Getting Personal

I was born in Boston Massachusetts, United States, near the end of Truman's era by natural childbirth. My mother nursed me for a long time. This is probably not the origin of my oral fixation. When I informed my parents that I was gay, it was sort of an accident. I was living with a much shorter guy and my mother saw my shoes along with his in one bedroom and asked if this were my roommate's bedroom, with the queen size bed and gold brocade bedspread and curtains. Yes. And where did I sleep? In here, with my roommate.

It was the longest period my mother was ever quiet, simply saying we should not tell my father right now. After all, I was the first son. My parents had never kept secrets from one another, and this one was pulling them apart. After about six months, my mother informed my father that they would probably not be attending my wedding in the foreseeable future. At least not a conventional one.

So my parents learned I was gay and accepted it, then I told my sister at her third wedding when I brought my current lover as my guest and to help with preparations for the wedding. The third time was the charm for my sister, as this marriage has lasted. I, on the other hand, have gone through 8 lovers. I lost each of the first three to auto accidents caused by drunk drivers from three months to six months after I had met them. I became a supporter of MADD.

Two of my former lovers have died of AIDS, contracted after we had parted. One died of lung cancer, having ignored my warnings that he would if he did not stop smoking. Since he was the dominant one in our relationship, it was difficult to tell him what to do.

My ancestors herded reindeer in Lappland North of the Arctic Circle. My grandparents immigrated to the United States at the turn of the last century. They first mined coal in Wyoming, then moved back East to Massachusetts. The crazy Finns liked to fire up the sauna (rhymes with "cow", not "awe") in the winter then chop holes in the ice of the mill pond and jump in after the sauna. I�decided that I was not circumcized because I needed that skin to help keep things warm. That ice water is really cold.

My ancestors also came from England, and like Victorian families they had lots of offspring and scattered to all points of the British Empire. I have distant relatives in Wollongong Australia, Capetown, and Christchurch, as well as England. My English grandparents died relatively young, probably killed by their English diet. I remember my grandmother making us children pancakes soggy with bacon fat. Then there's Yorkshire pudding, and steak and kidney pie. I think I'm still trying to lose fat put on during childhood.

I'm one very furry bear, with nice long fine body hair all over. When I'm really tan, my body hair glows almost blond. My chest hair is the longest at about 4 to 5 inches. I have very short military crewcut brown hair, short mustache, warm inviting bedroom hazel eyes. I have a round face, slightly receding chin, natural overbite and near perfect teeth otherwise. I'm a regular rollerblader, and that keeps my nice round, prominent, sexy butt firm, muscular and enticing, at least to gay males. I was castrated a couple of years ago. I'm 5ft10 and flirting with 190 lbs. I used to be a strong swimmer during college, but now I float very well and swim slower. Want to see more?

Go to see the National Bear Classification System

My own (self analysis) bear classification is: B0 f++ w+ dc! g++ k++ s+ mehrpq

If you follow the eyes link above to my photo page, you can check me out for yourself.

I was an actor in high school summer stock plays, everything from Our Town to William Saroyan's Beautiful People where I had the lead, an old man, who had most of the play's dialog. Fortunately, I had a friend who was an untiring helper with with whom I memorized the dialog, a demanding female director who would drive us mercilessly, and my own budding exhibitionism. Even then, I was becoming a hairy daddy bear. I guess my tenor voice contributed to that impression. I was also in high school orchestra, playing in Fiorello!, flute and oboe. I was also a high school rocket society member. We almost shot down a Piper Cub that strayed into our restricted air space once Saturday morning when we shot off a 2 stage rocket.

I was a choir member in college, a tenor capable of handling Handel and Bach. The choir master threatened us with the "tenor tool" if we wouldn't reach for those high notes, inspiring us with recordings of counter tenors and tales of the great Farinelli, the last of the castrati. We did fine. Years later, I have a much better understanding of Farinelli's sacrifices for his art.

Former certified Red Cross Water Safety Instructor who taught 5 &�6 year old children how to swim during the summers between college semesters. Those were the most rewarding summers ever, as the children all did very well once the fearful parents left. Half the parents cried with joy to see their children swim two full lengths of the pool for graduation from swim class, and I cried right along with them. I was fortunate enough to find that some of the other lifeguards at the pool shared my orientation and liked to frolic after hours at the club. It made life nicer, since I was living those summers at home with the parents and had no chance of bringing home playmates. I was now quite comfortable with my being gay but I knew my parents would be shocked. Like all young men, I thought they'd disown me. After all, I was son #1.

