Nude Wrestling in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin

Rock Island, July 2017

Bob and I are on a road trip from the Plains to New York. We spent the night in Rock Island, Illinois, my home town.  Now we're having egg white omelets and fruit cups at the Quad Cities Pancake House.

"So, what's on the schedule for today?"  Bob asks.

"Chicago, about three hours from here.  We'll hit a couple of the museums, spend the night, and then drive on to Cleveland tomorrow."

"Would you mind if we take a little side-trip first?  I have a cousin I haven't seen since we were kids.  It's a couple of hours out of the way."

"Where?"

"Fond du Lac, Wisconsin."

4 hours out of the way!  But this is Bob's trip, too, so he should have a say in the itinerary.  Besides,  I have a history with Fond du Lac.


During my senior year in high school, although I was still Nazarene, I became obsessed with all things Catholic.  I read The Seven Story Mountain and The Dark Night of the Soul, learned to say the Rosary, and even went incognito into a Catholic Mass. I didn't actually convert, but I was considering it.

 And I considered applying to Marion College in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin.

Dad even drove me up for a tour.  I remember a vast snow-covered campus with round white buildings, pristine, pure, as quiet as a cloister.

You could feel the presence of God everywhere.

I imagined living in an austere dorm room, all white, empty except for a bed with white covers, some statues of saints, and a shelf of contemplative classics: the Little Flowers of St. Francis,  The Cloud of Unknowing.  Of walking among buildings of brilliant white other-worldly splendor every day, en route to my classes in medieval philosophy, Catholic theology, Ecclesiastical Latin, and Koine Greek.


Saying the rosary, walking the Stations of the Cross, going to Novenas, blessing myself with holy water before daily Mass.


Spending every day in communion with the Divine.

I decided to go to Augustana instead, but ever since, Fond du Lac has remained entrenched in my mind as a place of peace and serenity, as close as you can get to heaven in this life.

"Could we go to a Catholic Mass while we're there?" I ask.

Bob blinks.  "Well, it's Wednesday, and I'm not Catholic, but...ok, if you want.  I'll text my cousin."

On the four hour drive to Fond du Lac, Bob tells me more about Cousin Tark (short for Tarkington).  He's older than Bob, a big brother who used to babysit him and sneak him into R-rated movies, until he went away to college in Wisconsin, and then got a job in Fond du Lac.

"Was he cute?" I ask.

Not an athlete, but big and tall, with a thick beefy chest and nice biceps.

"Any sausage sightings?"

"Man, we used to wrestle in the nude.  I remember it getting hard once!  Really big -- and thick!  Man, that thing was like a beer can!"

 A beer-can penis somehow seems out of place in a world of quiet contemplation.  Surely trivial matters like sex fade away when you are in the presence of the Divine.

Fond du Lac, Wisconsin

We arrive in Fond du Lac at around 2:00 pm.  Tark doesn't get off work until 5:00 pm, so we go to Lakeside Park and walk along the lake.

I try to imagine how different my life would have been if I had gone to Marian, and stayed in Wisconsin, instead of going to Augustana, then Indiana University, and then West Hollywood.  Would I have been to 10,000 daily masses by now?  Said the rosary 20,000 times?  Spent my life in quiet contemplation of the Divine?

Next we go to St. Paul's Cathedral.  No Mass is going on, but I bless myself with holy water and light a candle in front of a statue of the Blessed Virgin, while Bob texts on his cell phone.

Then Marian College itself, which is a disappointment: an Erbert and Gerbert's sandwich shop in the student union, a jazz concert coming up on Friday, a sports team called the Dockspiders, and "A Beginner's Guide to Star Wars" in the student newspaper.  Hardly contemplative or otherworldly!

At 5:30 we go to Joe's Fox Hut, a rather scary dive bar next to the army induction center, with a Schlitz Beer sign out front.

The server takes us into a dark, dismal room with country-western music blaring, and hands us menus: pizza! corn dogs!  garlic bread!

Nothing healthy on the menu.  Even the chicken breast comes with french fries and cole slaw.

Suddenly a very tall, chubby guy with short hair and a reddish-brown beard sneaks up behind Bob, motions for me to keep quiet, and grabs him.  Bob yells.

"Gotcha!"

Bob hugs him.  "Hi, Cousin Dweeb. This is my boyfriend, Boomer."

Tark slides into the booth next to me and shakes my hand.

"Cousin Dork, you're all grown up -- sort of.  You're still scrawny -- and dating your professor!  How did you pull that off?"  He nudges me.  "I'll bet the little guy gets all A's, huh?"


"He's not actually in any of my classes."

"Well, there's always next semester."

He orders a sausage-mushroom pizza with mini corn dogs on the side, and tells us about his job as an auto detailer.

"It's great -- they bring the cars right to my house, and I do the work in my driveway.  No overhead.  Sure beats working in a stuffy office all day -- or teaching a bunch of whiny brats."

"True," I say.  "But some of those whiny brats are cute."

"I heard that.  Man, if I was a professor, I'd be inviting every gal in sight for some extra tutoring in my office.  Maybe a little oral exam, huh?"

I don't like him.  In a world of quiet contemplation, all he can think of are corn dogs and oral sex.

Eventually his girlfriend Diane joins us: a music professor at Marian specializing in jazz history.

Jazz?  Not Gregorian chants?  

We go to a place called the Backstage Bar and Grille to drink beer (soda for me and Bob) and listen to live music, more pop than jazz.  Loud!

Then we go back to Diane and Tark's house to drink more beer, listen to more music -- loud! -- and play with their dogs and cat,.  Finally it's time for bed: they put us up in an upstairs bedroom with race car posters and stuffed animals.

Bob and I strip down.  "They seem nice," I say.

"Yeah.  He hasn't changed.  A little fatter, but still like a big brother."

