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Top 12 Public Penises of Central America

November 15, 2014, 5:30 am
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I've never been to Mexico, except a few times to Tijuana, which hardly counts.  People keep inviting me to the gay resorts of Cabo San Lucas and Mazatlan, but I want to see the archaeological sites; the Aztec ruins, the Mayan pyramids, the gate at Teotihuacan that looks like a portal to another dimension.

And, of course, the beefcake.

Here are the top public penises of Mexico and Central America.










1. In Mexico City, these buffed Aztecs are founding Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital and the largest city in North America  during the 15th century (10 time the size of London at the time).










2. Gaspar Yanga, an African slave who led a revolt against the Spanish in 1570, is memorialized in this statue in Veracruz.
















3. Moving south to Guatemala, the town of Livingston features an incongruously neoclassical Dios de la Mar (God of the Sea).

4, Tecun Uman, the last ruler of the Mayas and national hero of Guatemala, is memorialized, muscles in all, by Rodolfo Galeotti Torres.



More after the break.



















5. Chief Lempira, leader of the Lenca tribe, fought against the Spanish in the 1530s.  This bicep-heavy statue is in downtown Tegucigalpa, Honduras.
















6. The Museo de Arte in San Salvador, the capital of El Salvador, has a nice collection of  local sculpture and painting, like a shirtless Indian being led into the future (unfortunately, by a naked lady).

7. And the Monument to the Revolution, a mural of a naked man with his arms upraised.





8.-9. Two shirtless, muscular soldiers raise guns aloft in separate monuments to the revolution in Managua, Nicaragua.















10. The Centro Neotropico Sarapiqui, about a two hour drive from San Jose, Costa Rica, contains an archaeological park, a biodiversity museum, and this naked warrior holding the severed head of his enemy.















11. For a change of pace from the monuments to leaders of revolutions, go to Panama City, Panama, where the conqueror Balboa stands on a globe held up by naked men.















12. Plus the most famous citizen of Panama, boxer Roberto Duran.

See also: The Top 12 Public Penises of the Caribbean.
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Shock Treatment: Romance is Not a Children's Game

November 15, 2014, 2:33 pm
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In the summer of 1981, I went to see Shock Treatment, which was widely advertised as "the sequel to The Rocky Horror Picture Show!" 

Ok, so it starred Brad and Janet from the original movie, played by different actors (Cliff de Young, Jessica Harper).

No other characters from Rocky Horror, no references to Rocky Horror, no sweet transvestites, no gay relationships, no references to gay people except for a racist/homophobic anecdote!

But once you get over your initial disappointment, Shock Treatment presents an interesting conceit: the world is a tv studio, and everyone a player (shades of Shakespeare).  Everyone is under surveillance, everyone is acting in a show within a show within a show.  There are no private moments; everyone is always being observed, commented on, controlled.

And they're trapped.  Like many stories with gay symbolism, there is no way out.  This is the whole universe.

The story is a heterosexist fable: studio owner Farley Flavors is in love with Janet, so he hires Drs. Cosmo and Nations McKinley to institutionalize Brad in their psychiatric-hospital Faith Factory program.  To make Janet forget about Brad, they groom her to star in her own show.

Jessica Harper has a much stronger voice than Susan Sarendon, the original Janet.  Shock Treatment is worth watching just to hear her paeon to egotism, "The Me of Me"

Deep in the heart of me, I love every part of me
All I can see in me is danger and ecstasy
I'm willing to die for me.
One thing there couldn't be is any more me in me

Or to feel the throbbing sexual energy as she walks through red-draped hallways and cruises "young blood."

Janet:  I want some young blood, I want some young blood, and I'm going to get it somehow!
Brad: I'm looking for love....
Janet: I'm looking for trade!

The gay symbolism comes when the various couples prepare to bed down for the night.  Cosmo and Nation begin an S&M game, with evocations of the danger of the "jump to the left" that comes with acknowledging one's same-sex desire.

Nation: What a joke.
Cosmo: What a joke!
Nation:  You feel like choking, you play for broke.
Cosmo: Romance is not a children's game.
Nation: But you keep going back just the same.

But even more evocative is "Look What I Did to My Id," in which the cast is in the dressing room, preparing for Janet's big debut, and hoping in vain that it will allow them the freedom to escape:

Cosmo and Nation: With neurosis in profusion, and psychosis in your soul.
Eliminate confusion, and hide inside a brand new role.

Ralph: This could take us to a new town nowhere near here.

I've used that line many times over the years.



The key to escape is not power, not love, but as in Rocky Horror Picture Show, desire, a passion that vitalizes, sets priorities, and makes life clear.

Judge Oliver Wright and Betty Hapschatt, suspecting a nefarious purpose behind the studio, hide in the rafters all night to investigate without being observed.  When they discover that Brad and Farley are twin brothers separated at birth, they break Brad out of the asylum, take him to confront Farley Flavors, and reunite him with Janet.  Then the four find a way out and exit into glorious sunlight while singing about sex:

Some people do it for enjoyment.
Some people do it for employment.
But we're going to do it anyhow, anyhow
No matter how the wind is blowing.
We just gotta keep going.

It's not far from Frank-n-Furter's "Don't Dream It, Be It."

Not a lot of beefcake, although Gary Shail, who played the lead singer of Oscar Drill and the Bits (Janet's opening act), was somewhat attractive.  He also appeared in Quadrophenia (1979). 

See also: The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
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Looking for Beefcake on the Swim Team

November 16, 2014, 4:00 am
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This isn't a picture of my high school swim team -- the yearbook photo wouldn't scan properly -- but two of the boys look exactly like my old high school classmates.

Back row right: looks exactly like Craig, who  sat next to me in every class from third grade through junior high,  participated in the famous streaking incident of 1974, and invited me to "get down" at his graduation party in 1978.

Front row center: looks exactly like David, who was dating my buddy Emily, except David was a bit more impressive in the locker room.

Is it any wonder that I went to all the swim meets?

Swimming was always a reliable source of beefcake.  In the summer, you could go to Longview Park Pool to look at the never-ending parade of beefcake, men with hairy chests, jocks in red swimtrunks, heavily-muscled bodies glistening in the afternoon sun.   When it got cold, you could get your beefcake quota by reading sports books about swimming (This also satisfied your parents, who were constantly trying to push you into liking sports.)





















I collected Boy Scout instruction manuals on swimming, diving, water polo, and life saving, and guides to high school and college swim teams.

















The only athlete I could name offhand was Mark Spitz, who won 7 gold medals in the 1972 Summer Olympics and had guest shots all over tv in 1973 and 1974.  Most of the gay boys at Washington Junior High had this poster on their bedroom walls.
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Top 12 Public Penises of South America 1: The East

November 16, 2014, 12:17 pm
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Since I was doing the public penises of Central America and the Caribbean, I thought I would South America as well.  I visited Colombia once, 30 years ago, but otherwise it is completely uncharted territory.

But it looks like most countries in South America match Europe in the size and complexity of their gay communities, and in the legislative response: no sodomy laws, same-sex partnerships, anti-discrimination laws.

And, especially in the countries straddling the equator, ample beefcake.

