New Celebrities and Paranormal Indexes

 

New indexes of celebrity and paranormal stories:

The celebrity index features stories about the celebrities that my friends and I have dated, seen naked, or hooked up with (or claimed to have hooked up with), including Burt Ward, Dick Sargent, Groucho Marx, Jason Bateman, Gregg Sulkin, Keanu Reeves, Leonardo DiCaprio, Ricky Nelson...well, a lot.  

Also some collections of nude celebrity photos, and a few profiles.

Link to the celebrities index

The paranormal index features encounters with ghosts, time travelers, and other paranormal entities, mostly mine, some from my friends.

Link to the paranormal index

My Uncle and His Boyfriend in the Kentucky Hills

Eastern Kentucky, Summer 1973

It's the summer after seventh grade.  We're visiting my Uncle El, the only one of Mom's family to stay behind when the rest of them moved to Indiana.  Dinner is over, and we're telling stories of long-ago times, before I was born, when Mom was a little girl.   Sometimes the adults laugh at jokes I don't understand.

Uncle El's wife tells about the time she rode her bicycle all the way into Salversville to see a boy, but when she got there he was spooning with someone else.  (she obviously did not mean "sleeping front-to-back."  It was probably something like "making out.")

An elderly lady I don't know tells a story about witches.

Now it's Uncle El's turn.

"I'm going to tell about my brother, Manus, and his friend Graydon, two boys with the same soul."

I've been dozing off, but now I perk up -- sounds like this will be interesting!



Eastern Kentucky, Fall 1939

Manus and Graydon, the boy from down the holler, were born at the same moment, and some said they shared the same soul.

Oh, on the outside, they was as different as night and day:

Graydon was tall and dark, with thick arms and a tight chest, fond of wrasslin' and huntin' and fishin'.

Manus was short and slim and pale-skinned, a moody boy, always readin', but a good singer, with a clear tenor voice.

They was different down below, too.  You don't have much privacy in the hills, when you sleep three to a bed, and I saw them many times jumping nekkid into the creek, or lying on the soft grass.

Lordy, did that Graydon have a whopper!

"Eliot!  There are children present!"  the elderly lady snaps.

"Why, Marcy, surely they know that boys have something down there!"

Yet for all of their differences, Manus and Graydon were never separated, from sunup to sundown, when their parents forced them into different cabins for dinner.  Even then, they sometimes sneaked out to have secret adventures in the darkness.

Life was hard in the hills during the Depression.  Eight people in a four room cabin.

Kerosene lamps for light, a wood-burning stove for heat, and the woods outside for an outhouse.

They raised chickens and grew corn, beans, taters, and maters.  For everything else, they depended on Dad's job at a factory in Hueysville, eight miles away.

Still, they had fun. There were church socials and square dances.  In the evenings the neighbors came around to tell ghost stories and sing songs.  There'd be no dry eye in the house when Manus  sang "Barbara Allen."

Oh mother, mother, make my bed,
Make it long and make it narrow.
Sweet William died for me today,
I'll die for him tomorrow.

"I always hated that song," Mom says.  

In the summer of 1939, Graydon bought and fixed up an old clunker car.  Now they could drive all the way to Salyersville, 20 miles down the pike, to get malteds and go to the movies.

They liked Little Tough Guy, with the Dead End Kids, and Out West with the Hardys, with Mickey Rooney.

In late October of 1939, Graydon and Manus took ill, maybe from going swimming nekkid in the cold Brushy Fork Creek.  

They gave them herb medicine and mustard plasters and poltices, and Manus got better, but Graydon got sicker and sicker, and he died on November 5th, the day of the first snowfall.

His dad and older brother built a pine box to put him in, and they buried him in the graveyard up atop  the hill.

Well, needless to say, Manus was inconsolable.

He cried and cried, and after he stopped crying he wouldn't eat, he wouldn't sleep, he just sat on the bed in the room he shared with me and Edd, staring out the window, up at the hill where Graydon was buried.

Then one night he yelled to the family, "Hey, there's a light up on the hill!"

It was a swaying yellow light, like from a kerosene lamp.  But who would be up there in the middle of the night?  It was pitch dark, with just a narrow trail through the brush and trees.  

"I'm going up!"  Manus yelled, pulling on his coat.


But Mom and Dad forbade him.  It was too dangerous. He could wait until morning to investigate.

"No, I gotta go now!  I gotta!"  He tried to push past them out the door.  Dad grabbed him by the arms.  He fought.

There was no help for it: they had to lock Manus up in the room, where me and Edd could look over him.

Well, Manus paced and rumbled, and yelled, and cried, and finally sat down in a chair, still staring up at the light on the hill.  Finally Edd and me fell asleep.

