Help! I'm just not a very good gay.

I'm not very good at this homosexuality thing. I don't mean the physical aspect, I'm pretty sure what goes where and how long it's supposed to stay there until things start going red. Like a lot of gay guys I spent quite a bit of time watching videos that show exactly how it's done, in graphic detail. I guess I'm also an ok boyfriend when I've had the chance (twice in 28 years - in case you asked), I'm caring, attentive, generally thoughtful and considerate when I'm with someone and, to be honest, I've been treated ok.

It's the bit that comes before the boyfriend bit I have trouble with. I'm totally clueless when it comes to finding who's gay, deciding if I like them and then making a move.

Generally speaking, unless they are the kind of gay guy who you can tell from the next planet over is gay I generally have difficulty in figuring it out. The real kicker is that by the time I do find out they've usually partnered up or friend-zoned me int romantic oblivion. If it were a sitcom, I always end up as the chubby sexless sidekick rather than the star. I've spent too much of my quickly running-out romantic and sexual prime lusting after straight boys, partnered boys and my friends only to be shot down either directly or by them finding someone. I'm sick and tired of it... a theme we'll return to in a sec.

Then there's the figuring out if I like them. From the narrow pool of gay guys I've ever met and whose league I'm in, there are so many red-lines. I don't say this to brag about high standards or excuse pickiness, I'm pointing out that it's a problem. Recently, I've been thinking and all my red lines (being fat, being too nice etc) are all things I am. Essentially, I want someone who isn't me and when I meet someone who reminds me at all of myself, I run... and fast.

So, with the pool narrowed to guys who don't remind me of my own physical appearance/personality (for what the latter matters) and who I know are gay there comes the worst bit. Actually plucking up the courage to go ahead and talk to them and making my intentions known. Fucking terrifying. Seriously, I don't know how to do it. Everyone around me makes it look so easy. All the guys in the bars, smiling at each other, kissing, going home for one unbelievable night of please. The chilled, slim, toned beautiful young men who walk into the bar and with one blink have all of us pathetic losers mesmerised, who will settle down but not quite yet...because they have that choice. I guess I am a little jealous of how easy everyone (my two married exes in particular) have had it. The've come out, they've fucked around, dated, fucked around some more, done the multiple partners and then swapped the love, rings and eternal bliss. I've had none of it...not because I'm not trying to, because I can't.

I'm scared of two things. The first is what I'm missing out on by being such a social muppet. Even if (and it's a big if) I end up 1/10th as happy as everyone around me seems to be with their boyfriends and husbands then I'll still have missed out on my twenties - the best decade of my life, supposedly. When I look back I won't have those experience to look back on, to build on and become a better person with. I'll have missed out and there will be a new generation doing what I should have been doing. The promiscuity opportunity will have passed me by.

The second is what happens down the line. I don't want to end up being that guy with the silver earring, ill-fitted t-shirt far too young for my advancing years and the bottle full of unused viagra sitting beside my bed which hasn't seen anyone else in it for years. I'm scared that I'm going to stay where I am, in this sexless, loveless, gay outcast, position until I don't see another morning. Fuck it's bleak.

I thought that when I came out it would get better, I thought that when I fell in love for the first time it was sorted, on the rare occasions I do get laid (fucking rarely, if you'll pardon the pun) I think it's going to be fine. I've bene wrong every time and I guess I've just given up hope of being any good at this homosexuality thing. I keep thinking it'll get better but I'm done thinking that now. It's boring and I get hurt too much. I was crap at pretending to be straight and I'm utterly terrible at being gay.

Not sure what I'm looking for here, maybe advice, maybe just a place to vent so I can get up tomorrow. Anyway, if you made it here, thanks for listening. Who knows, it might work out. I can but hope.