Category: Remembering

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Memories of a Family Road Trip

I ran across this photo online, and it brought back a lot of memories.

It took me back to late summer 1970, reminding me of my dad's truck and a little camping trip my family made up north.

Obviously the picture above wasn't the exact same vehicle, but it was similar:

I don't actually remember where we went, but I have pictures the family took at Montezuma Castle, Sunset Crater, and the South Rim of the Grand Canyon. At this point I have no memories of any of that, other than all the places we went  seemed very distant from Phoenix. It's funny because nowadays Ben and I think nothing of making that kind of road trip in a single day.

But I digress.

There are a couple things I remember from the trip. The first and foremost is the one evening I ventured outside to pee after we'd parked for the night and I saw the stars. This night sky was nothing like my backyard in suburban Phoenix. The sky was alive with dots of light. My mom did the same thing after I returned inside and she asked if I knew what the little dipper shaped constellation was called. (Keep in mind I had just gotten into astronomy and was learning the constellations; I hadn't even gotten my first telescope yet.) "Uh, The Little Dipper?" I asked.

"No," she replied. "I know that's in the north. This is tiny. And it's in the east."

I argued with her like any pre-teen would, and finally grabbed my dad's binoculars went back outside to prove her wrong. Shivering my ass off, I scanned the eastern sky and spotted it. She wasn't crazy after all. I brought the binoculars to my eyes and was blown away by what I saw. I had "discovered" the Pleiades.

My love of astronomy was cemented.

The second thing I remember was riding in the camper as we were heading to our destinations—on the sleeper portion over the cab of the truck—without any sort of seatbelts! Ah…it was a different time, for sure.

And lastly, while riding up there, I remember pouring over Radio Shack catalogs. I was fascinated by all the electronic bits and pieces you could buy and although I never (and by never, I mean to this day) grasped the how and why of how it all worked, it held me in its grip.

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The Day Everything Changed

Today marks 59 years of people accepting that 1 bullet caused 7 wounds on 2 men." – John Fugelsang


John F. Kennedy was assassinated 59 years ago today.
This is a wonderful picture of him, his smile showing his love of the open water.

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My Tales of the City – Very Relentless

It was August 1994. The previous two years had taken an emotional toll on me, first with Rory, then with Ron, and it seemed The City had lost much of the magic that had enchanted me upon my arrival nearly ten years earlier. I ached for a change and after returning from a trip to Tucson earlier that summer I started wondering if moving back to Arizona might be what the doctor ordered to cure this ongoing malaise.

After I returned from Tucson and the summer drew on, my dissatisfaction with The City increased. It seemed every aspect of daily life—from the panhandlers to the urine-soaked doorways to the daily commute from hell to the cost of everything—had become an annoyance, so it was a relatively easy decision to cast it all aside and return to the desert southwest.

Once I decided on that course of action, I gave a month's notice at work and on my apartment with every intention of moving back to Arizona the second week of September, but ultimately it was not to be. At least not this time.

I've often said that The City is a very jealous mistress, and my attempts to leave during the next eight years only confirmed it. She does not easily let go of her lovers. And deep down, despite everything, I truly loved The City.

The Playground

The Saturday before I was scheduled to move, I needed a break from packing, so that evening I decided to head out one last time and get into trouble. Young, hung, and full of cum…or something like that. (Well, two outta three ain't bad, right?)

I learned about The Playground from my friend Rick (or Miss K.C. Dare as he went by when on stage). With the demise of the 1808 Club a few years previous and not being one who cared for the tubs, I'd been missing the kind of wanton abandon a good old fashioned sex club provided. From Rick's description, The Playground sounded perfect.

It was. There was something primal about the place, something that was very much liked to our deepest (and yes, I suppose darkest) sexual fantasies. I knew from the moment I stepped into the place that the owners had a gold mine on their hands if the only knew how to keep the ambience alive.

It was a converted warehouse, located on the north side of 17th Street between Folsom and Harrison. The building itself was at the far end of a large parking lot, all grey corrugated metal with yellow painted trim. At night there were two rotating yellow beacons located at the entrance, which was also a loading dock.