Here are the top 12 public penises of South America:

1. If you work your way down from the public penises of the Caribbean, the first country you hit is Venezuela, In Maracaibo, a buffed Saint Sebastian is falling out of his clothes as he's pierced by arrows beside a concrete tree.















2. Next come three colonies or recent colonies. Guyana is the only South American state that still has sodomy laws (what do you expect from a former British colony?).

This monument in Georgetown depicts Kuffy, the leader of a slave revolt in 1763.  He's not doing what you think.










3. Suriname is a former Dutch colony, so Dutch is still the official language.  A muscular freed slave named Kwakoe, is the symbol of the city of Parimaribo.  He's regularly dressed by clubs and organizations, and the Surinamian community in the Netherlands holds an annual Kwakoe Festival.














4. Guiana (not to be confused with Guyana) is a department of France.  The capital is Cayenne, but the economy has nothing to do with pepper.

At the entrance to the city, three people holding up a pyramid symbolize the African, European, and Indian races who constitute Guiana.  The Indian apparently has quite an endowment.











5. Also in Cayenne, you can see a statue of French abolitionist Victor Schoelcher freeing a grateful slave in a loincloth.

More after the break.

















6. So far we've been straddling the Caribbean.  Next on our way south is Brazil, one of the largest and most populous countries in the world, and as my old geography textbooks used to say, "a study in contrast." First stop, Manaus, on the Amazon, the gateway to the territories of protected and uncontacted rainforest tribes.

Manaus itself is a modern city with skyscrapers and an international airport.  It also has its share of neoclassical architecture, like this semi-nude lamp outside the Teatro Amazona

7. There are also some neoclassical nude males in the theater district of Sao Paulo.







8. But the most intriguing of Sao Paulo's statues is Event Horizon, Anthony Gormley's series of 27 fiberglass figures of naked men placed at strategic locations to illustrate the isolation of modern life.  They were in London and New York before making their way to Sao Paulo in 2012.









9. Strangely, I didn't find a lot of beefcake art in Brasilia, the capital, but Argentina, to the south, more than makes up for it. Like this monument to work, Canto al Trabajo, in Buenos Aires.  It seems to be praising mostly nude male workers.














10. I don't know what this is.  Maybe the same monument.
















11. And El Arquero de San Sebastian, "The Archer of Saint Sebastian," by Alberto Lobos.
















12. Puerto Madryn, in Patagonia in the deep south of Argentina (and actually the deep south of the whole world), features this monument to the Tehuelche Indians. They wore few clothes, even though Patagonia is quite frigid, and were reputed to be giants.

See also: The Top 12 Public Penises of the Caribbean.





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Heterosexuals Think Gay Men are Still Kids

November 16, 2014, 2:30 pm
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With Thanksgiving and Christmas approaching, I'm going to be visiting relatives.  And once again, I'm going to notice something disturbing:

They think I'm a teenager.  Or 21 at the oldest.

The problem is, every kid was expected to go through a series of milestones of maturity on the way to adulthood.  There were many minor ones -- growing an inch, or moving from the kiddie pool to the big pool at Longview Park, being allowed to drink coffee -- but only 8 big, important ones, ones that the teenagers and adults talked about over and over, sometimes with joyful anticipation ("You'll be a man!"), sometimes with a nostalgic sadness: ("You won't be a little boy anymore.")

1. Your first date with a girl.
2. Your first kiss with a girl.
3. Your first girlfriend.
4. Your first part-time job.


5. Graduating from high school.
6. Your first full-time job.
7. Getting engaged to a woman.
8. Getting married to a woman.
9. Buying a house.

#1 and #2 happened, but not #3.

(The fact that I kissed five girls during high school, more than 30 years ago, caused me no end of headaches. Heterosexuals who find out always exclaim "See!  You kissed girls!  That means you're really straight!")

#4-6 happened, but #7-9 did not.

So, according to my parents and other relatives, I've never grown up.

This prejudice is called the "Peter Pan Syndrome":  "You're gay because you're afraid to accept adult responsibilities.  You want to just have fun all the time, and not settle down and raise a family."

No matter if you have kids: "Doesn't count, it's just playing house unless there's a man and a woman."

And who says that everyone, without exception, has to have kids?

The adults do.

Whenever I visit my parents, brother, sister, or other relatives, I face some annoying consequences to the belief that I have never grown up:

1. Birthday and Christmas presents tend to be things that college students would want.  A popcorn popper or a dorm refrigerator -- even though I haven't lived in a dorm since 1982.  A DVD set of Family Guy.  A t-shirt with the Angry Birds on it.  What the heck are the Angry Birds?

2. Money.  When adults are alone, they have discussions of income tax, bank loans, mortgages, fixed annuities, increasing the equity of their investments, the pros and cons of retirement plans, the deductible in their medical insurance policies.

Sounds dreary.  But even worse is the humiliation when I come in the room and they immediately clam up, like they've been discussing a big adult secret, and ask what my favorite tv programs are.

3. Cruising. Adults expect you go to out partying every night. A few years ago, when I was living in Dayton, I spent Christmas with my sister and brother-in-law, and sure enough, Tammy said: "It's Saturday night -- aren't you going out to the bars?"

"Gee, I don't think so.  I'm 45 years old.  The music is too loud, the guys are too young, and I fall asleep by 10:00."

"Nonsense!  You're young -- go out and have a good time."

This from my baby sister.

4. College. The adults know that I'm associated with a college, but they assume that I'm a student.  "Aren't you done with your education yet?" my uncle asked.  "It's about time you grew up and got a job!"

"Um...I have a job.  I'm a professor..."

"No, I mean a real job.  Something that pays enough for you to buy a house."

Don't get me started on why they think houses are the end-all of maturity, and everyone who lives in an apartment is by definition a kid.

5. Boyfriends.  Heterosexuals divulge their relationships to their relatives in a standard sequence, mentioning them casually, then discussing moving in together, then announcing an engagement and inviting them to a wedding.  Gay people don't: they typically don't mention their relationships until they've moved in together, and there's rarely an engagement or wedding.  It's "This is my boyfriend," period.  So they remain "someone you're casually dating" even after 10, 15, and 20 years.

6. The Disney Channel.  I like comic books, graphic novels, and juvenile tv  -- they're not nearly as heteronormative as media for adults.  But just let me try turning on the Disney Channel at my parents' house.  They'll smile at each other as if to say "What did I tell you?  Jeff is still a kid!"
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Fall 2004: George Bush Broke Up My Family

November 17, 2014, 4:45 am
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The U.S. just had its midterm elections for some Senators, Representatives, and Governors, and guess what?  Mostly of the winners were Republicans who ran on a campaign of hate.  Sometimes virulent hate, with the bloodlust of a Puritan witch-hunter.  What we thought of as laughable extremism just two weeks ago.  But now they're in office, and the homophobic backlash has already begun.

No one expects the Spanish Inquisition.  But then, suddenly, it's here.

I haven't been this depressed since Tuesday, November 2nd, 2004.

It was two days after Halloween, still dark and scary out.  Election Day

Incumbent George W. Bush was running against John Kerry on an overt platform of anti-gay hatred.

