February 1983: My First Creepy Old Guy

Bloomington, February 1983

I'm 22 years old, out for 4 1/2 years, but I've only been to the bars a few times.  Growing up in a church that teaches that alcohol consumption is far worse than murder, I'm still not comfortable walking into a tavern.

Used beer bottles everywhere.  Rows of liquor bottles behind the bar.  A nauseating smell.  Guys drinking beer. Disgusting!

But gay bars are the only safe places, where you can relax and meet other gay people without fear of homophobic harassment.  So, with my friend Viju's help, I persevere, and get used to it.

Tonight he isn't feeling well, and wants to stay home.

Do I dare go by myself?

I decide to take the plunge.

I arrive at Bullwinkle's in downtown Bloomington at 9:00 pm.  There's room at the bar, so I sit on one of the red stools and order a Coke.   A small crowd, mostly college-age, some older guys from the community.  No one I know.

Suddenly the bartender hands me another Coke.

"I didn't order this," I tell him.

"That guy bought it for your."  He gestures at an older man sitting at the end of the bar.  Probably in his 50s, a little chunky white-haired, with a salt-and-pepper beard.  Dressed a little too formally for a gay bar, in a white button-down shirt and black pants.

I move over to sit next to him and introduce myself.  "Hi, I'm Boomer.  In grad school in English."

"Oh, a literary scholar!  I knew you were an artist!"  He takes my hand and refuses to let go.  "My name is Philip.  I'm a professor of the Classics, vainly trying to keep the basic texts of Western Civilization alive in this era of Disco Duck and BJ and the Bear." 


Ok, pop culture references five years out of date.  "I'm more a fan of Michael Jackson and Chips."  

"Even worse!  Have you never read Tacitus?  Or, if a randy mood strikes, Catullus?"

I take a sip of my drink, and sputter in disgust.  Vile concoction.  "What is this? It's not a Coke!"

"Why no, it's rum and coke. Isn't that what you were drinking?"

"No -- I don't drink."

"Don't drink, don't smoke," Philip says with a smile.  "What do you do?"

"So you've heard of Adam Ant?"  

"Oh, of course.  One must keep up."  His hand falls onto my lap, and he begins groping me through my pants.  "I hesitate to ask -- I'm afraid you'll find me a disappointment.  But I would certainly love spending the night with you.  Such youth!  Puerum pulcherimum!" 

Ok, this guy is way too old for me. I like guys who are my age, or only a few years older, 30s tops.  Philip is probably older than my father!  But I haven't had much experience in turning guys down.  Is it impolite?  Is it even allowed?

So I follow Philip to his house, an elegant two-story Tudor about five blocks away.

We sit in a living room that looks like it came from Versailles, on a gold-embroidered couch next to a grand piano.

"Do you play?" he asks.

"Um...no...I played the viola in high school."

"You're such a beautiful young man, so literary.  I'm sure you're musical, too.  You should play the piano."

"Um..."

"Care for a sherry?"

"Could I just have a Coke, with nothing in it?"

He brings me a can of bargain-brand cola, and the sherry, some vile-smelling concoction in a giant snifter, for himself.

After a sip, he fondles my shoulder.  "So beautiful.  Stunning, really.  You should be a model."

"Yeah..um...thanks."

He bends in for a kiss.  I see his whiskered mouth, wet from sherry, approach me, and turn away with a shudder.  He gets my cheek.

At that moment the phone rings.  "Yes...yes...oh, yes...he's sitting here now...very beautiful, like a Hellenistic youth.  Perhaps Hyacinth.  Yes, ok.  Thank you.  Good night."

Philip returns to me.  "My lover, calling to check up on me."

"He doesn't mind that you..."

"Oh, no.  At this point we're mostly business partners anyway.  Sex is a thing of the past.  It's all about the search for youth and beauty, don't you think?"

He takes the soda from my hand.   "Shall we adjourn to the boudoir?"

I'm reluctant -- being called "beautiful" a dozen times isn't erotic, it's just creepy.  But I can't see any way out of it.  Philip leads me down a hallway to a bedroom that looks like it came from a museum.  Gilded white dressers, Louis XIV chairs, lamps that must weigh fifty pounds a piece, a four-poster bed with lace curtains and gold pillows.

"Do you sleep on that bed?"  I asked.

"Among other things."  He unbuttons my shirt, runs his hand over my chest, then fondles me through my pants.  He unzips me and pulls it out.  I don't get aroused.

"Hmm...uncircumcized, are you?  The Phyrgian youth had foreskins so long that they pierced them and put ornaments in them.  Quite pleasing to the tongue, I understand."

Philip takes off his shirt - a thick mass of chest hair, and nipple rings.  The first I have ever seen.

"Oh, do you like my ornamentation?  You can play with them," he says.  "Squeeze them -- bite them...I'm used to the pain."

"Ok."

"Like this."  His mouth is on my nipple.  I feel his moustache tickling my cheek, then his tongue.  Then he bites down hard.

I push him away with a yell.

"Just relax.  Daddy knows best."  He returns to my nipple, and licks it.  Then he starts running his tongue down my chest, lapping like a puppy dog!  Gross!

"Stop that!" I yell.  Disgusted, I grab my shirt and start to leave.

