Love and Sandwiches

I love everyone. And I love that I love everyone. I pride myself on my open-mindedness almost as much as my ability to slap da bass in a dirty-song band.

When my fraternity brother came out of the closet about ten years ago, I reacted by hugging him and telling him, “Mazel Tov!” Though I found out a moment later that’s not really something he considered congrats-worthy, I was still pretty impressed with how easily I accepted the news. It was a true test of my homophobia, and I passed with rainbow colors.

I guess it’s one of the reasons I moved to Los Angeles in the first place: to be in a wonderfully diverse community. I live here because I love everyone, and because most everyone here seems to love me. We feed off that love to create a more beautiful world. 

But when you throw around a word like love as easily as I do, you’re liable to get yourself in trouble. Because I also love Chic-fil-A. And apparently, from what I read in the New York Times, Chic-fil-A doesn’t love gays.

Again, I’m not just throwing that word around. I fucking love Chic-fil-A. Like when I go there, I don’t take anything to read, as I normally would, because I like to look at my food and ponder its glory as I chew.

Sometimes, on days it’s prepared just right, I’ll even have a little love talk with my sandwich. I’ll say, “How’d you get to be so good?” And she’ll say nothing at all. Looking plump and tender and moist.

And I’ll say, “You know, you make me want to be a better man.” And she’ll just sit there, steaming. And for a minute, I’ll believe there may be such a thing as a Mormon higher power.

Then I’ll give her a look that says, “Let’s go.” And I’ll chew my bite, nice n’ slow.

So you see, it’s a bit of a love affair. It’s one of my longest-standing relationships. And here I am, caught in a vicious love triangle. Because, I also love gays. So does my love for Chic-fil-A prevent me from truly loving my gay friends? Do I really have to choose?