My name is Philip Mark Hunt, born 10^th August 1955 at Bushey, Hertfordshire, England, and fourth son to Geoffrey James Jupe and Dorothy Mavis Hunt of, at the time, Harrow Weald, Middlesex, England.  I have definitely known that I am gay since my early teenage years but possibly displayed certain tendencies in that direction as early as age nine.  I have rarely revealed the fact of being gay to people truly close to me but was reasonably well out to work colleagues and people of acquaintance during the 1970's and early 1980's, during my time of adult residence in the U.K.; I did not reveal myself to my family or church though and since residing in Australia (June 1985) have, again, not been out until recently, the change being triggered by my expression of love to a fellow 21 year old student, who did not requite my love and in fact, slightly to my surprise, told me he is straight and threatened physical violence if I tried to take it any further.  In the late 1990's I did come out to my two older teenage nephews, both after they were over 18, but it went no further than that.  Even though the young student said NO I decided around that time that I could no longer live two lives and I had to be truly honest to both the world and myself.  During the months of July and August 2002 I formally told both my surviving brothers and my late brother Stephen's widow, Joan; I have been greatly relieved and surprised by how supportive all my relatives have been.  I still believe that it could have killed my late mother, who I was very close to, if I had told her, and I don't think my father would have been able to cope at all either.  The last step in my coming out was to announce it to my small group at the church I was attending, this was a very difficult  step and also precipitated my changing congregation as, though many of the individuals were quite supportive, the corporate policies and affiliations of that congregation are not compatible with my being openly gay. My first really 'out' activity was participation in the Perth Pride Parade 2002 where I played the character Noah in the InterVarsity Queer Collective float which was a spoof on the Noah's Ark story.

It is difficult to say where my gay feelings come from and honestly I believe it is, to an extent, genetic but I am conscious of never having really been comfortable around females of my own age and all attempts to chat up girls, of which there have only been very few incidents anyway, have ended in abject failure.  Some of the deepening of these feelings may be a psycho-sexual response to my experiences during my attendance at an all boy's school, Ravensbourne School for Boys, Bromley, Kent, England, where I was bullied to the verge of suicide.

I am attracted to younger gay guys between the age of 18 and 35 and have now found happiness with a permanent companion.

I have recently been reflecting on the young men that I have been really strongly attracted to over the years including the two most recent, during 2002, and I have found that they all look extremely similar.

In total there have been only six young men that I could say I was truly head over heels in love with, in the 35 years or so since puberty. Every single one of these boys fitted, at the time I met or saw them, a general description of having short black hair with dark eyes, a fairly round face, of average height, smooth-skinned and slim of build, while not being skinny, for their age.  One of those six has now finally moved in with me and is my non-sexual companion; after all sex isn't everything, and I am just so ecstatically happy that my best mate loves me and is living with me.

Philip Mark Hunt

Medina, WA

July 2007