Yuri and the Unhung Hippie

Long Island, April 1999

Yuri came as my guest to a Sociology Department reception in the spring of 1999, and immediately saw Marcel parked by the buffet table, taking two, three, four helpings of quiche and tabouli with pita slices.

"The big guy there looks hot!" he exclaimed.

"Oh, you don't want to hook up with Marcel, trust me."

"Why not?  He has the four things."

Yuri liked them big, the bigger the better.  Hookups had to be at least a Bratwurst; he wouldn't accept a second date with anyone under Kielbasa; and the man of his dreams had the endowment of a Tom of Finland drawing.

Unfortunately, you can't tell from the basket -- it's often padded or invisible.  So, being a scientist, he developed a 4 Point Plan for Finding Super-Sized Guys,  If you met all four, you were in:
1. Height (tall)
2. Waist (small)
3. Hands (big)
4. Shoes (big).

Ok, Marcel had all four: he was very tall and lean, with big hands and big shoes.  But he also had a mountain-man beard, a blurry, dazed expression, and weird clothes: a flack jacket over a t-shirt with a bulls-eye painted on it, faded, frayed blue jeans, a flowered belt, and hiking boots. And you could smell the marijuana from five feet away.

"Marcel has been coming to department functions as long as anyone can remember," I told Yuri.  "No one seems to know who he is.  I heard a rumor that he was a grad student who had a nervous breakdown while writing his dissertation."

"I don't care about nervous!  I just care about if he's big!  Did you talk to him?  Is he gay?"

"I tried talking to him once.  Couldn't understand much of it.  He's sort of crazy.  I don't know if he's gay or not."

"Ok, let me try.  I'm good at getting guys."  It was true that Yuri's combination of an athletic physique and a handsome, almost angelic face got him a lot of attention.  He had been out for over a year, and hadn't been turned down once.  "Come, introduce us."

First Attempt:
We approached Marcel, who stared into space as if he was giving us Attitude in a cruise bar.

"Hi Marcel, you remember me -- Boomer.  And this is Yuri."

Yuri grinned and held out his hand.  "Nice to meet you."

"Hi!  Did you know that this is Malaysian Independence Day?" Marcel said.  "Hari Malaysia.  In 1963, Malaysia was formed out of the former British colonies, with prime minister Tunku Abdul Rahman, known as Bapa Kemerdekaan, or Father of Independence."

"That's cool.  Do you study Malaysia?"

"I'm planning to ride my bike to Sayville later.  All the twinks have left Fire Island -- I guess you can't be gay after Labor Day -- but it's still a nice ride, and St. Katherine's has a nice rummage sale.  You can come, but you have to beware of the bears."  He laughed at a secret joke.

I suddenly noticed someone I had to talk to on the other side of the room, and dragged Yuri with me.

"What's up?"  Yuri asked, annoyed. "I was cruising him!  He's gay, no doubt."

"But he doesn't know what's going on!  He's on drugs, or schizophrenic, or something.  You don't want to get involved with him."

"Why not?  I didn't say I want to marry him.  Come on, we go again."

Second Attempt:
The "very important conversation" over, we returned to Marcel.

"Have you heard the expression personne ne peut vivre sans vin ou baisses? (No one can live without wine or kisses)?" he asked, as if resuming the prior conversation. "Everyone thinks it's by Lamartine, but that's wrong.  It was Theodore de Banville, one of the greatest poets of the decadent era, who wrote 'Baises de Pierre,'"

"Est-ce qu'il était gay? (Was he gay?)" I asked, hoping that he would be more coherent in French.

Marcel grinned at Yuri.  "Some people are always trying to show off.  Not you -- I can see that you have a pure soul. You're a Taurus, right?  I'm going to the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona next year.  You can come, if you bring your own passport."

"Cool.  We were in Estonia last summer,"  Yuri began.  "And Finland and Russia."

"I was in Russia last year, but I didn't like being under surveillance all the time, and at the Hermitage a fat, hairy guy with no shirt on rushed up and smacked me on the butt.  You think he was KGB?"

I dragged Yuri off to another very important conversation.

"See?" I exclaimed.  "Completely paranoid.  You can't go home with him -- he'll start yelling that you're a Communist spy trying to get the secret of his cheesecake recipe."

"If you're worried, you come too.  We will share."

"Oh, no -- he's not my type."

"So you will just be with me.  I'll go between, and you don't have to see his body. Come on."  He took me by the arm and dragged me back to the food table.


Third Attempt:
By this time Marcel was working on his third piece of cake.  "Have you read The German Ideology?" he asked.

At least this one made sense.  It was assigned in my Sociological Theory class.  "Yes, I....."

"So you agree that the twink should have a room of his own?  Just like Virginia Woolf."

"I have a room," Yuri said.  "It's a graduate student apartment.  Do you want to come there?  Boomer will come, too."

Marcel smiled.  "Bringing up the reinforcements, huh?  Just like the Cavalry, which is not the same thing as the Calvary.  Ok, but I hope you've been taking your vitamins."

The Hookup:
We walked across campus to Yuri's apartment, while Marcel talked about blue jays (cyanocitta cristata) and Heidegger's Being and Time, and asked if we were fans of Janis Joplin, and did we have any beer.

When we got into Yuri's bedroom and shut the door, Marcel pounced, grabbing and squeezing Yuri, groping him, kissing him, running his hands all over his body.  I joined in, kissing Yuri, then Marcel -- he was quite good at that, if you could overlook the marijuana smell -- while Yuri unbuttoned his pants.

Very, very small.  Yuri looked at me and grimaced.

"Ok, who brought the condoms?" Marcel asked.  "The twink and I have a date, I believe."

That was the end of Yuri's 4 Point Plan.

See also: In Search of the World's Biggest Penis