My Boyfriend Gets a BFF

Heinz flexes and cooks weiners

In West Hollywood in the 1980s, the boundary between friend and lover was fluid. A friend might invite you into his bed; a lover might cruise someone else. You might have a regular Saturday night date with a friend; you might not see a lover for weeks at a time.

So I'm not sure exactly when Raul and I broke up.

1. Maybe in August 1987, when my roommate Alan moved to Thailand to start a gay Pentecostal church.    I asked Raul to move in to help with the rent, but he refused: "too far from work" (he was now in customer service at a company on Wilshire). So I had to hustle to find a new place, with Derek on Sunset Boulevard.

2. Or in October 1987, when Raul's lease expired, and he moved into an ugly house with a German flight attendant or something named Heinz -- in West Hollywood, only two miles from my old apartment.

Heinz's Horrible House

3. Maybe when Heinz got to be really, really annoying.  He wouldn't let anyone walk in shoes or socks on his white shag rug -- we had to go barefoot.

He listened incessantly to a terrible German pop group -- "Come away wiz me tyu Molly-Byu, tyu Molly-Byu, tyu Molly-Byu."

He forced us to watch the Miss America pageant.  Why would a group of gay men want to watch the Miss America pageant?  "For the outfits!"

And he hung out with women.

In tv and movies, gay guys always have hetero girl bffs.  The writers think they're all feminine, so of course they want to hang out with girls.

But in West Hollywood in the 1980s, most gay men weren't feminine, and -- news flash -- preferred the company of men.  (Besides, a female friend would confound the fluid boundary between friend and lover).  So when Heinz started coming around with female friends, tongues started to wag:

He was trying to pass (Passing, pretending to be straight, was an unpardonable sin.)
He suffered from internalized homophobia.
He had been brainwashed to believe that men were incomplete without women.
He was secretly straight.

4. But most likely when Raul, following Heinz's example, got a female bff.  Gina from work, a secretary-aspiring actress who did two commercials and guest starred on a sitcom.

He brought Gina to Heinz's house several times, then to my house, to the bars, and to the French Quarter Restaurant, where the waiter asked if they were a couple (come on, this was West Hollywood!).

My other friends stopped inviting me places -- guilt by association.

But the last straw came in December, when their office had a Christmas banquet. Gina invited Raul. To be her date.

I was furious.  "Doesn't she know that we're a couple?  Or does she not care?  Gay relationships are meaningless, right?"

"You know I'm not out at work," Raul said.  "Going with Gina would be better than going alone."

"Surely you're not considering it?" I asked, aghast.

He was considering it.

I hate the holidays.

My Celebrity Boyfriend

West Hollywood, January 1987

When I moved to West Hollywood in 1985, I found that half of the residents were aspiring actors, directors, writers, models, dancers, or singers.  Most of my friends and acquaintances had been in something, and some had been in several things.

I've had hookups and dates  with several celebrities, or at least people who are listed in the Internet Movie Database, but I've only been in a relationship with one.

No real names because he's still closeted, and  I don't want to get sued -- how crazy is it that in 2015, you can be sued for slander for "accusing" someone of being gay.

But I can tell you that he's a couple of years older than me, tall and slim, with dark hair and dark eyes.  He was most famous at the time for an adventure tv series which I watched at Indiana University in the early 1980s, but since then he's starred in a cop show and appeared in some soap operas. Shouldn't be hard to figure out.


The Meeting:

We met at the post office at Christmastime in 1986, a few days after my fight and sort-of-breakup with my boyfriend Raul.  He was standing in line in front of me, carrying a large package.  I said "that's one enormous package.  And the box you're mailing is pretty big, too."  He laughed. (In the 1980s, "package" was slang for the visible bulge that sex organs make in tight pants.)

I told him I worked for Joe Weider's Muscle and Fitness, and asked if he would be available for the June centerfold.  He laughed again.

I gave him my telephone number, and said I was getting ready to leave for two weeks in Rock Island, but maybe we could get together afterwards.

You know dating in West Hollywood -- if you're not available right that moment, forget it.  There are lots of other guys around.  So I figured I would never hear from him again.

But when I called my roommate Alan on Christmas Day, he told me that the Celebrity had left a message.

We talked later, and made a date for January 10th, 1987.






