Gay Bars in NashTrash

So I sat down, I ate dinner, I had one glass of wine (two beer queer here), and instead of finishing my apartment, I've decided to write the following post:

I only feel comfortable hitting on a guy in a gay bar. This is the south. Any gay vibe (and I have the worst gaydar there ever was) I get from a gay in a non-gay setting, say a Barnes and Noble, he could be closeted with a wife and 2.4 kids. I say hello, and he runs away screaming. Or you get someone who's so threatened by a simple hello, how are ya, that they punch your lights out.

So no, I don't hit on anyone outside of a gay context. But here's the rub: I don't like any of the guys that I've seen/met in our gay bars.

Our major gay bar is Tribe, a Manhattan style place. I actually like Tribe. There's a bartender there who gives me good drinks, usually at a discounted price, and I can sit on a couch, if it's not too crowded. Alcohol + couch = happy Chris. But here's what I've noticed people watching (and all I do is people watch when I'm at bars):

All the guys come in in cliques or pairs, usually with the same styled hair and jeans. They get their drink, they bop along to Rhianna, and they stare at others in the bar, but nobody talks to anyone outside of their clique. They all just.....stare, as if marking their prey. Then they all go next door to the dance club called Play, and that's apparently where all the hookups/phone numbers are exchanged...on the loud dance floor or in the bathroom stall.

And that.....really isn't for me. But there really isn't another place for single gay men to go in Nashville. I joined a gay runner's group...they're all in their 50's. I figured the gay reading group would be the same, plus sucky gay coming out fiction. (Honestly, does any gay fiction get passed coming out in high school/college and explore other aspects of life and story and plot?)

It feels like every gay guy who came out got a hand book describing what I like to call "The Homo Telepathic Broadband System." It seems that at these bars, there's communication going on, but just like Morse Code, I don't know how to read it. I certainly don't know how to use it to my advantage. So inevitably, I feel like a dunce because everyone seems to be in on the gag, but me. So I drink my drink, I bob my head to some song I can't stand, and then I leave.

So where does someone like me, someone who isn't comfortable yelling his mini life story over insanely loud music, someone who doesn't use the dance floor to seduce and arouse, someone who doesn't like sleazy bathroom stall hand jobs with strangers....

......where does someone like that meet somebody in this town?