Paper hanger, also during summer in college. I was earning tuition money. It was hard work, with my mother selling my services to friends, and they were all hard, especially with my mother coming to inspect the finished effort. "Paper hanging from Hell", but I usually got fed lunch during the jobs, and it did pay. One job, that of replacing ancient velvet fabric wall coverings in the house of two 70yo spinster sisters, was particularly difficult, but they fed me lots of homemade pastries and other food while chatting about their lives as teachers. I had trouble with the 40ft drop in the stairwell, being a sensible acrophobe.

Sailing instructor near Lake George New York, also during summer. I was a busy college student. Loved sailing, but the water was really cold. A dip in those waters and your basket would have cold shrinkage for sure. One of the straight married male counselors managed to detect that I would not reject a chance for him to take advantage of me, and I enjoyed his insertive attentions. I had a weakness for older men and enjoyed the sexual seduction they played to get into my butt.

Professional flutist, playing with nearby orchestras while in college, as well as playing with the college orchestra. I even cut a recording with the college choir playing my flute. I took quite a few music courses. It was a follow-on from my high school days when I explored the woodwinds, from bassoon to piccolo, stopping along the way to learn oboe. It takes strong lips to play the double reed instruments. Hmmm. Such talented lips. A fellow musician and I had a brief fling. He was a bassoonist who also had great lips. He also studied Greek

Photographer, published my photos in the college catalog, one of which graced its cover for three years in a row. Photography courses in college were fun and technically and artistically challenging. I never let on I had flunked basic Art course in high school. Basically, I can't draw. I can appreciate art, and I can create it in photography and in computer aided design, but drawing by hand escapes me.

I took these courses in my last year in school, when I had returned to finish my last year after an absence of five years in the military. I had not kept up my high entry marks and the faculty invited me to take a year off and get my shit together. It was an awkward interview with the Dean of Students. The Army sent me a draft notice, of course, and I enlisted in the Air Force that day. They gave me two tests. One was a language aptitude test, and the other was to see if I knew anything about data processing. I aced the latter and got near zero on the former. I knew where they were sending language experts. I was the oldest student on campus the year I returned to complete my degree. I also had a college FM radio station Friday night classical show as a radio announcer and host.

Some unperceptive but very enthusiastic girls from a sorority made a panty raid for charity and stopped by the radio station where they knew I was all alone on Friday night, stripped me of all my clothes while I kept to my post to avoid dead air, then told me to come and fetch them after my show was over. They had auctioned off the rights to dress me to girls to raise funds for a local children's group. They told me I'd be making a nice contribution to the charity. I spent another two hours naked in the radio station before the next announcer arrived to take his slot. He laughed so hard he hiccupped through his opening announcement. Of course, he wouldn't give me anything to wear at all.

After my show was over, my furtive run from the radio station in the old college theater building across the campus to the sorority house was exciting but cold. I enjoyed the fact that I had an excellent excuse for running naked across the college campus and across the road, in case one of the town's finest found me. Of course, the sorority girls had informed all the girls they could contact that I would be making my way to their house, and it was sort of general knowledge that these shenanigans were going on that night (for those who had time to read the student union bulletin boards) so there were spectators. They had a lot of good fun with the oldest student on campus all naked, hairy, and tattooed (arm eagle only at that time). I was really smug with the fact that I had fetched the highest price from a trio of girls who had pooled their (parents') funds to pay $2,000 for the privilege of putting on my clothes. This could have been because I became aroused looking at the other naked male students who were also unwitting supporters of the charity. They almost caught my ample parts in my pants zipper. The girls kept the Jockey briefs, as well as souvenir photos, one of which appeared in the school paper with strategically placed $ dollar signs. I had a broad smile. It was, after all, for charity.

My fraternity brothers managed to garner publicity for the house, and my naked photo (the original, without the $) was prominently hung in the foyer. This turned out to be a fortunate event, since I attracted the attention of three gay brothers. I kept each one's orientation from the others, as I was not in a sharing mood. At a more recent reunion, I informed them all, as we gathered in an intimate group for dinner. I think I may have created something, as two of them have become a couple.

An offshoot of this sorority escapade was an invitation to be a nude art model. I was older than all the other students and had much more body hair than any of the kids. This was a challenge to the art students, to depict body hair in drawings. The students wanted this challenge of drawing a more mature male figure. Fortunately, they kept the nude posing classrooms a little warmer and I never suffered from cold shrinkage. In fact, I had to review my math notes mentally to keep things in place. One of the cute male artists had my pulse up.

