Never in my 24 years of being lonely and horny have I been as lonely and horny as I have been in these past few months. My body is entirely parched and for some reason my place of choice to quench the desert that is my thighs, my neck, my heart; is the secluded section of a nude beach near the Golden Gate Bridge, of which is littered with homosexual men when the tides are low. There is something slightly more romantic about having sex with a complete stranger on a beautiful beach, opposed to the bathroom of a bar or the unfamiliar sheets of unfamiliar men in the darkness of intoxication. There is something less guilty in the parting of ways, when I put my pants on and walk away, satisfied, on sand; rather than slipping my legs through the holes in my pants and slowly creeping out of someones apartment door in the middle of the night. Perhaps there is even some relief in relieving myself with individuals who do not ask my name but instead ask, "are you clean?" or "how do you like it?"
I suppose I am now tailoring, what most unadventurous married people have always described as the sewing of one's oats. But I wonder if those oats are sewn for different reasons for different people. Is the wild college girl that fucks half the frat house any different from me placing my lips upon half of the men who call upon them? Is the root of the urge to sew those oats born from our humanistic nature to breed or is it born from a place of loneliness and need for affection? Is loneliness the bottom totem of human condition? Or am I alone in it? Maybe in our culture we have just learned to not love, but to secretly hope for it every time we undress. I suspect that is just what I have learned.
The weather yesterday was enticing, an optimistic turn, so I ventured to the beach in search of some fun and to possibly find a rock to read against while the ocean spits it's vastness in my direction. The beach was a war zone of sun bathing men and I could not have been more aroused. Thinking about it now I probably look like a kid picking out puppies, just happy to be able to pet so many. The sexual liberation I have experienced in the past year of group sex and tender and furious sex of power and weakness, has allowed me to take charge of and own my sexual energy and to confidently wear it's scent on my neck. My parents disapprove of my sexual conquests. I know this because just last week my father called me a whore and it has not been forgotten of the time my mother told me I had no self respect and that I was a slut. It's weird though that they can say these things to me and I know they come from a place of love; that said I think my parents have both needed to get horse fucked for years and have never truly owned their sexuality. I was taught from a very young age that sex is a beautiful meaningful thing and people who have it with people whom they do not love have low self esteem and are generally pathetic or sad.
I don't feel sad though, when I sink my teeth into the ass cheeks of a beautiful man I do not know, nor do I experience low self esteem when men worship the parts of my body most of the men I have loved never could. A part of me feels a tremendous amount of shame for putting my toes in the gooey waters of sexual freedom, but the other part of me, the bigger part; feels empowered. I am however, scared of the origins of that empowerment and of my oats. One of the things that makes me laugh every time my mother says it, is her Quaker Oats punch line, and in relation to this subject matter I could use it to say, "I've had more dicks in my mouth than Quaker has oats," and it would be true. I've also loved more times than Quaker has oats and been heart broken more times than Quaker has oats. But it's not an oat contest, and I'm not sure who would win anyway.
Yesterday was a good day at the beach as there were more naked men than, dare I say it, Quaker has oats. I was sitting in a wide crevasse between boulders watching a man please himself while watching me watch him, he must have been the demented type that gets off on abuse and looks of disgust, because I could not have looked more like I smelled dog shit. He was gross and sad but I ignored him and eventually he walked back to the beach tugging his cock while he walked. It's always a funny thing to witness, a man walking naked tugging at an erection. The walk itself resembles the way a kitten might walk if it stepped on a piece of tape that clung to it's paw.
Not long after he left, a tall, thin, well endowed young man approached my personal space. When he saw me he apologetically excused himself. His full beard and hairy body tickled my fancy so I called to him, "Do you wanna share this space with me?" I offered him my discarded shirt to sit his ocean soaked ass on and he was quick to accept the invitation. It's times like these that I am reminded of how assertive I am when I'm on the prowl. I mean business, I know what I want and I know who I want it from and I'm not beating around any bush's; if I want you to sit, you better fucking sit. And he did.
Turns out this guys name is Drew, he's 26. An hour an a half and 4 cigarettes later it was revealed to me that he was starting a leather accessory business of which he designs for, he likes sunglasses shoes and bags, he doesn't like his step brother because he outed him when he was 14, the same age he "discovered the taint," he lives in Austin Texas and was visiting for a wedding in Napa, he doesn't think the marriage will last but he loved the reception etc... I learned a lot about him and he learned a lot about me; I also quickly learned what his beard felt like between my thighs. I've never liked beards, I've never understood why someone would. They hide the jaw line and there is nothing more sexy to me than watching the jaw of a man slide while he chews. However, after getting my taint devoured by an experienced beard I can pretty confidently say that not only will I strictly date men with facial hair from now on, but that they should also have an insatiable appetite for taint.