The First Date:
I wore a thin silk shirt to show off my pecs, which was a mistake -- the Celebrity planned an "impress your date" dinner at Geoffrey's, on the beach at Malibu.  The temperature was in the 50s, with a wind whipping through me, and we dined al fresco.  And the Celebrity insisted that I have the chilled peach soup.  I turned down the invitation to "see his place," went home, and crawled under an electric blanket.

Ok, the first date was a bust.  I figured I would never hear from him again.

But he called the next day, and invited me to play tennis.

The Second Date:

I have played tennis maybe six times in my life.  I am terrible at it!  But how could I make any worse of an impression?

We played on a public court in Beverly Hills, with half of the Hollywood glitterati watching me stumble and trip, and bat the ball into the stratosphere, and land hard on my knee, requiring a trip to the emergency room.

Ok, the second date was a bust.  This was it for my celebrity romance!

But he called later and invited me to dinner at his house.

The Third Date:

The Celebrity lived in a rather modest house in the Hollywood Hills: only two bedrooms, a small swimming pool that was really more of a hot tub, no tennis court (thank goodness!).  He had two dogs, a Scottish Terrier and a Swedish Valhund, who sometimes took him to dog shows.

In West Hollywood, the third date meant that you were together, a couple.  But we hadn't even gotten to the bedroom yet.  And what if celebrities had their own rules?  I didn't know what to expect.

Dinner was chicken piccata, a green salad, and white wine.  I hadn't told him that I didn't drink, and anxious not to make any more faux-pas, I drank it, and got a little buzzed.

Then we went into the living room, watched a movie on his new VHS player, and eventually made it to the bedroom.

This is Christopher Atkins, not my Celebrity Boyfriend, but it will give you an idea of his physique: lean, firm, not terribly muscular, average or perhaps a little small beneath-the-belt.

But very cute, and energetic, willing to keep going all night.

Neither of us said anything in the morning, but I assumed that we were now together.

The Relationship:

During the next two  months, the Celebrity and I went out only twice more, once to see the opera Porgy and Bess at the Wiltern, and once for brunch at one of those top-floor restaurants where the spectacular views give you vertigo and the entrees start at $100. Otherwise we played tennis (again!), hung out in his pool, walked his dogs, and had Chinese or Thai food delivered while we watched movies on his VCR.

And cuddled and kissed. The Celebrity could cuddle for hours. 

He came over for dinner with my roommate Alan and ex-boyfriend Raul once.  I never met any of his friends.

In March I asked him about it.  He said, "Tell you what.  We'll host a party.  15 of my friends, and 15 of your friends.  That way everybody will get to know each other all at once."

The Last Party

On March 30th, 1987, the Celebrity and I hosted a post-Oscar party.  I invited Alan, Tranh, Raul, and two celebrities, Michael J. Fox and Tom Villard, to prove that I had famous friends, too (they didn't come).  The Celebrity invited several actors and a director.  I figured they were all gay, but as the evening progressed, some of them turned out to be hetero.

I thought I was being an excellent host, refilling drinks, pointing out the direction of the bathroom, answering questions like "how long have you two been together?" and "what are you guys planning for the summer?"  As guests left, I told them "Thanks for coming!"

But maybe I was too cruisy. In West Hollywood, parties tend to be exclusively gay, so light-hearted cruising, pretending to be interested, is customary.  Maybe that embarrassed the Celebrity. Or maybe he was jealous.

Or maybe he had been thinking of us as a "down-low" fling, not as a couple.

He was fine in bed that night, sharing the Director and then Alan, but the next day he didn't call, and when I called him, I got his answering machine.  During the next week, three messages and a drop-in went unanswered, and when I finally got through to him, he was "really busy."  Finally  I moved on.

Alan dated him soon after..

I just heard from him recently.  He said "thanks for not outing me," told me that he remembered the breakup being mutual, and complained that he wasn't on my Sausage List.

See also: My Celebrity Boyfriend and I Share; Guess Which Celebrities I've Dated; and Alan's Top 20 Scenes

Fred and the Cute Young Thing Visit

West Hollywood, February 1988

If you sit at one of the tables outside the French Quarter on Santa Monica Boulevard long enough, every gay person you know will walk by.

David Johnson, son of the Professor on Gilligan's Island.  

