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Exaggeration by Ricky

In civilian life, fairy tales usually begin with “Once upon a time… .” The military equivalent phrase is “This ain’t no shit … .” When used properly, these expressions are essentially the same but not always. Sometimes the fairy tales sound more real than the story told by a military member as the actions of the military are often unbelievable; activities which we never heard of due to security classifications, cover-ups, or possibly just the passage of time. I would relate some of those unknown activities, but then I would have to kill you to protect the secret, and I don’t want to do that.

All advertisements for commercial products contain major exaggerations or out-right lies. I do not believe that statement to be an exaggeration in any way. Ever since I was 5-years old, I hear about the “New and Improved Tide” for washing clothes. The only thing I know that changed is the box it comes in. During all that time, I have not seen any of my clothes get cleaner than in any previous version.

Some exaggerations are in common usage. “If I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a thousand times;” “I’ll bet you a million dollars you can’t do it;” and “If you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all,” are just three of the hundreds of possible examples.

Myths are similar to fairy tales. Another type of exaggeration is the myth type of story that is so outrageous, no one would believe it. This type is of the category Tall Tales, which is just a nice way of saying it’s a big lie. This type is not so much harmful as entertaining, in effect; a big white lie as it were. For example, most people believe the Grand Canyon is the result of river and wind erosion. The reality is a fact well known; the Grand Canyon is the result of Paul Bunyan dragging his axe along the ground while walking from Minnesota to the redwood forests of California. (I actually believe this is probably true, because the story was in my reading textbook in 3rd grade elementary school in Minnesota. Schools never teach bad information.)

I cannot count high enough to list all the dining establishments that proclaim their cuisine is the “best” in town, state, nation, world, etc. If I tried to add them up, I would fry my brain or burn out my calculator’s batteries.

Did you notice that even the Weather Channel is not above reproach on this issue? It seems that each-and-every common and routine weather event is portrayed as being a major disaster in the making. So, I’ll end my story today with a warning to all of us, “global warming” will kill us all, because we did not do something about it a hundred years ago, and now it’s too late.

I’m so thirsty from reading this paper, I’m going drink ten gallons of water before I go home.

© 3 June 2013

About the Author

I was born in June of 1948 in Los
Angeles, living first in Lawndale and then in Redondo Beach. Just prior to
turning 8 years old in 1956, I began living with my grandparents on their farm
in Isanti County, Minnesota for two years during which time my parents
divorced.

When united with my mother and
stepfather two years later in 1958, I lived first at Emerald Bay and then at
South Lake Tahoe, California, graduating from South Tahoe High School in 1966.
After three tours of duty with the Air Force, I moved to Denver, Colorado where
I lived with my wife and four children until her passing away from
complications of breast cancer four days after the 9-11 terrorist attack.

I came out as a gay man in the
summer of 2010. I find writing these memories to be therapeutic.

My story blog is
TheTahoeBoy.Blogspot.com

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My Revelation/Theatre by Ray S

You may believe that a revelation is some sort of epiphany, miracle, a Bible book with all of its fortunes and predictions. It is just a word until you attach yours or someone else’s content to it; and that includes the scripture.

Well for me, my revelations are the ones that manifest themselves in my weary subconscious at the most inopportune moments. Those times when my body is overcome with fatigue or some physical disorder—that is always the curtain call for all the detritus that’s been hidden away like the curtain that’s drawn back to reveal the Wizard—or in this case all of the thoughts or memories that you have ignored because of varying degrees of guilt, regret, a smattering of self-loathing for good measure, and general lack of good will for anyone concerned.

Each thought negative or it may be just pops up in your mind’s “letter box” under “unfinished business” or just WHY?

None of this procedure does little to set one’s mind at ease; it just seems to amplify the matters.

In the morning waking hours there is an overpowering desire to fight waking up to another dreary routine. This is followed by a reaction to the above that restates how fortunate you are that you have woken. A lot of good that does when you’d just as soon pull the covers up and over your head.

You lie down on your back with your hands crossed over your chest and wonder if you could will yourself out of the present anguish du jour. That would be such an easy solution, leave all of your worries and stuff for them to deal with—but what if this solution wasn’t as easy “you know” die with a smile on your face? The best detriment to suicide thoughts then takes center stage asking how are you going to do it and knowing your record of bad successes that it won’t work and you’ll really be “expletive” (F word).

Somewhere the wee small voice is heard reminding you of what the hell are you so down about? Think of the starving, fighting, dying, and terminally ill out there, and you have the gall to sit on your pity pot. Well, get over it; you’re still breathing, well cared for, etc., etc.