After we finished we hiked the mountain to the Golden Gate Shuttle where we parted ways with a hug. As I walked away he yelled, "don't forget about the taint," and I shouted back, "I taint never going to forget that!" As I rode my bike down the mountains I thought about how good it I felt and forgot the shame. I have spent a baffling amount of my life feeling ashamed of my existance and I'm proud to say I've reached a point of piece with myself. I am a man of humility, empathy, sex and love; not shame. When I first began exploring social sex, not that long ago, I wrote in my journal about how I couldn't write, instead I wrote about things I could write about and shame was one of those things:
"...I could write about the nude beach I visited just two days ago, about how I indulged in the delicacy of flesh for several hours with several beautifully sculpted men. I could write about the shame I fight off when I lay my head down at night for enjoying the type of sex that I do. For exploring the cold wet floors of orgies or the degrading warm sand of a nude beach. I could write about these things, but how do I even begin to explain how I have devalued sex, something I used to hold sacred, and how I cannot handle real intimacy without trembling. Finding the words to express the roots and fallacies that burn within me feels like I have been told that somewhere in the ocean is a grain of salt, and that I must find it before it deludes. Sometimes I see the grain of salt in the ocean of my heart that possesses the words but before I can pick it up and dry it off, it deludes into the canyons of my wet finger tips and it is gone..."
I wish I could go back in time as myself and touch my face, look into my own eyes and tell myself that I am not sick. I am not disgusting. I am young and have tasted the forbidden fruit of freedom and the reason I feel shame is not because I devalued sex but because most people are not free. Most people make free people feel ashamed for finding an elevated sense of existence that sometimes appears to be low. Self indulgence is not low, it is dangerous but never low. I wish I could tell myself those things almost as much as I wish I could tell the 14 year old me to cry more. Almost as much as I wish I could tell the 18 year old me to run further, or the 22 year old me to love a little less; but all I have is the me I'm stuck with now and the me that is now is a me that whispers to the past much to often.
A little over a year ago, before I moved to Chicago and then to California, I was invited by a handsome middle aged gentleman whom I knew through work, to a sex party in Kansas City. For months he would invite me in our passing conversation and I would decline, but when my curiosity cracked, I asked him for directions to the next party. I had always wandered what it might feel like to have half a dozen sets of hands placed upon me, and I decided I would find out. I was in the midst of letting Justin go and was under the notion that letting him go would be easier if I fell in love with someone else; but love is in short supply for gay men in Kansas City and the closest thing I could think of to replace the intimacy of love was in the touch of anybody.
I remember the night of the sex party well. I stood in my living room pacing on the uneven planks of wood that made my floor. "Am I really going to go to this thing?" I repeated to myself over and over and over again while trying to keep the piece of paper with directions on it, from shaking out of my finger tips. I called Jen for some advice and she had this to say, "Ryan, you've been wanting to do this for I don't know how many years, just go!" and with that, I was in my car on my way to the sex party. I considered getting black out drunk to help ease myself into the idea of what I was on my way to do but decided it would be best if I kept my wits about me. I was quick however, to find myself wanting a drink when I parked my car in a dark alley way in the arts district of Kansas City. The directions to the party lead me behind an old bank, to an unmarked rusted steel door, and I sat smoking cigarettes for half an hour debating approaching the back entrance of the bank. There was no signs of life.
It was the 4th of July and I listened to the fireworks bang in the distance from Lincoln Memorial, occasionally the garbage cans would illuminate purple with a particularly large explosion. I was about to turn my key and leave, seeing no signs of a gay sex party when from within the alley came an explosion that shook my car and rang my ears. Someone had just lit an M-80, which is a quarter stick of dynamite. I don't know if it's a Midwestern thing or not, but most my memories of 4th of July involve more dynamite than sparklers or smoke bombs. I once blew up a horse watering hole on my uncle's farm with an M-80, and he drug me through mud and rocks as my punishment.
Even with all of my run in's with dynamite on the 4th of July, I never fail to be horrified by the sound, and after the explosion in the alley I got out of my car to catch my panicked breath and suddenly the lifeless alley was alive with car alarms and shouting. I stood now, in that alley smoking a cigarette when over the car alarms I heard the rusty steel door creak open and watched crawl out of it 3 burly men wearing nothing but leather jock straps and chains. One of the men saw me and asked, "What the hell was that?"
