The Music Major's Top Turn On

Plains, January 2017

First day of the semester.  A day of anticipation and dread.  Will my new classes be a pleasure or a pain? Which students will be eager to participate?  Which will be taciturn?

But today I'm feeling a little off:  I got no sleep last night, and somehow I pulled a muscle doing bicep curls, of all things.

Plus I'm teaching an overload this semester, so it's class nonstop all morning, with no breaks.  I have to dash out to get lunch and eat it in my office during my office hours.

It's exactly noon, and very crowded at the Student Union Food Court.  I get into the line at the Grille for my regular lunch of chicken, vegetables, and a fountain drink.

The line moves sideways, cafeteria-style.  The guy next to me turns and smiles.

"It's my first time here.  Is it any good?"

He's a student, taller than me and rather stocky, wearing a brown sweater and jeans, but no coat.  Reddish-brown hair, short reddish-brown beard, blue eyes.  Reminds me of Alan the Pentecostal Porn Star, my friend in West Hollywood..

"Sure.  I eat here almost every day.  The grilled chicken and brown rice is pretty healthy."

"I'm Wagner[not his real name].  I just started in the graduate school."

This is weird.  You don't speak in line except to complain about the weather, and you certainly don't introduce yourself to someone you'll be standing next to for only about 30 seconds.   You stare at the food, or look at your cell phone.

He's from Bemidji, Minnesota, studying for Master of Music degree, concentration in music theory.

That's why he isn't wearing a coat -- the Performing Arts Building links directly to the Student Union.

He gets my name, my department, where I'm from (I say California), and where there's a good coffee house in town.  Curt, one-word answers.

I'm turned off by his over-friendliness.  Is it that weird "Minnesota nice"?

Wagner's order arrives.  He pays as I give my order.  I expect him to vanish, but he waits for me to finish, and then asks "Where are you sitting?"

Walking away, I tell him.  "I have to get back.  Office hours."

"Ok...nice chatting," I hear in the distance.

I'm starting to feel guilty.  The poor guy probably doesn't know anyone, he's in an unfamiliar city far from home on the coldest day of the year,  he reaches out, and gets Attitude.  I should have been nicer.

It wouldn't hurt to have lunch with him....

I turn and go back to the cafeteria.  There are rows of tables in the front, and some booths in the back.  Wagner is sitting at one of the booths, with three other guys....

He looks up quizzically.  I wave and go through the side door.

Ok, not lonely.  Was he cruising me?

I get cruised by twinks all the time -- I was cruised in a crazy retro restaurant in Indianapolis a couple of weeks ago, and ended up with a New Year's Eve date --  but usually it's the soft, cuddly, passive types.  Wagner is a bit older, stockier, bearded, aggressive.

Besides, I can't attract men with face alone, at least not recently.  My physique draws the attention, and today I'm wearing a bulky coat that hides everything.

I return to my office. Office hours, class, gym (lots of shirtless guys playing basketball!), snack, class.

At 8:00 pm I'm finally ready to go home, have dinner, watch Netflix, and fall asleep.  The route that involves the least amount of time outside in the cold goes through the Student Union and Performing Arts to the north parking lot.

Besides, you can usually find some cute theater majors hanging around in the Performing Arts lounge.

And music majors?

I go into the lounge, pretending that I want to buy a soda from the machine.  Sure enough, there's Wagner, sitting by himself, working on a laptop.

"Hi!" he exclaims, scooting over so I can sit next to him.  "How was your day?"

Almost exactly 24 hours later, Wagner is in my bedroom, going down on me.  He has a firm physique with big nipples and a belly, very furry -- there's even hair on his shoulders.  Nice tongue action.

When I finish, we climb into bed.  I wrap my arms around him.  He lays his head on my chest.

"You have the most spectacular chest I've ever seen," he murmurs.  "You must go to the gym every day."

"Just about."  I move to go down on his very thick beer-can of a penis.   "Question, though.  When we met, I was wearing a bulky coat, so you couldn't see my physique.  What did you find attractive?   Are you into older guys?"

"Well, yes, but that wasn't it.  I get approached by older guys all the time.  Most of them are just pathetic, so needy."

"So...just out of curiosity."

"Your voice," he says.  "Great basso profundo.  I figured you for a music professor."

That's a new one.  

"Most gay guys go to the ballet to cruise bulges," Wagner continues.  "I go to the opera to cruise voices."

 I do have a deep voice, but I can't hold a note.

Fortunately, he doesn't ask me to demonstrate.  My mouth is occupied elsewhere.

See also: Cruised by the Waiter in a Crazy Retro Restaurant; First Day of Class Beefcake and Bulges.

Grandpa Prater's Banjo

This is the second erotic story about my Grandpa Prater.

It's the day after Christmas in seventh grade;  I just turned 12.  We're visiting my parents' relatives in Indiana.  Today we drive out to the farmhouse near Garrett to visit my Grandpa Prater, my mother's father, and bring him his Christmas presents.

