Even the Dewey Decimal system can’t compartmentalize love and sex the way men can.

I’m the perfect example. I always seem to be stuck screwing guys I don’t want to date and dating the guys I don’t want to screw.

Like this guy I met playing volleyball. We went up to block a shot and we both fell down. We had a “Love Boat” moment when I grabbed his hand to help him up. There were wedding platters in his eyes. There were penises in mine.

So we go on a date. Or rather, he went on a date. I went on a hunt. After dinner, we relaxed on my couch. My hands, looking for warmer weather, migrated south.

“I don’t do that on the first date,” he said, putting my hands back where they belonged.

“How about on your last?” I asked, putting my hands back where they didn’t belong.

I was kidding. Sort of. I couldn’t help myself. The guy was my type the way Arial font is The New Yorker magazine’s type — easy on the eyes, making you want to finger the whole thing till you get to the end.

Our dating rules didn’t match. His was basically “Three Dates and You’re In.” Mine was basically, “Three Dates and You’re Out.”

I was so unfair to him, but once your inner pig comes out it’s hard to coax it back in. “Let’s do something, dinner, a movie,” he’d say.

“I can’t really do anything until eleven o’clock,” I’d tell him.

“Well, you can’t do anything at eleven o’clock at night on a weekday except have sex and go to sleep,” he’d say.

“Exactly,” I’d say to myself.

And so, whenever he asked me out he’d hear a knock on his door around eleven.

The truth was that I didn’t really want to have dinner or do romantic things with this guy. I was obsessed with his body, not his mind.

Then there’s the other side — the guys you want to date but not screw. They’re the worst. Because they make you realize what a nut case you are.

Like this guy, “Ted.” I loved everything about this guy except his body. I tried to do the chick thing. You know, screw a guy even though you’re not physically attracted to them because they’re kind and smart and loving and that’s what you want in your life, so what’s a few minutes of terror.

Well, it just didn’t take. I tried but I just couldn’t do it. I even invoked the “Three Date Rule” to buy myself some time, to let my emotional attraction translate into a sexual attraction.

We did have sex once, but only once. I don’t know how women do it, but if I’m not attracted to a guy physically I can’t have sex with them no matter how attracted I am to them emotionally.

I’m not the only one. Most gay men I know are like that, too. That’s probably a major reason so many of us are single for so long. If we could direct our sexual desire from physical asses to emotional assets we’d lead more fulfilled lives.

But how do we do it? Are there bio-psychologists out there who can re-wire us? I doubt it. Not without going through a lot of blown fuses and the occasional electrocution.

The common sense answer is to find guys you want to date AND screw. Easier said than done. The qualities we look for in guys we want to date usually aren’t found in the guys we want to screw. You know, like the ability to use verbs in a sentence.

I’ve spent my share of time in bars. I’ve never overheard anyone say, “Look at the morals on that stud. I bet he’s loyal as shit.”

I’ve never heard anyone say, “You know, I’d really like to open myself up emotionally to the dick-dancer in the middle cage. He seems like a good listener.”

Love and sex. Sex and love. They’re like ships passing in the night. Mostly because the male pier insists it only has room for one or the other.

Sometimes the ships do run into each other, however. And for a few glorious moments you experience something other than your neurotic self.

If you’re lucky, the moments turn into weeks, the weeks into months and the months into years. Then the problem goes from how you get the ships to run into each other to how you stop them from sinking.