When you first entered, to the right was the admission area. When you passed  through that, you first entered the television and refreshment area. There were several sofas clustered about a lone TV. If continue toward the back and slightly to the left, the next area you encountered was the gloryhole space. It was a series of black painted cubicles surrounding a raised platform. Naturally, there were more than an ample number of holes drilled between the cubicles and the platform.

Immediately to the right of that area is what I referred to as "the Drive-In." There was an English taxi of unknown vintage parked there that faced a large projection television that showed the same porn videos that were playing in the television area. Continuing back toward the rear of the building, you entered another area separated by separate separate cubicles. These cubicles had small holes drilled at eye level and surrounded another, smaller room, allowing you to look in and see what's going on.

Continuing on toward the back of the building, you passed the dungeon on the left that contained a sling and other accountrements. On your right were the restrooms (and yes, they were used for play as well as for their intended function). Continuing down a set of stairs, there were three more spaces: the jail (four cells complete with bunks and stainless steel toilets), the "infirmary", and a small room with a bed and a single lone light bulb. I remembered there was something very eerie and uncomfortable bout being in those two rear rooms, even if you were totally alone. I never lingered there.

And the soundtrack to this debauchery? It was The Pet Shop Boys' recently released Relentless half of Very/Relentless.

And as far as what exactly happened that night, let's just say I came home a very satisfied man.

Melancholy Sets In

During what was ostensibly my last week in San Francisco, I took Wednesday off and ran errands that morning, noticing the fog spilling over Twin Peaks as I drove down Dolores Street. As I got out onto the 280 Freeway (I was heading to Target to get a cooler in which to transport my tropical fish), I realized that this was probably going to be the last time I was on that highway.

A certain melancholy descended upon me as my continued my errands, picking up items I knew I wouldn't be able to find once I left Oz. By the time I returned home, I was severely depressed. I was just about ready to call it all quits and bail out of the move, but I realized I couldn't. It was too late. I had to go through with it.

The next night I hooked up with an especially handsome man whom I'd met the prior Sunday while I was out washing my car in front of my building as one is wont to do in San Francisco. He was walking down the sidewalk. We locked eyes, and to my utter surprise he'd paused and started up a conversation. We had dinner and ended up in my bed. What was I doing? I was leaving the fucking city in less than a week, and here I was going on a date with an impossibly good looking man who seemed quite enchanted with me and expressed great disappointment that this was only going to be a one-night thing.

After he left, coupled with the doubts that reared themselves the day before, I found myself wondering why the hell I was leaving San Francisco. Was it really too late? During the weeks that led up to all of this, my friend Stan was fond of telling me it was never too late to change my mind. I wondered if he might be right.

I sat down to write in my journal later that evening, but didn't get more than a paragraph completed. I'd started writing about everything that had happened that week: the unabashed lure of The Playground, meeting Peter, the realization that I really did have friends there who didn't want me to leave,  the magic that continued to come into my life in various forms—and I wrote, "I can't leave!" I broke down and cried.

And then, at a little past midnight, I made a decision. I wasn't going anywhere. No matter what it cost, I was not going to say goodbye to my beloved San Francisco. The only problem was I was caught in a financial Catch-22. I had to leave my job in order to remain in San Francisco. I needed the severance money they were giving me in order to pay the two months rent I needed to stay in my apartment. I didn't relish the idea of leaving the firm that had become my family over the previous eight years, but I also knew from my conversation with my boss a week earlier that staying on was probably not an option. No matter. It would force me to find a position doing more computer and less (hopefully much less) architecture.

What I wasn't prepared for when I told him of my decision the next day was the fact that he wanted to keep me on—and would be willing to loan me the money to pay my rent so I could stay. Now that is something you just don't find in today's workplace.

I accepted.

Friday afternoon we closed the office early and I came home and started putting my apartment back together. IT was no easy talk, although the unpacking did go much more quickly than the packing had. By that evening the living room had pretty much been returned to normal. By dinner time on Saturday, the rest of the place was put away. Instead of driving down I-5 heading toward Los Angeles, I was busy putting my track lights (it was the 90s, after all) back up and reinstalling all the flat switches and electrical outlets I'd swapped out only days earlier.

