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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13800
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I was chatting to a friend and, while it was nothing to do with our topic, I found a question forming in my mind. "What does being a gay man mean to me?"
Obviously some here are bisexual, some are gay, some are unsure and woudl love to learn what they are. But I think the question is valid.
So, What does [insert sexual orientation appropriate to yourself, if known] mean to you?
I'm still thinking about my own answer. I'll post it when I get closer to it.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13800
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I started out in life finding being gay to be totally negative. Some of the things that it meant were- fear
- Of my friends
- of losing my friends
- of my parents
- of losing the love I pretended I had from the lad I adored
- loneliness. I knew no-one else like me
- Isolation, subtly different from loneliness
- inability to relate to boys with girlfriends because I had nothing to contribute to the conversation
So it was not a good time to be in my head.
As I matured (Well, relative to being a teenager) I found that being a gay man was something that disgusted me. I wasn't disgusted with myself It wasn't gay sex that disgusted me. Instead it was the mincing, camp, preening creatures that were the only people I could see who were gay. They were so alien to me that being gay disgusted me.
Around that time I found glory holes. They weren't in use. I wanted to take a dump, pure and simple, and the holes in the wall disgusted me. I have never found taking a dump to be a spectator sport, I'm very private about it, and the holes made me afraid. And I found myself more and more revolted by homosexuality. I could not be gay, would not be gay, if that was to be my life.
It took me until I was 48 to acknowledge that I am a gay man. That acknowledgement caused tears. I was ashamed to admit that I am a natural bottom because I've been conditioned to view that as a female role, and yet there is nothing female about me, nothing at all. I just happen to be a natural bottom. Sometimes I think that stems from an early penis injury, sometimes I just know who I am very clearly. But admitting it to another soul made me uneasy.
That's when being a gay man started to be a positive experience for me intellectually and emotionally.
I realised that I could start to become free from my inner demons if I worked hard at it. Being gay let me assemble a huge cast of inner demons, and acknowledging I am gay has let me remove each of those demons, one by one. I've picked them off, sniped at them and shot them. Sometimes they take more than one shot. I have one back at the moment, but it's under my control, more or less.
Being a gay man has meant I have amassed the inner strength to handle things I would have expected to overwhelm me. I handle them because I have the strength, in part from the friends I've met online and later in person. Being a gay man the way I have done it has let me find friends all over the world that I'd never have met otherwise.
I'd never have learned to write stories without being gay. I'd not be editing a novel now if I'd not learned to write.
And these things have let me become an out gay man. Not a flamboyantly out gay man, just a bloke who is gay and is happy that people know. And it gave me the courage to march in two Gay Pride Parades, both of which helped me become a content out gay man.
Being gay has meant to me a journey towards the happiness I've always felt I deserved but never managed to find. I'm not there yet, but I'm getting there daily.
It's meant I've felt different, an outsider, most of my life. Now I see those who don't accept me as outsiders. I have a cousin who is firmly on the list of outsiders now. And the outsiders are the losers. Being a gay man has meant that I've learned who my friends really are.
And it is all still evolving.
Very little of being gay has to do with sex. It has to do with orientation, or it does for me. Instead it has to do with an increasing feeling of self worth, one I feel I ought to have always had, but denied to myself. But being gay means that I have fought to find it and I have found it.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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timmy wrote:
(snip)
> Instead it has to do with an increasing feeling of self worth, one I feel I ought to have always had, but denied to myself. But being gay means that I have fought to find it and I have found it.
For me, that's the key to it.
Self-worth for me meant overcoming the feelings of failure at not being the kind of person (in any respect: lack of sporting achievement, being over-sensitive and over-intellectual, valuing practical skills, heterosexual ....) that my father wanted me to be. I was lucky in that I knew I was gay as I approached adulthood, was from about age 16 onwards able to tell a few close friends that women weren't all that interested me, and to come out fully to all and sundry at age 24. As a result, I've spent over 30 years living as / having a strong sense of self-identity and scial identity as an "out gay man": an identity that is is so many ways meaningless, yet so deep-seated that I can no more imagine not living as "out gay", than I can imagine living not as a "man".
