Southern Exposure
I found myself in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, going to school, again, or rather, still. Couldn't figure out what I was cut out to do, so just decided to keep studying until some revelation happened.
My sex life continued to be really dull. I ran across a sexy book or two in the local book store and in the stacks at the university library, and treated myself to a marathon masturbation session every once in a while, but that was about it. I dated some of the local southern belles, but that was less than wonderful too. One girl, Amy, was an expert french kisser, and I liked that, but I couldn't get too excited about any other aspects of our physical relationship. She moaned and groaned very convincingly, and wrote passionate love letters when she transferred to a school in Missouri, but I eventually broke it off.
There was no homosex at all during this time, but there could have been. I became friendly with another graduate student, Ken, who could have been had, if I had wanted that. Ken told of many straight affairs in the past and claimed to be fucking a local girl at the time. But he did have a suspiciously abundant amount of knowledge about things homosexual. He told me about a friend of his from undergraduate school who used to go with older men for money. At first I didn't fully comprehend what Ken was talking about, and when I did, I was a little shocked. I was, of course, aware that things like that occurred, but it was surprising to me that my friend knew a homosexual prostitute personally, and that the hustler could be a southern student from a small religious college in Texas. Ken also educated me about S&M activities, of which I was almost completely ignorant. One day in passing a magazine stand, Ken pointed out a magazine with a
picture of a threatening looking woman who was scantily dressed in leather, and in the corner of the magazine cover was a small imprint that said "SM". Ken explained the significance of the imprint, and said that there were several such publications for sale.
I was very restrained around Ken, never or rarely bringing up sex as a topic of discussion, and Ken became very curious about my feelings, orientation and experience. He decided to find out by getting me drunk. So one lazy weekend afternoon, we were in Ken's apartment, when Ken took out a cocktail shaker and mixed up a batch of martinis, announcing that we should celebrate the end of final exams. I was not a martini drinker, but went along with the celebratory mood that Ken was in, and accepted a drink. Ken drank his quickly, coaxed me into doing the same, and then tried to push a second and then a third drink on me. I refused, and began to get suspicious. Was Ken trying to seduce me? Maybe, or maybe he just was curious about me and thought he'd loosen up my tongue with some booze. Ken asked me if I was a virgin; I hotly denied it, and desperately tried to change the conversation. Ken would have none of it, and joined me on the bed where
I was stretched out. His talk became raunchier and raunchier, bragging of his many conquests with girls. Ken then claimed to be uncomfortable in his slacks, and decided to change into jeans. He watched my face as he stripped off his pants and paraded around the room in his jockeys as he "searched" for his jeans. There was no overt homosexual advance, but the electricity in the room was palpable, and there was an undeniable tension and smell of sex in the air. Nothing came of all this, since I fled soon after my second drink, but years later I wondered how far things might have gone had I shown a bit more interest in Ken's advances.
It was from Ken that I first heard the term "gay" used in its homosexual meaning. At the launderette one afternoon, Ken asked me if I knew what "gay" meant. I thought the question odd since everyone knew it meant happy. Ken explained that it was sometimes used as a code word for homosexuals to identify themselves to each other; they referred to their homosexuality as "being gay." This was 1959. I was doubtful about Ken's information. Sometimes Ken made things up or said stuff to shock or appear in the know about odd things like black magic or voodoo. He had something that he claimed to be a shrunken head hanging from the closet door in his bedroom, about which he told quite fantastic stories, that varied slightly with each retelling. But about the word "gay" Ken was sure on the money. Within a few years the term entered mainstream American conversation, and eventually even the most staid media used it. Now how did this supposedly
straight boy from a little panhandle town in Texas know about all this stuff, while me, raised not far from big, bad, cosmopolitan New York City, remained so ignorant about such things for so long?
Ken followed up with the question: "Do you know what a faggot is?" It was a trick question. Ken and I had been taking a psychological testing course together during the past term, and one of the vocabulary words to define on a widely used intelligence test was the word "faggot" which refers to a small hard piece of kindling wood used to make a fire. The question succeeded in flustering me, as I turned red and stammered out the kindling wood reply. Ken laughed.
Oh, yes, there was something definitely funny about Ken. My father picked up on it, when he met Ken during a visit to Louisiana.
"Do you think that boy is a good friend to have, son?", he asked. I don't think I like him."
I couldn't get my father to specify what it was he didn't like about Ken, but I defiantly defended my friend, and even drove back to New York in Ken's car, refusing my father's offer to join him and my mom in their car.
"Nah, Ken is going to be working in New York for the summer. He needs help with directions on the drive up. I told him I'd go with him."
My father was frosty for a few weeks after I returned home, and only began to defrost when I resumed seeing some old girl friends again.