We start kissing and fondling.  Bob pushes me down onto the bed.

I look up to see Tark.  Grinning, naked.

He motions me to keep silent.  Bob is kissing my chest.  Suddenly Tark grabs him from behind.

"Nude wrestling!" he yells, dragging a giggling Bob to the floor.  "Rowdy Roddy Piper versus the Dynamic Dork!"

No, we didn't "share."   But I did get a sausage sighting of his beer-can penis.

Yes, that makes up for the absence of quiet contemplation in Fond du Lac.

Bob Hooks Me Up with the Wrong Guy

Davenport, Iowa, July 2017

That's the last time I let Bob, the19-year old economics major, arrange a hookup for us.  On the way east to New York, he somehow found the most disgusting guy of all time, and on the way back, he got the wrong guy!

We stayed overnight in Rock Island again, and went to the Figge Museum of Art, across the river in Iowa.

I had never been there before.  It opened in 1997, after my parents moved to Indiana, and on the rare occasions that I returned to the Quad Cities, there wasn't time for much sightseeing.

The second floor had galleries devoted to Spanish Colonial art, Haitian art, Grant Wood, and contemporary art.  The third floor was devoted to a corn maze, and the fourth floor to a collection of black dolls.

Some of the galleries had a nice view of the Mississippi.

No beefcake art to speak of, although I did notice a surprising number of Cute Young Things and twinks among the patrons.  A lot of cruisy smiles and up-and-down glances going on.

I found out why when I heard a lot of raucous noise from downstairs, and left Bob in the Haitian Art gallery to investigate.

The downstairs exhibition room was full of people, very cute college-age boys in grey t-shirts with "Metro Arts" logos, some girls, a few kids, very well dressed adults mingling with glasses of wine and little sandwiches.  Some were already sitting on folding chairs facing a stage.  There were t-shirts for sale, and tables of snacks.

Was this a private function?  In my t-shirt and jeans, I looked more like one of the college boys than an adult.

I milled about, pretending to belong, trying to find someone alone, not in a group, to pump for information.

No luck.  Some of the teenagers were in groups, doing voice exercises and giving each other encouragement.  Some were talking to groups of adults.  No one was alone.

As usual, I got cruisy glances from the twinks, suspicious glares from the adults.

Then the program began: it turned out to be the showcase of the Quad City Metro Arts Summer Youth Program.  Thirty college students from all over the Midwest were selected for the five week program, where they worked on projects ranging from public art to graphic design to comedy improv.

The adults were parents, friends, and community leaders.  Later I discovered that the mayors of both Davenport and Rock Island were there.

First up in the showcase: a comedy improv with three performers.  I milled about, taking photos.

Soon Bob joined me, drawn by the noise. I apprised him of what was happening, and we watched in silence for a few minutes.

My eyes were drawn to a father and son standing alone, with no mother.  Gay?

 Dad was in his 40s, with a rugged face, salt-and-pepper hair, and a tight frame. Son was probably 15, wearing a gray Metro Arts t-shirt, with dark wavy hair and an orange baseball cap, texting furiously on his cell phone.

I am always attracted to guys in business suits.  Maybe because they are designed specifically to hide the physique and bulge, so trying to imagine what he looks like with his clothes off becomes exciting.

And fathers, guys who are nurturing and domestic, yet obviously were naked, intimate, and aroused.

Bob nudged me.  "You like him?"


"Sure, he's hot. And definitely gay.   But I can't get him to make eye contact.  He's too busy concentrating on the show."

"That's funny, I'm getting some major perv from him."

"Maybe you're more his type.  And...there he goes."

The improv show ended, and father and son walked up to shake hands with one of the performers.  All three headed back toward the room with the snack tables.

"Didn't you say that the museum was the best place to pick up guys?" Bob asked.  "Why don't you go after him?  We could have a three-way tonight."

I glanced around, embarrassed to be discussing three-ways so openly.  "I'm not even sure we're supposed to be here, so I want to keep a low profile.  And how do you pick up a guy in front of all of his relatives?"

"No problem.  I'll take care of it. Be right back."

Before I could protest, Bob walked off toward the snack room.

The next showcase began, five artists talking about how they painted murals by the river.

Bob was gone a long time.  I began to get annoyed, and walked back to find him.  He met me.

"It's all set.  They're going to a place called Wise Guys Pizza after the showcase, and we're going to meet them there.  I guess it will be a whole big group.  But if I'm going to hook up, I need to shower and brush my teeth.  Could we go back to the hotel first?"

We crossed the bridge into Rock Island, showered and shaved and hung out for a bit, and then drove across the bridge again to Wise Guys Pizza, far away on the north side of town.

 There was a group of gray-shirt Metro Arts teens occupying a booth, looking at the menu.  Bob waved.

No parents.

Where's the hot Dad?

A teenage boy with dark wavy hair and an orange baseball cap slid over so we could join him.  Bob let me sit next to him.

He hooked us up with the wrong guy!  The son, not the father!

I could have hooked up with a twink on my own.  I wanted Bob to be my wing man in picking up a hot Dad.

It's not Bob's fault -- I'm dating a 19 year old, I get cruised by twinks all the time, and last week when he hooked me up with a teenager, I didn't object.  What would you conclude?

The boy - Ethan -- wasn't 15, he was 20, entering his junior year at Western Illinois University,and totally into hooking up. Smooth, solid physique, 5" cut but easily aroused.   Although he was mostly an anal bottom, he allowed me to go down on him while he went down on Bob, and then do interfemoral in a side position while Bob slid against his butt.

Bob is turning into rather more an anal top than I anticipated when we started to date.

A nice hookup, but not much different from the ones I get on the Plains.  I wanted the father.

See also: Nude Wrestling in Fond du Lac.