You’re right about the small dating pool. It’s incredibly small where I live, as most of the gay men my age move to Dublin, which is too expensive to live in. I will admit, I have high standards, but it would be nice if there were more gay and bisexual men in my town and we had a place just for us to interact with each other. Ironically, my sister has a lot of gay male friends, but they’re not the kinds of guys I’d be into. But some homosexuals find love later in life, so it can happen eventually. A few years ago the deputy principal at my secondary school came out as gay and married his husband. Before he came out, he was just a single man, who devoted his time to running the school and running study centres in the evenings and weekends where we did our homework or studied for exams. After he came out, he started to get more free time for himself, but he was still devoted to his school and he even postponed retirement when the pandemic hit.

And yes, it’s better to have friends based on interests and personality. All of my friends are straight, but they’re cool. Straight men aren’t interested in me so I don’t have to impress them, and they understand what it’s like to be male, and straight women understand what it’s like to find men attractive and you don’t crush on them. Now, there is the risk of developing feelings for a straight friend, but it helps that most of my straight male friends don’t look like the kind of guys I want to date. Don’t get me wrong, my friends are good looking, but I like men who are bald or have very short hair, and my male friends have curly hair, medium length hair, or black hair, which I’m not into. Another trick I use is to think of these men as my brothers, which helps a lot.