He wanted to re-criminalize sodomy, pass a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, strike down anti-discrimination laws, and generally save America from the gay people who are trying to destroy it.

He wanted to make this an evangelical Christian nation, where evangelical Christian beliefs were law.  No more teaching evolution or sex education.  Belief in Jesus Christ a requirement for public office. Strict regulation of mass media to ensure that there was nothing obscene, like gay characters.

Barney and I voted early in the day; Yuri was not a citizen,so he couldn't.  Then we went about about our everyday activities.  I went to the gym, drove to Boca Raton, taught my afternoon class, drove back to Wilton Manors, met Yuri for dinner at a Thai place.  We walked around, thought of going to the bars, but they all had election results on tv.

So we went to the Club, and immersed ourselves for three hours in the warm, dimly-lit hallways of naked men and disco music.





Then we went back home and turned on the tv.  Bush had taken Florida, naturally -- we all knew that outside Fort Lauderdale and Miami, the state was a cesspool of hatred.  He had taken all of the South and crazy redneck Mountain states.  But he also had swing states like Ohio and Virginia, and even in staunchly democratic states, he lost by less than 1%.  They were predicting an easy Bush victory.

Barney and his boyfriend came home, and we watched together, four of us wondering what would happen next. We all agreed that we couldn't live in the U.S. with Bush in the White House.  I wrote on gay topics; Barney owned a gay gym.  It would be too risky.

Then we went to bed.  I had my own room, but that night I slept with Yuri. We held each other.  We knew that this was the beginning of the end.

By June, Barney had sold his gym, sold his house, broke up with his boyfriend, and moved to Costa Rica.  Yuri found a new job in London, and moved at the end of the semester.  I tried to find a job in Canada, briefly worked in Slovakia, and finally took a job in Dayton, Ohio.

I haven't seen either of them for nearly ten years, though Yuri still emails me on occasion.

I blame George W. Bush for breaking up the family.

See also: I Escape to the Gay Haven of Slovakia.

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Fall 1977: Trying to Escape Church

November 18, 2014, 6:42 am
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I hated the Nazarene church.

1. Hour-long sermons three times a week, with dull funereal hymns from a hundred years ago, full of "thou hasts" and "wilt thee."

2. The preacher pacing the stage and pounding his Bible and screaming about how evil the world was.

3. Excruciatingly long altar calls, where the backsliders and the sinners had to go to the front of the church, kneel at the altar, and beg and whimper and sob for God's forgiveness from their sins.

4.  And there were lots of sins.  God hated movies, cards, games with dice, swimming, dancing, short pants, long hair, earrings, bad words, Catholics, comic books, restaurants that served alcohol, carnivals, circuses, rock music, science fiction, and evolution.

5. And the three sermons per week were just the beginning.  There was Sunday school, Nazarene Young People's Society, Afterglow, choir practice, Calling (visiting people who had missed last Sunday), Canvassing (knocking on doors of strangers to try to Win them for Christ),

Having a school activity or a lot of homework was excuse enough to skip the weeknight activities, but the Sunday morning and evening services were another matter.  You had to go.  No exceptions.  I tried various ways to get out of it:

1. "I don't want to go to church!"That didn't work, even if I started to cry.

2. "I have a lot of homework to do."  It worked during the week, but not on Sunday.  It was a sin to do work on Sunday. You had the whole weekend.

3. "I have an upset stomach!" Foolproof, right?  No one can say that you don't.  But then my parents would sneakily serve fried chicken or pie-and-ice-cream for Sunday dinner, with some thin soup and jello for me.

4. "My friend invited me over for a sleepover Saturday night." Nope.  First I had to be actually invited to a sleepover, and then Dad would pick me up Sunday morning early enough to get to church on time.

5. "My favorite tv program is on!" Nope.  You'll just have to miss it.

In junior high and high school, I attended regularly, due to my fondness for the jump quiz, male grabbing and fondling at the altar call, and Verne, the Preacher's Son, and because I wanted to be chosen to go to Switzerland for the Nazarene International Institute.

But during my senior year, Verne was gone, Switzerland was over, and the preacher had discovered "homa-sekshuls,"

I wanted out.  

I thought of the "what girl do you like?" interrogations of my parents and practically every other adult.  They were so obsessed with compiling evidence that I was wild about girls that I could get away with anything, from coming in after curfew to losing my new jacket, just by claiming that I had been trying to impress a girl or meet girls.  

Why did you sign up to fight tigers? "I heard there would be girls in the audience."

Why did you jump out of the airplane?  "There was a girls' school below."

Getting out of the Sunday evening service was easy:  "I want to stay home to watch The  Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries,"with Shaun Cassidy, Parker Stevenson, and...um... Pamela Sue Martin."



You have a crush on Pamela Sue Martin!  Great!  Wonderful!  Stay home and watch her all you want!

Sunday morning was a little harder.

1. "A girl invited me to her church." No -- I would actually have to get a girl to invite me, and then it would just be more church.

2. "I want to go to the library to study.  There will be girls there." No -- the library was closed on Sunday.

Ok, think!


Awhile ago, church princess Debbie Stark asked me to go with her to the Afterglow, the teen party after the evening service.  When I refused, she stared at me for a moment as if she had never heard such nonsense, then flounced off in a huff.  Ever since, neither she nor her cronies would talk to me.  If I was just walking down the hall toward them, they would turn and flounce off.

3. "I can't go to church -- Debbie won't talk to me!"

Rejected by the girl of your dreams! My parents commiserated.  Heartbreaking!  Of course you can stay home!

I still had to go on occasion.  But it was a start.

See also: The Preacher Discovers Homa-Sekshuls; Shaun Cassidy
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10 Reasons Why Thanksgiving is the Gayest Holiday

November 17, 2014, 6:25 am
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If you're not from the U.S. you might not be familiar with Thanksgiving, a holiday celebrated on the fourth Thursday in November (it's also celebrated on different dates in Canada, Liberia, and Grenada).

It's my favorite holiday.  And the gayest:

1. It's in November, so it's cold outside, and dark at night like it's supposed to be.  No one is forcing you to go out and "enjoy the outdoors."

2. There are no tv commercials depicting heterosexual couples giving each other gifts or watching in rapt joy as their children unwrap gifts.

3. There's no religious significance, so you won't feel guilty if you accidentally say "Happy Thanksgiving!" to someone who is Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, Wiccan, or atheist.


4. Gay men spend many extra hours at the gym in anticipation of over-indulging on Thanksgiving.  As a result, at Thanksgiving they're more buffed than at any other time of the year.

5. Everyone gets to demonstrate their culinary skill.

6. You only get Thursday and maybe Friday off work, so there's no time to take a plane ride 2000 miles to the place you grew up.  Thus, "home" is no longer in the past, it's the place you are today, and "family" is what you make of it. (But why are they serving Thanksgiving Dinner in bed, and why is the kid wearing a mask?)

7. If you do go home to visit extended family, Thanksgiving dinner is the traditional time for making Big Announcements, like "Guess what?  I'm gay."

8. Most of the bars, clubs, and bathhouses have special Thanksgiving Day events, so you don't have to waste all Thanksgiving afternoon watching football.