And, Timmy - good on you! It's been quite a journey for you !
"The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. ... Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night devoid of stars." Martin Luther King
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13800
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I'm sure there is quite a journey remaining 
I should also mention that your journey has not been easy.
[Updated on: Thu, 19 November 2009 23:45]
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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That is a complex question even in the simple way its phrased and asked. Being Gay to me is not just about where I put my sexual reproductive organs. Oh, and as far as that topic goes, I have known from "natural urges" at the tender age of 11 or 12 as I commenced my journey into becoming a fully realised male, that my personal urge was to insert mine in other males.
I have watched various members of this quaint "gentleman's club" hosted so kindly by Monsieur Trent dance around the meaning of "Gay." Possible by way of explanation, I think due to the fact that they remain closeted for any number of reasons or because they feel uncomfortable with their sexuality.
I'm not gonna do the dance folks, I don't give a shit. On Being Gay: I want to wake up next to a person whose got the exact same equipment I have. I want a person whose emotional structure/makeup is male. I like being able to pad into my kitchen and walk up behind a male that completes me as a person, physically, emotionally, personally, and hug him and kiss him and feel the morning stubble on his chin. [sorry ladies] Oh and yeah, the sweet smell of the opposite sex just doesn't cut it or turn me on.
BUT, and there's that ugly conjunction, I have had to deal with at least 39 years out of my 50 of being a second class citizen and have had to put up with learning to be labeled in a divisive and demeaning way. To be told that what I felt inside was evil, abnormal, and of course a mortal sin. [& yeah, I was raised Catholic] I have had to watch as a professional observer as human beings have been killed solely because they felt the same way that I did inside. I have been at the end of a pair of fists in a brutish attack in West Hollywood a number of years ago ONLY because my attacker saw me come out of a known Gay bar, and ASSUMED I was a fag so he was angling to beat and rob me based on that.
What does being Gay to me mean? It means that I have deep seated feelings, NOW, of being a male who happens to love other males. Intimacy for me isn't just sex. Actually, it is so much more than that. Just the simple act of holding my love's hand and watching a TV show. Or going to a movie. Then there's my all time favorite activity, cooking a simple meal together and eating it, together.
I personally do not give a shit if someone gets displeased when I greet a friend with a hug and a kiss. (Really GOOD friends also get a squeeze on the arse.) I am no different than say my brothers, its just that they love women which is what makes them feel complete. Being Gay also means that I have to put up with my sons and brothers offering advice on good looking guys........by THEIR standards....ewwwwww!
Seriously? It simply means that the "one" who created this mess we call life also was inspired enough to create a sense of love that supersedes man's definition of "right or wrong" love. My sense of beauty is male, my sense of intimacy is male, and most of all, my sense of loving a person is male. That's what being Gay means to me.
[Updated on: Fri, 20 November 2009 12:08] |
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13800
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Brody Levesque wrote:
> I have watched various members of this quaint "gentleman's club" hosted so kindly by Monsieur Trent dance around the meaning of "Gay." Possible by way of explanation, I think due to the fact that they remain closeted for any number of reasons or because they feel uncomfortable with their sexuality.
At risk of distracting folk from answering the primary question, I'd say that being closeted is Ok. I was closeted for almost all my life.
Being closeted means that being gay can take on a fear inspiring role. That is as important as any other aspect of being gay. I'd like to see many more posts about what it means to each of us, personally.
I wonder, though, if you've said what you truly wanted to say? I think there is a lot more hiding in there.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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Very interesting and thoughtful, Brody.
Hugs
N
I dream of boys with big bulges in their trousers,
Never of girls with big bulges in their blouses.
…and look forward to meeting you in Cóito.
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Macky
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Really getting into it |
Location: USA
Registered: November 2008
Messages: 973
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What does it mean to me to be a gay man?
