Was Cousin Buster Gay?

When I was growing up in Rock Island, we visited my parents' family in Indiana two or three times a year, and I always wanted to spend the night with my Cousin Buster, who lived in the Trailer in the Deep Woods.

He was a year and a half older than me, and more adventurous, dragging me into mishap after mishap in the peat bog, the old barn, the endless corn fields, and the haunted House on the Hill.

At night we crammed into his narrow twin bed and read comic books until our eyes were bleary and he dozed off, and I could watch his bare chest rising and falling, and if I was very careful, reach over and gently caress him. One of my first stirrings of homoerotic desire, perhaps.

The last time I spent the night was at Christmastime in 1973, when I had just turned thirteen. I was very disappointed that he gave me the couch, although I did catch him masturbating later.

As a teenager, my visits to Indiana became sporadic.  I was old enough to stay home, I was very busy with school and clubs, and besides, it was different.  I was disgusted by my family's conservative politics and country-western music, and by Cousin Buster's macho interests in hunting, fishing, working on cars, and girls.

No more comic books.  No more adventures.  No more magic and mystery in life.  Just "I revamped the carburator, and put in a new gasket"  and "she had really big tits."


After high school, my visits became even more sporadic, and Cousin Buster was absent altogether.  His mother made excuses for why he couldn't come to family barbecues and picnics.  Fine with me: seeing him again would be awkward and embarrassing, like running into an ex-lover after a bad breakup.

I heard about him through my mother: working at an auto garage, collecting classic cars, going hunting and fishing with his buddies, dating girls but never settling down with anyone.

In August 1996, at the age of 38, Cousin Buster collapsed at work.  He was taken to the emergency room, then admitted to the hospital.  Two days later he was diagnosed with cancer.  He was moved into a hospice. He died a few days later.

I didn't go to the funeral; I had just visited my parents in Indianapolis and my friend Alan in Norfolk, and I didn't have the money for another expensive plane flight.  Besides, it would be awkward and embarrassing.  He was a stranger.

But recently I began wondering: we had so many plans as kids.  We were going to move into a house together, and have a room for comic books and a room for toys, and sleep in the same bed, cuddling in the night.  It sounds very much like two gay kids who haven't figured it out yet.  Could Cousin Buster have been gay or bi?

First I asked my only cousin from that side of the family that I was still in contact with, Uncle Gus's daughter Shelley, but she didn't remember Cousin Buster very well: "He was 12 years older than me,  I don't think he even knew that I existed."

I couldn't ask his elderly, conservative mother, who I wasn't out to...could I?

Turns out that I could.  When I was in Indianapolis last Christmas, my elderly, conservative mother wanted me to drive her up to northern Indiana to visit her two surviving sisters, and when we were visiting Aunt Mavis, I managed to steer the conversation to Cousin Buster.

"Oh, what a ray of sunshine!" she exclaimed.  "He was so busy with work and his friends, but he still took time to visit his old mother every day."

Old mother? Um...when he died Mavis was only 58 years old, still working full-time and a member of several clubs, hardly a shut-in.

"Speaking of friends, did he have anyone special?" I asked.  "Any best friends?"

"Nobody comes to mind. But just a minute -- I'll get his memorial book."

At the funeral, Cousin Buster's friends were asked to write their memories of him in a book:

"

"Interests: arrowheads, cruising, nudists, the good stuff, making jewelry, having friends."

"I'll miss you lots.  I'll miss your smile and our long talks."

"Hey, buddy, I still carry your rock with me every day."

"To the biggest pumpkin in the patch."  Huh?

"You were my best friend in all the world!"  (Two of these).

Some of the comments were suggestive.  I tried to track down the people in the memorial books, but was successful only with the "rock in my pocket" guy, Jack, now a 62-year old grandfather living in Indianapolis.

"Great guy!  I still think about him all the time."

"And his rock?"

"I still carry it with me, like a good luck charm." It was a smooth lavender agate.

Lavender?  The gay pride color?

"Another guy in the memorial book said that he was into nudity, cruising, and the Good Stuff."

Jack laughed.  "Well, I never saw him naked, and I don't know what the Good Stuff meant, but he was definitely into cruising."

"Really?"  Looking for hot guys?

"Did you see his 1972 Plymouth convertible?  Man, that was a gas."

I was tired of beating around the bush.  "Did he have anyone special in his life.  A girlfriend, or a boyfriend?"

He shrugged.  "Everybody was special to Buster.  He always acted like you were the most important person in the world.  And I guess, at that moment, you were."

I left not knowing if Cousin Buster was bi or gay, or asexual, or heterosexual.  He surrounded himself with people, male and female, young and old, and loved them all.

Who cares if he was in love with any of them?

PS: When I was in Indiana in August 2021, my Mom confirmed that Cousin Buster was gay (I think she meant bisexual).  She only just found out: her sister told her during a conversation about her transgender granddaughter.  Funny that they would keep that a secret for so many years.