9. The origin story, about 17th century Pilgrims and Indians coming together to share a meal, is an imperialist myth, masking a history of conquest and genocide.  But it does lend itself to some interesting ideas for homoerotic revisions (picture from Crow821 on deviantart.com).

10. Gay people have a lot to be thankful for.  They grew up in a culture where they told, over and over, that "discovering the opposite sex" was inevitable and universal, that no gay people existed except for grotesque monsters.  And they survived.


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Summer 1973: I Meet A Teenage Indian God

November 19, 2014, 12:00 am
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When I was a kid, my Dad got a 2-week vacation every year.  We would always spend the first week visiting our relatives in Indiana, and the second camping up north, usually in Minnesota.

But in 1973, just after seventh grade, for some reason we spent the first week visiting my Kentucky Kinfolk, and the second in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, about sixty miles south on the border of Tennessee and North Carolina.

A whole week of nothing to do but sleep outside, fish, hike, and ride horses.

Gross! Where were all the historic sites? Where was all the beefcake?


Then Mom and Dad announced that we were going to spend a day at the Cherokee Indian Reservation.  We would see the Cherokee Museum, the Oconaluftee Indian Village (a replica of an 18th century Cherokee village), and Unto These Hills, a drama about Cherokee history performed in a gigantic outdoor theater.

The play (written by Kermit Hunter in 1950) was big on "noble savage" myths and short on historical accuracy (a new, more accurate version was introduced in 2006).

But it had lots of white-Indian buddy-bonding: future President Andrew Jackson befriended Chief Junaluska, and William Holland Thomas, a white boy adopted by the Cherokee, befriended Chief Yonaguska.

And lots of semi-nude male dancers.  I especially liked the head Eagle Dancer, a super-muscular teenager whose bare hard chest glimmered in the firelight.  I kept waiting for his white loincloth to flip up so I could see what was underneath.

He reminded me of the  Naked Indian God at the Pow Wow in Rock Island three years ago, but I was just a little kid then, and didn't know how to handle the situation.  Now, a 12 year old grown-up, I knew exactly what I wanted -- to meet the Teenage Indian God, and hopefully see him naked.

 After the performance, I asked my parents if I could go get his autograph. They said ok, but hurry.

I pushed my way through the crowds to the little staging area behind the amphitheater, where the performers were wiping off their makeup.  I found the Teenage Indian God, surprisingly, alone.  He had already exchanged his loincloth for a pair of jeans, but his chest was still bare, smooth and hard, his pecs outlined in blue paint.

"Hi!  You were great!"  I said breathlessly, trying to memorize his physique. "Can I have your autograph?"

"Sure."  He signed my program.  Our hands touched as he passed it back.

What could I say to get him interested?  "Um...I want to be a dancer, too, but the Mean Boys at school say it's just for girls."

"Don't let Mean Boys push you around," the Teenage Indian God told me.  "Do what makes you happy.  I'm the only boy in my ballet class -- one boy and twenty girls!  Nice odds, huh?"

Wait -- was he studying dance just to get girls?  What about the muscular male bodies?  What about the buddy-bonding?

"Gross!" I exclaimed.

He laughed. "Just wait a few years -- let me tell you, there's nothing like holding a foxy chick in your arms..."

"Don't you ever dance with boys?"

"If you're going to be a dancer, you have to dance with girls," he said, looking at me oddly.  "They're always going to be your partners, for the rest of your life."

They're always going to be your partners.  What a bleak future!

Blinking back tears of outrage, I rushed off, forgetting to thank him for the autograph.

When we got back to the camper, I looked at my program.  Kevin Martin.  

He wasn't even a real Indian.

I took it out into the woods and threw it away.

Researching this post, I found out more about Kevin Martin.  After high school, he studied dance in New York, and then spent twenty years performing for dance companies in Cincinnati, Louisville, and Washington.  Today he is the director of the men's dance division of the Nutmeg Conservatory for the Arts in Connecticut.

Hopefully he hasn't done it all just to get girls.
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Summer 1979: The Colombian Hustler

November 19, 2014, 11:30 pm
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In the wilds of Colombia
During the summer of 1979, just after my freshman year at Augustana College, the Nazarene Church was looking for some able-bodied college students to help build ten new churches in Colombia.  I hadn't attended regularly for about a year, but you stay on the membership roster forever, so they called me.

They warned us: this was the jungle, where Jim Elliot was killed trying to bring the gospel to the Auca Indians in 1956.  Expect poisonous snakes, crocodiles, and naked cannibals.  They might try to eat us!

Um...did you say cannibals would be naked?

I'm in!





Itagui, Colombia
Actually, my group ended up in Itagui, population 200,000, a major industrial center with gleaming modern architecture, a gigantic soccer stadium, and restaurants called "Chocolate Chicken the Prince" and "Nice Sandwich and Juice."

No poisonous snakes, but lots of poverty, crime, and drugs.  We were cautioned to not leave the Youth Hostel at night, and not go into Medellin, about 5 miles away, where murder and kidnapping were daily events.










"Reto,""The Challenge," Itagui
Heck with that!  I was going to find a nice Swedish leatherman to dance with, like in Switzerland, or at least a cute gay waiter, like when I visited Olivet.  Only now if he offered "Come back to my hotel! I have Schnapp!", I would know what to do.

But with no internet and no gay guidebooks (I had never heard of the Damron Guide), how could I find the gay men of Itagui?

It turns out that they found me.

I went downtown, to a small, brightly-lit taverno that seemed to have all men inside, mostly elegantly-dressed young adults.  I sat down at the bar and ordered a Postobon, an apple-flavored soda.









Not Marco, but close enough
Five minutes later, a college-age boy named Marco sat down next to me: short, muscular, with black hair and intense black eyes. He was wearing a track suit, as if he was in a race -- rather out of place for such an elegant clientele, I thought.

 We chatted, in my pretty-good Spanish and his rudimentary English, mostly about the Sandinistas taking control of Nicaragua and Skylab falling out of the sky.  His leg brushed against mine, and he didn't move it away.  Then he said, apropos of nothing: "Necessitas marimba?"

Why would I want a xylophone?   Later I figured out that he was offering me marijuana.  "No, no...busco...um..." What was the Spanish word for gay?  "Hombres que aman los hombres." (Men who love men.)

"Oh!" His eyes lit up, and his hand fell onto my knee.  "100 lucas...200 dollars."

"Para que?  No quiero comprar algo." I didn't want to buy anything!

"Ok, ok, 50 lucas!"

"No quiero comprar..."

"10 lucas!" he exclaimed in exasperation. "Que barato!" About $20.  What a bargain!

Finally I understood -- I had read The Happy Hooker, after all.  I just never realized that there were male hustlers, with male clients.

"No way!" I exclaimed, pushing aside his hand and getting up from the bar.

He followed me out into the street and yelled, "Oye, chino!  Medio  luca!" About $1.00.

Amazonian guy with fish
"Estas burlando?" I asked.  "Are you kidding?  That's about the cost of a Postobon!   It's not even worth it."

He grabbed my arm and started speaking very quickly in Spanish. "You're very cute, but you have to pay...I'm not a pillow-killer...I'm a cannibal...it's only for the money."