David Cameron, whose mother starred him in the classic novel The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet.

And, in the spring of 1988, my first live-in boyfriend, Fred.

We met during my sophomore year in college, when he was a ministerial student.  When he got a job at a church in small-town Nebraska.  I moved with him, but it was a disaster -- he cheated on me with the teenager downstairs -- so I returned Rock Island.

We kept in contact, mostly through mutual friends, and hooked up occasionally at Christmastime.  He stayed in horrible small-town Nebraska until 1982, then moved to horrible small-town Kansas, and in 1985 left the ministry for a job as a mental health counselor in Kansas City.

One morning in February 1988, my roommate Derek, my ex-boyfriend Raul, and some other people were having brunch at the French Quarter, when suddenly Fred strolled by on the sidewalk outside, accompanied by a Cute Young Thing.

The French Quarter

I did a few double takes, then rushed out and grabbed him by the shoulder.

"Boomer!"  He gave me a friendly hug.  "I would have called, but I have your old number listed in my address book."

In those days, whenever you moved, your phone number changed.

I dragged him and the Cute Young Thing back to our table to join us.  "What are you doing in town?"

He was visiting seminaries, planning to enroll in a D.Min. (Doctor of Ministry) program to hopefully land a church in a decent town.  He had already interviewed at Yale and Vanderbilt, and now Claremont School of Theology, out in the San Gabriel Valley.

The Cute Young Thing (CYT), was barely out of his teens, slim with dirty-blond hair, an ostentatious diamond earring, a blue t-shirt, and tight blue shorts with a bulge that caused heads to turn even in bulge-heavy West Hollywood. I don't know where Fred found him.

A CYT

He looked askance at our Crabcakes Benedict, Mardi Gras Omelette, and Strawberry Crepes, called us all "fatties," and ordered the Diet Plate.  Then he criticized the French Quarter as "bourgeois."

You don't often see such an annoying combination of hotness and snark.

We went sightseeing, and then to dinner and to the clubs, while the CYT kept up a constant stream of criticism:

West Hollywood was "tacky," the Pacific Design Center "tired," Beverly Hills "bourgeois."

I had a job at Muscle and Fitness as "a glorified file clerk for narcissists," I was getting a "worthless degree" at a "second rate school," my car was "tacky," and my clothing was "hayseed."

To add insult to injury, the Cute Young Thing kept cruising me.




The next day Fred had to do a sample sermon and have lunch with the committee, and somehow he talked me into taking the CYT out for more sightseeing.  I dragged Raul along to share the pain.

The criticism continued:  I was from the Midwest, "nothing but hayseeds and cows," and a "geezer" at age 27.  Raul was "fat," wore a "glorified pimp" outfit, and should "learn to speak English."

The cruising also continued, and the CYT had the nerve to suggest that we come back to his hotel. Behind Fred's back!

Something had to be done about this menace!

Fortunately, we had a plan.

We went back to the hotel, kissed and fondled a bit, and stripped the CYT out of his clothes.  Then we broke away.

"Whew!  That's some gut you got!"  Raul exclaimed, pointing at his six-pack abs. "How did you hide it? Sorry, man, I'm not into fatties."

"What?  I....um..." the Cute Young Thing stammered.

"And what do you call that?" I said, pointing at his enormous package.  "I never saw one so small before."

"Maybe Fred likes them tiny?" Raul suggested.

"How does he even know it's there?  Sorry, buddy, I'm not into pencil stubs."

We got up and left the CYT speechless and staring on the bed.

Later that evening Fred called.  "What did you say to the CYT?  He insisted that I turn Claremont down!  He said the guys in West Hollywood are too fat and ugly!"

As it turns out, Fred and Matt stayed together for about 10 years, and we often "shared."

I never figured out what Fred saw in him.

Maybe you can?

See also: 8 Harvard Yard hookups; Matt's First Night with Fred and His Brother

Raul and my Bed-Hopping Roommate

West Hollywood, September 1986

In the fall of 1986,  shortly after I returned from Japan, I was living with Alan, who dragged me to the gay Asian bar Mugi twice a week.  Our other roommate, Chaiyo, was from Thailand.  I was taking a class in Chinese literature at USC (as part of my doctoral study in comparative literature).  Three days a week, I drove downtown to my job at the Community Redevelopment Agency, which was in the midst of revitalizing Little Tokyo.