Grandpa Prater is 70 years old, but still big and rugged, with thick arms and shoulders and huge hands. He wears overalls, sometimes with a white t-shirt underneath, sometimes without, so you could see his hard round pecs dusted with white hair.

He moved from Kentucky to Indiana with his family in 1942, to take advantage of factory jobs during World War II.  Now he is widowed, and all of his kids have moved out except Uncle Edd, who acts more like his brother than his son.

There's no car in the driveway, and no one answers when we knock, so we figure that they're out, at the store or visiting friends in town.  We drive down the road about half a mile to the Trailer in the Deep Woods, to visit my Cousin Buster and his parents and wait for them to return.

Cousin Buster shows me the guitar he got for Christmas, and tries to play "Your Mama Don't Dance," by Loggins and Messina.  He doesn't do well.  "I should have asked for a banjo," he says. "Man, I could really howl on that box." 

"Why don't you ask Grandpa if you can borrow his?"

Somehow we decide that it would be a good idea to sneak into the farmhouse while he's gone and "borrow" the banjo.  

We walk through the woods until we come to the side yard.  There's still no car in the driveway.

We climb onto the porch and go in through the parlor (country folk don't lock their doors).

I've been there a thousand times, but never when the house is deserted.  There's something eerie, even sinister, about the two overstuffed sofas, red with clawed legs, the old console radio with a black-and-white tv on top, the picture of Jesus on the Cross that changes to an Ascended Christ if you look at it right.  

The kitchen is familiar, too.  I've been there many times.  But there's something sinister about the plate of half-eaten toast and jar of Sue Bee Honey left on the kitchen table, as if someone suddenly rushed out.  Or was kidnapped.

I've never been inside Grandpa Prater's bedroom.  

First there's an anteroom, with some coats on hooks and shoes on the floor.  Then a big oak door.

More after the break

The Sanderson Boys Get Naked

Manville, Illinois, July 1971

I never understood the Lionel Ritchie song "Easy like Sunday Morning."  In our house, Sunday morning was a flurry of activity, as five people rushed through breakfast, fed the dogs, put the potroast in the oven, dressed in our best clothes, and drove across town to make it to church for:

9:30 Sunday school (classes informing us of the things God hated)
10:30 Morning service (the preacher screaming about the things God hated)

11:30.  The altar call.  Depending on how many people decided to go down, and how long it took for them to Pray Through to Victory, you could get out at 11:40, 11:45, or 12:00.

Home for a change of clothes, the potroast, and a few hours off, then back to church for
6:30 Nazarene Young People's Society (NYPS)
7:30 More screaming at the evening service.

8:30. Another altar call.

9:00 Afterglow, a teen party.

But six hours in church on Sunday wasn't the end of it.  We were expected to be in church "every time the doors were open," for choir practice, missionary society, prayer meetings, Bible studies, youth groups...

And as if that wasn't enough, twice a year, in the fall and the spring, there was a revival: a whole week of services led by an evangelist, who made his living going from church to church, trying to revv up the congregation and get them saved.

It was horrible.  Sunday morning screaming amplified by a thousand!  Especially near the end of the week, when just about everyone had been saved, and it got harder and harder to get those bodies of their seats and down to the altar.

The only bright spot was the gospel music group that appeared with the evangelist.  They sang fast-paced modern songs, not our usual ancient funereal hymns full of "thees" and "thous."

Getting ready today, moving out tomorrow
Gettin' sanctified through earthly sorrow
I'm looking for a brand new day
I've found the Lord, I'm almost there.

 They were accompanied by banjos, guitars, even tambourines.  Church elders used to tinny pianos and organs were shocked.

They were usually related, or groups of brothers, or pretend brothers, like the Calvary Boys (below).

I couldn't understand why at the time, but eventually I figured it out: traveling all over the country, living out of buses or vans, spending all of their time together, asleep or awake, there might be sexual temptations.  But not if they were related.

The men and boys were undeniably cute, clean-cut and fresh-scrubbed.  Unfortunately, their matching gospel outfits made it difficult to check for the bulge of a bicep (or anything else).

But sometimes when you went down to the altar, they rushed over to help you Pray Through to Victory, and there was a hard celebrity arm across your shoulders.

Or, when their van or bus was parked in the church parking lot all week, you could sometimes find an excuse to drop by the church in the afternoon and see them out of uniform.

During the spring revival in fifth grade, the musical group was The Sanderson Boys, three "brothers" in their mid-20s.  They were all tall, wide-shouldered, and grinning, but I liked Joe, the biggest and huskiest.  Unfortunately, he didn't come down to the altar to help me Pray Through, so I didn't get a chance to feel his hard celebrity arm across my shoulders.

And I never got a chance to drop by the church parking lot to see him out of uniform.

But that summer, at Manville Nazarene Camp (a few weeks before I visited Cousin George in South Carolina), I was surprised to find the The Sanderson Boys as our camp counselors (top photo)!