I threw him off and walked away, through the warm tropical night toward the youth hostel.  I was gratified that there were enough gay men in Itagui to make hustling profitable, but upset that Marco couldn't bring himself to acknowledge that he was gay, a "pillow-killer." He was a "cannibal" (apparently slang for "hustler" or "on the downlow"): telling himself over and over again that it was about the money, not about desire.

So I met a cannibal after all.  Just not the kind that goes fishing in the nude.

See also: The Top 12 Public Penises of South America.


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Top 12 Public Penises of South American #2: the West

November 20, 2014, 4:07 am
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Our Public Penis tour of South America left off with Argentina.  Next stop: Uruguay.

1. Greetingman, a 20-foot tall blue naked man, bows in Buceo, Uruguay to demonstrate friendship.  He is the creation of Korean artist Yoo Young-ho.















2. A monument to the last of the indigenous peoples of Uruguay in Montevideo.














3. Working our way north, we come to Paraguay, the only nation in South America where an Indian language, Guarani, has official status.  Parque Ybycui, about 60 miles south of Asuncion, has a statue of a semi-naked gladiator.

4. Next comes Bolivia, the only nation in the world with two capitals, La Paz and Sucre.  In Lapaz, this muscular Unknown Soldier lies prostrate on the ground.




5. But you may be more interested in Cabezas, a small town in the Gran Chaco region, where Father Francisco de Pilar is leading a buffed, loincloth-heavy Indian to Christ.















6. In Santiago, Chile, there's an interesting statue of Dedalus mourning a prostrate, naked Icarus outside the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes.

More after the break.








7. And Capoulican, the military leader of the Mapuche, who led an uprising against the Spanish from 1553 to 1558.

8. If you go all the way south to Punta Arenas, Chile, the monument to Magellan features more semi-nude Indians.














9. I definitely want to visit Peru for Machu Picchu and other Incan archaeological sites, but there's not a lot of beefcake art.  Unless you count this statue in the Museo de Historia y Arqueologia in Lima.
















10. North to Colombia, the only country in South America that I've visited in person, to help build a church in a suburb of Medellin.  The most famous artist in Colombia is Fernando Botero, whose distinctive style of squat, hefty naked people is called Boterismo.

Many of his paintings can be seen in the Botero Museum in Bogota, but there are also a number of statues, including this one in Medellin.











11. And this one in Bogota.  Even the horse is sculpted in Boterismo style.

















12. If you prefer your beefcake art a little more svelte, visit the Cathedral of Salt, an underground church carved out of the salt mines in Zipaquira, about a 1 1/2 hour drive north of Bogota.

There's a naked miner at the entrance, one of the few fully nude pieces of beefcake art in all of South America.

See also: Top 12 Public Penises of South America 1: The East and Me and the Gay Cannibal.
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The Temple of the Penis

November 21, 2014, 6:54 am
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In Central Java, Indonesia, on the slopes of Mount Lawu (and eight hours by car from Jakarta), there's a low-sloping truncated pyramid called Candi Sukuh, or Sukuh Temple.

Covered with bas-reliefs of people in erotic poses.

Surrounded by statues of naked men, gods, and monsters.




An elephant-headed god  and his dog dancing with two men who are forging a sword.. Most of his gigantic penis has been broken off.

Men having sex with women.

Men having sex with men.












A life-sized statue of a naked, muscular man grasping his two-foot long penis (it's so explicit that I can only show you the base).









There are phallic symbols everywhere, carved into the walls, protruding from walls, lying on the ground.  There was once a 6-foot tall penis rising from four giant testicles, but it's been removed to the National Museum in Jakarta.







The temple looks like a smaller version of an ancient Mayan pyramid, leading some para-archaeologists to claim that Mayans traveled halfway around the world in 300 AD. and established a beachhead in Java.

Or that both cultures were remnants of ancient Atlantis, or Mu.

Or that it was built by aliens and holds secret messages about the end of the world.

But relax: it's Hindu.



The elephant-headed god is actually Lord Ganesha.

The giant lingam (Hindu phallic symbol) contains a Sanskrit inscription proclaiming that this "sign of masculinity is the essence of the world."

Another inscription allows us to date the temple at 1440 AD, long after the Mayans.

Indonesia is staunchly Muslim now, but previously it was the site of several powerful Hindu kingdoms, including the Majapahit Empire, the largest in Southeast Asia, extending through modern-day Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines.

In 1440, Majapahit was in decline, falling to internal disputes and the incursions of the Muslim sultanates to the east.  So a crew of artists and builders came out to the jungle to ask for the help of Lord Ganesha, the power of masculine energy, and the penis.

See also: Top 10 Public Penises of Hinduism;






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Spring 1971: Two Men Can't Live Together

November 21, 2014, 8:15 pm
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Ever since I moved away from gay neighborhoods in 2006, I've heard a constant drone of "Buy a house!  Buy a house!  Buy a house!"

In the straight world, you have to live in a house.  Apartments signify immaturity, irresponsibility, or poverty.  They mean that something has gone seriously wrong with your life.

But I don't like houses.  I like apartments.

1. Someone else does all of the mowing, shoveling, grouting, tiling, and repairing, things that I hate with a passion.
2. Apartments are near the shops, theaters, bars, and gym.  In houses you have to drive.
3. You can hear other people, voices through the wall, footsteps from upstairs.  Who could ever be lonely?
4. Houses are scary, with attics and basements and crawlspaces.
5. It takes 30 years to pay off a house.  Who wants to live in the same place for 30 years?
6. Houses are occupied by heterosexual nuclear families.  Gay people live in apartments.

When I was a kid, I didn't know that apartments existed.  I thought that everyone lived in a small square house with a living room, a kitchen, two bedrooms, a bathroom, and a basement.

My first shock came in the third grade, when my friend Bill invited me to his house: there were four bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a separate "family room"!

Around that same time, there was a game show called Dream House, in which couples competed to win rooms full of furniture.  Rooms I had never heard of before: dens, studies, game rooms, rec rooms, breakfast rooms.

I was hooked!  Whenever Mom went to the store, I asked her to pick me up a "House Book," a magazine featuring floor plans for people looking to build houses.

So many styles!  Gothic, Tudor, Princess Anne, Ranch, A-frame, Federal, French Colonial, Art Deco, neo-Classical!




And filled with such a clutter of rooms!  Rooms for sitting, for listening to music, for watching tv, for reading books, for just sitting in the sun!

Why did you need a separate room just for mud?

I got a ruler and some graph paper and started drawing my own floor plans.  Big houses, small houses,bungalows, mansions.

 A foyer with a statue of a naked man in it.

A sunken living room where my boyfriend and I could entertain guests.

A kitchen with a center island where we could cook.

A library of 30,000 comic books.

Not surprisingly, my parents never suggested that this newfound passion might lead to a career as an architect.  My future career was already decided: lineman at the factory.  Instead, Mom played the Wife card.




One Saturday afternoon in January 1971, during the Christmas break, I was sitting in the living room, working on a floorplan on a clipboard.  My mother happened to glance over.  "Don't forget a nursery!  Your kids will need a place to play!"

"There won't be any kids living there," I answered, preoccupied.

"Well, won't your wife be lonely?"

"No wife either."