With all of that Asian influence, you might expect me to meet a lot of Asian guys.  But I didn't.  The problem was, they found Alan so infinitely attractive that I couldn't compete.  Even if he didn't do anything.

One day in September 1986, I brought an Asian guy home.  Alan was watching tv in the living room, so I introduced them casually as we passed through.

 "Wow, your roommate is hot!" my date exclaimed. Sometime during the night, he got up to use the bathroom and "accidentally" stumbled into the wrong room, and into Alan's bed!

Alan didn't mind, but I wasn't yet comfortable with the West Hollywood custom of "sharing" with one's roommates.

Besides, "sharing," was only for committed partners, not casual dates!

Besides, "sharing" meant both of you participating!

Not to worry, there were lots of non-Asians around. L.A. was ethnically diverse.  In fact, it was 50% Hispanic.

50%!  I liked those odds!  On October 4th, 1986,  I went to the Plaza or the Silver Platter (I forget which) and met Raul from East L.A., a cook in a Filipino restaurant, short and slim with small hard muscles.

Was it safe to bring him home, or was Alan infinitely attractive to Hispanic guys, too? (This was before we started going to Tijuana.)

I decided to take the bull by the horns:  I invited Raul over for dinner Friday night "with my roommates."

He insisted on cooking -- "I'm a professional chef, I do all the work" -- chicken adobo, broccoli, and a Filipino rice cake called puta (no connection to the homophobic slur).

Raised in Iglesia Pentecostal Jesucristo, Raul was fascinated by Alan's plan to start a gay Pentecostal church in Thailand.  "But...how can you be cristiano, if you are gay? The Bible says that God hates gays."

After dinner, Alan grabbed his Bible and his Greek New Testament and started explaining how they didn't condemn gay people at all, starting with the story of Sodom -- it's about lack of hospitality, not gay people.

I already knew all about it, so I quickly got bored.

Famous gay couples, Ruth and Naomi, David and Jonathan.  Chaiyo fled to his room to watch The Golden Girls.  Raul jumped up and took the place he vacated next to Alan on the couch.

Ephesians and Romans: incorrect translation from the original Greek.  Arsenokoitai means "male prostitute," not "gay man." Alan's arm was wrapped around Raul's shoulders.

In the Book of Acts, Philip meets an Ethiopian eunuch, and invites him to spend the night.  Eunuchs were usually gay.  Adam whispered something in Raul's ear and tried to fondle his leg; Raul laughed and pushed his hand away.

I knew where this was headed.  "Hey, sounds like you guys have a lot to talk about," I said. "It's late.  I'm going to bed."

"Ok," Raul said, barely noticing me as he looked down at a passage in the Greek New Testament -- or was he looking at Alan's bulge?  "We will be done soon."

Yeah, right!  I thought.  I'll see you at breakfast!  

I went to my room, got undressed, and lay in bed with a book, fuming with jealousy.  I heard muffled conversation from the living room, then a burst of laughter.  Then an ominous silence...were they kissing?  And footsteps heading down the hall to Alan's room.  Someone used the bathroom.

Then my door opened.  It was Raul!

"Man, that Alan...talk, talk, talk," he said, stripping off his shirt.  "I mean, it was interesting, but come on, man! I'm on a date!"

He slid out of his pants and climbed in bed next to me.  "And he's so grabby!  If I didn't know better, I would think he was cruising me!  You weren't waiting too long, were you?"

"Not at all."  I turned off the light.

Heinz' Boyfriend: When Sharing Went Wrong

The West Hollywood custom of sharing developed in response to AIDS. Sex with strangers seemed dangerous, especially before we knew what transmitted the HIV virus, so you kept it "in the family."
1. Emotional-commitment sex with a boyfriend.
2. Recreational sex by "sharing" the boyfriend with other close friends.

The AIDS crisis first became noticeable in gay communities in the summer of 1981.  I moved to West Hollywood in the summer of 1985, just four years later, but sharing had developed remarkably fast, with a complex series of procedures and protocols.

Sometime after the second date, but not too long after (typically after about two weeks), you chose a friend to share (have a three-way), and report back to the group on his size, stamina, and favored sexual positions. If they approved of the match, then he would become "one of the family," open to sharing with the others.  If not, you might find yourself off the guest list for parties.