Every day we had an assembly where they asked us to yell "Boy, am I enthused!" and sing camp songs like "If you're saved and you know it, clap your hands." Then they split up to coach sports: Jim touch football, Jack basketball, and Joe baseball. Unfortunately, there was no swimming.

I picked baseball, just in case Joe got sweaty and took his shirt off.

He did!  Big shoulders, throbbing biceps, nicely ribbed abs!

But I wanted to see more.  So I devised a clever plan.

One day during a game I walked over to Joe and said  "Um...I have to...um...pee."

"Sure, go ahead."

"The bathroom's way over to the other side of the camp.  I don't think I'll make it," I said, squirming and looking distressed.

"Well, why don't you find a tree in the woods, and go there?"

I glanced toward the woods.  "With the spiders and bugs?  No way!"

"Come on, it's easy!"

I hung my head, looking like I wanted to cry.

"Would you like me to go with you, and show you how?"

I nodded.

So Joe took my hand and led me into the woods.  He found an oak tree out of sight of the other campers.  "Ok, now just unzip, pull it out, and aim toward the tree." He unzipped his own pants, pulled out a monster that rivaled my Cousin Joe's and let loose.

I was so elated that I almost forgot to let loose myself.

"My Uncle's Queer": Joel'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 long 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.

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

June 2004

Joel has a bright red mohawk, and his group, 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 is 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'm out to your Dad.  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."  But I do get a sausage sighting.

See also: We teach my Nephew the Gay Facts of Life; Nephew Sausage Sighting #3: A Fondle and a Penis Sock

Spring 1965: Chasing the Boy with the Guitar

Garrett, Indiana, Spring 1965

One of my earliest memories:

It's a warm night in the springtime.  We're  living on Randolph Street in Garrett, Indiana, so I must be about four years old.  My bedroom window looks out on the alley and then the back yard of the house in the next block, where there's a little grey-stone patio.

It's late, long after bedtime, but I'm still awake.  I go to the window.  Across the alley, some teenagers are sitting in green-striped lawn chairs on the patio, in kind of a circle, listening to a boy play the guitar and sing.

Mrs. Brown, you've got a lovely daughter.
Girls as sharp as her are something rare.

He is facing my direction.  Maybe he is singing to me!

I know I'm not anybody's daughter, but he said "lovely."  That means he loves me!

I push against the wire screen.  It must be broken -- it comes off easily.  I push myself out of the window, and land on the hard, warm grass.  The teenage boy keeps singing, looking in my direction. 

Our house on Randolph Street

Walkin' about, even in a crowd, well
You'll pick her out, makes a bloke feel so proud

He's seen me walking around!

I walk across the back yard.  My new boyfriend is cute!   He is wearing a pale orange shirt and short pants, and sandals.

Don't let on, don't say she's broke my heart
I'd go down on my knees but it's no good to pine

Next comes the alley, all gravel, hard and sharp against my bare feet.  But I'm willing to endure it to let him know that it's ok, I won't break his heart again. .

Then suddenly the music stops.  The teenagers are all staring at me.  I hear murmuring "Look, it's a kid!" "Where'd he come from?"  "Is he lost?"

They are interrogating me, accusing me.  Scared, embarrassed, I start to cry.

Herman's Hermits

 A teenage girl wearing sandals crosses the alley and sweeps me into her arms.  My boyfriend follows her. I get a glimpse of his smooth tanned chest, smell his Aqua Velva cologne.  They take me around to the front of the house, knock on the door, and deliver me to my parents, who yell a lot.

The screen in the window is fixed the next day.

I don't remember ever seeing my "boyfriend" again.

I've always thought of  "Mrs. Brown, You've Got a Lovely Daughter" as a gay song, though I can't really find any gay subtexts in it, and Herman's Hermits is my least favorite boy band.

My Date with the Country-Western Star

Nashville, Fall 1991

I spent the fall 1991 semester in Nashville, where I studied Hebrew at Vanderbilt Divinity School, taught English at a state college, outed a Medieval knight...and dated a country-western singer.  At least, I thought he was a country-western singer.

I'll call him Randy.

We met at a restaurant near near campus, when he saw me trying to translate a passage from the Hebrew Bible and came over to ask if I was "a Christian."  Turns out he went to Bible college, planning to become a missionary, but dropped out, and now he was working as a waiter and at a guitar store while honing his musical craft.

Naturally, I started going to the restaurant for lunch almost every day, at the end of the rush when he had time to chat.

Randy was a country boy, all about fishing, hunting, working on cars, and following sports, but he never mentioned a girl, so I figured he was gay. Besides, there was something about his open face and appreciative smile that made my gaydar go off.

Nashville was the country-western music capital of the world, so I started trying to impress him by listening to Johnny Cash, Hank Williams, Willie Nelson, Charlie Pride, and Roy Acuff.  I couldn't stand the dismal, depressing, ballads about being poor, tired, hungry, lonely, rejected, replaced, and generally miserable, but if they helped me get into Randy's good graces, it was worth the depression.