The next morning, when we woke up, Manus was gone!

The door was still locked from the outside.  The window hadn't been touched.  There was no way Manus could have gotten out!

Some say one of his sisters let him out, and he went dashing up the hill and fell in a ditch, and got eaten by a bear.

El glances pointedly at my mother.  But she was only two years old at the time.

Some say a neighbor sneaked him out, and drove him to Salyersville, where he bought a bus ticket Out West, like the Hardys.

Some say Graydon came for him.

Whatever happened, no one ever saw Manus again.

But that night, up on the hill, we saw two glowing lights.

See also: My Kentucky Kinfolk; The Naked Man at the Crossroads; Erotic Story about Me and My Grandpa #1

Drake on a Date with Ricky Nelson and Bob Ellis

Hollywood, May 1956

One day in the spring of 1956, Harriet Nelson (who played "herself" on the long-runnng Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet) invited her friend MJ (Mary Jane Croft)  over for coffee, and to talk about a problem.  Her son Ricky, a sophomore at Hollywood High, was soft and sweet and feminine, not outgoing and athletic like his older brother David.  Ozzie  pushed him into playing football, but he hated it.  He preferred tennis, if he was going to play a sport at all.  And music -- he was "musical."

MJ smiled.  "When I was a little girl, musical was what they called...wait...you don't mean Ricky is that way...doesn't he have a girlfriend?"

"Ricky and Claire are just friends. They go shopping and talk about clothes.   I've never seen them kiss, or even hold hands.  And Ricky positively idolizes men.  It's even appeared in the show."  Lately head writers Dick Bensfield and  Perry Grant had been introducing some "Ricky doesn't like girls" plotlines into the scripts.  Harriet didn't know why.  To signal that they knew...to issue a warning.  She sighed.  Studio politics!

"So what if he's...um...musical?" MJ asked.  "You're still his mother, aren't you?"

"Of course!  I have nothing against people like that, I've worked with them since I was a little girl.  And some of my closest friends...." Harriet trailed off: the aggressive, mannish MJ, who played Lucille Ball's perpetual foil/best friend, was almost certainly of the Sapphic persuasion, but she hadn't yet admitted it to anyone.   "But society can be so cruel..."

"Especially the Hollywood gossip mill."

"..and I don't want Ricky being hurt.  Mixed up with the wrong crowd, men who will blackmail him or abuse him.  I think he needs a friend more than anything, to show that he's not alone.  Do you know anyone who...."

"Are you trying to set Ricky up on a date?"  MJ asked, a delighted gleam in her eyes.  "Oh, it will be so sophisticated, like a Cole Porter song, like 'Begin the Beguine.'  I know tons and tons of eligible men who are 'not the marrying kind.' They're mostly older, though. Cesar Romero, John Wayne, Joe Kearns....oh!  Tony Curtis!"

"Tony Curtis?" Harriet repeated.  "I never met him, but I hear that he's the utter living end, as the kids say.  Why, Drake, the boy who rode to school with David and Ricky, used to talk about him all the time.  He was positively in love with him before they had a falling out of some sort...."

She trailed off again.  They looked at each other, understanding...

"Is this Drake boy handsome?"  MJ asked.

When Harriet Nelson called 18-year old Drake, she was so subtle that he had no idea that the evening with Ricky was supposed to be a date.  More like babysitting.  The kid was two years younger than him, scrawny and kind of obnoxious.  But his father insisted -- Ozzie and Harriet was one of the hottest properties in Hollywood, and it wouldn't hurt him to get tight with a big teen star.

Was Ricky even a teenager yet?

If he was going to be stuck in dullsville for an evening, he wouldn't do it alone -- he invited his boyfriend, Bob Ellis,  a 23 year old actor who had starred on Meet Corliss Archer as a "best friend."  Bob was great -- he had a car and his own pad.  Plus a thick beefy chest, nice biceps, and a cock that wouldn't quit.  Not just big, although it was about 7" -- Bob could take three blow jobs, one after the other, and still spring up, ready for more.

The plan was to go to dinner and then bop at the Zanzibar.  Ricky brought Claire along, and Drake and Bob would go "stag."

Everything went fine for awhile. Ricky was becoming rather cute, and he was very knowledgeable about modern music.  Drake could almost see dating him.

Then Bob and Ricky started doing that look that Drake knew well.  Could he be that way?  And hot for his guy?

It got worse:

"Dad said I could sing on the show," Ricky bragged, "Or maybe play the drums, like Krupa."

"You'll never be as hot as Krupa!" Bob said with a sleazy leer.

"Maybe, but which one do you have a chance with?"