"You certainly don't want to live in that big house all by yourself!"

"No.  Bill will be there, too.  We'll sleep in the master bedroom.  And we'll have two dogs and two cats."

Now my mother became firm and somber.  "Two men can't live in a house together."

"Sure they can.  What about My Favorite Martian?" 

"They live in an apartment -- you know, where a house is divided into a lot of little rooms?" She sat down next to me, as if she was about to share a sad truth of adulthood.  "Sometimes, when they're just starting out, two men will share an apartment.  But only until they find the right girl and get married.   Then each one gets a house of his own."

"Why can't two men buy a house, if they want to?" I asked.

"If they tried, they'd be arrested! Houses are just for married couples."

Some local ordinances did indeed prohibit landlords from renting to "known homosexuals" through the 1970s.

"What if they never meet the right woman and get married? Then they could live in an apartment forever, right?"

Mom laughed.  "The things you worry about!  That never happens! Sooner or later, you'll meet the girl of your dreams, and get married.  Then you'll go to work in the factory so you can support her, and pay for the house."

So the three Big Events of my future were linked -- marrying a woman, working in a factory, buying a house -- three aspects of the same heteronormative prison.

Maybe if I escaped just one, the others would fade away.

I never went to work in the factory, "discovered" girls, or lived in a house.  Except for a few years of renting rooms from Derek in West Hollywood and Barney in Wilton Manors, which hardly counts.

 I refuse to buy, rent, or live in a house, in spite of everyone around thinking that there is something seriously wrong with me.

I like apartments.

See also: Dad Takes Me to See Naked Men


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10 Ethnic Groups on my Bucket List

November 22, 2014, 8:16 am
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On The Simpsons, Homer sings "I could love [e.g., have sex with] about a million girls."

A million?

Assuming a 50-year sexual life, that's 20,000 per year, or 384 per week.

That's a lot more than gay men could ever hope for.

If you spent every waking hour in the bath house, and if you were extremely attractive, you might get as many as 10 partners per day, or 70 per week.

But in real life, people have other interests and obligations, they don't have a superheroic physique, and they're usually involved in relationships that require monogamy or "sharing." They might average 10 partners per year.

Or only one.

Homer goes on to list the various ethnic groups he is interested in: "I could love a Chinese girl, an Eskimo, a Finn. I could dig a Deutschland chick...."

That sounds more promising.  There are only about 6,000 ethnic groups in the world.  Could you "love" someone from each one?

For the purpose of this study, "loving" will be defined as "an event in which you see your partner naked in a private setting." Clubs, bath houses, nude beaches, and dates that don't end with a bedroom won't count.

An "ethnic group" will be defined as a group identified by a distinct language and culture.  Generic white Americans and African-Americans don't count.

After careful calculation and checking my journals, I find that I've "loved" guys from 41 identifiable ethnic groups.



18 European
8 East or Southeast Asian
5 African
5 Latin American
2 Middle Eastern
2 Native American
1 South Asian

5,959 to go.

If I really want to sample the vast variety of  masculine beauty in the world, there are a few left on my bucket list:

1. Faeroese: from the Faeroe Islands far to the north of Britain (population 44,000).  Like the famous swimmer Pal Joensen (top photo).

2. Yakut: a Turkic-speaking people of Siberia.  There are 478,000 Yakut speakers, including 10,000 in the United States, so there's hope (second photo: a Yakut wrestler).

3.Ainu (left): the original inhabitants of Japan were not of Asian ethnicity, and their language was like no other in the world (there are only about 10 native speakers left).  They liked beards so much that the women got their chins tattooed to make it seem like they had beards, too.  Today there are an estimated 25,000-100,000 Ainu in northern Japan.  The most famous is Oki, who performs electro-pop versions of traditional songs with his Oki Dub Ainu Band.


4. Chukchi: from remote northeastern Siberia, near the Bering Sea.  The 16,000 Chukchi speak a Paleo-Siberian language.  Their shamans change from male to female when they travel to the spirit world.

 5. Hawaiian (left): 400,000 people claim to be part Hawaiian, but only 140,000 claim to be Hawaiian alone, and only about 2,000 speak the language.







6. Jivaro (left): about 20,000 of the former head-hunters, divided into several different tribes in the western Amazon region of South America, mostly in Ecuador, Peru, and Colombia.  I visited Colombia, but didn't meet any Jivaros.

7. Tuareg: there are about 1.2 million Tuaregs, a nomadic people of the Sahara, mostly in Niger and Chad. Formerly called "the blue people" because the blue dye in the men's turbans rubbed off onto their faces, they speak a Berber language.







8. The Mbuti (left): one of several "pygmy" tribes in the Congo, there are about 30,000 Mbuti, most still living as traditional hunter-gatherers.  The men have an average height of 4'9." Sounds like my kind of guys.

9. Greenlander: The northernmost country on Earth, Greenland has a population of about 60,000, most of whom are Greenland Inuit.












10. Aboriginal Australians: The original inhabitants of Australia have the oldest cultural traditions in the world.  They have legends about walking to Australia over a land bridge that hasn't existed for 14,000 years!  There are about 600,000, divided into many different tribes with distinctive languages and customs.  Ritualized same-sex behavior is commonplace as an initiation rite.

I visited Australia 20 years ago, but didn't get a chance to meet -- or "love" -- any aboriginal guys.

But there's always next year.  Maybe these guys are on Facebook.

See also: In Quest of the Bushman Penis









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10 Things You Should Know About Scottish Kilts

November 23, 2014, 5:37 am
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1. The kilt was not part of ancient Scottish Highland dress; it developed during the 16th century from an earlier cloak worn over one's tunic.

2. Kilts have no pockets.  You put your personal items in the sporran, a pouch that hangs down in front.  The sporran also serves to symbolize your sex organs.

3. Scottish soldiers would remove their kilts and charge wearing only their shirts. This tactic was meant to shock the enemy.








4. In 1746, King George II outlawed "Scottish dress," fearing that it would lead to insurrection.  The penalty was six months in prison.  The ban was lifted in 1782.

5. Today many men wear kilts to demonstrate Celtic pride, whether or not they are Scottish.

6. And rainbow kilts for gay pride festivals.











7. The kilt is becoming increasingly popular as everyday wear in Scotland.

8.  Many movies and tv shows have depicted men trying to peek under Scotsmen's kilts to see if they wear anything underneath.

A man trying to get a glimpse of another man's penis makes for quite a homoerotic spectacle.










9. In fact, the kilt was designed to be worn without underwear.  Most men still don't wear anything underneath.

10. You can buy "Official Kilt Inspector" t-shirts at the tourist shops in Scotland.

See also: Celtic Festivals.


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Search

The Bodybuilding Villages of India

November 24, 2014, 2:22 am
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In West Hollywood, everyone went to the gym.  The dating game was very competitive, and if you had a partner, there were lots of guys eager to break you up.  So you had to be in shape.  We joked that you could always tell the sexual orientation of guys in their 40s: the gay men looked 30, and the heterosexuals looked 60.

But there's a village in India where nearly the entire adult male population, gay and straight alike,  is into bodybuilding.