Okay. Okay. I guess you’re right, but why do I still feel this way?

The voice behind the curtain reminds you that you’re a pretty ungrateful SOB, but after all rebuttals it possibly seems that all my subconscious revelations have taken their bows, returned to the green room, waiting for their next “on stage” time; and I can finally get out of bed, put my feet on the cold floor, stand in front of the toilet, and get on with the day.

February 24, 2014

About the Author

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Visits to the Doctors by Phillip Hoyle

I started going again to the doctors in my late twenties when my life seemed to complicate and I had started feeling stresses of work that caused pain and left me seeking relief.

Oh, I’d been to doctors before. Surely it was a doctor who delivered me from my mother’s womb, a doctor who filled my teeth, a doctor who gave me a physical in preparation for going to scout camp, a doctor who removed my plantar warts, a doctor who checked my dislocated knee, and a doctor who examined my throat and found I had both strep infection and the kissing disease, mononucleosis. These were specialists and my visits all related to crises or organizational demands. I’d go to their sterile offices, talk to them in their white lab coats, open my mouth, drop my pants, and otherwise skirt their world of science and be properly impressed. I needed their expertise I suppose but wasn’t really all that interested in what they had to say or prescribe.

I have a close friend now and who has a different relationship with doctors, whom he visits on numerous occasions for any variety of illnesses—real and imagined. My friend sees at least one or more doctors weekly and often tells me what his cardiologist or his dermatologist or his back doctor or his general practitioner or his internalist or his surgeon or some other specialist has said about his illnesses. It seems to me that beyond his own education in business and bookkeeping he has pursued a medical education in the hallowed halls of hospitals and clinics, a constant search for remedies, medicines, and knowledge to improve his day-to-day well being and treat his several conditions.

I don’t report this kind of phenomenon in my friends and acquaintances without revealing my own preoccupation with specialists for I, too, have sought knowledge from the doctors. I too have been enamored of their offerings, specialties, and diagnoses, but rather than radiologists I have visited musicologists, rather than endocrinologists I have sat at the feet of philologists, rather than chiropractologists I have preferred historiologists.

My manic phase of learning from doctors began in my late teens, reached a huge crescendo in my early thirties, and then quickly diminished (frankly a great relief to my wife at the time). My obsession slackened when I realized I had been in school for twenty-two of my thirty-three years. For more than a decade I had visited the offices, lecture halls, theaters, labs, and libraries of learning about theology, musicology, and biblioraphgy. I read dictionaries, scholarly studies, philosophies, essays, novels, short stories, periodicals, codices, and manuscripts in my pursuit of a wide variety of intellectual topics. My doctor’s names included Van Buren, Lee, Childs, Duke, and Beckelheimer, scholars who led me into the literatures of their specialties. I couldn’t read enough, hear enough, or absorb enough for years.

Finally I had had enough and nearly quite seeing them—doctors of all kinds. My decision to curtail my extravagance wasn’t because I was cured of my need to learn and know. I simply was tired of the institutions that offered the doctors’ advice—the schools with their curriculum plans, requirements, and tests. So I decided to self-medicate my need, to read on my own, to attend only seminars and workshops of interest, and eventually I gave up most of those things in order to begin writing my own essays and my own stories, a change that seems to have become my ultimate self-treatment. Forgive me if I have sinned, but for my penance just promise me not to take away my tablets, pens, or word processor.

Mea culpa.

Denver, 2013

About the Author

Phillip Hoyle lives in Denver and spends his time writing, painting, and socializing. In general he keeps busy with groups of writers and artists. Following thirty-two years in church work and fifteen in a therapeutic massage practice, he now focuses on creating beauty. He volunteers at The Center leading the SAGE program “Telling Your Story.”

He also blogs at artandmorebyphilhoyle.blogspot

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Road Trip by Pat Gourley

I actually have several memorable road trips in my past that I remember with varying degrees of fondness. My first trip west to Wyoming in my late teens is still a vivid memory. The first time I saw mountains outside of pictures, movies and T.V. was quite breathtaking. I simply had trouble grasping that they were real. The parts of northern Indiana and Illinois where I lived are really quite flat and I guess I grew up assuming the world was flat. That the world might be flat was a view of the world not uncommon among many Europeans in centuries past as I recall.

Then there were the trips to Florida in the late 1960’s with college friends. These were most remarkable for the fact that they provided my first views of the ocean. They were also noteworthy for the fact that we were frequently trailed and mildly harassed by various Florida state troopers. Being longhaired hippies we really stuck out. If it weren’t for our nearly invisible car, an old Dodge Dart slant six, we would have probably been stopped much more often. There was absolutely nothing cool about that car and a vehicle many of the frat boys going down to Ft. Lauderdale on spring break in those days would never be caught dead in but the cops largely ignored.