This question throws me into a state of confusion. In order to make sense of it, I have to first determine how big a deal homosexuality is among the other major influences in my life. If 99% of what’s important about me has nothing to do with being a gay man, then being gay means little to me. If 99% of what’s important about has to do with being gay, then it is very important indeed.
So I came up with 3 major influences in my life. Each of these is a category head and can be broken down into more specific influences, but I’ll not go there in this post. After thinking about it for an hour, I came up with these 3 major influences; 1) Social ineptness 2) homosexuality 3) Spirituality.
Each of these areas has it’s own source. I believe that my social ineptness is a result of physical brain structure. I am seeking professional help to have this theory evaluated. My spirituality is obviously all mental. And I feel that my homosexuality has both physical and mental aspects.
My next step in seeking an answer to what being a gay man means to me, was to quantify the importance of each of these major influences. It just seemed very obvious to me that social ineptness is a good heading for at least half of what I am. The other half is evenly divided between homosexuality and spirituality.
The situation is complicated by the fact that these 3 major influences all influence each other as well. So what being a gay man means to me, would have to be how being gay affects my social ineptitude and my spirituality, as well as, my off the cuff guess that being gay is 25% of my makeup.
So here’s the result.
How homosexuality affects my social ineptitude – It complicates it. I’m closeted to the world except my wife. So I have to wear various masks when dealing with anyone but my wife. This severely limits my interaction with the rest of humanity. I never really share my views and I never get back feedback that hits home from society. “All the world is a stage” applies in bold letters.
Fortunately, in non social settings, like this forum, I can be honest, so being here means a lot to me, because I get real reactions. A downside to that is that I take reactions in this non-social setting much too seriously. This is very imperfect communication, stripped of much of human interaction. In a word, feedback is based on the nebulous understanding that forum posters have of me. But it sure beats anything I can get from anyone other than my wife.
How homosexuality affects my spirituality – Well, with the kind of spirituality I originally embraced, there is constant conflict between these two influences. As defining my sexuality became more clear, defining my spirituality became more murky. I find myself wanting to believe more than actually believing. I find myself moving away from a deistic spirituality towards a more human centered spirituality. I really think this has been a good influence of being a gay man. As my concern for the deity fades, my concern for humanity becomes more clear. I think this is making me a better person, and a more truly spiritual person. It’s using spirituality as a tool to serve people, rather than a crutch to help me live in an imaginary society with an imaginary friend.
If this exercise has made me realize anything it is that being a gay man is not the biggest factor in who I am. It’s basically 25% of who I am. Additionally it affects my spiritually favorably and my social ineptitude negatively. It probably accounts for about 25% of my spirituality and maybe 10% of my social ineptitude. So being gay is a quarter of my spirituality, which is a quarter of my being and .25 x .25 = about 6% influence of being gay in this area. It affects 10% of my social ineptitude with is 50% of my being and .10 x .50 = about 5% influence of being gay in this area. So if I add the initial 25% plus 6% spirituality related plus 5% social ineptitude related, homosexuality accounts for around a third of the person I am. An important thing to consider, but definitely not the most important thing influencing my life.
If using mathematical representations of my personal makeup seems odd to you, you should know that I find it necessary to think that way to try to make sense of these subjective issues. And yes, it probably indicates a certain lack in social decorum.
Macky
Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brothers to dwell together in unity!
Ps 133:1 NASB
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13800
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The way we each express things, mathematical, metaphysical, ethereal, pragmatic, is part of us. It is the thinking about concepts that is important, together with the willingness to state them.
You can neither be right nor wrong, except that you are comfortable or uncomfortable with what you have written. But what you write (you plural) affects those we do not see, those who read without posting.
So thank you for expressing it in your own analytical way. Another soul striving to analyse himself will be able to identify with you in some way because of the clarity of expression that meets his needs.
Are you able to summarise an emotional short summary or is that awkward for your way of thinking?
[Updated on: Fri, 20 November 2009 17:04]
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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Macky
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Really getting into it |
Location: USA
Registered: November 2008
Messages: 973
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"Are you able to summarise an emotional short summary or is that awkward for your way of thinking?"