Of course, if he had a different circle of friends, he chose one of his to "share" with you.

To fail to make the invitation within a reasonable period of time was an unforgivable snub.

It was equally unforgivable to refuse.

The guy you chose to share could not be in a relationship, and he could not be someone new, someone you hadn't been with before.

However, he had to be someone your new boyfriend had not been with before.

In a small community where social circles overlapped, these rules made the choice could be very complicated.

For instance, let's say I am dating the ex-boyfriend of one of my friends, A.

My social circle consists of A, B, C, D, and E.

When my new boyfriend was dating A, he shared B.  Both out.

I've never been with C before.  Out.

D is currently in a relationship.  Out.
That leaves E.

No wonder it was unforgivable to refuse.

Which leads to the point of the story:

One day my ex-boyfriend Raul's housemate, Heinz the German Geezer, called and asked me to "share" his new boyfriend.

Huh?  Why me?  I didn't even think of Heinz as a friend.  He was there by default when I hung out with Raul, and he came to a couple of my parties. I didn't know who was in his social circle, so how was I supposed to report back to them?

Heinz explained.  "Arnie and I have known each other for years.  We shared friends and lovers lots of times -- but since his lover died last month, we only now started seeing each other as boyfriends."

"There must be someone else.  What about Raul?"

"Raul dated him.  Just once -- I don't know why they didn't go any farther."

Ok, so I the only guy who had been with Heinz but not with Arnie?  "Scraping the bottom of the barrel?" I asked.

"Not at all.  I remembered when you and I made love -- it was fantastic."

Not too fantastic.  Heinz wasn't at all my type physically: tall, thin, elderly, pale, with a thick white moustache and a small cock.  Besides, he was a neat freak who didn't let you eat in the living room and got mad when you walked across the carpet in stocking feet.  And his annoying song "Come away wiz me tu Molly-bu, tu Molly-bu, to Molly-bu..." kept going through my head.  I went down on him to its beat!

But...refusing was inconceivable. "I would be honored to do it," I said with a sigh.  "I'll just need a list of your friends to call.  And I get to pick the music."

We agreed to meet for dinner at the Greenery on Tuesday night. But first I called Raul to pump him for information.

"He's a nice guy, a little dazed.  Too many drugs in his wild hippie past, I guess."

"Hot."



"He's black, in his 40s, a bit of a belly, and hung...but..."  He paused.

"What?"

"I should let you find that out yourself."

Curioser and curioser!

Arnie and Heinz turned out to have a sort of Mutt and Jeff thing going on: tall/short, thin/chubby, pale/dark, talkative/reticent.  I couldn't get his coming out story, or any tales of celebrity hookups, or even where he was from:  "Oh, I've been around."

He did talk about some of his ailments: no HIV, but Crohn's disease (whatever that was), some sort of back problem, diabetes, and something that lowered his blood pressure so much that he fainted sometimes.

When he wasn't talking about his diseases, Arnie was being a slob to contrast to Heinz's neat freak.  He picked up his chicken with his hands, spilled polenta all over his t-shirt, had broccoli in his teeth for the rest of the evening, and reached over to take a forkful of my pie without asking.

If this had been a date with me, I would have walked out.  But it was my duty to share.  Besides, maybe Arnie was hung.

Next we went back to Heinz' house to watch a movie on VHS (watching a movie at home was still an unusual experience). We sat on either side, Heinz with his arm around Arnie's shoulders, and me holding his knee.  But when I moved my hand farther in, toward his crotch, Arnie moved it away.

Um...we're sharing tonight, remember?

I decided to kiss him, broccoli or not.

Gross -- his breath smelled of garlic!  And he didn't have anything with garlic for dinner.

Finally it was time to go upstairs to the bedroom. While Heinz  and Arnie kissed, I unzipped Heinz and went down on him. I tried to unzip Arnie, too, but he pushed my hand away.

Curioser and curioser.

I stood and pulled up Arnie's t-shirt so I could kiss his chest.

"Be careful of the colostomy bag," he murmured.

The what?

I looked.

Ok, this was really killing the mood.

I knelt again and went down on Heinz for awhile, pushed his cock against Arnie's crotch, and tried again.  This time he let me pull down his pants and shorts.  A huge, thick cock sprang out, soft, uncut.

