minutes with them?).

let me digress by allaying your fears. the former was definitely not the case. i found Justin to be just as fantastic as John had described him; more so in fact. the latter, however, remains to be seen. anyway, back to the story...

we met up at a chinese restaurant and had a wonderful meal; y'all know how i love my Chinese food. he definitely proved himself to be incredibly intelligent, witty and clever, albeit a bit quiet. there was really nothing to dislike about him and talking with him really made me see how different (read: complimentary) he is from John; they reminded me of Stephen and I (similar, but different enough to keep the other interested). we then went back to our place for coffee, dessert and board games. you can really learn alot about someone during an intense game of Scattergories or Taboo. it was the latter, though that really made me think.

we played 2 rounds: Stephen and I vs Justin and John. they did well, but we kicked ass; the more ass we kicked, the more frustrated Justin seemed to get. the 2nd round we switched partners, John and Stephen vs Justin and I. this is where it got really interesting. Taboo is one of those games where you either really have to know how your partner thinks, or have enough shared history to be able to invoke points of reference that fall outside the things written on the card (the taboo words). we had fun, but Justin and i got our asses handed to us.

here's the thing...john and i think so much alike and share so much history and reference points ("put it in your ____ Mrs. Mudge" or "the name of that drag queen who did Barracuda")that when we're a team, it's scary how well we do. after 4 years, Stephen and i think so differently, but have so many personal points of reference and history("the name of that girl who gave you the Mickey pillow" or "that place where you ordered the clam strips") that there's no way we wouldn't do well. i was so glad, though that justin did as well as he did. there's little shared history (at least for he and john), but he's really good at reading people and determining the way they think. if i was him i would've gone nuts (since i'm terrible at relating to people who think differently than i do).

i'll be honest, too, being in the same room with john and i enough to drive anyone nuts. when we're together, it's like the John and David Show (it's a spin-off of the David and Jenn Show which is still running and the Jon and David show which got cancelled in the late '90's). like most friends who've known each other for a long time, it's a constant volley of memories, movie quotes, and song lyrics. trying to jump into that would be like trying to hop an express A train that's still moving. stephen once told me that when the two of us are together, he gets dizzy. i'm not surprised that he and Justin seemed to hit it off so well, or that they spent quite a while chatting. he struck up a similar rapport with Jenn's husband Brian when they were introduced and you can frequently find the two of them chatting away, while Jenn and i natter on, blissfully delirious in our own world.

john has always said that if we weren't "us" we'd hate us; the same can be said for the "us" of Jenn and i. we're alot to take. i give our boyfriends/husbands/lovers alot of credit; to paraphrase a sign on most desks in corporate america: you don't have to be crazy to love us, but it helps.

after spending almost 5 hours with Justin, though, i can tell that he's going to be one of "us" and it won't take that long to get there. Stephen and i will still kick their asses at Taboo, though.