"Oh, be yourself!" Claire said, hitting him playfully with her purse.

At the Zanzibar, Drake asked Claire to dance -- good for keeping his pecularity a secret, but a bad strategic move.  When they returned to the table, Ricky and Bob were gone.

"Looks like our fellas have ditched us," Claire said.  "They must out spooning somewhere."

"You mean it's cool with you that Ricky...does that?"

She shrugged.  "I knew about his taste in fellows since we started dating. It doesn't hurt anybody, and I'd rather have him sometimes than not at all."

Doesn't hurt anybody?  Drake was roiling with jealousy.  He went into the bathroom, hoping to catch Bob and the scrawny kid in the act.  Not there.  Then into the parking lot, to Bob's car....

Bob and Ricky were sitting side by side in the back seat.  Ricky had his cock out, and was playing with himself while he went down on Bob!  Drake saw a flash of Bob's shaft, and quite a lot of Ricky's cock -- rather small, cut, and pale in the light of distant street lamps.

Drake rapped loudly on the window.  Ricky sprang up in alarm and covered himself,  then saw Drake and smiled.  He rolled the window down part way.

"Just warming him up for you," he smirked.

Drake never went out with Bob -- or the little weasel -- again.

West Hollywood, August 2017

I heard this story a couple of weeks ago from Drake's ex-boyfriend Zack (I made up the conversation with Harriet).

Why did Drake never talk about it when I knew him in San Francisco in the 1990s?   I think because it puts everyone, and especially Drake, in a rather bad light.  Drake had no cause to expect monogamy from Bob when multiple partners seem to have been the norm in 1950s Hollywood.  He overreacted to the situation and lost a boyfriend and a potential friend.

And there's another problem: Drake going down on Tony Curtis is a sallow 16-year old with no experience in the gay community; Drake going on a date with Ricky Nelson is an experienced 18-year old with a boyfriend.  Six months apart at most. Can they both be true?

See also: Drake on his Knees in Tony Curtis' Dressing Room; Billy Finds a Special Friend on The Twilight Zone; Ricky Nelson Hooks Up with Kent McCord.

Dad Explains the Facts of Life

There are several traditional rites of passage between a boy and his Dad:

When he teaches you to shave.
When he lets you drive for the first time.
When you can beat him at arm wrestling.

But the biggest is The Talk, when Dad sits you down and explains The Facts of Life.

By which he means the mechanics of biological reproduction, how sperm and egg cells merge their chromosomes to turn into an embryo, and nine months later, a baby.

Why is this the sole subject matter of The Talk?

Finding out how you came to exist may be interesting, but it's irrelevant, the physiology of the past.  What about your respiratory, circulatory, nervous, and muscle systems?  What about the nutrition and exercise necessary to ensure that your body works properly?  Surely those are Facts of Life of more immediate importance.

The reason is obvious: The Facts of Life Talk isn't really about biological reproduction.  It's about Sex, aka heterosexual intercourse.

Dad assumes that the quest for heterosexual intercourse, will occupy your thoughts, color your decisions, throughout your life.  You will choose colleges and careers solely on the likelihood of heterosexual intercourse, marry to be ensured of a regular partner, get a job and a house and have kids to ensure that she sticks around, and spend your declining years on a park bench, gazing at "all the pretty girls" and wishing that you could have heterosexual intercourse with them.

By the time Dad sat me down for the Talk, I already knew all of the Facts of Sex, except for one.  I heard them through:

1. 7th Grade Health Class.  The teacher showed us a drawing of a man and a woman, facing us like the greeting to aliens on the Pioneer Space Probe, with the testicles and ovaries circled.  He explained that sperm from the man's testicles merged with eggs from the woman's ovaries, which was then embedded into the uterine wall and developed into a fetus.

Ok, but how did the sperm get to the ovaries, when they're a good five feet from each other?  Teleportation?

"Don't get smart!  You already know about sex!  That's all you kids think about!"

2. Sunday School.  Ok, so we reproduced through sex. That must be why Brother Dino admonished us not to have sex before marriage, or God would strike us with incurable diseases as a punishment.  He didn't want kids having kids.

But what exactly was sex?

"Good question!" Brother Dino said.  "It's not just sex.  God hates anything that defiles the body."

Which didn't answer the question.

3. Summer Camp.  At Nazarene summer camp the summer after seventh grade, I asked an older boy named Marty to explain the procedure.  He told me about going from first base (kissing) to second base (feeling the girl's breasts over her bra) to third base (feeling under).  He even demonstrated by feeling my chest under my shirt.  But then he got nervous and left before the home run.