Bartender at gay bars as part of being a member of a gay bike club. The first club I joined, the Druids in DC, tended bar at Louis', now demolished, that was patronized by J. Edgar himself at lunch with long time companion. It was on 9th St NW at Pennsylvania Ave. We tended bar every Tuesday night, put on drag shows (I did a Dolly Parton using a 9inch Nerf ball cut in halves and a 44D bra with a 3ft long strandof pearls. The heels were difficult.) and had a short but riotous run of The Ritz, where I was an actor who played the gun toting husband, complete with knee length old style stockings with garters, boxer shorts and athletic undershirt. I was darkly handsome with slicked down hair. We had an SRO crowd for the 6 weekend performances of the run. It was a stretch playing a really butch part, but after all, I was an accomplished actor by then.

Motorcycle rider and member of gay bike clubs. I had a 750cc bike as my first and won two third place awards in bike riding skills my first time at a run. I now ride a Honda Gold Wing GL1500 6 cylinder touring bike. I love riding it down to Key West. I also ride it to work in the drier winter months.

I rode a new bike years ago to see my folks near Myrtle Beach and picked up a stocky young blond muscular Marine hitch hiker who had a back pack, hiking boots, no shirt and very short shorts, on the way North to Lejeune. We had a little S&M frolic in the back woods along the way to christen my new bike properly. �I tied his wrists to the engine guards and had his naked butt over the rear seat. He spurted on the license plate. He later took some R&R with me when he was on temporary duty (TAD) in the DC�area. He had stamina.

I wrote this particular event as a story in Drummer magazine. The illustration they printed was not a military man, but they had paid for the story.

Most military men find it hard to get any privacy at all, let alone gay sex. My private seat of the pants sex survey (aptly put, there) of military men showed me that maybe more Marines are gay than other services. They also seem to have more to prove about their masculinity, being gay Marines. All the gay Marines I've had the pleasure to meat have been masculine, competent, eager, somewhat inexperienced in sex but willing to explore. Maybe they joined the Marine Corps to prove to themselves they were "men" instead of fairies. Gay males, however, are good at camouflage, since they look just like other males. Of course, there are the obvious drag queens, but I was shocked to find out that some of those considered themselves straight. Indeed, more straight males do cross dressing than gay males.

Volunteer gay charity corporation corporate secretary, corporate treasurer, fund raiser, along with a lot of other dedicated leather bike club people, while in the DC area. We also sold home baked exquisite exotic cakes at Valentine's Day to support the orphans at St. Ann's Orphanage in DC. I also support Parents and Friend of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG). I'm pleased to say the charity is still functioning and now disburses over $100,000 a year in the DC�area, all funds raised from within the gay community.

College instructor at a DC�area community college. It was fun teaching assembler language programming to people at night. I got the most interesting mix of students. I couldn't take more than two semesters of that and was thankful I had a nice day job in the military teaching puppy dog cute young Marines how to program also.

Computer consultant for a large international corporation now. Former instructor in many programming languages while in military service. Taught young Marines. Kept my paws off them, however, as I respected the special teacher-student relationship. On the other hand, once they had graduated and became available, that was an entirely different matter. Opportunity knocked several times, and each time was a nice experience. These military men, however, tend to move on. My then lover brought a former student home with him one night and then left him with me when he discovered we knew each other, and went off to find other opportunities. I enjoyed playing the daddy to this cute young farmboy Marine. It was a nice evening, night, and morning. My other half presented us with eggs Benedict for two, breakfast in bed on the silver tea service, him dressed in his three piece suit ready for church at the high Episcopal church in Washington DC, Ascension and St. Agnes, where he was an alter boy. He kneeled a lot.

Writer: I write technical articles for popular computer industry publications now. Several years ago, I wrote gay leather stories for Drummer magazine and other pubs. I enjoy writing smut. It makes some of my friends happy and I have fun writing it. I write it, though, in a humorous vein. In recent years, I've published technical articles in several computer industry magazines as well as software for a number of platforms.

Carpenter fixing up old houses. I have lived in older houses all my adult life, it seems, and they all need some work. The Arlington manse was built around 1935 and I removed the old coal chute door and chute and bricked up the opening with glass brick, built all sorts of little things around that house. The nice gay couple who bought the house did a lot of renovations, more than just moving furniture around. The photos they sent show a nicely architected remodelling. One of the couple is the twin brother of an ex lover of mine. We kept it all in the family.

Here in Florida, they have mostly concrete. The builder who designed my present house in 1958 was obviously thinking "bomb shelter", since it has reinforced concrete foundation and slab, reinforced concrete block walls, and reinforced poured concrete roof. Yes, roof. It's a type of roof they no longer want to make, probably because it is durable and will put the roofers out of business.