And no matter what I did, it stayed soft.

"Nothing's going to happen down there," Arnie said.  "I haven't been hard since 1981.  My ___" (I don't remember what disease he named).

Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope.

I let Arnie go down on me while Heinz topped him. It would have been impolite not to.

And I gave a glowing review to Heinz' friends.

Let them find out for themselves.

20 Hispanic Boyfriends, Dates, Hookups, and Sausage Sightings

55 million people in the U.S. are Hispanic, with ancestry in one of the Spanish-speaking countries of Latin America.  Most from Mexico, followed by Puerto Rico, El Salvador, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Guatemala.  About half are foreign-born.

They can be of any race, but the most common configuration is mestizo, with both white and Indio roots.  Straight black hair, brown skin, smooth chest, huge beneath the belt.

I speak fluent Spanish, and lived in places with high Hispanic populations: Los Angeles (49%), New York (27%), and Florida (25%), so I've managed to attract the attention of a few Hispanic hunks, boyfriends, dates, and memorable hookups.

1. Marco the Gay Cannibal.  After my freshman year in college, we went to Colombia to build a church, and I encountered a gay hustler ("cannibal").  We didn't actually do anything, but I'm going to count him anyway.

West Hollywood

2. Arman, the first Hispanic guy I remember dating,  few weeks after I arrived in West Hollywood, shortly after my date with Michael J. Fox.  He was a rough-looking tattooed guy who everyone was ignoring at the Gold Coast.  Our date involved going to his cousin's quinceanera and meeting his abuela.

3. Raul from East L.A., who I met at the Silver Platter in 1986, when I was tiring of Alan stealing all my Asian dates.  We dated, on and off, for the next three years.

4. Bathhouse Boy Alejandro.   Alan and I went cruising in Tijuana and met several guys at the bathhouse, but we met the Indio Alejandro at a bar.  His first language was Nahuatl.

5. The Silverlake Stud.  In the fall of 1993, I went cruising at Basgo's, east of Alvarado, and met the Silverlake Stud, who pretended that he was poor and didn't speak English.

6. The Multiracial Four-Way.  One night at Basgo's I picked up a black Hispanic guy from Venezuela, while Lane picked up an Asian guy from Mexico.

7.Mauricio, the Waiter in the Mexican Restaurant, who was actually from Macon, Georgia, but put "Mexico City" on his name tag because it sounded better.

8. Enrique,  a gay Hispanic singer-songwriter who performed at the MCC in 1994.  He also had a bodybuilder's physique and an enormous Kielbasa beneath the belt.

9.During the Great Redneck Roundup of 1995, Lane and I met a Hispanic guy in Flagstaff.  He worked as a waiter at a gay-friendly bar, but he was actually studying anthropology at Northern Arizona University.

San Francisco

10. At the Gilroy Garlic Festival.  David and I shared Hector, who ran the garlic ice cream stand.

New York

11. Mario the Teen Model.  The youngest guy I had ever dated up to that point, a 19 year old fashion model and Columbia University student who took me on a wild night that never ended, no matter how often I said "Let's go home."

12. Breaking Every Rule of Gay Cruising.  I didn't cruise in bars in New York much.  This is probably why.  Jorge was attractive and all, but he sneaked me into his parents' house, and then had to sneak me out again while they were all having breakfast in the morning.  Plus I got lost somewhere in New Jersey.

Florida

13. Andre, who wore a Flowah Powah T-shirt and took me on the worst date in Florida history, involving a half-built house, an alligator, a crazy roommate, and drugs.











14. Remy, a regular at the Filling Station.  We were "bar friends" for two years before we finally got around to hooking up.

15. Victor, who Yuri and I shared in 2004. I didn't know he was Hispanic until he wrote down his last name.

16. His boyfriend Jauvier, a blond Hispanic guy from Peru.

Ohio

17. Carlos and his Two Secrets.  First secret: instead of "a few extra pounds," he was a superchub.  Second secret: his boyfriend was an incredible muscle god.

Upstate

18. The Shared Stud.  Troy tries being a top, but it doesn't work out well.

Plains

19. The straight guy's first time.  CJ, a time traveler from the distant past, had crazy, outdated ideas about gay people.