I think that an emotional summary for how I feel about being gay right now would be "I always thought it would be a place where I would fit in. Now I know that fitting into a "gay community" was just as much a flight of fancy as my special friend deity. Special friend group....special friend god...it's the same thing. The goal is meaningful interaction with a world that I may be poorly equipped to interact with." I've found a new intimacy with my wife this past year. I believe that shows progress.
Macky
Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brothers to dwell together in unity!
Ps 133:1 NASB
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13800
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Be unafraid when you say you are poorly equipped to deal with things.
First, no-one is born well equipped socially. We learn to manufacture confidence, small talk,, body language.
At school we discover that "Will you play with me?" is doomed to failure, and that "May I play with you?" usually works. We start the lifelong process of social learning and social interaction.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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Brody, if that's what being gay means to you, I'm in no position to disagree - we're all different.
However, I would certainly deny having danced around the meaning of "gay" for myself.
Yup, of course it includes the guys I've fucked (rather few), been fucked by (rather more) or otherwise enjoyed myself with (even more). Of course it includes who I've enjoyed waking up next to (lovers both male and female, friends of both sexes, cats ...), or who I would like to wake up to (male). It includes the men who have made my heart miss a beat, the hope I have of again meeting such a person. It includes the expression of love when I wiped the dribble spaghetti sauce off his chin in a crowded restaurant, and the time he called me to say he was stuck on a ferry waiting to dock, in a romantic moonlight, and was thinking of me. It includes the times I've spent in hospital after receiving a queer-bashing (two). It was decisive in my original choice of career, and in many of the job changes I've made since (I would refuse to work anywhere that discouraged me from being open about my relationships). It includes all those marches in the rain, letters to MPs, petition-signing and multifarious other political activities to push forward the right of gay people to be treated equally.
For me, being gay includes all those things, but none of them individually or collectively are what being gay "means". Being gay for me is much deeper than that: it's a fundamental and conscious part of my identity, in a way that my religious views, skin colour, education, even gender are not - probably because as a well-educated white male I've never had to fight discrimination on any of these issues in person.
Oh, and "closet"? The first major announcement of my sexuality was in a written election manifesto for a sabbatical post at Uni - circulated to 100,000 students - three decades ago, and I've been out at home, at work, and every other damn where, ever since. I don't do the "gay scene", but I don't do closets, either.
"The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. ... Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night devoid of stars." Martin Luther King
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So what does being gay mean to me?
Peace of mind. I don't have to pretend to myself any more. I'm straight acting anyway, and if I were out of the closet elsewhere than on this board, I would still be straight acting.
My only reason for remaining in the closet is that it would otherwise upset other people.
At my age physical sex is out of the question. Performance could not be guaranteed and I certainly would not want to have sex with someone my age. I get sufficient companionship from straight friends.
A lot of sex goes on in my mind, but that's the limit. I'm happy with that.
I appreciate good-looking males without wanting to jerk, suck, shag, be jerked, sucked or shagged. Basically I am a very content person.
Hugs
N
[Updated on: Fri, 20 November 2009 22:15]
I dream of boys with big bulges in their trousers,
Never of girls with big bulges in their blouses.
…and look forward to meeting you in Cóito.
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13800
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I suspect from conversation with Brody he was careless in his placing the message in the thread beneath you.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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I wondered about that. But I think it's interesting, nevertheless: the way "being gay" presents itself to each of us in emotional, physical, social, or whatever terms is clearly very different ... and doesn't (so far) seem to be to be correalated with how much (if any) of our lives we have lived as openly / overtly gay men.
As Nigel kinda pointed out, the important thing is to be happy being gay, however one interprets it!
"The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. ... Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night devoid of stars." Martin Luther King
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13800
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I think our different reactions go a long way to saying that the alleged "gay Community" is an artificial construct that exists nowhere.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13800
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There is an obvious question here. It is to do with tenses. Yup, that old tense thing is back.
At what point did you say to yourself "I am gay" and then derive the contentment that you do from that knowledge?