How did feeling under a girl's bra make sperm go from your testicles to her ovaries?  The two organs were still a foot or more apart!

4. Mike. In eighth grade, my friends and the jocks claimed that they had sex often, a dozen times a week.  As we walked down the halls, they would say "I've had her...had her...had her..."  

I couldn't ask them, so I asked Bill's big brother, Mike.

"Ok," he said, "The home run: you put your penis inside the girl's vagina." (yes, he used the technical terms).  "That's an opening that leads all the way up to her ovaries. So the sperm comes out and goes right up the tube to the egg."

"But...but...pee comes out of your penis, too!" I exclaimed.  "How do you make sure that sperms come out instead?"

Mike began to blush.  "Um...when you get older, sometimes...you know, it gets bigger...and like turns into a baseball bat."

"Sure, I know all about...um, baseball bats," I said, feeling very grown up and sophisticated.  No one had ever mentioned that Fact of Life before.

"Well, when you're like that, only sperm can come out.  When you're not, only pee."

"But..you can't control when that happens.  How do you get it to happen when you want to have a baby?"

He laughed.  "Oh, you'll find out, Bud.  Believe me, you'll find out!"

So I sort of knew the procedure.  But Mike left out the most important Fact of Life.

5. Dad. In the fall of ninth grade, Dad took me out to the back yard, sat me in the grape arbor where, he said, someday he would host my wedding, and had the Talk.

"You had Sex Ed, right?" he started off.  "You know about sperm and eggs, and all that?"

"Sure."

"Do you have any questions?"

"Well..."  Yes, I had a question.  "I already learned about running the bases, and what to do with your penis if you want a baby.  But I hear guys talking all the time about having sex when they don't want to make a baby."

"Don't do it!" Dad said sharply.  "God will punish you with incurable diseases."

"Sure, sure...but...why would you want to?  I mean, if you don't want to make a baby, what's the point?"

"What's the point?" he repeated, staring at me.  "What do you mean, what's the point?  It's a girl -- let's say a really cute girl -- and you've been kissing her, and feeling her breasts."

I looked away, toward the garage.  "That's gross!  Girls are all soft, with no muscles, no penis.  Nothing cute.  I mean, why would you touch them like that, unless you had to?"  

I didn't realize that I had said too much until it was too late.  Dad stood abruptly, snarled "Don't be a wise guy!" , and nearly ran back to the house.

Dad left out the most important Fact of Life.  It took me years to figure out it out on my own:

Some boys want to hit a home run with boys, not girls.

Leonard Bernstein, the Rabbi's Son, and the Verge of Coming Out

This story has been moved to RG Beefcake and Boyfriends

The Farmboy, the Preacher, and the Security Guard

Louisville, Kentucky, Novembe 1982

During my first year at Indiana University, Roy the Farmboy and I drove to Louisville, Kentucky to go to the Metropolitan Community Church

I couldn't wait!  A church founded by and for gay people!  I had been looking for a MCC ever since I read the Rev. Troy Perry's autobiography a couple of years ago.  There were none in Indiana at the time.

We parked near the Brown Theater in downtown Louisville and walked to the Unitarian Church, an old Gothic grey-brick building.  There was a guy pacing outside the door: African-American, very dark skin, short, solidly built, in a pink shirt and tie. He looked like a pro wrestler.

I didn't have my list of the Five Traits I Find Attractive yet, but in retrospect, he had four: short, dark, muscular, and religious.  And probably the fifth, too -- beneath the belt gifts.


"Hi," I said, holding out my hand.  "I'm Boomer, here for the service.  And this is Roy.  You probably know him already."

"Hi, Roy!  Glad you're back!  How's Bloomington?"  He looked around to make sure no one was watching, then gave Roy a kiss.  I felt a pang of jealousy.

"Boomer, this is Terence.  He's the sound guy and security guard for the church."

"Hi!"  He leaned in for a brief kiss.  "You can't be too careful.  We've had bomb threats.  You never know if a visitor is going to try to kill you.  So, are you guys together?"

"Not yet -- but I'm working on it."

Terence laughed and clapped him on the back.   "Come to brunch with us after the service and we'll talk, ok?"

We walked on into the sanctuary.  It looked like any other congregational-style church -- bare of religious symbols except for a pulpit decorated with a cross.  There were King James Bibles and Methodist hymnals on the pews.

"You and Terence...." I began.

"Oh, no.  I haven't been with anyone in church.  Besides, Terence is Rev. Reid's spouse.   That's what they call them in MCC.  Life-long commitment, rejecting all others, and all that.

My heart sank.  There would be no seeing Terence naked today, or any day.