20.The Trophy Boy, met at the doctor's office, where I had to pry him away from his overprotective Dad.

Rev. Jasper's Boys

West Hollywood, September 1987

I don't remember where I met Rev. Jasper.  Not at MCC, maybe at Evangelicals Together, the gay evangelical network in West Hollywood.  He was in his 40s, a little taller than me, and very muscular,  thick and heavy, with a furry chest.

A bit too old for me: in West Hollywood, you were expected to date within a 5 year age range, and in the summer of 1988, I was only 27 years old.

But he had most of the characteristics I find attractive, including being a clergyman: he was a minister at a gay-friendly American Baptist church in Gardena, about 45 minutes south of West Hollywood.

There aren't any Baptist churches near Gardena that are gay-friendly today, so I doubt that there were any 30 years ago.  Rev. Jasper was probably just feeding me a line.

On our first date,  we had dinner at the French Quarter, and he tried to impress me with his knowledge of Hebrew, Greek, and Latin.  But he got some basic dates in biblical history wrong, and he had a weird theory about Leviticus:

"The Bible is the literal Word of God, no doubt about it, but you have to interpret it right.  For instance, in Leviticus, thou shalt not lie with man as with woman.  Well, how do you lie with man as with woman?  You lie on top of him, and he puts his legs in the air.  So no Greek (anal).  But God doesn't say anything about French (oral)."

But he was muscular, with a thick neck and black eyebrows, so I invited him home.

He liked oral, getting but not giving.  Not a problem.  The only thing I didn't like was his annoying habit of calling me "nice boy, good boy" during the Act.  I felt like a puppy dog.

On our second date, you always introduce him to your friends, so Raul and Heinz invited us over to watch a movie.

This date didn't go as well.  Rev. Jasper was practically drooling over Raul, even suggested sharing on the second date!  Plus he told us about another weird theory.

There were 8 sexes, 4 anthropomorphic (male) and 4 gynecomorphic (female):

Masculine/feminine men
Masculine/feminine boys
Masculine/feminine women
Masculine/feminine girls

And you are only attracted to other sexes, so masculine men are never into other masculine men, for instance, only feminine men, boys, women, or girls.

"Um, excuse me!"  I exclaimed.  "I'm only into masculine men, and I'm plenty masculine!"

He said "Are you really?"

Ok, this would be our last date!  "What about Raul, my ex boyfriend?  He's plenty masculine too!"

"He's still a boy.  A very hot one, I might add."

Raul was 24.  So by boy, Rev. Jasper meant twink.  

Didn't he?

I didn't call Rev. Jasper again, but I don't think he noticed.  The moment the 48 hour waiting period was over, he called Raul for a date.

Fine with me.

So they began dating.  Raul told me that Rev. Jasper was interesting to talk to, and very nice in bed, except for his annoying habit of saying "Good boy, nice boy" during the act.

"I'm not a boy!" Raul exclaimed.  "I'm a grown-up man, ese!"

"He just means a twink,". I said.

"It's still disrespectful."

I shrugged. "Then break up with him."

Raul smiled.  "Did you see what he looks like naked?  I can stand being a boy for a chance at that sausage.  And he has some interesting things to say about the Bible..."

Then, just after their fifth or sixth date, Raul called, bubbling over with excitement.  "My brother Manny is coming for a visit!"

Raul's parents were very conservative Pentecostals.  They weren't happy with him being gay, but they were trying to learn tolerance.  So agreeing to let Manny visit was a major victory.

"We'll have so much fun!" he continued.  "We'll go to Knotts Berry Farm, and Mann's Chinese Theater, and the beach.  And I'll introduce him to all my friends, so he can go home and tell Mama and Papa that gays aren't monsters."

On Friday Raul and I drove down to Escondido, about two hours away, to pick Manny up and take him out to dinner at Mel's Diner in Hollywood.  There were six of us: Raul, me, and four of his friends, including Rev. Jasper.

Manny was 14, cute, energetic, and very nonchalant about Raul's gayness.  He asked thoughtful questions about who called who for the date, who paid, and how you stayed friends after breaking up.

On Saturday, Raul and Manny went out on their own to tour Hollywood and the Santa Monica Pier.

On Sunday, Raul, Manny, and I went to church at the MCC, and then we drove him home.