Probably my most memorable road trip though was one I took in the spring of 1989 with Harry Hay and John Burnside. Harry as many of you know is considered by some to be the founder of the modern American gay movement since he was instrumental in the formation of the Mattachine society in Los Angeles in 1950. Harry and John had been mentors and queer spirit guides for me personally since first meeting them in 1978 and our history together was after more than a decade quite rich really.

Our personal dynamics were actually emerging from a period of stress as a result of internal and very fractious Radical Faire politics. I was at the time becoming quite immersed both personally and professionally in the exploding AIDS epidemic. I often wondered why Harry and John both did not seem to me at least more involved with the AIDS epidemic but perhaps it had something to with the fact that Harry had lived through and survived the great influenza pandemic of 1919. Perhaps this created a different worldview of the inevitability of illness and death.

At any rate they were in Denver that spring of 1989 at the invitation of a group of local Fairies I was heavily involved with called the Moonroot Circle. This was a spin off of the local collective that sponsored the second large national Radical Fairie gathering in the foothills west of town in the summer of 1980. It was group important to me not simply because of the deep friendships involved but also it helped me keep my bearings in the choppy waters of AIDS and HIV politics boiling over at the time.

Among several activities we had them participating in during this visit was a well-attended public talk we sponsored featuring both Harry and John at the local Metropolitan Community Church on Clarkson, which is still there I might add. Harry was always a riveting public speaker and had a wealth of personal experience he was willing to share that always seemed to stir the radical juices in many who would come to hear him.

They were staying with my partner David and myself in our little house on West Center Street in Denver spending their nights sleeping in the back of their ancient Datsun pickup truck with a camper shell. This was their preferred mode of travel shunning airplanes whenever possible. They had driven to Denver in this rickety bucket of bolts from Los Angeles.

They planned to return to L.A. by way of Northern New Mexico visiting old friends there and reconnecting with a part of the country they had lived in for many years in a compound nestled in the San Juan Pueblo. In the early 1980’s Harry and John had shown a group of us around the Northern New Mexico Pueblos they had come to know and love and introduced us to some of the indigenous queer folk and culture.

Photo of a Radical Faerie ceremony provided by author.

In one of the late night discussions during this Denver visit in May of 1989 the topic of Chaco Canyon came up and surprisingly despite years of living in northern New Mexico they had never been there. David and I had actually been there a few years earlier so the opportunity to travel with them and introduce them to a piece of the country they had never been to was too rich to pass up. David had work obligations and could not go with us but I volunteered to follow them in my own little Toyota pick-up and I would be their guide to Chaco Canyon.

John Burnside in addition to being one the most wondrous fey individuals I have ever know was also a master mechanic though he didn’t drive. In fact I don’t think he had a current driver’s license though I could be mistaken about that. This mechanical ability frequently came in handy since their vehicle would break down several times on nearly every road trip they took. As I recall they had had some trouble coming into Denver from L.A. so I volunteered to follow behind on our journey. Harry was the driver and believe me following behind him was always a bit harrowing. Traffic lanes, stop signs and the rules of the road in general were to Harry merely suggestions most often ignored.

And of course about an hour out of Denver on Highway 285 their water pump went out. John very astutely remembered that we had passed a Napa auto parts some miles back so after diagnosing the problem he hopped in my truck and we drove back for the needed items. Harry stayed behind. He often would go into a bit of a sullen funk especially around car problems it seemed.

The remainder of the trip to the San Juan Pueblo was uneventful. We spent the night there with friends and then proceeded the next day to Chaco Canyon. They were of course duly impressed with the ruins. It was during our walk through the ruins that my most memorable moment of the trip occurred. That moment was when we were seated together in a meditative silence in the great Kiva. Harry was tearful as I recall. I had seen him tearful before but meditative silence in the presence of the father of modern gay liberation was a totally new experience for me and one I will always cherish.

After several hours we were on our way back to San Juan though I do not remember very clearly the return trip at all. Nothing apparently broke down. I think H. and J. spent a few more days in New Mexico before retuning to L.A. I drove back to Denver the next day with the great memory of having had the opportunity to introduce Harry Hay to a part of New Mexico he and John had never visited.

A great little gift back to the men who had introduced me to so many, many different and exciting things queer. A big part of who I am today and my worldview I owe to Harry and John. I still frequently find myself invoking one of Harry’s greatest teachings and that was his frequently saying, “Now that is an unexamined assumption, isn’t it” and thereby prompting a totally different way of viewing the world!