There were about 50 people in the congregation, mostly gay men, mostly couples.  A scattering of lesbian couples, a few with children.  One heterosexual couple.

To my surprise, the service was all Nazarene -- old-time Gospel hymns, quotes from the King James Bible, hand-clapping, shouts of "Amen!," calling each other "Brother" and "Sister," and a sermon full of "God told me!" and "You got to get right with God!"

The only differences were:
1. The clerical robes.
2. The communion.
3. People typically kissed hello instead of shaking hands.  Same-sex on the mouth, opposite-sex on the cheek.
4. The sermon topic, Galatians 3:28: "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus."  The preacher expanded it to include "there is neither gay nor straight."

The preacher, Brother Reid, was in his 40s, a tall, beefy bear who looked very much like Brother Tyler back home.  He even paced and pounded like that old bulldog.

It was nice, but I was expecting something less -- well, less Nazarene.

Afterwards, Terence, Brother Reid, and a few other guys took us out to the English Grill in the Brown Hotel, which specialized in a sort of turkey Eggs Benedict called a Hot Brown.  Brother Reid sat beside me with his arm draped over the back of my chair, and we shared childhood "horror stories" about repressive church rules.  No swimming!  No dancing!  No movies!  No shopping on Sunday!

He looked, and acted interested.  Meanwhile, Terence was sitting next to me, but totally taken by Roy the Farmboy.  What was going on?  Did they..um..do that sharing thing, like the Episcopal priest I met in Des Moines?

A preacher hooks up with guys other than his spouse?

"What are you doing later?" Brother Reid asked.

"We have to be heading back to Bloomington.  It's a two hour drive."

"Two hours -- that's nothing! Sometimes I drive two hours before breakfast.  You need the grand tour of Louisville, and then the drag show at Nowhere."

Preachers go to bars?  And drink beer?

"Sounds like fun," Roy said.  "I just turned 21 last month -- I haven't gone to the bars yet!"

"Then it's high time you started!  The drag show is at 10:00 pm."

I didn't want to go to a drag show in a bar! "But then we'd be driving on dark country roads all the way up to Bloomington at midnight!"

"Or -- or --"  Brother Reid said with a smile, "You could spend the night, leave at 7:00 tomorrow morning.  We can put you up in the spare bedroom."

Sighing, I agreed.  Another night with Roy, who was nice but not my type, all anal instead of oral, while a Greek god lay sleeping in the next room.

The four of us, behaving very much like two couples on a double date, spent the rest of the afternoon at  Conrad's Castle, which I found only moderately interesting, and Slugger Field, which I found not interesting at all.  We had dinner at a steak house, and then went to Brother Reid and Terence's apartment to listen to depressing country-western music and wait until it was time to go to the bar.

I staked out an easy chair, while the other guys got the couch.

"Plenty of room over here," Brother Reid said, patting the tiny bit of seat next to him.

"Oh, I'm fine here," I said petulantly.

Roy stood, came to the chair, and put his arms around me.  "Feeling neglected?"  Soon we were kissing.  I was vaguely aware of Brother Reid and Terence doing the same.

"Maybe we'll skip the drag show," Brother Reid said.  "It's been a long day.  Roy, you know where the spare bedroom is.  There are clean towels in the bathroom, if you want to shower."


Another night with Roy -- good kisser, but not particularly impressive with anything else.

Later I got up to "use the bathroom."   The other bedroom door was closed.

I returned to our bed. "Sh*t!" I whispered.

"Anything wrong, babe?" Roy murmured.

I didn't know he was awake!  "Oh -- I was hoping to see those guys naked, but their door was closed."

"Why didn't you say something?  I can take care of that.  Hang on a minute."

He disappeared.  I heard the door to the other bedroom open.  A moment later, Brother Reid appeared in the doorway, naked, smiling.  He climbed onto the bed, pinned me down, and pressed his mouth against mine.  I felt his Bratwurst move against me.

When it was over, he returned to his own bed, and Roy returned to ours, having had a similar experience with Terence.

Apparently preachers do, in fact, hook up with guys other than their spouses, but they don't talk about it afterwards.

And I never did see Terence naked.

See also: The Farmboy Butches it Up; Dumped by Richie Rich

Straight Guys Never Figure It Out

Wilton Manors, October 2003

When I was living in Florida, newcomers from the small towns (or big cities) of the vast homophobic Straight World often went crazy with joy: "You can be open here!  You can be free!"  They found a job in a gay venue, read only gay books, went only to gay movies, and never ventured beyond the magic square bounded by Oakland Park Blvd., Powerline Road, NW 13th Street, and the Atlantic Ocean.

"Oh, you live on NW 12th Street?  Isn't that a little...iffy?"

