Ricky with a Y

My birthday was a couple of weeks ago.  I've now been in the category of "older guys" for 15 years, and though I'm noticeably more bald and craggy than I was in 2000, the ardor of the Cute Young Things has not diminished.  If anything, it's increased.

When I go to a M4M Party, the twinks start sidling over before I even have a chance to get my pants off.

When I go on Grindr, I get these pickup lines or variants a dozen times an hour:
1. "Nice pic" (everybody gets that)
2. I love older guys"
3. "I've been a naughty boy, Daddy."

I hate being called Daddy.  Maybe I'm 20 or 30 years older than you, but I'm not your father.

Ricky with a Y (he specified the Y even though I could see it on the screen)  wasn't physically spectacular: in his 20s, a little shorter than me, with a handsome face, a hairy chest, not particularly muscular, a little small beneath the belt.

But he stood out from the crowd by his lack of obnoxious cruising.  We talked about The Walking Dead and the musical Titanic rather than the things he wanted me to do to him.

He found out that I was a college professor without making a stupid joke about requiring special after-class tutoring, wink wink nudge nudge.

He found out that my birthday was coming up without making a stupid joke about dinosaurs.

Nor did he call me Daddy.

So of course I accepted the date, for the Saturday after my birthday. "Leave everything to me.  This is my town, so I know my way around.  I'll give you an unforgettable night."

He picked me up at 6:00 pm in a very nice black convertible.

"This is my baby -- I've had her since college.  You should have seen me tooling around Harvard Yard."

Ok, everybody I've known who went to Harvard was crazy.  I waited to find out what Ricky's eccentricity was.  Other than being Ricky with a Y.

We went to dinner at a place called Grille 26, where the prices were high and the food boring: scallops, pasta, steak.

And the craziness began.  He psychoanalyzed everything.

"What do you do for a living?" I asked politely.

"Interesting that you would start off with the financial rather than my artistic or spiritual life.  Do you feel dissatisfied with your own economic success?

"Um...I was just trying to be polite."

By the way, he helped run the family soft drink company, which was quite successful, with root beer, birch beer, and cola that was #3 in the state, after Coke and Pepsi.  He also ran a mail-order company specializing in gay pride merchandise, and in his spare time he did financial consulting.  And he wanted to talk about his artistic side?

"My favorite food is Thai," I continued, making small talk.

"Interesting.  Is the food a stand in for the people?  Fetishization of Asians is quite common in gay communities, I understand.  They're stereotyped as soft and passive, easy to dominate, particularly if you're insecure about your sexual prowess."

"I'm not...i'm not insecure about my sexual prowess!  I just like pad thai."

And on and on.

Why did I stay friends with most of my ex-lovers?  Was I reluctant to let go, let the past stay the past, because I was afraid to face the future, the inevitability of death?

Why did I call my mother every week, but not my father?

Why didn't I allow my dinner companion to try one of my scallops?

Finally, after what felt like an intensive psychotherapy session, Ricky with a Y said "This has been fascinating, but we'd better be going, or we'll be late for the theater."

He had theater tickets?  Great. Angels in America was playing at the college.  But instead he took me to A Christmas Story: The Musical, about that kid and his quest to get a gun from Santa Claus, plus the lamp shaped like a lady's leg.

"Why does the lamp shaped like a lady's leg bother you?  Is it the disembodiment, the objectification of women?  Or does it make you doubt your own sexual identity?"

Then we went to an upscale dance club -- for heterosexuals.

"Come on, there's nothing to be afraid of.  This isn't the homophobic 1980s.  Why are you afraid to admit that things have gotten better for gay people?  Does it threaten your raison d'etre?

"Why are you Ricky with a Y?" I countered.  "Is it so people don't mistake you for Ricki with an I, a girl's name? Are you trying to draw attention to your Y chromosome? Do you think that being gay makes you a girl?"

"Good point!  But getting back to..."

By the time Ricky said "This has been great! Let's go back to my place!", I had been run through the emotional wringer a dozen times.  I wanted to go home and curl into a fetal position.

But maybe a nice peaceful wordless sexual encounter would be a good antidote.

He had a modern apartment, all steel-and-glass, with plants and abstract art and leather furniture.  We kissed for awhile on the couch, then went into the bedroom.  Where the psychoanalyzing began again.

"Why do you have an aversion to anal sex?  Is it because that's the iconic gay sexual act?  Do you think that, as long as you don't top me, you're not really gay?"

I avoided commenting on his extra-small penis and extra-big car.

See also: 8 Harvard Boys in My Bed; and My Platonic Friends and Their Boy Toy

The Bondage Boy with the Wife Upstairs

Dayton, April 2008

Most gay men in Dayton were closeted, but none was more closeted than Roland.