I asked his opinion of Clint Black, Alan Jackson, Garth Brooks,  and Randy Travis.

I did extensive research, until I was able to talk to him about the history and genres of country-western: honky-tonk, rockabilly, country pop, the Bakersfield sound.  Bluegrass, banjo pop, Outlaw Country, Western Swing, neotraditionalism.

After a few weeks of buttering him up, Randy finally made his move: "I'm performing this weekend.  I know it's not really your kind of music, but...you know, if you want, you could come.  And maybe we could have dinner afterwards."

Randy's gig was in the Paradise Park Trailer Resort, a dark, dingy redneck bar downtown where the floors were coated with Astroturf (I'm not kidding).  There was lawn furniture against the walls.  There was a Spam exhibit.  The other patrons looked like refugees from Duck Dynasty. 

I got there at 9:00, just as Randy was going on.  He walked onto the small, dingy stage with guitar in hand, nodded at me, and sang:

Farm people, book wavers, soul savers, love preachers!  Lit to pop and nobody is gonna stop!

It sounded familiar...wait...was it "Stop," by Jane's Addiction?

Then:
That's me in the corner, that's me in the spotlight, losing my religion, trying to keep up with you.

What kind of country-western singer performs "Losing My Religion," by R.E.M.?


And then his own composition:

The world keeps on turnin'
I can't decide if it's night or day
Your jaws keep on movin'
I can't decide if you know the way

Protest conformity, rage against the machine, raise your fist against the injustice of the world!  Indie rock!

All this time, I had just been assuming he was a country-western singer!

Later, over dinner, I praised his song effusively.  Randy said "That's a relief!  You're such a big fan of country-western music, I didn't think you would find anything to like in indie rock."

"Oh, I'm versatile," I said with a suggestive leer.  "I can find something to like in just about everything."

Teen Hunk #10: Jean, the Violinist

I played the violin in junior high, but I didn't have the dedication to put in hours of practice every day -- or to face the bullies who disapproved of the existence of boys carrying violin cases -- so I didn't get very proficient, and in high school I switched to the viola:

A bigger, bolder instrument responsible mainly for harmonies.

The viola turned out to be my forte, the Rocky High Orchestra my home.

I had a crush on Mr. Hart, the orchestra director, slim, red-haired, horn-rimmed glasses, with an amazing bulge shifting as he conducted.  He signed me up for contests and competitions, and taught a special class in music theory in the predawn hours.

My first sexual experience was with a violinist named Todd at music camp, during the summer after 10th grade.

Another violinist was unbearably cute.

Two of the cellists were inseparable partners, perhaps a gay couple.

Other orchestra boys were surprisingly uninterested in girls.

Home.


But in college I had too many other interests and activities to pursue music further, so I put my viola back in its case,  It came along when I moved to Omaha with Fred, and stayed there when I left.  He said it was in his parents' attic, waiting for me to come and pick up.  It might still be there.

But I still listen to classical music, go to the symphony, and crush on musicians, especially those who remind me of those halcyon days.

In the spring of 2004, I went to Europe for my usual Paris-Brussels-Amsterdam circuit, and dropped in to the Bains d'Odessa, near the Luxembourg Gardens.

There wasn't much activity going on in the late afternoon hours, but as I was dressing to leave, I saw a very cute guy in the locker room, also getting dressed: in his 20s, tall, broad shouldered, with pale, smooth skin, tight muscles, nice bulge.  We made eye contact, but didn't interact: I followed the rule that younger guys must always approach older.

He put on a white shirt and blue jeans, and then pulled a violin case out of his locker.

A violinist!  I wasn't going to let this one get away!

I walked over to him.  "I played the viola in high school."

He glared at me.  "Très fascinant."

Well, that was rather a lame pick-up line.

He headed for the door.  I followed.   "Um...um....the first guy I had sex with played the violin."

"Vous devriez lui téléphoner."  Then you should call him.

I was sinking fast!  He paused to pick up his valuables from the lock box.  "Um...um...my high school music teacher had an enormous penis.  Almost as big as mine."

"Vraiment?"  He turned and smiled.  "Je m'appelle Jean."

When all else fails, go for the penis.

Over coffee, Jean told me that he only went into the sauna to work out and use the steam room.  "Sex in a bath house is disgusting, don't you think?"

"Oh, yes, I hate it," I lied, "So uncomfortable."

He was 22 years old, a student at the École Normale de Musique, working toward his diplôme supérieur d'exécution, a performance degree.  "They have degrees in teaching, too, for students with abysmal talent, perhaps those who went to a provincial lycee."

What an elitist!  "I studied at the University of Southern California and Setauket University...." I began.

"Sorry, I don't know them.  The only true universities in America are Harvard and Yale, don't you think?"

"Well, Setauket has an excellent program in history"

"History!  How can you stand it?  It is the most dull of all subjects."

Ok, I was working really hard to get this jerk into my bed.  He'd better be spectacular!

I was too embarrassed to invite him back to my one-star tourist hotel, so I said I had a roommate.  Jean offered to take me home -- his parents and younger brother were away on holiday.