He takes my arm.  "Don't go.  Youth is so beautiful, don't you think?  It fades away year by year, until finally you're a ravaged husk.  Cherish it while you can."

"Yeah, I'll do that.  See ya."

It's been 32 years since that night in Bloomington.  I'm now the same age as Philip.  But I don't go around calling twinks "beautiful boy" and complaining about the ravages of age.  I don't want to become a Creepy Old Guy.

Pop Quiz: List five things that Philip did wrong.

See also: The Night I Became a Creepy Old Guy

Carl, the Cowboy Cop on My Sausage List

Hell-fer-Sartain, Texas, April 1985

You probably know the type of guys I find attractive:

1. Short, the shorter the better.
2. Muscular or husky.  Fat is good.  Bodybuilder too.
3. Dark-skinned.  Black, Asian, Hispanic.  If you're Caucasian, then maybe Italian, Greek, Spanish.
4. Religious, or better yet, clergy.
5. Gifted beneath the belt.

So how did I end up with a guy who was taller than me, thin, a fair-skinned blond, and not religious?

Well, at least he met trait #5: he was the third biggest guy I've ever met.

It was during my horrible year at Hell-fer-Sartain State College in Texas, the worst place in the world.  I drove into the Montrose, the gay neighborhood of Houston, to the Wilde and Stein Bookstore.  While I was browsing in the fiction section, a guy approached me -- very tall, at least 6'8" to my 6'1, lanky, blond, wearing tight jeans and a lumberjack shirt.

"Don't I know you from somewhere?" he asked, in retrospect the oldest line in the book.  But we chatted, and it was a relief to meet someone who wasn't deeply closeted or was overloaded with weird quirks.

 His name was Carl, he was 27 years old, and a real life cowboy -- he grew up on a ranch near Abilene.

We went to dinner at the Hobbit Cafe, which, in spite of its name, served Mexican food, to the mall to buy me a pair of cowboy boots, dancing -- at a regular gay disco, not a cowboy bar, and then back to his apartment.

 It was such a relief to meet someone who wasn't closeted or kooky that I didn't mind his lack of the traits I usually find attractive, or that he lived in Pasadena, on the south side of Houston, a good 40 miles from me.

During the usual date small-talk, Carl told me that he worked in human services.  Now, sitting on the couch in his apartment, he said "You know what?  I'm just going to come out with it.  I'm not exactly in human services."

"What, then?"

"I'm a cop."

I felt the blood draining from my face.  Same-sex acts were illegal in Texas (they would be until 2003), and the police actively sought to entrap "homosexual deviants" in the bars and bookstores of Montrose.  Put your hand on his shoulder, you're under arrest for lewd conduct.  And we had been dancing together, groping, and kissing....

"It's not like that," Carl said, sensing what I was thinking.  "I'm gay.  In the closet, of course."

"Of course."  If he were discovered, he would be instantly fired.  "Um...the gay community doesn't have a very good attitude toward the police."

"I know.  That's why I don't usually tell people until the second or third date.  It scares them off faster than finding out that I'm bisexual."  He conked himself on the head.  "Whoops, I let another one slip out, didn't I?"

"You sure did.  Any more closets you want to open?"

"Yeah.  I'm an atheist. I grew up in a fundy household, and all of that God crap just riles me up!"

Hmm-- I believed in God, and went to church, but I decided to not mention those few details.  I wanted to see this guy in the bedroom!  "Bisexual, atheist, cop," I joked.  "I'm surprised you haven't been lynched!"

We went into the bedroom, and Carl revealed that, although he was missing traits #1-4, he more than made up for it with #5.

On our second date, he came up to my apartment, with a pizza -- 45 minutes late.  He explained that he had stopped to help a lady fix her flat tire.

A good Samaritan, too.  This one might be a keeper.

We sat in the living room, eating our pizza from the coffee table.  Carl started checking around the room.   An Eastern Orthodox icon.  A Catholic crucifix on the wall.  A small bronze statue of The Madonna of Regensburg that I got during my semester abroad.  A bookcase containing Church and Society, Halley's Bible Handbook, Dag Hammarskjold's Markings, Three Treatises of Martin Luther, God in the Dock by C.S. Lewis...

"Don't tell me you're into that God crap!" Carl exclaimed, his mouth full of pepperoni.

"Well...um, I was raised Nazarene, but they're way homophobic, so when I was in grad school I started going to the Metropolitan Community Church.  There's one in Houston.  I don't get there very often, but...."


"Church is church.  It's all about hating homos!"

"No, the MCC is different.   It was founded by the Rev. Troy Perry, who's gay, and most of the members are gay."

"Self-loathing, no doubt."  His voice changed to a squeaking falsetto.  "Oh, I'm gay, I'm so worthless, I need God to wipe my sins away."

"But the MCC teaches that gay is ok.  God loves gay people, and..."

"Enough is enough!  I didn't come here to listen to the whole God spiel!"

I was starting to get angry.  "Well, Carl, if I don't mind that you're an atheist, you shouldn't mind that I believe in God, right?  Difference of opinion and all that?"

"I don't have to respect ridiculous opinions.  What if you thought the moon was made of green cheese?  Should I respect that?"

We went on like that for awhile, and Carl ended up leaving.

Turns out that I was lacking one of the traits that the bisexual cowboy cop found attractive.