Most residents of Wilton Manors weren't quite so insular.  But all of our friends were gay.  So were our neighbors.  And, as far as we know, so was the guy on the next treadmill at Barney's Gym, the guy sorting coupons in the check out line at the Publix Supermarket, and the woman browsing among the humorous cards at To the Moon.  We avoided heterosexuals as much as possible.  They were the enemy, screaming "God hates you!" from behind security fences at Gay Pride, or asking simpering, insulting questions, like "What do they think causes it now?"

So my house mates were surprised, and not entirely sympathetic when I befriended a heterosexual.

In the fall of 2003, when I was working at Florida Atlantic University, I saw Josh (not his real name) in the locker room of the campus gym, stripping out of a plaid shirt, suspenders, and a ridiculous red bowtie. I concluded that he was heterosexual almost immediately, through the gleaming, new-looking ring on his finger and his casual references to his wife. Surely Josh concluded that I was gay almost immediately, from my answer to the question " What are you working on now?” (media images of gay teenagers), or from the shelves of gay books, rainbow flag mouse pad, and gay pride poster in my office.

But no, when an attractive girl passed, Josh nudged me so I could look.  "I only look at guys," I said.

That didn't do it.

"He will never figure it out," my housemate Yuri told me.  "Stupid straight guys can never see anything but straights."

"Anyway, why would you want to tell a breeder?" my other housemate, Barney, said with an accusatory glare, as if I was planning some act of treason.  "When he finds out, he'll start screaming that you're trying to molest him."

"He's not a friend, really.  He just comes to my office to chat.  Besides, it's a challenge.  Somehow or other I'm going to get him to figure it out!"

"Impossible!"  Barney exclaimed.  "But why don't we make it interesting?  I'll bet you $20 that you can't get him to figure it out during the next week.  You can say anything you want except 'I'm gay.'"

"I want in on this thing too," Yuri said.  "But you can't cruise him.  Or talk about your old boyfriends."

I spent the next week dropping all of the hints I could think of.

"I can't get married in this state.  It's illegal."
"Oh...still married to the wife back home, huh?"
No, you nitwit, gay people can't get married!

"I can't donate blood.  It's illegal."
"I hear you.  Get a venereal disease just once, it haunts you for the rest of your life."
No, you idiot, gay men can't donate blood!

"My childhood church was totally homophobic.  It blamed gays for everything from child molestation to 9/11."
"That's ridiculous!  Gays are just people, like you and me."
Are you in on the bet?  Did my housemates pay you to pretend ignorance?

Finally in desperation I invited Josh over for dinner with Barney and Yuri.

"Oh, a guys' night!  Leave the girlfriends at home!  Sounds great!"

During dinner, I brought up Wilton Manors' reputation as a gay mecca.
"Yeah, gentrifying neighborhoods often have gay guys fixing things up."

Barney's job managing a gym with a mostly gay clientele.
"It's great that you're so secure in your masculinity that you aren't worried about them seeing you naked in the locker room."

Yuri's quest for the World's Biggest Penis in the Basque country of Spain four years ago.
"Wow, are they really that big?  They must really impress the ladies!"

My housemates grinned at me.

After dinner I invited Josh to select a movie to watch from our collection of 200-odd DVDS. Other than a few classics, they all had gay characters, gay subtexts, or covers displaying muscular guys with their shirts off. Without a word or even an odd look, he selected Alfred Hitchcock’s North by Northwest, which has none.

Josh sat on the couch, directly behind a coffee table containing a pile of gay magazines. On top was an issue of The Advocate, selected deliberately because the word “Gay” was written on the cover three times, along with photos of the gay icons Harvey Milk and Chad Allen. Surely that would be enough.

It wasn't.

After the movie, we were channel surfing, when an attractive man appeared on the screen. “Wait – go back,” I exclaimed. “That guy was totally hot!”

"What for?"  Josh asked.  "It was a guy."

Finally in desperation, I pulled out my wallet, handed $20 bills to Yuri and Barney, and said, in a loud, clear voice, "I am gay."

"Yeah, right.  Don't be funny."  He turned to Yuri.  "Does Boomer always joke around like this?"

"Yes, all the time," he said, barely restraining his laughter.  "Except when he wants to impress a girl."

I hit him on the head with a pillow.

When they finally assured Josh that I wasn't joking, he was shocked.  "I had no idea.  You hide it so well!"

Hide it?

Then: "I think it's great that you guys are so secure in your masculinity that you don't mind having a gay roommate."