He lived in a small but elegantly furnished apartment in the 14th Arrondissement, about 20 minutes away by Metro.

When we arrived, Jean sat me down on the couch and opened his violin case.  "Now I will play for you, and you will tell me if I am as good as the violinist who was your first boyfriend."

He pulled out a cake of rosin for his bow.  Memories came rushing back.  "Um...do you mind if I try?"  I asked, reaching across the couch.  I gingerly lifted the violin from its case.

He snatched it out of my hand and sprang to his feet.  "No!  Are you crazy!  You must never touch another man's instrument!"

Elitist and crazy! "Je suis désolé...I didn't know."

"How can you not know?" Jean yelled, his eyes flashing.  "Did they not teach you anything in your second rate lycee in the provinces?"

"Ok, ok, I will not touch your instrument.  Is it ok if I touch your penis?"

The bedroom activities turned out to be very nice -- Jean was passionate, versatile, and not at all demanding.  He even insisted on cuddling all night.


But in the morning he started up again: "Next August I will visit you in America.  I want to see this second rate lycee where you teach stupid people about sociology.  How do you ensure that they do not sleep during your lectures?"

I ran.

See also: 12 Teacher Hookups; 20 Teenagers and Twinks; and Spending the Night with Todd.

Spending the Night with My Music Teacher and His Favorite Boys

Iowa City, November 1978

To fill my fine arts requirement at Augustana College, I registered for a class called "Music Cultures of the World."  It sounded more interesting than "Music Appreciation."

The professor, Dr. Morrow, grew up in Indiana and got his Ph.D. in music from Northwestern. He was the first African-American professor I had ever had to that point, so I took advantage of every opportunity to gaze at his very solid, muscular frame, with impressive shoulders and biceps.  I'm not usually into backsides, but when he turned his back to write on the blackboard, my interest was piqued.

 For some reason that I haven't yet figured out, I was the only white kid in a class of twenty.  The others were African-American, five girls and one boy (a sizeable percentage of the twenty or so on campus).

They may have been expecting more African culture.  Instead, we covered:
1. Native North America
2. South America
3.Australia, New Guinea, and Oceania (like the Australian didjeridoo).
4. China, Japan, and Korea
5. Southeast Asia and Indonesia
6. India and Pakistan
7. Central Asia and the Middle East
8. Europe
9. And, finally sub-Saharan Africa.





Since I was the only white student in the class, Dr. Morrow was very careful to make me feel welcome.  He was always calling on me, asking me questions, lending me books and recordings to drop off at his office later.  He liked my paper on traditional Chinese musical instruments so much that he kept a copy and put it on reserve in the library for students in future classes to read (it was still in Special Collections in 2014).

On the weekend of November 10th, there was a festival of Indonesian music at the University of Iowa, about a 45-minute drive away.  The headliner was Sumarsam, a 34-year old Javanese musician, expert on the gamelan, currently an artist-in-residence at Wesleyan University.

Anybody could go, of course, but Dr. Morrow said the department would pay for three students.  I don't know how many applied, but he selected me, Manny (a senior music major) and Kurt (a sophomore from his Rock class).

Three boys, no girls. What a coincidence!

Oh, and bring your swimsuit.  The hotel has a heated indoor pool.

We left right after everyone's last class on Friday, arriving around 4:00 pm.  "Dinner's not until 6:00," Dr. Morrow said.  "Plenty of time to take a dip.  Who's up for it?"

I didn't need to be asked twice!

Dr. Morrow was very impressive, as muscled as a bodybuilder, with an amazing bulge in his swimsuit, but I was jealous of the attention he lavished on Manny.  I thought I was his only favorite!

 Dinner was Indonesian, which is very similar to Filipino: rice, fish, dumplings, peanut sauce.

The first concert was good.  No naked male dancers, but a lot of interesting music.

Afterwards we went back to the hotel room, where there were two double beds.

We all stripped to our underwear, except for Dr. Morrow, who went into the bathroom and came out wearing pajamas.

 "Ok, who's bunking with me?" he asked, climbing into one of the beds.  "I'm not picky -- I'll sleep with anybody."

Manny jumped into bed next to Dr. Morrow before I had a chance to say or do anything.  I don't know if they hooked up during the night.

I slept in the same bed with Kurt, but nothing erotic happened.

In the morning I got a nice sausage sighting from Kurt, but not Manny or Dr. Morrow.

Another question: Were Manny and Dr. Morrow romantic partners?  I suspected as much, but when when I asked a knowledgeable senior about gay people at Augustana, she didn't mention either.

Dr. Morrow still teaches at Augustana.  He is in his 70s, with children and grandchildren, and he's written a major textbook on ethnomusicology.

See also: 15 Teachers I May Have Hooked Up With.

Teenage Millionaire: The Teen Idol Career of Jimmy Clanton

Have you ever heard of Jimmy Clanton?

I thought I was an expert on teen idols, but I missed this one.