February 2014

About the Author

I was born in La Porte, Indiana in 1949, raised on a farm and schooled by Holy Cross nuns. The bulk of my adult life, some 40 plus years, was spent in Denver, Colorado as a nurse, gardener and gay/AIDS activist. I have currently returned to Denver after an extended sabbatical in San Francisco, California.

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Getting Touchy by Nicholas

This topic seems naturally to lead into intimate areas of body contact which I do like, just in general. I do like being touched. Not only for the human warmth of touch but also because I agree with the sentiment that our skin is really our largest sense—or sex—organ capable of innumerable delights. So, it isn’t so much a matter of don’t touch me here, there or anywhere but who’s doing the touching. With some people, please, don’t touch me anywhere. With others, I have no idea where the boundaries are (assuming we’re not frightening any unintended neighbors).

But if I can broaden the meaning of ‘don’t touch me there’ to include subjects not wanting pursuit or questioning, I do have those. Call them preferences or phobias or private areas, don’t go there. This is where the psychological sun don’t shine. Now we’re into intimate areas of the heart and mind, hopes and fears. And that’s a way bigger deal than body parts.

One is writing. I have long seen myself as a writer and even once made my living by writing. Problem is, I hardly write. I wish I could write. I wish that I could just sit down and write something beyond what someone once dismissed as disposable writing—meaning journalism or journaling. But I don’t want to go into it. PLEASE, don’t touch me there.

The future is another one. I’ve never had any great confidence in the future. If I have one, I have no idea what it is or how to make it happen. The future will sort of unravel on its own, as I see it. I much prefer the past which was loads of fun or the present where I can at least run away. So, please don’t touch me THERE.

A related taboo area is health. I’m in good health as far as I know. But what do I know? Every ache, I’m convinced, may signal that my last breath is near, the start of that downhill slide. And as for hospitals, please, don’t TOUCH me there.

And of course there’s politics. I’m pretty moderate in my politics and believe that political opponents should be tortured and annihilated only in rare circumstances. But those circumstances seem to be getting less rare. So, you better NOT touch me there.

As you can tell I am far touchier about non-physical touch than about physical touch. Physical touch usually stays on the surface and is, when not an assault, a pleasure. But verbal, psychological touch almost always aims deep. When someone says, “I just wanted to touch on that,” you know something’s up and you better pay attention. In general, just don’t touch me there.

April, 2013

About the Author

Nicholas grew up in Cleveland, then grew up in San Francisco, and is now growing up in Denver. He retired from work with non-profits in 2009 and now bicycles, gardens, cooks, does yoga, writes stories, and loves to go out for coffee.

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A Letter to My (Much) Younger Self by Gilllian

For Christ’s sake, Gillian, you’re ten bloody years old and …

No, I mustn’t swear. This is a letter to be read in the early 1950’s. And leave Christ out of it as well. You surely recall that at the age of nine you decided organized religion was a load of — , well, you rejected it.

Gillian, you really need to get your shit together.

Oops, that’s no better. Gillian, yes, YOU, the seventy-year old one, need to get YOUR act together. OK, act together, that’s better.

Gillian, you’re ten now, and it’s time you got your act together.

No, that really doesn’t work either. The ten-year-old Gillian IS acting; playing a part. And at some level she knows it. She needs no encouragement in acting. And it all sounds a bit distant and cool, doesn’t it? It shouldn’t. I feel great affection for, and of course empathy with, this desperately confused younger self. So here we go, AGAIN. Well, I didn’t expect this to be easy.

My dearest Gillian, (yes, MUCH better!)

Now you are ten, I think it’s time we had a little chat.

No, no! Too condescending.

My dearest Gillian,

Yes, you are only ten, but you have some pretty difficult stuff to deal with. I know you know what I mean, although you are trying oh so hard to hide it, even, or especially, from yourself. You think, in those rare times when you face up to thinking about it at all, that you are absolutely the only person in this entire world who is attracted to those of the same, rather than the opposite, sex. You think that somehow, in some way quite unclear to you at this time, these feelings will, magically, go away. They will not. I cannot guarantee you much, but that I can promise. No matter how hard you continue to refuse to accept them, they are going to strengthen until the day comes when you can no longer deny them to yourself, and so no longer wish to deny them to everyone else.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not advising you to ‘come out of the closet,’ (a phrase she is not yet even familiar with, needs explanation) that is, shout out on the school bus that you love girls not boys. Don’t kiss your best friend, though I know how much you have wanted to for quite some time. And don’t tell Mum and Dad. Dad, I suspect, would walk away without a word, and, if you tried to pursue it, might say something like, ‘I don’t ever want to hear that again,’ and walk faster, and further, away. Mum would, more predictably, say, “Oh Gillian! You’re being entirely too silly!” And that would be the unsatisfactory end to it.