Of course, it seemed like the moment I got resettled, all that magic disappeared like the fog burning off each morning.

Peter—who seemed at first so disappointed that I was leaving San Francisco—became cagey. After telling him I'd decided to stay, I tried several times to set up a second date but his excuse was always "too busy at the moment" to get together. I finally wrote him off. If there was one thing I learned through that whole transformative process of leaving and then at the last minute stepping back from the brink is that I no longer had time to waste with bullshit like that.

And the magic that was The Playground? It too dried up, although not as quickly. While I had one more magical night at the venue, it seemed with each subsequent visit, the quality of the clientele and the encounters themselves dropped precipitously until I reached the point where it was more satisfying to simply stay home and jerk off by myself.

And that is why I say San Francisco is a jealous mistress…

 

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What Was Yours?

Jekyll & Hyde's, Tucson AZ, January 1977.

Advertised in the University of Arizona's student newspaper The Daily Wildcat, as Tucson's Newest and Gayest Bar—seemingly from the moment I first set foot on campus in the fall of 1976—it wasn't until the following semester (after coming out) I finally made it to the place.

As previously related for those who are new to the blog and have not heard this story before:

Ric was another Louie's regular, although I don't remember him ever showing up at a GSA meeting. A couple years older (I believe he was 20 or maybe 21 when we met), I was enraptured. On yet another Friday afternoon at the table plans were being made for the evening. Ric turned to me and asked what my plans were. "Just going back to the dorm and watching some television," I said.

"Posh! Come out with us!"

And by out, he meant Jekyll's, which billed itself as Tucson's newest and gayest disco,

"I dunno," I said. "I'm not much of a going-out kind of person."

"Well, if you change your mind, here's my address," he said, handing me a slip of paper. Tina's driving and we're leaving around 9. If you want to come with us, be there and we'll all go together."

I walked back to the dorm, butterflies dancing in my stomach. On one hand I was being honest when I'd said I wasn't much for going out; on the other hand, I desperately wanted to get to know Ric better and yes—I wanted to see what gay life was really like.

The butterflies didn't dissipate, even when, several hours later I was walking down 4th Street (or maybe it was 5th Street—I honestly don't remember) to the house he and Tina shared. I knocked on the door and Ric answered, giving me a big hug as I walked in. "Welcome! I'm so glad you decided to go with us. This will be fun tonight!"

I seem to remember one more person joining us—it was probably Don Hines—before we headed out. We all piled in Tina's big yellow sedan and drove to Oracle & Drachman, where Jekyll's was located.

Jeckyll & Hyde's, May 1977

At this point, some 42 years later, memories of that evening are little more than a blur, but some things do stand out. I remember paying a three dollar cover charge to get in, but I also remember I was not carded. (At the time legal drinking age in Arizona was 19, and I was still 18.) In fact, I was never carded, except at Maggie's in Phoenix years later—and then only because the bouncer wanted to know my name. (But that is a story for a future installment.)

Looking back, I'm sure Jeckyll's would be judged a dive by anyone's standards then and now, but for me it was absolute magic. I'd never been to a disco before, and here I was in a gay disco. There were men dancing with men, women dancing with women, and lots of people of—as we politely say today—people of indeterminate gender being their own fierce selves.

A wraparound bar greeted you as you walked in. To the right there was a sunken wooden dance floor and DJ booth. To the left was an elevated area with booths and tables.

And the music…I'd never been exposed to music like that before and I was entranced. It was here I first heard Giorgio Moroder's From Here to Eternity, Themla Houston's Don't Leave Me This Way and Cerrone's Love in C-Minor to name just a few. Disco wasn't something that had been on my musical radar at all, but it became something that I love to this very day.

Not apologizing.

We stayed until the bar closed that night, and afterward walked down the street to grab an early breakfast at Denny's. It seemed to be the place to go after the club shut down. Drag queens mingled with leathermen, and we were in the middle of it all. When we were finished eating, Tina and Ric drove me back to my dorm room, my head absolutely spinning.