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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I said "I am gay" to myself about six months before retiring, but after the decision to retire. The contentment grew gradually, but was noticeably there after I retired, that is at a point in my life when I was responsible solely to and for myself.
Hugs
N
I dream of boys with big bulges in their trousers,
Never of girls with big bulges in their blouses.
…and look forward to meeting you in Cóito.
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13800
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I know this may be an impossible question to answer, because I failed to acknowledge to myself that I was gay until I was 48, and I am not sure, quite, why that was. Even so, I'll ask. Do you have any idea why it took you so long to realise, or to say it? And, before that, since I doubt that your attractions changed, how did you perceive yourself?
I'll think about my own answers to that, too.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13800
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I know this sounds like a religious conversion, or the question one asks a person about their life "before you found god?" Well I never found god. But I did find out how to find myself. I know he's in there somewhere, and I'm getting closer to working him out.
There is a bit of background you might want to read as I answer the question: http://www.trent.karoo.net/is-homosexuality-important.html has a go at describing the importance in my life of homosexuality, but it doesn't answer the question.
I posed the question to Nigel and promised to try to answer it myself. And it's hard.
Before I was anything I was a boy. His name is Tim, his parents and wider family insist on calling him Timothy - he is not Timothy, nor has he ever been - and he goes, here at least, by the name timmy. I was a happy child because my childhood was the only childhood I had ever known, but it was not a good childhood.
Timothy was a good little boy who was, prior to puberty, expecting to be heterosexual. But he was not heterosexual before he was gay.
As puberty hit, Tim fell in love with another boy, a boy who, to Tim, was the most wonderful creature who ever lived. But Tim was not queer. Nor was Tim a paedophile - he as 13 himself after all - nor a boy lover - he was a boy himself after all - he was just a kid who discovered he was in love with another boy. And, according to the straw poll I'm carrying out, that's normal: http://vote.sparklit.com/poll.spark/1107722 tells us how normal.
Tim went through his teenage years in distress. It's fair to say that he was lonely in a crowd of friends, well, schoolfriends. He valued their friendship sufficiently to conceal his love for the boy, and to conceal his marked lust for a huge list of others. He refused to risk losing the approval of his friends by letting even a clue escape.
When Tim was 17, maybe 18, he was outed at school. That didn't make him gay, or queer, not in his head. That made him feel wronged. He was angry and frightened, but he was not gay.
During university Tim was heterosexual. Well, obviously he wasn't, but he tried very hard to be. Who can blame him? He was afraid of being queer, terribly afraid. That fear made him unattractive. He was easy enough on the eye, but no-one, boy or girl, seemed at all interested in him. He had sex a couple of times, found it not to be all it was cracked up to be, and reverted to relentless masturbation. He was damned well going to be heterosexual.
Apart, that is, from the panorama photograph of all the boys he'd ever lusted after that played in his head while he wanked. But he was not gay.
When he left university his source of attractive boys pretty much dried up, not that he'd even got close to any. Tim concentrated on getting a job, one where he found a boyish and petite girl quite interesting, but also found her to be unavailable. And, as time passed, he tried dating girls with no idea what to do, and no real success. Tim was still picturing boys in his head, but he was not gay.
He was lucky. He fell in love, quite by accident, with a gorgeous girl, and married her, and had a son. But Tim was not heterosexual either. All his sexual fantasies were about the boy, the boys, that he'd adored from afar and never got to do anything with, assuming anything had actually been available. Tim wasn't gay, but he was worried.
As he grew older the age difference between his body and his mind diverged perhaps by more than the actual age difference. In his head Tim remains 15, his body is no longer anywhere near that. And he recognised that being attracted to teens was pleasant in his head, and wholly intolerable both to society and to the teenagers themselves. Tim forced himself to start to grow up. But Tim was not gay.
He was, of course, but he refused to allow himself to think that way, and men, real men, were as unattractive to him as were girls and women.