Born in 1938 in Louisiana, he burst onto the charts right after high school, eschewing the usual rock for rhythm & blues.  Between 1958 and 1962, he released six albums, and had three hit songs:

The full post is on Boomer Beefcake and Bonding

Liam Gives Me a Present on his 18th Birthday

When I applied to grad school on Long Island, the admissions director said "Oh, yes, we're only eight miles from New York City.  You can get there in ten minutes."

He meant eight miles from the hinterland of Queens, by car, without traffic.

When I arrived, I discovered that the gay neighborhoods of Manhattan were thirty miles away, two hours by train!

Cut off from the usual venues for meeting people, I started hanging out in online chatrooms -- you waited there until someone attractive showed up, then started an Instant Message conversation.

But you had to be careful.  Profile pictures might be ten years old, or of someone else entirely.  Guys dropped 20 pounds, added a few inches, and changed their age.  Sometimes they were really much older. Sometimes much younger.

Once I had made the date and was getting ready to go out the door when the guy said "By the way, I'm not really 25.  I'm 15."

I ran.

Soon I learned some strategies to weed out the underaged:
1.  They didn't want to talk about their jobs or school.
2.  They talked about their parents a lot.
3.  They wanted to "hang out," not go out on a date.
4.   They wanted to know "what it's like" to have sex with a guy.

Of course, some older guys who were closeted might be eliminated, too, but it didn't matter. There were lots of choices in the chatrooms.

Liam started hanging out in the Long Island chatroom in the fall of  1998.  I didn't need clues: he told me right off that he was in high school.

I immediately crossed him off the list of potential boyfriends, but we continued to chat. We had a lot in common.  He was from a working-class household: his dad was a truck driver, and his older brother was an auto mechanic.  He wasn't out to anyone.  He liked Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Pokemon, and the Harry Potter books, and he was taking piano and judo lessons.

We didn't talk about sex -- that was my #1 rule in chatrooms, regardless of age -- but we talked about cute guys, dating, coming out, and gay culture.   I heard about his crushes on his judo sensei and his English teacher, and encouraged him to come out to his best friend.  He heard about my research projects and my romances with Blake and his roommate Joe.

Liam began his senior year in high school in the fall of 1999.  I heard about his senior project, his first date, coming out to his brother and his parents.  One day in February 2000 he emailed me: "Hey, I'm coming to the City to talk to some admissions reps at NYU.  We should hang out while I'm there."

Did he mean hang out or hook up?  He was a senior in high school, of legal age --  but  a 20 year age difference?  What would my friends back in West Hollywood say?

"Oh, and my brother wants to meet you, too."

In that case, fine.  

Liam turned out to be a little shorter than me, firm but not muscular, with sandy blond hair and blue eyes and a warm handshake.  His brother, Ozzie, had massive biceps and a ready smile.

We browsed at the Different Light and went to a Japanese restaurant, and once Ozzie took me aside and said "Thanks for being such a good friend to my brother.  You really helped him."

I did that?

"None of us knew anything about being...you know, gay.  You really helped."

I did that?

"And it was so great that you haven't put any pressure on him to have sex.  You could have really taken advantage of him."

"Well...you know, I can restrain myself."

Liam decided to attend NYU, and in August 2000, he moved into the Goddard Residence Hall on Washington Square East, about a mile from my apartment.

"Only a mile away!" he emailed me.  "We should definitely hang out.  Guess what -- my 18th birthday is coming up on Friday!"

"18!  The big one!  What are you going to do to celebrate?"

"Nothing really.  It's too soon to go home for the weekend, and I don't really know anybody on campus yet."

"You're in the biggest party town in the world. We'll figure something out.  I'll invite Yuri."

But Yuri couldn't make it, so Liam and I went out alone, to a barbeque place in the West Village, then for frozen yogurt, then for a walk along Christopher Street, where Gay Liberation began.

"You're old enough for a 18+ dance club," I said.  "Do you want to go?"

"Maybe later.  Right now I'd like to see your apartment."

Did he mean....?

"I want to look at your books on gay history."

A little disappointed, I said "Ok, fine."

We returned to the apartment I shared with Edward the Art Appraiser.  He was camped out in the living room, so after saying hello, we went into the bedroom.  I sat on the desk chair, and Liam looked through my bookcase.  Eventually he took down the massive 1978 edition of Gay American History and sat down on the bed to leaf through it.

"You can sit next to me, if you want."

"Well, it's a little warm in here."

"Yeah.  We should take our shirts off."

We sat on the bed, side by side, shirtless, thighs and arms touching.   I wasn't going to push myself on Liam, not after his brother's vote of confidence, not without a clearer signal.  But there weren't any clear signals.  We were two friends  leafing through a book.

Sigh.

Suddenly Liam looked around the room.  "Do you know what time it is?"

I checked my clock.  "A little after 11:00.  Why?"

He put the book aside, leaned over my lap, and started kissing and groping me.  I responded.

The next morning we had another session, then got up and went out to breakfast.  "I had no idea that you were interested," I said.