I don't remember exactly what happened after that first night out together, but at some point Ric showed up at my door and didn't leave for a week thereafter. If my encounter with John had left me scratching my head, wondering what all the hoopla was about gay sex, Ric showed me. OMG…Ric took me places I didn't know existed and left me begging for more.

Ah, youth.

An obvious romance was brewing—at least in my eyes. We spent nights wrapped in each other's arms, sleeping on blankets in front of the fireplace at this house when we weren't at my dorm. When he'd left his beat-up army surplus jacket in my room one day, I brought it with me to Louie's that afternoon to return it and he said, "You like it? Keep it."

I wore it like a second skin.

But then something happened, and I was left wondering what precipitated it, other than what I now know to be the uncontrollable hormones of young gay men. Ric stopped coming around. We weren't doing anything together any more. He'd become very hard to get hold of, and when I did he was distant. And then the answer arrived. I was told by someone at the table that he'd been seeing some other boy; someone who was not from GSA or the table. I was crushed. When we finally connected, there were tears. At the time I just didn't understand. I thought we were something special…

Within weeks after the breakup, I became very ill. My tonsils and under-jaw glands swelled up. I went to Student Health and was diagnosed with mono. (I'd gone all through high school without coming down with the scourge, for obvious reasons, so it came as no surprise it finally hit when it did.)

I'd let my folks know what was going on and they expressed parental concern. I assured them I was in good hands with Student Health and basically spent an entire week in bed, missing every class. (Yeah, I felt that bad.) Shortly after my recovery, I received a very strange missive from my dad. It was an article about upper respiratory gonorrhea that had been clipped from the Phoenix gay paper. On the bottom he'd written in big block letters, "Don't give him anything but love."

Now keep in mind this was months before I finally came out to the family, and this left me confused as hell. How did he know? Where and how did he get this article?

The student mailboxes were adjacent to Louie's, so I didn't actually open the mail or read it until I was already sitting at the table. I guess my jaw must've dropped to the floor because they asked what was going on. "I just got this from my dad," I said, passing it around the table.

They all agreed: "He knows."

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I Had This…

…or some variation thereof, on my bedroom wall all through grade school. I took to drawing my own version of the planets—no doubt as fanciful as these representations, never dreaming that during the course of my life we'd actually see each one up close via robotic probes!

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World AIDS Day

As is my tradition every December 1st, I remember…


Kent Kelly


Ken Cohen


Steve Golden


Dennis Shelpman


Jim Hagen


Chuck Krahe


Marty Kamner


Michael Nelson


Jim Nye


Kevin Ohm


Rick King


Ron Aiazzi


Grant Neilsen


Ric Hathaway


David Koston


Kim Holstein


Russ Alvarez

Ben Walzer
Ken Borg
Harold Gates
Jim Girard
Keith Roseberry
Tom Farrel
Peter Whitman
Chuck Mayer
Richard Gulliver
Scott Woods
Bobby Farina
Brian Lea
Fred Sibinic
Steve McCollom
John Trapp
Philip Ruckdeschel

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Flashback Friday

March 1985, Tanque Verde Falls, Tucson AZ

I remember there was still a definite chill in the air that March morning. I believe this was the third time Bernie and I had come to the falls, and while he had no trouble stripping down completely, I was still far too reserved to go flashing my bits to the world (even though everyone else in the canyon was buck naked).

Of course all that changed over the summer, and despite the treacherous trails to get deep into the canyon, it was worth it.

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The Earth Shook, The Sky Burned

(With apologies to William Bronson)

October 17, 1989

Jack and Nick (my bosses, and co-owners of the four-person architectural firm where I had been working for the previous two and a half years) had left the office earlier that afternoon to "discuss business" at the pub a few doors down the street. I wasn't feeling particularly inspired to do any work, and since the only other member of our little professional family, Neill, was absent for some reason, I made the executive decision to close up shop at 4:30 and head home. I had received the repaired video card from my computer in the mail that day and was anxious to get it put back in so I could enjoy the newly purchased NEC "Multisync" monitor I'd picked up at a computer show that previous weekend.