By dint of a huge effort of will, and not a little Bel Ami porn and other free porn, Tim raised his sights and discovered that he could function in an erotic manner with a higher age group. He won't ever lose his attraction to teenagers, but he knows it can't be acted upon if he truly likes teenagers.
At that point Tim became a gay man, and softened his hard edges. timmy is still not easy to love with, but he's easier.
So, before I was gay, I was totally screwed up.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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It has been a bit of a trial, I suppose, being a gay man. But not much, really. I've just been extremely lucky.
Lucky in that I developed late and didn't realise what my sexuality was until I had left school.
Lucky in that I never got caught.
Lucky in that people at my university were tolerant and if they guessed or knew they never gave me any grief about it.
Lucky that nobody tried to persuade me to adopt any religion or to tell me that god was disgusted by what I had done.
Lucky to find someone I could marry who accepted me as I am, warts and all, and married me even though I told her about my gayness.
Lucky that I was able to keep my side of the marriage bargain; it means I'm a little bit bi!
Lucky that I found this group which has helped me to face and admit the things I've been ashamed of.
Lucky that I've never been attacked (not even with harsh words) as a result of being gay.
Lucky that everyone I know who knows about me seems to accept it/me with equanimity.
And I suppose what it *means* is that when I am tempted it is by other men, not by girls however pretty.
I wonder if I have answered the question.
Love,
Anthony
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Macky
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Really getting into it |
Location: USA
Registered: November 2008
Messages: 973
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Well Nigel,
I think you have done super with the cards you have been dealt. I love your posts here and am so happy to have had the opportunity to get to know you a little on this forum. You can pen a great story too.
Max
Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brothers to dwell together in unity!
Ps 133:1 NASB
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Macky
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Really getting into it |
Location: USA
Registered: November 2008
Messages: 973
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Thanks for the sincere and frank post Timmy. I don't know, I found it touching somehow. You know plowing through all the adversity has to have had some beneficial effect. Can you think of what you have that you owe to your tumultuous youth and the stony path to where you are now?
Max
Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brothers to dwell together in unity!
Ps 133:1 NASB
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13800
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A trite answer is that I am alive.
I think the real answer is that every hard knock created a little part of me. Every piece of adversity made me tougher. But it was the wrong type of toughness. I was brittle, harsh, hard edged, aggressive, and a lot more besides.
I am learning to be tough like tempered steel, not tough like cast iron. Cast iron breaks when hit hard. Tempered steel is substantially different, more versatile.
Like everyone here I am damaged goods. All of us created our own damage or allowed the damage to be done to us.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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It took me so long because I worked in an environment where being gay wasn't understood and if it got out in any way it would have been a lever to get me out of my job with bleak chances of getting another one in teaching.
Before that I perceived myself as someone with a secret I even had to keep from myself. If I didn't tell myself I was gay, I therefore wasn't gay.
This might sound difficult to believe. An Irishman would understand it. The Irish are the only people I have met who can hold two opposing views and see nothing wrong in that. I worked with one like that for several years.
Hugs
N
I dream of boys with big bulges in their trousers,
Never of girls with big bulges in their blouses.
…and look forward to meeting you in Cóito.
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Max, the stories are my way of dealing with my past, my safety valve.
Hugs
N
I dream of boys with big bulges in their trousers,
Never of girls with big bulges in their blouses.
…and look forward to meeting you in Cóito.
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There are interesting parallels in your account, Timmy, with my life. For instance, in my mind I am 14, I like(d) boys who are the opposite of me, sex with women has never done anything for me.
It is so much easier to be gay these day. Even the word 'gay' has helped. In those days we would have been queer, an ugly word. Throughout most of my life I fought being gay and looking back regret not giving in to it.
Hugs
N
I dream of boys with big bulges in their trousers,
Never of girls with big bulges in their blouses.
…and look forward to meeting you in Cóito.
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13800
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I understand that view perfectly. Denying that one is in denial is an excellent concept
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13800
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More parallels than you can imagine. I deeply wanted to be a R F Delderfield style 'to serve them all my days' schoolmaster, but I made it impossible for myself to do that. I would have been unable to resist temptation.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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