"Well, I don't think we should be like boyfriends, but I wanted to thank you for being so nice.  Sort of a birthday present."  He laughed.

Ok, I was a little disappointed, but who can complain about a night with a hot guy?  "Why did you ask the time before making a move?"

"I didn't want to get you in trouble, so I waited until it was legal for us to be together.  I was born at 10:36 pm, so technically I wasn't 18 until 10:36 pm last night."

"Well -- thanks for being cautious."

I didn't have the heart to tell him that the legal age of consent in New York is 17, not 18.


See also: My Date with the Teenage Model and The High School Bodybuilder.; Yuri and the Penis Size Contest

My First Time: Spending the Night with Todd

Decorah, Iowa, June 1976

Although Dan and I would not be escaping to Arabia after all, my interest in the Middle East remained strong when I started at Rocky High in the fall of 1975, so I was delighted to meet a real Arab!  A sophomore violinist named Todd.

He was actually half Arab – his mother’s parents were from Lebanon – and Christian, not Muslim.  He didn’t know any Arabic except salaam (“hello”) and tayta (“grandma”). But still, he had roots in the "good place" where same-sex loves were free and open!  And he was beautiful, small and compact in a green turtleneck with flawless olive skin and dark shining eyes.

This model is much older, but he has Todd's face and physique.

 Unfortunately, Todd had been engaged since the fifth grade to a girl named Faith, and now they were attached whenever possible by hand or hip or mouth. You couldn’t address a question to one without both answering.

Maybe I was just rebounding from Dan, but I couldn't take my eyes off Todd. Even the air around him and his tan desk etched with graffiti seemed vivid and alive.  One lunch hour I lost twelve consecutive games of chess, unable to strategize or think of defense because Todd was sitting next to me. I wanted. . .I wasn’t sure what, but the desire burned hot and raw and panting. I churned the covers off my bed at night, restless, unable to sleep.

If you asked God to do anything in Jesus' name, He was honor-bound to do it.  My friend Rita used God's Infallible Promise to "get" Donny Osmond as a husband.  So one cool Sunday in November 1975, after the evening service, I walked out into the alley behind the church, looked up at the stars,  and asked God in Jesus' name to give me Todd.

 It took months, but eventually God kept His Infallible Promise and delivered Todd.  Or at least we were both selected, alone out of the entire orchestra, to go to the prestigious Dorian Music Festival. An entire week with Todd all to myself!

Luther College

The festival was held at the end of June 1976, after our family vacation in the northwoods and a few weeks before our Nazarene church camp,  at Luther College, on the bluffs of the Mississippi. Though Todd was only cautiously cordial at Rocky High, at the Festival he clung to me as a familiar face. On Thursday  we skipped afternoon rehearsal to explore the town.  We visited a rock cavern and then bought blueberry muffins at a bakery festooned with red and green streamers.

We even went to a movie, my first since I started becoming a "Johnny Nazarene."  I put my arm against the center arm rest, as Dan used to do.  I moved closer and closer to the hard curve of Todd’s body until I could feel the fibers of cotton in his shirt and smell Dial soap and, very faintly, his own scent of vineyards and bleached stone, but I dared not move that tantalizing quarter inch that defined the difference between a casual and a willful touch.


On Saturday night, after the Grand Concert, it was hot in our room, so Todd took off his undershirt, and I noticed a thin gold chain around his neck. When Todd climbed into bed and pulled the covers up to his chest, it stood out against his brown skin, gleaming like a fiery ring. On the front, against his collarbone, lay a small plate with what looked like a portrait of a man.

“Is that a surfing symbol?” I asked, stupidly.

“No,” Todd said in a dim lazy voice. “It’s a scapular. . .like a medal.”

“Oh. . .what did you win?”

Boy with scapular

“No, it’s a religious symbol.” He carefully pulled the plate up from his chest. “See, the Sacred Heart on one side, Mary Mother of God on the other.”

With a shudder I realized that Todd was talking about being a Catholic. “I thought you were a Christian!”

“I am,” Todd said defensively. “Maronite Catholic.  But I go to St. Pius."

Nazarene preachers told us to never go near a Catholic church, or we would be dragged inside to an unspeakable fate, and never talk to a Catholic, or we would be brainwashed into worshipping idols and drinking blood.

I chided himself for my irrational fear.  I had been friends with Frank, a Catholic boy, for two years!  Catholics weren't monsters and demons. Sometimes they were perfectly nice.

And what else had I heard about Catholics: "They have no morals, they're up for anything. If you want a good time, call a Catholic."

I stared at the scapular, and at Todd’s neck, golden in the brash light of our dorm lamp, with two moles close together on the left side like a vampire bite.

Finally I said, “I’ve never. . .seen a scapular before.  Can I touch it?”

“Sure.” But instead of taking it off, Todd motioned for me to come closer.