It was a typically balmy autumn afternoon in San Francisco, and I enjoyed the two block walk up 2nd Street to Market, where I went downstairs to MUNI and caught one of the K, L, or M cars outbound which would deposit me at the Van Ness Station for my four block walk home to 12th & Folsom. (Yes, I lived "right around the corner" from the SF Eagle and yet I had only ventured in a handful of times over my tenure at that location.)

After getting off at Van Ness and walking down 12th just past Mission, one of my contact lenses decided to ride up on the top of my eye. As I paused to try and dislodge it, the ground started moving. Having been on the earthquake simulator platform at the Academy of Sciences numerous times, I knew exactly what this was and struggled to keep my balance. At the same time, my contact lens slid back down and I looked across the street to see the billboard above the parking lot at the corner—one of those cantilevered things that was supported on only one end—start bounding up and down. I heard glass breaking, a few people screaming and then, as soon as everything started, it ended.

The stop lights at Howard and at Folsom were both out. When I got home, I quickly saw that power was out there as well. My housemate Frank—who had moved in with me several weeks earlier and whose constant presence (he had just lost his job) was already putting a strain on our relationship (another story for another time), seemed nonchalant about the whole thing and was busy mopping up water that had spilled out of the aquarium.

Remembering what I'd been told about things to do after an earthquake, I grabbed my pipe wrench and headed down to the basement to turn off the gas. I initially turned our's off, but after a couple hours, with no one in the building smelling any gas, I went back downstairs and turned it back on so we could at least cook dinner.

Obviously the power didn't come back on, so I didn't get to enjoy my new monitor, but we had candles, and Frank had a battery-powered radio so we were at least able to stay abreast of what was happening and counted ourselves very lucky as the spotty reports of the damage starting coming in: the Bay Bridge, the Marina (we could see the smoke rising from our living room windows), and the Cypress Freeway in the east Bay. I thought back to all the times I'd driven that freeway that had pancaked…

I phoned my mom to let her know I was okay within minutes of arriving home. After I hung up with her, I phoned my dad to make sure he was okay (he was also living in San Francisco at the time). He was fine as well—a little shaken but okay. I was glad I called Mom when I did, because when I tried to call again about fifteen minutes later, I got the perpetual "All circuits are busy. Please try your call again later," message each time I tried.

As night fell over the city, it was indeed very dark. The only lights seen on Twin Peaks was the dim flickering of thousands of candles. By 10 pm, they were mostly all extinguished and the light of the just-past-full moon was illuminating the city in an eerie glow I'd never seen before.

Neither Frank or I were overly concerned. We and the cats had plenty of food in the house and we stayed out of the refrigerator and freezer to conserve the cold until the power came back on. It was a little odd sleeping without the constant din of the traffic on Folsom or the quiet whirring of the bedroom fan, but I managed.

The next morning there was still no power. I held out hope it would be on sometime that day since Dad told me his—and in fact, much of the city's—electricity had been restored sometime during the night. I was able to get hold of everyone from work, and they were also okay. I was told to not attempt to come downtown. Jack and Nick had returned to the office right after the rumbling stopped and discovered the office was a mess. They couldn't get the security gate at the entrance to our suite open, but they were able to go through the entrance of the structural engineering office next door.  They peeked over the partitions and saw that all the not-fastened-to-the-wall bookcases which had lined the entire south wall of our space had toppled, and while the building itself was not (yet) red-tagged, they didn't want to risk having anyone in there; the cleanup could wait.

Frank was in a pouty mood because of the power still being out, and since I didn't want to deal with it, I ignored my employers' recommendations to just stay home and I headed out to explore.

Hoping to find an open restaurant to grab a bite to eat, I walked up to Market Street hoping to catch a train to the Castro. Surprisingly, the underground MUNI was running—albeit with only limited service between the Embarcadero and Van Ness stations, so riding a train to the Castro wasn't an option. I hopped on a bus, and while not unexpected based on what Dad had told me about the rest of the city, power was on in the Castro,  but every restaurant that was open was mobbed.  And quite unexpectedly, there was a strong, bizarre sexual electricity in the air; it seemed like every beautiful man in the city was out cruising and looking to get laid. I finally gave up hope of getting something to eat, and left went back home, stopping to grab a sandwich at Ted's Market on Howard Street.  