My Book of Cute Boys

This story has been moved to RG Beefcake and Boyfriends

A Naked Man for Christmas

Dan in college

This story has been moved to RG Beefcake and Boyfriends

The Boy with a Crush on My Dad

When I was growing up, I was fascinated by a photo of my father sitting on a burro in Tijuana.

Dad is tanned, muscular, smiling, wearing a sombrero that invites us to "Kiss My Ass!"

The photo is dated September 8th, 1959, a little over a year before I was born. There are two names written on the back, "Frank" and "Jared."

Frank is my father, but who is Jared?  The burro?

And how did this grinning, bawdy, irreverent 21-year old turn into the Dad I knew, conservative, somber, serious, who rarely laughed and never joked or fooled around?  What changed?

Here is all I knew:

June 1956

Frank graduates from high school in Indiana, and joins the Navy.  He spends the next three years seeing the world, visiting Japan, Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong, and the Philippines, learning to repair things deep down in the hulls of the big ships, and buddy-bonding.  He calls it the best time of his life.

June 1959

Frank returns to Indiana for a two-week long shore leave and reunites with his high school sweetheart, who is working at the A&W.  They impulsively get married, and drive with her sister and brother-in-law cross country to Long Beach, California.  They move into a tiny apartment.

The next year is a blank space in their lives.  They don't talk about it.  There are only a few mementos and photographs.  I know that they went to Knotts Berry Farm and Tijuana, that a couple of relatives flew out for a visit, and that Mom bought a set of encyclopedias from a fast-talking salesman, and that's all.

June 1960

Frank's four-year tour of duty ends.  His Captain asks him to stay on, with a promotion to Chief Petty Officer, but he refuses.  Instead, he and Mom return to Indiana and move into a house on South Randolph Street.  He goes to work in the factory, which he calls a "hell hole," even when he's not angry: "Well, I'm off to the goddam hell hole, back at 4:00."   and frequently evokes his Navy years as "the best time of my live."

Why did Dad abandon a Navy career he loved for a factory job he hated?  

I could have grow up in Long Beach!  I could have met Randall and Will the Bondage Boy early in my childhood.  I could learned about gay people and been part of the gay rights movement of the 1980s.  Instead I rumbled around Rock Island in utter silence, my same-sex loves ignored, my most casual friendship with a girl applauded as the meaning of life.

Why did they leave Long Beach?

Indianapolis,  May 2016

I'm visiting my parents on the way back from New York. My nephew is digitizing their old photos, and I see the "Kiss My Ass" burro photo again.  Emboldened, I decide to coax as much information out of them as possible.

Maybe the statute of limitations has passed, or maybe after nearly 60 years they don't care about their youthful transgressions anymore, but Mom and Dad both open up, describing their apartment, the corner grocery store, the movie theater where they saw Ben-Hur and Pillow Talk.

"You went to movies?" I ask, shocked.  Nazarenes are forbidden from setting foot inside movie theaters.


"That's not all!" Dad says with a laugh.  "We played cards.  We danced.  We even drank -- just beer, one time, but if the preacher or my parents found out, we'd be in big trouble!"

"We made friends with all sorts of people that would set my Mom and Dad off," Mom adds.  "Blacks.  Jews.  Catholics.  Mexicans.  And...well, you know..."

"Gays?" I suggest.

Suddenly Dad becomes somber.  "It was the Fifties.  We didn't know about things like that."

"Or if we did, we thought it was very rare," Mom adds, "You'd never meet anyone like that in a lifetime, which is good because it was the worst thing possible, like a sin and a crime and a sickness, all rolled up into one.  Then we met that boy, Jared"

"We were supposed to give him a copy of the photo," Dad says.  "That's why his name is on the back.  But we didn't get a chance."

More after the break

10 Ethnic Groups on My Bucket List

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: The Day I Turned Japanese

"My Uncle's Queer": My Nephew's Transformation from Choir Boy to Punk Rocker

Rock Island, December 1999

I am in grad school in New York, visiting Rock Island and Indianapolis for the holidays, staying with my brother Kenny in his rundown, rambling house downtown.  The house is crowded with Kenny's children and stepchildren, plus a huge assortment of dogs, cats, hamsters, and parrots.

It's easy to miss Joel, Ken's youngest son, in the crowd: he's thirteen years old, short, slim, a quiet, polite Johnny Nazarene.  But a talented singer: he's toured in Iowa, Minnesota, and Sweden with the Moline Boys' Choir.  We go to their Christmas concert and hear his solo in "Come, O Come Emmanuel."

December 2000

Yuri and I are visiting Rock Island for the holidays. My family practices a "don't ask, don't tell" policy, so they don't know if we're friends or boyfriends or lovers.  Most of them probably don't even know that we are gay.  But Joel figures it out.  Although he claims to be straight, he asked us to teach him and his friend Max "how gay guys have sex."