St. Pius Church, Rock Island

I got up, wearing only cotton briefs, and sat on Todd’s  bed.  Todd’s body was hot, and soft yet firm. I touched the scapular. Then slowly I moved my hand down and stroked Todd's chest.  He moaned and closed his eyes.

After some other things happened, Todd refused to kiss or cuddle, so I returned to my own bed.

When I awoke, Todd was already gone.  I dressed quickly and wandered around the campus for a long time, looking for him, but I didn't see him again.  After breakfast Dad arrived to drive me home.

Back at school, Todd returned to being cautiously polite, nodding hello as we passed in the hallway but refusing all attempts to talk. Sometimes I saw him across the cafeteria, laughing with his Crowd, cozying up to Faith. Sometimes the sunlight glinted off his scapular, which he was now wearing on the outside of his shirt.

It seemed that some boys liked boys only at night.  You could see them, and touch them, but in the morning they would become cool and aloof, brushing past you as they searched for girls.

40 years later and 500 miles away, I hooked up with his nephew.

See also: Dating My Boyfriend's Girlfriend; My Hookup with Todd's Nephew;  I Learn About Oral Sex.

Dating my Boyfriend's Girlfriend

Rock Island, Fall 1976

In the fall of 1976, shortly after Todd and I spent the night together at music camp, I tried to win him by dating his girlfriend, Faith.

She was establishing her autonomy joining every club she could find that Todd didn’t belong to -- Writers’, Swedish, Circle K, Archery, Golf – and in October she got around to the fundamentalist Christian club, Campus Life. I didn't have my driver's license yet, so I asked her for a ride home, thinking vaguely that she might be meeting Todd, and ask me to tag along.

On the first Monday night, we chatted for a few minutes as she dropped me off.

On the second Monday night, we parked for a long time, while she complained about Todd.  Seven years of engagement, and he treated her like a buddy! No parking on the levee to watch the Mississippi flow past! No “getting some” on her doorstep!

“You kiss!” I exclaimed. “I’ve seen you kiss, in the cafeteria.”

“That’s only for show, so Todd can brag to all his friends,” Faith said, witch eyes flashing. “When we’re alone, he’s a drip, all cold and stiff like a dead fish.”

“Maybe he’s waiting for your wedding night?"
"He doesn't even like to hold hands!  Even his sister says he’s a Swish!”

I winced at the forbidden word. “You’re from East Moline! Why would a Swish want to marry you? They can’t stand being around women.”

“For a screen. They marry women so no one gets wise.” She paused. “Maybe I should just dump Todd.”

I was starting to get nervous.  Girls usually dumped their boyfriends only when they found someone they liked better, and that would be. . .me!   I quickly said goodnight and left.

But then I thought, this might be useful.  If I dated Faith -- briefly -- Todd would be jealous, and fall into my arms.

Ok, I was fifteen years old, and not thinking clearly.

On the third Monday, we sat in the darkened car for almost an hour, talking about Faith’s frustration,  Todd’s lack of interest in her, or apparently in any girl, on and on, with no jokes, no wit, nothing to relieve the boredom. Finally I leaned forward, pushed briefly against her cold, hard lips and then jumped from the car and crushed across the dead leaves to my door.

On Tuesday I expected Faith to make a "just friends" speech, but she chatted as if nothing had happened.  So I asked her to a concert on Saturday.  She agreed.

My parents spent the rest of the week variously jumping for joy and weeping that I was "growing up."  My friends congratulated me as if I had won a major competition.  No one cared that she was Todd's girlfriend -- it was expected, even obligatory, to wrest the Girl of Your Dreams from the place-holder she was dating.

But the date never happened.  On Thursday night she called. "I didn't plan on it, but I can't go to the concert.  I met a guy, and. . .I didn't plan on it. . .but I Fell in Love With Him."

“Huh?” I said, as articulately as possible, given the situation. This was an unexpected development, and quite unwelcome. For one thing,  I was looking forward to the concert.

“I met the One! Isn’t it wonderful?”
“Um. . .when did all this happen?”
“Yesterday.” It seems that on Wednesday evening, Faith went a Photography Club Halloween party, where she danced with, drank blood punch with, kissed, and Fell in Love with a jock named Kent. I knew him from my athletic trainer job: tall and firm-muscled, with a pleasantly open face. . .and the biggest penis I had ever seen.  We had to order a special extra-extra large cup for him.

Faith apologized for not calling to break the date last night, but after Falling in Love she had to call to dump Todd, and he cried so hard that she felt guilty and needed comforting in Kent’s muscular arms. (Right, comforting! I thought savagely.) Then  – two or three hours later -- it was too late to call.

One more thing: could you surrender the tickets, for use with her True Love?

I couldn’t think of a response sufficiently acidic, so I yelled “Waste your time doing some-thing else!” and slammed down the telephone. I stayed home moping on Saturday night, staring at my unused tickets, feeling jealous and outraged and sad.

Why was I so miserable?  I didn't really want to date Faith.  But now we wouldn't be talking about Todd every Monday night, so in a weird way he was no longer part of my life.

See also: My First Sexual Experience