By the time I arrived home Frank was gone, also out exploring.

The next day—with the power still unrestored—and myself now caught up in that weird sexual energy and horny as fuck, I went downtown looking for trouble and was surprised to discover that most of my usual haunts were open, and let me tell ya…they were hopping.

I can quite honestly say that I wasn't frightened during the ordeal.  It was more exciting than anything else.  And despite the inconvenience of being without power for what turned into 36 hours, I can say it was quite a break in the day-to-day monotony of my life.  Granted, it wasn't quite as big a break as if giant UFOs had appeared over the world's cities, but it came damn close.

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Believe It Or Not…

Believe it or not, I once dated a porn star. Okay…a "male adult model." He wasn't a top-tier or well-known by any means. He didn't do any films (that I know of), and only appeared in one issue of Advocate Men, but from the moment I first saw him on the cover of that magazine in June 1986, I knew our paths would eventually cross—even though at the time I had no idea where or when that might happen. The bio in the magazine said "Justin Banks" was a landscape architect who lived in San Francisco. I was still living in Tucson, and while the cogs were definitely in motion for my eventual relation to SF, nothing was yet firmly in place.

Of course all that changed in the blink of an eye and I found myself a resident of The City two months later…and not six weeks after that "Justin" and I passed on the street as he and some friends were leaving the Midnight Sun. Our eyes locked. I smiled. He smiled back. I stopped and glanced back over my shoulder, but he kept walking down the street with his buddies. And that was the end of it.

Or so I thought.

The following February a friend and I were at a toy store in Corta Madera called The Imaginarium, where we spotted "Justin" working behind the counter. So much for being a landscape architect…

His eyes lit up when he saw me and immeidately came over. He definitely remembered our two-ships-passing moment, telling me that after he'd dropped his friends at their car that night he came back to try and find me, but I'd already disappeared into the night. He introduced himself with his real name (Michael Rose) and gave me his phone number. "Call me."

The rest is now ancient history, but we ended up dating for a few months. And all I can say about that is Michael taught me a valuable life lesson: NEVER date porn stars—excuse me, "male adult models"—not even the B-Listers.

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All I Can Think Of…

…are the people who threw themselves out of open, broken windows rather than be burned or crushed by the building falling around them.

It seemed we were one people for weeks and months following the attack. Now we can't even unite in the simplest of ways to prevent our fellow citizens from perishing.

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Trade Center

Like many gay men of a certain age, I have my own salacious stories of the clandestine (and not-so-clandestine) venues that catered to this sort of activity in the 80s and 90s—albeit in San Francisco, not New York.

I can hear you now, "Do tell!"

• The Shaklee Building, 2nd Floor
• 255 Bush, 2nd Floor
• The Russ Building, 11th Floor
• Rincon Center, 1st Floor
• The Sir Francis Drake, Mezzanine (the only place I ever almost got busted)
• The Hyatt Regency, 2nd Floor…and of course, pretty much every public restroom on the shop level of the Embarcadero Center, of which the Hyatt was a part.

But like one of the contributors in the video above pointed out, after 9/11 all these buildings slammed shut to casual comings-and-goings. (Or should I say, comings-and-cummings.)

Some day I may go into greater detail regarding my adventures—and misadventures—my own Tales of the City as they were, but I'm in no hurry, as much as I'm sure you'd all like to read them. I don't want to shock my husband after all these years. I mean, he knows I was a slut when I was younger; I'm just not sure I want him to know how much of a slut I was…

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Growing Up Gay…

We all knew this kid in grade school, a borderline (if not outright) homophobic bully who was going to grow up oozing testosterone while simultaneously terrifying and exciting our pre-pubescent bodies in ways we didn't quite understand at the time. My own tormenter—let's call him Squire—while never getting physical with me, loved hurling "faggot" in my direction whenever we were out of earshot of any adults. This went on for years, and while it tapered off when we got to High School, it never ended completely. Thankfully by this time our paths seldom crossed, with him pursuing sports and me avoiding them.