The time and place would not be good. Caution is advised, my dear. (Good. Nice and warm, and what her mother often calls her.) In your current year, 1952, the Enigma codebreaker Alan Turing is being forced to take ‘cures’ for his homosexuality. (Don’t think the word ‘gay,’ though friendlier, would mean a thing. Come to think of it, neither would Turing nor Enigma, both being silenced for years to come under the Official Secrets Act. Never mind, she can get the idea.) Sir John Nott-Bower, commissioner of Scotland Yard is beginning to weed out homosexuals from the British Government, at the same time as McCarthy is conducting a homosexual witch hunt in the US. No, not a good time and place. (Though I suspect, in 1952, there was no good place.)

You will find this hard to believe, but my wonderful same-sex partner, of twenty-six years, and I are about to be legally married in the U.S., where same-sex marriage is now, nearing the end of 2013, legal in fourteen states.*

It is also legal in parts of Mexico, and legal throughout another sixteen countries.** The 21st century is an amazing place!

What I implore you to do, is, simply, look at yourself. Accept yourself. You are beautiful just the way you are, and one day you will know it. But if you deny it, hide it, try to make it go away, that will not work. You will hurt others.

Unintentionally, but the hurt is there all the same. And yourself. But there will be losses as well as gains. There will be sadness as well as joy. But make your life-choices consciously, for positive reasons, not negative ones, and never in denial of who you are, and who you must be. You are who you are. You have no choice. I know that now.

I wish, my dear Gillian, that I had known you, myself, a whole lot better in 1952. But here I am, sixty years later, still working at it, and very slowly I believe I’m getting there.

*
California, Connecticut, Iowa, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Delaware, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, Maine, Maryland, Washington, and Washington D.C.

**
Argentina (2010) Denmark (2012) The Netherlands (2000) South Africa (2006) Belgium (2003) England / Wales (2013) New Zealand (2013) Spain (2005) Brazil (2013) France (2013) Norway (2009) Sweden (2009) Canada (2005) Iceland (2010) Portugal (2010) Uruguay (2013)

October 2013

About the Author

I was born and raised in England. After graduation from college there, I moved to the U.S. and, having discovered Colorado, never left. I have lived in the Denver-Boulder area since 1965, working for 30 years at IBM. I married, raised four stepchildren, then got divorced after finally, in my forties, accepting myself as a lesbian. I have now been with my wonderful partner Betsy for 25 years.

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Coming Out Spiritually by Betsy

Contemplating today’s topic I realize that before I can write anything about the subject I must be clear about what is meant by “coming out.” In the context of sexual orientation it means first that I acknowledge and accept that I am homosexual and that I am willing and able to openly declare that I am gay. Stated another way: “coming out” means revealing a truth about myself. Of course, if I do indeed accept my homosexuality, it naturally follows that I will not spend my life in the closet and I have no problem with declaring my sexual orientation to the rest of the world.

I am examining the phrase “coming out” because it is usually used in the context of sexual orientation. So when applied to spirituality I find there is a problem. That is that in the case of sexual orientation I am applying the phrase to the way I AM, who I am. In the case of spirituality I am referring to what I believe or do not believe, regardless of who I am. “I AM what I believe?” This statement does not ring true for me. What I believe is something I do, not who I am, and what I do or think can change from one day to the next. Furthermore, if coming out means revealing the truth about myself, then coming out spiritually is impossible because spirituality is based on faith, not known facts.

Enough semantic gymnastics. For the sake of today’s topic coming out spiritually means that I acknowledge that I have certain beliefs about the nature of the universe and the nature of life and death and I am willing and able to make these beliefs known to others.

In this way the two comings out (sexual orientation and spirituality) are similar. Also similar is the fact that coming out in both cases ends with the declaration as mentioned above to others and ends there. That is, I have no need or desire to try to persuade others of my sexual way of life or my spiritual beliefs.

I consider my sexual orientation and lifestyle to be a personal matter as do I regard my spiritual beliefs. Another similarity. What is different about the two comings out is that my sexual orientation has stayed the same throughout my life; of course, that’s who I A M and that’s not going to change. On the other hand my spiritual beliefs are ever-changing. Furthermore I am constantly asking questions, observing, hopefully learning and developing beliefs around my spirituality; ie, changing my ideas about the nature of the universe and where I fit into it. Whatever ideas evolve in my head are beliefs though, not facts. You could argue that my sexual orientation, acknowledgement and acceptance and revelation thereof, has everything to do with my spirit. Used in this broader context then, I believe, revealing anything about myself IS coming out spiritually.