Yuri and I teach him about gay kissing.





August 2001

I've completed my Ph.D., and I'm visiting Rock Island for a few days just before moving to Florida.  Joel is a cute 15 year old with short black hair, pale skin, and nicely rounded biceps.  Nazarenes aren't allowed to listen to "the devil's music," basically anything with guitars, but he likes Weezer, Nickelback, and other groups that I never heard of, but sound loud.

Oddly, ,my brother doesn't forbid it.  "It's his life," Kenny says.  "If he likes the devil's music, that's on him."

Joel asks why I didn't bring Yuri.  "You guys are, like, hot together, aren't you?"

Ken glares at me, accusing me of outing myself to his son.  "Boomer has a lot of friends, all kinds," he explains.  "Black, white, Jewish, Muslim, gay, straight.  He's so liberal, it hurts."



December 2001

It's only been six months since I saw him last, and the transformation is amazing.  Joel is a surly 15-year old, dressed all in black, who protests the "capitalist spending frenzy" of Christmas.  He spends most of his time in his room, listening to metal music.  He emerges to eat a bowl of Lucky Charms instead of Christmas dinner, and to ask "So, Uncle Gizmo, are the beach boys hot down in Florida?  I bet you get tons of action."

In front of the whole family, including relatives I wasn't out to!

"Um...well, I do ok," I stammer.

Later I ask Kenny if Joel is gay.

"Nope, nope, nope!" Kenny exclaims.  "He's totally hot for girls.  He's got a little gay friend, but that doesn't mean a thing."


June 2003

Maybe Kenny is angry about my accidental outing, or maybe he's just busy, but he doesn't invite me to Christmas in Rock Island in 2002. I don't visit again until June 2003.

Joel has just turned 17.  He has green hair, earrings,  and a pierced lip.  He gives me a hug and calls me "Beach Boy,"

He just got back from Hardcore Fest, where he heard Walls Of Jericho, Suicide Note, Saved By Grace, As We Speak, Provoke, How It Ends, Devastator, Preacher Gone To Texas, Blood In Blood Out, Too Pure To Die, For Death or Glory, Wings Of Scarlet, Uphold, Begin Again, King of Clubz, Pound for Pound, Undo Tomorrow, Haunted Life and Butt Lynt.

"Sounds like a great lineup," I tell him. I've never heard of any of them.

And naturally he's the lead vocalist in his own punk band, The Dead Eunuchs.

June 2004

Joel has a bright red mohawk and a nose ring.  The Dead Eunuchs has been performing all over the Quad Cities.  Tonight they have a gig at the Rusty Nail in Davenport.

"You should come," Joel says.  "We play a great set."

Well -- I'm not much for punk music in noisy heterosexual bars. "I don't think..."

 "You'll like one of our songs.  It's called 'My Uncle's Queer.'"


My face begins to burn.  Is Joel outing me in front of roomsful of drunken heterosexual rednecks?  "Queer?  Sounds homophobic!" I exclaim.

"The Dead Eunuchs are opposed to racism, sexism, homophobia, anti-Semitism, fascism, capitalism, brutality, and the police state," Joel recites.  "It's right there on our MySpace page. Come Saturday night.  You'll find out."

It's a small club with a bar and grille and a little stage.  About 20 people in the audience, some rednecks, but mostly bohemians of all shapes and sizes.  The Dead Eunuchs, five guys in their late teens or early 20s, perform in mohawks, shirtless (nice abs), with lots of crotch-grabbing and pretending to lick each other.

Their songs are the standard punk "life is meaningless" shtick, until they come to "My Uncle's Queer."

As far as I can tell from the screeching, the lyrics are:

My uncle's queer, you heard me right!
He won't tell Dad, he's scared to fight!
Break the system, break the wall,
Press your cock against my balls.
We're all dying from the fear
Inside out, everybody's queer!

Not very complementary, but at least it's inclusive.

Guitar riff, and then the second verse:


My sister kissed a dyke for [?],
My brother sucked a stud for Jesus
We all got cocks, we all got balls,
We all got faces pressed to the wall.
I am queer!  You are queer!
Hear that preacher, the world is queer!

"Nice inclusive message," I tell Joel later as he sits, shirtless and sweat-soaked, at my booth eating a hamburger.   "But not entirely accurate.  I've been out to your Dad since high school.  He was the first one I told when I figured it out."

"The song isn't about you.  It's about everybody who's afraid to be who they are."

I hesitate about asking if Joel is really "queer" or not -- it would be contrary to his message of solidarity.

And no, he never invites me to "press my cock against his balls."