How To Find the Right Player Two

LoveFAQ is a weekly advice column for geeks, by geeks about love, life and maxing out your romance meter. Got questions for LoveFAQs? Send them to advice@escapistmag.com.

Dear Love FAQ,

I have a nice and complicated situation for you. I am a bi girl, although I'm mostly into girls. I'm also trans (most of the way through my transition). I'm also a pretty big geek.

Now I have a life outside my geekyness. I study, I work hard, I play music. But I often find it hard to talk to people I don't know without resorting to geeky things. Generally, this doesn't really work too well when talking to girls I like. There's already a barrier there, with me being trans and all; but add on the geek awkwardness, and it just gets to the point where I don't even bother.

Any advice you could give?

Thanks,
The Trans Geek

Dear Trans Geek,

You know what toasts my heart-cockles about your letter? It's that the most complicating factor in your love life isn't the fact you're bi, or even trans. It's that you talk too much about Star Wars.

It gets better, indeed.

These days, being a geek isn't that much of a dating impediment. Geek is chic: Just look at the popularity of comic book movies or The Lord of the Rings. Or, hell, the phenomenon that is Nathan Fillion.

But what does make dating difficult is isolation. So surround yourself with the right people, those who get where you're coming from. Look for LGBT campus or community groups; seek out queer-friendly WoW guilds and gaming forums. (And add the fantastic Gay Gamer to your bookmarks. Right now.)

Suss out MTFs, bi ladies, and other queer folk who you can relate to, who understand what you're going through. You need that support network of likeminded people to rely on and to connect you to others; after all, you never know who will know someone who knows someone who ends up being the love of your life.

Meanwhile, if you're not having any success in face-to-face random encounters, give online dating a whirl. The advantage there is that you can cut through some of the mating dance BS and immediately zero in on gals interested in dating a trans girl.

The drawback, of course, is that you also have a higher chance of attracting tranny-chasing creepers who can't see past their fetish. But hey, if dating were easy, I'd be out of a job.

Finally, remember: If you chat up a girl and it doesn't go anywhere, then it just wasn't meant to be. Don't get bent out of shape over it. You (and your scale-model of the Millennium Falcon) are still fab. Just keep trying.

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