Okay, then, here it is: what I happen to believe today. My spiritual coming out.

There is more to me than a brain and a body and that once that body dies my spirit, essence, Being will go on. In what form I do not know. That spirit, essence, Being is within me now and always as long as I exist in this form. The key word here is WITHIN. The power of the Universe is within all of us not out there somewhere making rules and orchestrating our existence.

Coming out spiritually means that I have abandoned the religious teachings and traditions with which I was raised. I have departed from those beliefs. It means that I accept that I have no answers to the usual questions about the nature of life and death. In other words I have no beliefs about such matters except as described above. I have not taken any leap of faith. The only thing I really know for sure at this moment is that I DON’T Know. And when I really think about it I come to the conclusion that I don’t need to know.

Historically and still today however it appears that most people do need to know or more truthfully stated: it appears to me that most people do need to believe in something. History has shown that many people, especially collectively not only need to believe, but need others to believe as they do, and are often distrustful of those who have a different belief system. Of course, now I am talking about power and politics and that is another subject for many future discussions and story telling writing topics.

July 1, 2013

About the Author

Betsy has been active in the GLBT community including PFLAG, the Denver women’s chorus, OLOC (Old Lesbians Organizing for Change). She has been retired from the Human Services field for about 15 years. Since her retirement, her major activities include tennis, camping, traveling, teaching skiing as a volunteer instructor with National Sports Center for the Disabled, and learning. Betsy came out as a lesbian after 25 years of marriage. She has a close relationship with her three children and enjoys spending time with her four grandchildren. Betsy says her greatest and most meaningful enjoyment comes from sharing her life with her partner of 25 years, Gillian Edwards.

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Point of View by Will Stanton

When many people think of the so-called “gay lifestyle,” they very often have a stereotypical picture of gays frequently hanging out for hours in gay bars, drinking, and picking up tricks, one-night stands just for sex and without much regard for getting to know the person any better. At least, that may be the more visible aspect of some gays’ lives, but I know that this is not true with many others. Some have dinners and parties in their homes rather than going to bars. I found this to be especially true in cities that were less tolerant, such as Cincinnati at the times I visited there. That community was in some ways rather southern and conservative, and they did not tolerate gays very well. Many other gays spend more time in activities such as going to movies, plays, or concerts. Some engage in active pursuits such as sports or hiking in the mountains, just like many other people. Still, the bar scene seems to be one image that often comes first to some people’s minds.

The idea of going to bars as a major means of having fun never has been my point of view. My tastes always have been very different. I occasionally can enjoy an alcoholic drink just for the taste, but I don’t need more than one to enjoy that taste. I never have needed to get an alcoholic buzz, either. Plus, I did not care to lose more brain cells than I already was losing from the toxins in our water, food, and air.

And speaking of toxic air, that went for heavy cigarette smoke, too, the usual atmosphere of bars when I was young. The few times that I ventured into bars at the request of friends, my lungs felt as though I had sand in them by next morning.

I never went to bars looking for anonymous sex in basements. I also never cared to dress up either in drag or butch-drag. My point of view is that genuineness is preferable to affectation.

I also have a very different point of view when it comes to choosing music to listen to. I never cared for ear-splitting pounding drums and screaming. I know that many people seem to enjoy loud noise, but I now feel vindicated by all the medical studies that document the physical and mental harm from exposure to atavistic drivel foisted upon us by rock-noisicians. I realize that more civilized music is regarded by many to be boring, and they would complain if that were played in bars.

Still, when I was young and first met some gay people, I was persuaded to go to a few bars just for the camaraderie. A few of the places were relatively civilized. The only gay bar in my hometown had been made out of a small garage some distance from the downtown. It was run by a couple of older, friendly guys who tried to keep the prices of all the drinks, hard or soft, very low. They never made much money, and eventually the bar had to close.

The most comfortable bar that I remember was one that two friends of mine and I found as we traveled through Allentown, Pennsylvania. The bar was unusual because it had been a small branch-library and was situated in a pleasant, residential area rather than, as happens so often, in a less desirable location. It had ample parking in a large lot where cars were safe. The building was in the shape of an “H” with the entrance facing the middle reference desk, which had been turned into the bar. To the right in one end of the “H” was a large dance floor with dancing music. At the opposite end of the building was a large, quiet lounge with comfortable chairs and couches where friends could talk with each other without having to shout.