He was a regular at Rode's M4M Parties: in his 40s, tall, slim, with a full head of brown hair, a short beard, a smooth, hard chest, and a curved cut Bratwurst beneath the belt.

Roland wasn't his real name.  He never talked about his life outside the parties, except to say that he was a high school math teacher.  He didn't chat much at all.

Sexually he was mostly passive, giving oral more often than receiving it.  He didn't do anal.

One day in the spring of 2008, I casually mentioned the bondage club I used to go to in New York, and his jaw dropped in surprise.  "Bondage, really?  I'm into that, too!  Are you a top or a bottom?"

"I like to do the tying up."

"Whoa, that's great!  I meet so many guys in Dayton who are total bottoms.  What's your favorite position, spread eagle or behind the back?"

The conversation continued like that.  Ropes or chains?  Dildos?  Whipping or paddling?  Dirty talk? Fantasy scenes?  I never saw Roland so enthusiastic.  Finally he said "I have a fully stocked dungeon at home.  Care to come over and try it out, say tomorrow night at 7:00?"

A bondage date!  How exciting!  Guys in Dayton didn't date much -- they were too closeted, afraid of being spotted by someone they knew.   "I'd be happy to.  Shall we have dinner first?"

"Um...no, come after dinner.  But there's a mini-fridge in the dungeon with snacks, if you get hungry."

Ok.  But certainly after the bondage scene we would go to bed together, cuddle and kiss, spend the night, go out for breakfast in the morning, a date just like back home in the gay world.


I got a little nervous when I drove up to the house in Beavercreek, a suburb of Dayton full of heterosexual nuclear families.  Not really a gay-friendly place!

Roland answered the door, took my coat, and ushered me into a family room off the huge steel-and-marble kitchen, where The Simpsons was playing on a big-screen tv.

He didn't live alone!  There was a middle-aged woman sitting on the couch.  Next to her, a 10-year old boy.  And a girl, probably about 12, sprawled out on an easy chair.

 His sister?  A straight female housemate?  What was going on?

"Boomer, this is Sandra and Rick -- he's in fifth grade and already a ladykiller!"

The woman and boy held out their hands to be shaken. Who were these people?

"And the Queen of Angst in the easy chair is Rhianna, in junior high, already beating off the guys with a club!"  She didn't react.  "We're going downstairs to watch the game.  Be up in a couple of hours."

He led back me through the kitchen and a laundry room to a stairway that led to the basement.

"So, was that your sister?"  I asked.

"You really are gay, aren't you?" he whispered.  "That's my wife and kids.  I'm a happily married family man."

This wasn't a date!  It was a down-low hookup!  "But how..."

Behind a side door was his Man Cave, a low wood-paneled room with a couch, a pool table, a card table and chairs, a tv, and some metal cabinets.

"When me and my buddies are in here, watching the game or doing dude things, you don't disturb us unless a kid is bleeding or the house is on fire."  He locked the door and banged on the wall.  "Soundproof.  You can scream, bellow, shout, and no one outside can hear a thing."

The cabinets contained a good stock of bondage equipment: including dildos of various sizes, a vibrating anal massage device, a violet wand, and several types of lubricant.  I imagined Roland coming into the house with a brown paper back in hand and saying "I bought some stuff for the Man Cave, honey."

"You mean you have guys in here to tie you up, with your wife upstairs, and she never suspects anything?"

"Not a thing.  She thinks we're watching tv, or maybe, at the most, wrestling.  I don't think she knows that gay or bi people exist.  She certainly doesn't know what BDSM is."



I was really nervous, but Roland had a nice physique and a Bratwurst beneath the belt, so I managed to orchestrate a simple scene: he was tied to a chair naked, blindfolded, teased, and"forced" to give and receive oral sex.

Afterwards he said "That was nice, back to the basics.  It's so much more erotic when I'm helpless, in your power, don't you think?"

He insisted that I stay for two hours, the length of a real game on ESPN, so we cuddled on the couch and watched Family Guy and American Dad, kissed, and had a vanilla (non-bondage) encounter.

I went back to Roland's house again several times that spring, either on Saturday afternoon or Sunday night.

We stayed mostly in the man cave, except once when I helped Sandra frost cupcakes, and she gave me a a few in a tupperware bowl to take home, and once when she said "It's too nice a day to be cooped up in the basement.  Why don't you guys take Rick down to the park?"

I heard about Sandra's squabble with her sister and Rick's problems at school, and eventually, through conversation, Roland's real name (Mike) and real job (systems analyst).