And—of course—we all know what became of most of these school bullies, don't we?

Yup.

I ran into my own go-cart racing, faggot-spewing hellion in one of my favorite gay clubs about three years after we graduated high school.

He was there by himself, and looking quite studly in the jeans-and-generously-unbuttoned-flannel-shirt uniform of the day. In fact, he initially caught my eye for that very reason—until, of course, I realized who it was. We locked eyes, he got up from the bar stool he'd been sitting on, and in a flash was gone. I never saw him there again. I was quietly chuckling the rest of the evening, while thinking, "That explains so much!"

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Philip Ruckdeschel

Despite the fact we dated for months and knew each other for years afterward. I do not have a single photo of Philip, and can only vaguely picture him now.

We met the night of the gay pride parade in 1988.

That evening, after grabbing dinner with friends, I decided it was time I venture into some of the Castro bars and see what sort of trouble I could get into. My first—and as it turned out, my only stop for the evening—was The Detour. It was a dark, hole-in-the-wall place with chain link fences, throbbing dance music, half naked bartenders, and that night was full of some very good looking menz…

It was there I met Philip. As I recall, he came up to me. He was quite drunk, but I was still flattered that such a good-looking man (inebriated or not) took an interest in me. We talked for a bit, and agreed to meet at his apartment after I'd run back home and let my houseguests who were ostensibly in town for the parade know I'd probably be out for the remainder of the night.

The houseguests were not there. This was a decade before the first cell phones, so there was no way of tracking them down. I left a note, grabbed my trick bag (contact lens case, solution, toothbrush and toothpaste) and drove up to Philip's apartment.

He lived on Van Ness, probably somewhere near Clay Street. (I have long sense thrown out address books from that period and a quick Google Streets perusal didn't come up with anything definite.) What I remember most about his place at the time was the elevator was old. It didn't even have a door in the cab, just an open metal accordion gate. Philip had a large studio apartment that was done to the nines. I learned soon after that he was an interior designer—and it was evident. Unfortunately our tastes were very different. That alone should have been a red flag.

I stayed the night. We dated for a few months thereafter until one evening we were scheduled to get together and we had a blowup over my refusal to come pick him up to drive him back to my place, where we had planned the 1988 equivalent of "Netflix and Chill." (I was in the middle of putting a desk together and he had indicated earlier in the day he would take a bus down.)

After that, we didn't speak for months. We reconnected by accident later that winter and got together occasionally for some recreational activities when the need arose. It was nothing serious, as we both realized that we were fundamentally different in so many ways. Philip also drank a lot. Eventually this became a problem in the bedroom and things just—pardon the expression—petered out. We remained friends, however, until his death in 1992.

The reason I bring all this up is that he popped up in a dream the other night. Well, not him specifically, but rather that I'd found a photo of him—and being a dream, it was not just a simple photo. It was like a little video on a credit card. It was damaged, and while he was doing something extremely campy as I remember, it still warmed my heart to see him again.

 

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During the Summer of 1970…

…while my mom, sister and I were visiting her parents in Massachusetts, my mom decided it was time we learned how to swim. (I was comfortable in and  around water, but I didn't know how to swim, which was apparently not good enough for any of the adult parties involved in this decision.)

The dashing gentlemen standing between us was Chad, our instructor.

There is a reason I'm covering my crotch with my hands. I wanted Chad in the worst way, even if at that point in my life I didn't know how. I can't tell you the number many times I'd come home from one of our lessons to shower off the remnants of Laurel Lake adhering to my skin, soap up and shoot a huge load down the drain after thinking about the guy.

("Oh gurl…those socks with that shirt? Were you high?")

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Blast from the Past

It's amazing the things you find packed away when you're forced to move and someone else boxes everything up.










This was published in October 1987. I never realized how many of these items were long gone from Jack's menu until I saw this. I miss the Monterey and Mushroom burgers; also the Taco Salad and the Supreme Nachos.