And finally, the spookiest experience that I had at a bar was when my friend Jim drove me many miles to a bar in a town in central Ohio. It was located in an older, urban area, and originally had been built for some other kind of business. There was a small entrance room, which was not lit very brightly, then a hall that led past restrooms and storage, and then finally a long area in back where the barroom was located.

The time was around twelve-thirty that night when Jim and I decided to leave. As we started to pass through the empty, front room, a lone figure approached out of the shadows. We saw that he appeared to be much too young to have been permitted into the bar, and he had not ventured farther back into the barroom. He appeared to be about fifteen. He spoke to Jim, but in a tone of voice that actually surprised us because it sounded angry and bitter. He said, “I’m chicken!” He seemed to glare at us with that announcement. Jim and I looked at each other somewhat confused by the intensity of his voice. I noted that he was good-looking, but I also was startled by the apparent fury and bitterness in his eyes. He seemed to be a very stressed and unhappy person. The intensity of his look stunned me.

Jim got over his initial surprise and said, “What?” The boy repeated his angry statement, “I’m chicken!” And then he added, looking only at Jim, “I have a hotel room nearby.” Jim, who always was the far more adventuresome person than I, turned and looked at me, seeming to communicate that he was attracted to this good-looking kid, would like to go with him, but at the same time, realized I that I would have no transportation. So, Jim, perhaps regretfully, declined the offer and said that we had a long way to drive and needed to leave now. As we left, I still was amazed and mystified by that very strange encounter.

It was some years later that I saw that face again, those intense eyes. I saw that face in newspaper photographs and on the TV. The image was immediately recognizable. Ever since then, I never could forget what a bizarre encounter Jim and I had had with this person and how close Jim possibly came to learning more about this strange kid than Jim would have wished to learn, even though what the kid became noted for began three years later. I clearly remembered the pained expression on that face, the intense bitterness in those eyes. And when I learned his name, I never have forgotten that either…Jeffrey Dahmer. Now there was someone with a very different point of view.

© 13 October 2013

About the Author

I have had a life-long fascination with people and their life stories. I also realize that, although my own life has not brought me particular fame or fortune, I too have had some noteworthy experiences and, at times, unusual ones. Since I joined this Story Time group, I have derived pleasure and satisfaction participating in the group. I do put some thought and effort into my stories, and I hope that you find them interesting.

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My Most Vulnerable Moments by Ricky

Vulnerability affects every person at several points in their lives. The moment a person is conceived, they are vulnerable to the actions and reactions of the mother’s body and her choices (to abort or not, what food to ingest, drink alcohol or not, take illegal drugs or not, level of activity; the quality of the environment the mother lives in, and etc.). As vulnerable a person is while in utero, the growing fetus is protected by the mother’s body. It is after a successful birth that the extended period of greatest vulnerability begins as a baby is totally helpless and dependent upon others to sustain its life; and so it was for me as well.

All children grow and as they do, vulnerability changes in both degree of risk and impact of the consequences. People learn as they grow and a child must process and internalize a massive amount of information as their senses provide the input. Most children are very successful in this endeavor but some get sidetracked along the way. I got derailed somewhat because I did not learn the consequences of “disobedience” quickly enough and received many corrective applications of father’s hand or belt to my bottom. Therefore, I was constantly afraid of him because I never connected the discipline to my actions. Naturally, I was also mentally vulnerable as I learned that my mother was a “snitch” by telling all of my misdeeds to him so he could apply the corrective can of “whup ass” to my butt. In other words, I could not trust her and I feared my father. I tried to please both of them but never quite understood that I must follow their instruction and not my own desires. [What two through five-year old child ever does?]

While living on my grandparent’s farm, I was not as mentally vulnerable as when living with my parents, but my vulnerability to physical harm skyrocketed but not from my grandparents. There were many ways to become seriously injured or even to die on the farm. Falling off the tractor while riding with my grandfather and being run over, or falling into the maws of the bailer, discus, harrow, or plow are but a few ways. Other ways included being kicked by a cow, falling out of the hayloft, or having hay bales fall on me.

Mental vulnerability on the farm consisted mostly of feeling abandoned by my parents and not receiving the kind of outward signs of love from my grandparents like those my own parents would give (hugs, kisses, and other such signs of affection). Those feelings followed me back to California when I finally was able to rejoin my “new” family (mother had remarried and I now had an older step-brother and twin half-brother and sister). I became the proverbial “middle child” and spent nearly nine years without much of a social life due to babysitting requirements. Thus, I acquired personality “issues” that have followed and negatively influenced me throughout the rest of my life to date.