Actually two adjoining suburbs, Asola and Fatehpur-Beri, about 10 miles south of New Delhi, near the airport.

They belong to the Gurjar, a Scheduled Tribe (historically disadvantaged) from Rajasthan, previously nomadic, relocated to Delhi to work in farming and low-paying government jobs.  But mostly unemployed until they discovered bodybuilding.

The bodybuilding craze began 15 years ago, by accident.  A wealthy businessman, driving past, saw some of the village men wrestling, and offered them 2,000 rupees apiece (about $32 U.S.) to be the security guards at a wedding he was hosting.
This was big money!  They jumped at the opportunity.



Soon professional bouncer agencies were placing the other muscular young men of the village.  The more massive, the better.

You can make a living through your physique?

 Everyone started hitting the gym.

Kids growing up looked to bodybuilders as role models.

Now over 200 villagers are employed as "hired muscle": bouncers at New Delhi's trendy nightclubs, private security guards, and bodyguards.


The jobs are temporary: once you reach your 30s, your attractiveness to potential employers declines.  But by then, most of the  men have used their connections to pursue other careers.  Some have become wealthy businessmen.

I assume that the standard proportion are gay; the gay dating services list a number of men from Asola and Fatehpur.

See also: A Bodybuilding Contest in India.




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The Erotic Temple Carvings of Khajuraho

November 25, 2014, 5:30 am
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When I was in grad school in Bloomington, my friend Viju invited me to fly back to India with him for a visit.  I had only been to Switzerland, Germany, and France before, so I was thrilled!   I spent months doing research: buying guidebooks, studying conversational Hindi, going to Bollywood films, and compiling a list of the important sights:

The holy Ganges River at Varanasi
The Golden Temple of Amritsar
The Portuguese colony of Goa
The Ajanta Caves
The Taj Mahal in Agra.
And the temple complex of Khajuraho, with the most famous erotic carvings in the world.

As it turns out, we stayed in Delhi, except for trips to Varanasi and Agra.   Viju wanted to spend time with his family and friends, and eat in his favorite restaurants, and go shopping and cruising, not drive all over the country to visit boring temples. Khajuraho, 9 hours south in Rajasthan, was definitely out of the question.

"You're not missing anything.  Believe me, it's nothing special."

"It has the most erotic carvings in the world, doesn't it?" I asked.

"Maybe you think they're erotic, but I don't think so."

Later I found out what Viju was talking about.

Guidebooks continue to praise Khajuraho as the "most erotic monument in the world," but they mean erotic for them, not for me.

1. The complex contains about a dozen temples dedicated to various gods, including Shiva, Krishna, and Ganesha.  The walls are covered with hundreds of carvings depicting thousands of people engaged in everyday activities, to symbolize the four goals of life in Hinduism.

Dharma (right conduct)
Kama (pleasure)
Artha (making a living)
Moksha (the search for the Divine).



2. There is no beefcake.  The bodies, male and female, are slim and sinuous, with feminine curves.  No muscles.

3. About 20% of the everyday activities depicted involve Kama, and only about half of those involve sexual acts.  So 10% of the total.

4. The sexual acts are overwhelmingly heterosexual.  Men are copulating with women in various positions.  There are trios, two women and one man.  There are heterosexual orgies, where every identifiable man is with a woman.








5. There used to be some same-sex acts, two women together or two men together, but they were erased during the "sexual cleansing" regiment of Gandhi and Nehru.  Now there are perhaps two left.  The official Indian government says "none," that this one is a misinterpretation of a disciple bowing to his master.





You'd be better off watching Rajasthani bodybuilder Anand Arnold.

See also: A Bodybuilding Contest in India.


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Veronica's Closet: How Not to Play a Gay Character

November 26, 2014, 12:00 am
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In the 1990s, TV writers didn't know what to do with their gay characters.

They knew what gay men were: men who were really women.  Men who were interested in show tunes and chick flicks and skin care products, who used their hands when they talked, who secretly wore dresses.  And who might...possibly...date men.

  But what to do with them?

Veronica's Closet (1997-2000) took a novel approach: how about a gay man who doesn't know he's gay?  He'll have the show tunes and skin care products, but claim to be straight!  Won't that be hilarious?

It wasn't hilarious at all.


The show aired after Seinfeld, and starred Kirstie Allie, formerly of Cheers, so it became popular.

Veronica ran a clothing company designed to increase women's chances of romance (modeled after Victoria's Secret).

Her staff included:
1. Olive (Kathy Najimy), whose job was undefined.
2. Underwear model turned publicist Perry (Dan Cortese, top photo).
3. Uptight marketing manager and token black guy Leo (Daryl Mitchell).
4. Secretary Josh (Wallace Langham).

Josh started out as feminine-coded, working as a secretary for a women's underwear company.  And the feminine traits piled on, week after week. Not only show tunes and skin care products, but pink handkerchiefs, demitasse, a worry over getting fat, a female best friend, no interest in sports, a girly car, hints at drag. For heaven's sake, his middle name was Nicole!

Therefore he must be gay.  The entire cast acted as if he was gay, asking his advice on skin care products and trying to fix him up with men  When he protested that he was straight, they smiled knowingly.

"Wait," I wanted to ask, "Has Josh ever expressed the slightest interest in men?

"No, never," Veronica might answer.

"Has he ever expressed any interest in women?"

"Yes, often.  He's been shown having sex with women.  He had a girlfriend, nearly got married. But what does that have to do with it?  He's feminine, so he's gay."

Near the end of the series, Josh finally gave and admitted that he was feminine...um, I mean gay.

He reluctantly gave up his heterosexual romances and began dating a guy, not because he was interested, but because that's what feminine...um, I mean gay men do, right?

Right?


The cast doesn't have a great record on gay rights.  Kathy Najimy is bisexual. Kirstie Allie is not a gay ally

Wallace Langham, who played Josh, turned out to be rather homophobic also.  In 2000 he beat up a gay tabloid reporter while using anti-gay slurs.  He was sentenced to 450 hours of community service for LGBT charities.
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Summer 1979: Cute Nerd or Creepy Old Guy?

November 26, 2014, 5:13 am
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Summer of 1979.  The summer after my freshman year at Augustana College.

There were no gay organizations in town, no gay books in the library, no gay dating sites on the internet.  There was a gay bar, but I was only 18 years old, and you had to be 21 to get in.

There was no way to meet gay men -- or straight men on the downlow -- except randomly, in the course of your daily activities.  Of course, neither of you would come out, for fear of violent reprisal.  So you played a game.

You made eye contact for a little longer than usual.
He glanced at your crotch, and made sure that you noticed.
You glanced at a hot guy passing by, and made sure that he noticed.
He asked if you had a girlfriend.
You asked if he lived in the dorm or with his parents.

When you were quite sure, you got him alone and made an undeniable move: you touched his face or his basket, or leaned in for a kiss.  But you were never completely sure.

He might jump away and yell "Whoa, man!  That's not my thing!"
Or call the Dean and have you expelled.
Or kill you.

During my four years at Augustana, I only met two or three guys that way.

One was a cute nerd.  Or maybe a creepy old guy.  I couldn't decide which.