Electrician fixing up the current old house. The previous owner was a klutz in terms of electrical work, and managed to cross connect two circuits in the kitchen ceiling fan box without killing himself. I almost did when I tried to find out what breaker shut off the kitchen island and thought I had found it. Much research later, I managed to find the offending connection, disconnect the error, and now everything is fine, except I still have about 15 outlets to change from 2 prong to modern grounded 3 prong and check all the ground connections. I installed infrared detector lights around the house so people coming up to the house cause the lights to light the area. I also installed electic and water to the two docks. Boats coming up the canal turn on the lights on that side of the house, which aids their navigation of the canal.

Gardener. In Florida, you are either a gardener or you hire one to chop down the spreading whatever. Here, you drop a stick on the ground and it grows roots and threatens to take over next week. I have 28 palm trees, most planted from neighbors' coconuts, and they are thriving on the nearby river water. Fortunately, my lawn is the kind that is used for gold course greens and does not require frequent mowing. I also have 4 grapefruit trees and 2 orange trees, plus 5 Florida Oak trees that drop tons of leaves each February, mostly on my car.

Wildlife game warden. Opposums, raccoons, occasional monkeys raiding mangos or oranges or bananas, ducks waddling about, some with ducklings that the occasional small alligator likes to trail after and snatch one by little one, mother never seeming to count them all contribute to the interesting wildlife. The visiting small fox that likes to knosh on small ducks that roost in my flowering ginger next to the river and leaves their heads to adorn the seawall helps to control the duck population. Then there are the swarms of thousands of now wild bright green parrots that flock about the neighborhood, waking us all up at the first hint of a ray of sunlight in the morning, usually set off by the paper boy hurling the paper onto my driveway with a loud thwack that is a nice counterpoint to his noisy car. Fortunately, his car's power steering has quieted down and no longer shrieks as he makes the turn through the cul-de-sac.

Crab trapper pulling crabs from the canal. I throw out a crab trap baited with chicken wings in the evening and in the morning I have a half dozen crabs to steam and clean. Friday night crabbing is most convenient. Picking the meat off the crabs is tedious and I have to control my appetite as the smell of crab permeates the kitchen.

Rollerblader skating around the neighborhood. The nice dead end streets in our neighborhood run from a main street to the river and stop, with canals along each street so all the houses have waterfront. Most have boats and sailboats at the docks. The streets are each a half mile long, so it's easy to tell how much I've skated.

Boater with a 20ft Bayliner outboard I run around the city in. I can go to lunch, dinner, or Sunday brunch with the guys by boat in good weather. Of course, we can also call the Water Taxi to come fetch us for a night at the Performing Arts Center. The Jungle Queen tour boat comes by my house for three trips a day. Christmas time, the boat is decked out in lights with Santa's sleigh and lighted reindeer on top of the double decker paddle wheel style boat. About 22:15, the boat comes down river after the dinner cruise, and they're all singing old time songs. Very festive. The newly scheduled Fort Lauderdale Gay Pride events in February will include a trip on the Jungle Queen for lunch. I'll have my Gay Pride flag flying on the river, next to the US�flag.

Notable males in my life include an enthusiastically sexy little 4ft10 Italian chef who became my lover for a couple of years in Alexandria VA after I tripped over him in the Washington DC�Eagle one night.

I had been following a cute blond hunk and failed to notice this lurking obstacle. Having fallen on him, I helped him up, and then he asked if I wanted to get on top of him again that night. He was a little chubby and had very hairy round little butt and legs like a Greek mythology Pan. We usually just flipped a coin to choose who would be on top first. He got me into 3 and more-ways with casual pickups. When he worked as a restaurant waiter, he once invited home the crew of a foreign airlines plane and invited them to wake me up and have their way. It took a few minutes to find out what language they would like to speak other than sexual Braille. It was a night to remember. They were French but spoke passable English as do all aircrews. I liked their Greek especially.

He took me to Atlantic City before the casinos came to commercialize it, and we stayed at a gay hotel that was wall to wall males. I had a couple of drinks too many and ended up the object of a gang-bang on the 6th floor in a darkened hallway. In the middle of this, he came looking for me and scattered the group of naked and aroused males.

After the Short One and I parted company when I discovered his liking for drugs, I met a nice blond librarian. Again, I was in the DC�Eagle, this time in a new and odorous leather jacket. A friend standing next to me told me not to move quickly as I had acquired an admirer. I�looked down and found this short guy licking my military issue combat boots. He was prone on the floor, dressed in leather jacket, pants and boots, holding a cigar in one hand and a cognac in a brandy snifter in the other. He had a motorcycle cap hiding his head. Occasionally, he would partake of the cigar and then the brandy. He had been overcome by the smell of my jacket and the lure of my combat boots and was easy prey to bag and to take home.