My sexual activities made me extremely vulnerable. When I finally quit lying to myself and admitted to myself (what others already “new”) that I am gay, I became the most vulnerable. I managed to retain the psychological maturity and mentality of when I was twelve years old even though I grew up physically. Due to my suppressed sexual orientation, when I “came out” to myself and other men, my age, I wanted to experience gay sex in quantity. Thus, I am currently vulnerable to the advances of men I would not normally want to have as sex partners and with whom I have not established some type of personal or social or friendship relationship. I’m also especially vulnerable (as a 12 year old) to “fall in love with” someone who is simply using me to gratify himself and ultimately wounding me emotionally. (All gay men are vulnerable to this, so I am no different than anyone else on this issue.)

I know I am at risk but I try to be careful. That’s one of the minor reasons I come to The Center to deal with my issues. Therefore, my most vulnerable period in my life is currently right now.

© 24 November 2010

About the Author

I was born in June of 1948 in Los Angeles, living first in Lawndale and then in Redondo Beach. Just prior to turning 8 years old in 1956, I began living with my grandparents on their farm in Isanti County, Minnesota for two years during which time my parents divorced.

When united with my mother and stepfather two years later in 1958, I lived first at Emerald Bay and then at South Lake Tahoe, California, graduating from South Tahoe High School in 1966. After three tours of duty with the Air Force, I moved to Denver, Colorado where I lived with my wife and four children until her passing away from complications of breast cancer four days after the 9-11 terrorist attack.

I came out as a gay man in the summer of 2010. I find writing these memories to be therapeutic.

My story blog is TheTahoeBoy.Blogspot.com.

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Some Ramblng Explorations by Ray S

It was during the summer of his eighth year. Father had set up camp for the family at the Indiana Sand Dunes State Park. Close enough so he could commute into the city and be with the family all weekend. When you’re that young you take a lot for granted and looking back now it is amazing to realize how well planned and engineered the little camp community was. Besides his family, mother, father, and older brother, there were three other families that met at the camp grounds each summer. All with various canvas domiciles. One was even a real circus tent with the interior sub divided by sheets hung on clothes line to allow for some degree of privacy and decorum. But nothing in his mind could compare with Father’s layout.

There were three of the latest no-center-pole square tents. If memory doesn’t fail, they were interestingly or curiously named Dickey Bird tents. Father set the two tents up facing each other with the front flaps joining to make a dining-sitting area–the sides draped with a zippered doorway and made of something called ”bobbinette.” All of this was set upon a 6 inch high wooden deck to keep the sand out and dry in case of rain. The T bird tent was for him and his brother.

The little kids would go swimming, or learned to swim assisted by adults in beautiful Lake Michigan–oblivious of the nearby steel mills of Gary.

There were exploring expeditions in the shore line sand hills collecting little pails full of wild blueberries which Mother made into wonderful pies for the crew’s communal dinners. And, yes, she baked them in a fireside tin oven. The lady was quite adept at camping culinary cuisine.

Usually on the 2nd of July a pit was dug a little way from the tents. About 5 feet square and 4 feet deep. Then the men would build a big fire and keep it going until morning when there would be a goodly pile of hot coals. Fresh ham roasts, loins and pork ribs were seasoned and wrapped tightly in layers of butcher paper followed by three layers of wet burlap sacks, all tied and bound. The bundles were lowered into the pit of coals and then covered over with the excavated soil.

The next day the 4th of July was celebrated with everyone enjoying the pit roasted barbecue and all the trimmings.

Brother and his buddies all went down to the lakeside in hopes of finding some teenage romance. The little kids sat around the campfire watching the adults doing what adults do when it is party time and celebrating the demise of prohibition.

Summer at camp, swim and play, and know there would never be an end to those happy days.

But he does recall how everybody became so quiet and spoke in hushed voices one day. He finally asked Mother and Father why this change in the people’s mood. One of the families actually had a car radio and had heard the announcement of the plane crash and subsequent deaths of the pilot–one Wiley Post and his passenger friend Will Rogers. This was the major national tragedy of the time, the Great Depression not withstanding.

Exploring the childhood days of the early half of the 20th century has led from blueberries, sand and camp to realities of the Graf Zepplin at Lakehurst, the soup kitchens and bread lines in all the cities, the underworlds personalities of John Dillinger, Al Capone, Bonnie and Clyde, the rise of totalitarian governments in Europe and the Orient, and the ultimate reality, World War II.

So much for exploring. On to our next topic “No Good Will Come of It.”

About the Author