On Monday, Raul called.  "That's all! I'm not dating Rev. Jasper any more."

"Why?" I asked, surprised.  "What happened?"

"Oh, he's good...he's smooth...but come on, I'm not stupid. When Manny was visiting, his eyes got all big, he talked to him like that, asked him questions like that."

My face started to burn.  "You mean..."

There was dead silence on the line.

"I didn't notice anything inappropriate," I began.  "When he says boy, he means twink....um, doesn't he?"

"He calls me today, he wants to invite me and Manny to Bear Mountain."


"Um...well, that sounds innocent.  He's just being nice to his boyfriend's brother."

"But wait -- he says 'Manny is such a cute boy!  Such a good boy!'"

Ok, that sounded a lot like Rev. Jasper's pillow talk.

"Then he says 'Do you think Manny liked me?  When can I see him again?'"  Like he wants a date! First you, and then me, I'm still a boy, and now Manny!  Pendejo!"

Ok, no more Rev. Jasper.

See also: Preachers, Priests, and Monks on my Dating List

Raul and I Bankrupt the Porn Industry

West Hollywood, November 1986

On November 19th, 1986, my roommate Alan the ex-porn star, who kept trying to steal  my boyfriends, threw me a surprise birthday party. After the present-unwrapping and cake, he introduced Raul and me to an older, balding guy named Scott and asked "What do you think?"  .

"I'll need to see them in action, of course. But they certainly have the right look."

"Um...thanks?"  I turned to Alan for an explanation.

"Surprise! Guess what -- that pocket organizer wasn't your only present.  I set you up to star in  Scott Masters' new movie!"

He was the head of Nova Studios, a major producer of.... I reddened.  "You want me to do porn?"

"Alan recommended you and Raul," Scott said.  "It's a great script: funny and romantic, not just sex.  That's why we want lovers, to add verisimilitude."

"But...I'm not an actor."  I had a brief modeling career in college, but no nudity, and certainly no sex.

"You don't need to act.  Just do what you do anyway.  $800 a day for a guaranteed five-day shoot."  

The money sounded good (my three jobs were't paying enough to cover rent, tuition, and jaunts to Australia and Japan).  And Raul liked the idea (Filipino restaurants don't pay well, either.) So we signed on, and that Saturday we got up at 4:00 am to shoot some exteriors at the San Miguel Mission in San Luis Obispo.

The script didn't require a lot of memorization.  In old Spanish California, Rodrigo (my character), falls in love with Paco (Raul), an apprentice monk at the mission.

But Paco is secretly the kept boy of the homophobic Archbishop "Farwell" (a play on Jerry Falwell). There's a duel that ends with a three-way encounter.

A few days later we drove to a house in the Hollywood Hills to film some of the bedroom and pool scenes (yes, the old Spanish mission had a pool.).  I wondered who would be playing Farwell. Boomer Stryker?  Kip Noll?

I didn't find out until he walked through the door -- Alan!

Was this all just a set-up to trick with Raul?

"Hey, they needed a husky guy, and I'm a preacher, so I have the right vibe."  He grinned.  "Tricking with Raul is just a bonus."

We were going to shoot the Farwell-Paco first.  That meant I had to watch Alan and my boyfriend together!

"They're just acting!" I told myself over and over.  I started thinking of last September, when my date wandered into Alan's bed.  And a year ago, when Alan and I were dating, and he cheated on me with a Norwegian con artist.  And now he was with Raul.  They were kissing...and groping...and kissing...with obvious enthusiasm!

I couldn't take it anymore!

"Get off him!" I ran over and pulled Alan away. "He's my boyfriend!  You always do this!  Every time I meet a guy, you horn in...."

They looked up at me quizzically.

"No ad libbing!" the director yelled.

Flushed with embarrassment and anger, I stumbled away.  "I'll...I'll be waiting in the car."

Raul followed, saying something like "It's just a job, man..."

The aftermath:
1. The film was never completed, but we did get paid for two days of shooting.
2. Alan forgave me: "I know you have hangups about monogamy."
3. Raul and I broke up, but not over that. We stayed friends, and reconciled a few months later, after my celebrity boyfriend dumped me.
4. Nova Studios went bankrupt.  But surely that's not my fault.

See also: Alan's Arrests.