Protestin' Too Much
Once I was at a bar (fine, a kava bar) on Halloween. At the next table, someone was talking about writing novels and programming. I was at that time a professional programmer, and remain a big fan of writing novels. I wanted badly to meet this person.
Problem: my costume was totally insane and in line with my wife's preferences for my attire (that is to say, borderline pornographic). Additional problem: the person at the next table was a pretty girl.
Solution: I am married! Thus I approached in an extremely married way. Introduce myself semi-formally with an appeal to our common interests having overheard her, but within a few sentences, before she wastes cycles on "am I being hit on," make clear "organically" that I am here with my wife.
I use techniques like this a lot. It's not disingenuous; I really did want to make friends and I really wasn't hitting on her, and the whole thing went well. But I do feel a sort of breath-fogging-up-the-window wistfulness about the strategy of it all. It's one thing not to have sexual motive. All well and good. But it's another thing to present myself as fundamentally, nigh-ontologically unavailable. To be the gender Someone's Husband (and now, as another handy option, though it wasn't yet then, Someone's Dad).
To be clear, in my younger, single days I could and did approach people to ask them out, or flirt, or whatever. I don't have the form of scrupulosity where I'm terrified of ever displaying attraction, in principle. But there's something about attraction, dating, whatever, that just spreads like a overwhelming fungus, choking everything else out in a thick haze of plausible deniability. It's a fun dance! But if you don't opt out pretty hard, it's easy to opt in, to be pulled into a nebulous field of eros particles. It's not so much that I don't like that; I can like that plenty! But I also like other things, and once the particles get going they command so very much attention.
Dating/sex is the main version of this dynamic, but there are others. Like, I want to make sure I never focus unduly on ways my friends are socially powerful or could give me leverage for this that or the other. If my friend lives with a minor celebrity who I admire, I never ever want to ask anything about the celebrity, lest I seem to be in it for that. Again, not disingenuous! I really am not in it for that. But I wish to be totally above reproach.
There's something too effortful about all of this. I should probably just flirt and gawk and network. But I guess in defense of the part of me that wants to hold something back, to not connect in too intense or unfiltered a way, I do believe there's a shortage of Boringly Safe people, people who simply move around in the environment predictably shying away from boundaries with a ten foot pole. A person you can go to and it's gonna be Fine. I think it's possible to be a more authentic and pleasure seeking and vibey version of myself, while retaining this property. But I don't want to trade off hard between the two!