But when I ran into Roland at the Mall, he pretended that he didn't know me.

In June I had to cut a session short because I wasn't feeling well.  "I think I'm coming down with a summertime cold," I told Sandra.  "They're the worst."

A couple days later, there was a knock on my door.  I answered in my bathrobe, with a box of kleenix in my hand.  It was Sandra!

"Hi, Boomer, I got your address from Mike's phone.  I just made a big pot of chicken-rice soup, and since you're not feeling well, I thought I'd bring you over some."

I was too shocked to say anything except "Um...thanks."

"Oh, it's the least I can do.  I've been wanting to thank you for being so great with Mike."  She handed me a green tupperware container.  "He couldn't ask for a better boyfriend!  Much nicer than some of these guys he brings home."

Boyfriend!  "Um...er..."

"But really, you should get him out of that dreary Man Cave sometimes.  Take him to a gay bar!  Or to one of those gay sex parties I've heard about.  He's a big guy -- I'll bet he would be very popular!  Well, I have to run.  I hope you feel better soon!"

I stood there agape.

Apparently Roland was less closeted than he thought.

See also: The Boy Who Wanted to be Rode

My Home Town is a Queer Haven

I just got back from a visit to Rock Island, my first in about 10 years.

The gay scene was gone.

When I was living in West Hollywood in the 1980s and 1990s, I flew back twice a year, at Christmastime and during the summer, and spent a lot of time in the local gay scene.

1. Three gay bars, including JR's, a disco that covered half a city block.
2. A club that featured male strippers.
3. An adult bookstore that sold gay magazines.
4. Outdoor cruising at the levee.

In 1995, my parents retired and moved to Indianapolis, about a five hour drive from the Quad Cities, to be closer to my sister and her family.  So I spent most of my Christmas and summer visits there, and drove out to the Quad Cities for brief overnights, to see my brother and Dick, my friend from high school, and his partner Jack.

 Not a lot of time for gay bars, or nightlife of any sort.

Then Dick and Jack moved to Denver.

And problems with weather and cars and other traveling intervened, and I didn't visit Rock Island at all for ten years, until last weekend, in December 2015.

I didn't recognize much.

My old college had a new Student Union.

Downtown was an entertainment district with nightclubs, theaters, art galleries, restaurants, and casinos that I had never heard of.

I didn't even recognize my old house -- I had to check the address to make sure.

I reconnected with some of my old high school friends.  How had they managed to get so much older than me?

And the gay scene:
1. The gay bars were now two straight bars and an Italian restaurant.
2. The adult bookstore: an antique store.
3. The male strippers: a comedy club.
4. The levee: a landscaped jogging and biking path along the Mississippi.

What happened?  Was Rock Island back in a 1950s closet?  Had all the gay people packed up and moved to Chicago?

Time to get on Grindr, and get some local guys into my hotel room to find out.

I wanted someone gay, out, and in his late 20s, who would know about Rock Island's gay scene, or lack thereof.

No one bi, straight, on the downlow, married but looking.

Not Brad, a 60 year old who hadn't cruised since the 1980s.

Not Curtis, a newly-out 20-year old college boys.

Ok, maybe we could get together for a couple of hours tomorrow, before I left town.  

But for tonight, I chose Dylan, age 28, with black hair, dark eyes, and a  smooth, muscular physique.  But more important, he was a life long resident of the Quad Cities, gay, and out.

I met him at a coffee shop around the corner from my hotel.

A straight coffee shop, full of heterosexual couples!

"Last year The Advocate named us one of the 15 queerest cities in the United States," Dylan told me.  "We have had anti-discrimination protections for 17 years, we have a gay alderman, an annual Pridefest, and a lot of gay-run businesses."

"But...no gay bars, no adult bookstores, no cruising places."

"I get my porn and cruise online, and I go out to the bars to have fun and dance with my friends.  Some are gay, some are straight, some are queer.  Why should I exclude my straight bros?"

"Well, if 10% of the population is gay, and you're in a bar with 100 people, your chances of finding someone to dance with are limited."

He gave me one of those pitying glances twinks get when talking to someone hopelessly out of touch. "Why couldn't I dance with a straight guy? Or a girl?  It's just dancing."

"Ok, but what about dating?  How can you find a boyfriend in that crowd?"

"That's what hookup apps are for."  He put his hand on mine under the table, then pulled it onto the table top.

We were holding hands in plain sight of everyone in a straight coffee shop!

You can't go home again.

Oh, the hookup?  Very nice, very passionate, uncut average beneath the belt.

We exchanged phone numbers.  I could use more gay friends in Rock Island.  I may be coming back more often.

See also: Spending the Night with Todd