The librarian and I parted company after five years, after he had been unemployed for 6 months and would not let me support him any longer. He moved away to an Army base as a civilian librarian.

I took up with a dark haired frotteur. This darkly handsome guy loved to excite himself by rubbing his body and body parts against my furry bod. This was sometimes foreplay leading to other forms of expression. I have very fond memories of spending a warm Thanksgiving week in Provincetown MA with him, all alone in the Provincetown Inn at the end of the Cape. The huge window of our room looked out on the bay lighted by the full moon. We took advantage of the wonderfully romantic setting, and we lost control after losing count. After a year of on and off romance, I found an interest in a Philadelphia daddy who found me a challenge.

My daddy liked to make leather things for me, strap me in his barber chair and give me a very close crewcut, and also strap me to his massage table and shave me all over. My leather outfits felt dramatically different with no body hair. Body shaving is the among the kinkiest things to do to teddy bears. This was years before the acceptance of "bears" as attractive male types and the advent of popular gay bear magazines. I was also young enough then to be considered a "boy". He enjoyed displaying me in the gay bars in Philly, my naked butt hanging out of the leather chaps.

What I like? I include rather than exclude. I like rather than dislike. I don't have one preferred male type. I find short males as attractive as tall ones, thin as well as nicely padded large daddy bears, young and eager "boys" (adults only) to older daddies, all attractive with their own personal merits. I've had the great good fortune to have a much bigger male muscle builder be Top, as well as have a small boy toy type be bottom, both of which were incredibly hot sexual encounters. I�like everything from gentle warm cuddling to hot and bed-shaking coupling. The night the muscle builder was on top and we broke the brass bed was very moving. The fact that the muscle builder did not break stride was awe-inspiring as well as deeply fulfilling.

I've had nice times with males of many types. I've learned to be bold enough to make the first moves, since most gay males are reticent about being open with others, even other gays. I've made the fortunate discovery that muscle builders like to be admired for their mental abilities and personality in addition to their bodies. A gym rat who repels my initial sexual invitations may respond favorably after I've turned the interest to his life in general and what he likes. Body builders often have intelligence.

In leather bars, I can get into the roles being played by the patrons if I find one interesting enough to merit further exploration and try for an invitation home, if that's my objective for the night. I like to make first contact by making small talk and finding out what the guy does for a living and what social things he likes before setting up the mood for a sexual opening. If I'm chatting with a Top and things turn to sex, I adopt the bottom role and reply respectfully to his questions, saying "sir" as well, playing to his chosen role.

Rule one: get interested in the other guy. You don't want to have sex with an uninterested partner. I find I'm turned on more when I disregard my own needs and concentrate on giving my partner pleasure. My needs will be satisfied by making him happy. I'm usually right.

As far as sexual practices, I've gradually expanded my likes quite a bit since my brother-in-law "took my cherry" when I was 16. I got into the gay leather scene in DC in bike clubs, taking an active part in social and community affairs. A little S&M here, preferably with bondage, a little modern technology with electrical stimulation devices there, and I'm quite happy.

I've done English (whipping), French (oral), Greek (anal), and a lot of other things that don't have a particular nationality associated with them. Things that lack nice national labels include: frottage (rubbing together), phone sex (masturbating while talking to someone on the phone), and chat sex (masturbating while in an interactive chat - yes, I've done that, and it was fun though a little challenging, since I had to educate my OS/2 Warp V4.0 voice recognition to the words unique to sexual chat). I've also joined my ex Marine gay cousin and his studly muscular short exNavy SEAL boyfriend in riding naked across South Florida on I-75 between Fort Lauderdale and Naples. We did ride an hour while totally nude on our three motorocycles. I even stopped for a young male hitchhiker on the way. He decided not to disrobe, however. I often wonder what we would have done if a trooper had come upon us.

Speaking of nudism, check out my favorite nude beach.

With my older "barber" daddy in Philadelphia, after he had done the regular shaving, we would either go out to the gay bars, where he could show off his latest "boy toy" with a nice smooth shave, dressing me in leather he had made for me, leaving my butt bare for the pleasure of the bar patrons to feel, or we would sit in his parlor and just talk. He got his pleasure from putting me through my paces, getting me to do what he wanted. I got my pleasure from his. The exquisitely slow and sensual masturbation helped.

Am I careful? Yes. Safe and sane sex is something I practice and support. I'm an educator and believe strongly that informing everyone of safe sex practices is the most effective way to limit spread of disease. Keeping knowledge from people, including high school students, will only lead to tragedy.

Tell me your thoughts.