In the main reading room of the Augustana Library, there was a bookcase filled with discards and donations.  You could get a hardback for fifty cents and a paperback for a dime.  Many students browsed there, sometimes a faculty member, but rarely anyone from the community.

I had a part time job in the library, and I often noticed Trevor (not his real name), a slim, rather cute guy in his 30s or 40s, with brown wavy hair and horn-rimmed glasses, who always dressed formally and spoke in over-grammatically correct English.  He came in most Tuesday afternoons at 3:00, just as the new books were put out.  He bought at least three, sometimes four or five, week after week.

When he came up to the circulation desk to pay, we made eye contact for a little longer than usual.  I glanced at his crotch, and made sure that he noticed. He glanced at a hot guy, and made sure that I noticed.  I asked if he lived in the dorm, and he said, "Oh, no, I'm not a student.  I live in town."

I, not we.  Not married.  Maybe gay, maybe interested.

But there was only one way to be sure.

One day he found a treasure: a ten-volume set of the works of Martin Luther in German (the library had just received a new edition).  "I'll take the first five volumes now, and come back for the others."

"I'll be happy to help you carry them to your car."

"I don't have a car.  But don't worry -- it's just five blocks."

I thought for a moment.  "Hey, we're running a special for our best customers -- free taxi service.  My car's parked out back."

He hesitated.

"It's 90 degrees out there.  You can pay me back with a bottle of pop."


Trevor lived five blocks from campus, where 5th Avenue turns industrial.  There was a factory across the street and an Irish pub next door.  No neighbors.

"Do you live alone?" I asked.

"It was just Mother and me until she died five years ago.  Now it's just me."

Suddenly I thought that this might not be a good idea.  Serial killers always lived alone, or with Mother.

Or with Mother's corpse.

Trevor piled the books on the enclosed front porch and fumbled about for his key.  "Your payment awaits within -- one bottle of pop," he said with a weird lunatic grin.

Besides, in a big house isolated from all the others, if he got violent...

Today I would never set foot inside that house.  But I was 18....


Trevor opened the door onto a large, rectangular parlor with parquet ceilings and two old chandeliers.  And books. Books and books. Wall-to-wall bookcases crammed with books.  Books piled on the sofa, on the coffee table, books in neat piles stacked near to the ceiling.

At a glance, I saw Modern Astronomy, Reading Norwegian, Shakespeare's Festive Comedy, Gargantua and Pantagruel, Look Homeward Angel, Murder on the Orient Express, five Complete Works of Shakespeare, and about a dozen paperback copies of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

"I run a rare book service for collectors," he said, noting my surprise. "This is some of my inventory."

He pushed aside a pile of books from a 1950s-style couch, invited me to sit down, and disappeared down a book-lined hallway.  A grey cat appeared out of nowhere and jumped onto my lap.

Other than purring, the room was utterly silent.  I imagined the terrible emptiness at night.  There wasn't even a tv or radio.

Trevor returned with two A&W root beer mugs filled with soda and a plate of cookies. The tray depicted a weird scary Santa Claus drinking a Coke.  "The cookies are homemade.  My secret ingredient is allspice," he said with a nervous giggle. "I see you've met my roommate,"

"Your roommate?"

"George the Cat." He put the tray down, sat next to me on the couch, and started to pet George, his hand coming perilously close to my crotch.  I began to redden.  "You're quite athletic, aren't you?  How many push-ups can you do?"

"Um...I don't know.  I never checked.  Don't you get lonely here?  Or do you have friends over every night?"

"No...I'm afraid I don't get many guests.  Sometimes a client stops by.  But usually it's just George and me, and my books."

I wasn't worried about Trevor being a serial killer anymore.  I was worried that he was me in the future, going through life alone, with no friends, no lovers, just a cat and piles of books, the only gay person in a world of husbands and wives, a creepy old guy trying to pick up college boys.

Suddenly a phone rang.  I jumped a foot -- I hadn't noticed it behind a pile of books on the end table.  Trevor excused himself and answered.  "No, I haven't started yet...chocolate fudge, I suppose....ok, then, lemon...."

He hung up.  "Sorry about that. I've been drafted into making a cake for a birthday party tonight. You're welcome to stay, if you like.  We can talk while I bake."

A life devoted to cats, books, and cooking. Even worse. "Thanks, but I have to be going."

I didn't stop to ask who he was making the cake for.  I figured a nephew or neighborhood kid.

Trevor continued to come to the library book sales, but in the fall my schedule changed, and we rarely saw each other.  Two years later Professor Burton, who held the famous handcuff parties, "introduced" him as one of his gay friends.

This time I went home with Trevor to spend the night.  And heard about his wide circle of friends in the Cat Club, the Iowa City Rare Book Club, the Friends of the Library, the Celtic Heritage Society, his cooking classes at the community college.  Male, female, gay, straight.

Trevor had carved out quite a nice life for himself.  Even though he was rather weird.  And lived in a small town full of heterosexual husbands and wives.

See also: Naked with the Church Treasurer; and Handcuffed by My Professor
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Do Gay Men Play Strip Poker?

November 27, 2014, 5:48 am
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When I was growing up in the Nazarene Church, nearly everything was a sin, a one-way ticket to eternal damnation:

Reading any non-religious books or magazines, including the newspaper, on Sunday.
Dancing, "even in the guise of physical education class."
Eating any food that contained alcohol or sounded like it contained alcohol, like beer nuts.
Games with dice, including Monopoly.
Playing cards.
Entering a Catholic church, even an architectural masterpiece like the Cathedral of Notre Dame.
Saying bad words, even "gee,""gosh," and "golly."

I started breaking away during my senior year in high school.  It took a couple of years to severe all ties, and a few more years to stop feeling guilty over the Nazarene "sins."

Today I'm doing pretty well.  I only feel twinges of guilt on occasion, when I read the Sunday newspaper or play golf.

But there are two "sins" that I've never overcome:

1. Alcohol.  I don't mind being in a bar or restaurant that serves it, but I won't have it in my house.  I've had two glasses of wine and 1 1/2 cans of beer in my life.

2. Cards.  Seeing playing cards fills me with revulsion.  Especially the face cards -- Jacks, Kings, Queens.  I won't touch them.

Fortunately, card games -- Bridge, Poker, Gin Rummy, Pinocle -- seem to be primarily a heterosexual pastime.  No one in West Hollywood, New York, or Florida ever invited me to "play cards."


I understand that there's a game called Strip Poker, in which everyone who loses a hand must remove an article of clothing.  It's purportedly designed to give heterosexuals a chance to see people of the opposite sex naked.







But skillful male players usually suggest the game to unskilled female players, or they plan in advance with multiple articles of clothing, so the decks are stacked against seeing a male Full Monte.

Unless it's an all male group.








Here's another all-male group.

Gay men don't really need a game to trick other men into taking off their clothes.  You can just ask.

So they don't usually play strip poker.

Strip Twister, maybe.





In 2006, Paddy Power held the first annual World Strip Poker Championship in London.  Freelance writer John Young beat out 194 other contestants, mostly male, by keeping his clothes on the longest.  He won a fig leaf trophy and $10,000, to be donated to the charity of his choice.

See also: Twister; and The Night I Drank 1 1/2 Cans of Beer.

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