"I don't know," I lied. There was silence and they turned to go back inside.
"Wait!" I yelled. "Is this?" I asked pointing to the door. The largest of the men walked towards me with his arm extended and said, "Yes it is." He winked at me and I followed him inside. It's funny now that I think about it, that the M-80 went off when it did and if it hadn't, I would not have this story to tell.
Once we got inside I found myself in a small room leading to a basement, or as they called it, "The Dungeon." There was a small podium before the basement with stipulations typed on paper that I needed to sign before entering The Dungeon, among them were these: "I will not write about my experience here" and "I am responsible for my own level of safety..." After I signed the papers and handed them to a hairy middle aged naked man wearing nothing but tall leather boots I asked for my friend, the one who invited me, and the naked man fetched him for me. I suppose for the sake of this story I should give him a name, as I'm sure he would not appreciate me exposing his identity in such a way; I'll call him Danny. As I waited for Danny to climb the stairs from The Dungeon I watched a well toned hunk grab a beer from a refrigerator at the top of the staircase. He was wrapped in leather and let his gigantic throbbing cock swing about as he bobbled back down the stairs.
"Oh My God Danny!" I shouted when I saw him reach me, I was happy to see him if for no other reason than the fact that I was in unfamiliar territory and his face was not. "Well what do you think?" he asked me. "I don't know yet, I think I'm just going to check it out and leave, I'm just curious to see what it's all about." I said laxly. "Well then lets go," he said while ushering me to the stairs. Standing at the top of the stairs I couldn't see much, it was so dark down there and it smelled like men. With each step I took down that stair way I smelled more men, heard moans of pleasure and of pain. With each step I became more excited.
When we reached the bottom I was handed a plastic bag by the door man who yielded a sharpie and nothing else. "Put your clothes in here and pick a number" he said. I looked at Danny and asked him if I could leave my underwear on. "Sure but then your going to have to carry it with you." I chose to leave them on anyway because I wasn't sure if I would be taking them off at all and I also chose the number 29. The naked man with the sharpie wrote the number 29 in large characters on my left bicep and then wrote the number again on the white trash bag containing my clothes. As I reached to take my shoes off Danny stopped me and said, "leave those on, you don't want to slip."
My bag of clothes were thrown into a mountain of about 60 other bags and Danny began the tour of The Dungeon. "This is our porn room" he said while using his elegant hands to Vanna White the entrance. I stepped inside and there was a projector flinging raunchy porn onto the wall and about twenty lawn chairs spread out for viewers. Only half of the chairs were occupied by men furiously pleasing themselves and each other. It was around this time that I began to wonder what the fuck I was doing in the basement of a bank nearly naked, getting a tour of a gay sex Dungeon in Kansas City, but the tour was not even close to being over and I had a lot more to see.
Next, Danny walked me to the "social room" taking much delight in my looks of horror and intrigue. Upon walking into the social room I first noticed a muscular tattooed man lounging in an antique shoe shinning throne getting a blow job from a skinny young twink, it was at the sight of this that blood began to leave my brain and fill my lower half. There were twenty or so men lying on couches fucking, or standing next to someone feeling around to create a spark. "Over here we have our spanking station, the paddles hanging on that hook over there if you wanna try it out," said Danny. I imagined what the sting of that paddle might have felt like on my thighs or face or back. Danny motioned for me to keep moving while he showed me more, but my eyes stayed on that spanking station until my body found itself in a third room.
In the third room, there were three sex swings hanging from the cob webbed rafters above, one of which was occupied by a young college student I recognized from behind the cash register at my favorite jewelry store in Westport. He was getting jack hammered by a line of men waiting their turn. It was in this room that I looked up at the faces of the men around me. Some were young, attractive specimens and others were undesirable even to a mirror but it is strange how similar people look when they are naked. The expression on their faces were that of dogs at an animal shelter, their eyes widened and their noses inhaled at the sight of a meal, of which was soon to be slipped under their cage in a dirty chipped bowl. I imagine I might have looked the same.
Danny introduced me to a body builder who's name I did not catch, but who had the nicest chest I've ever seen, upon which was a tribal tattoo. I hate tribal tattoos but I am a sucker for a nice chest and it was not long before I grabbed him by the cock, using it as a leash to guide him back to the social room where we retired to an old couch. It was the type of old couch you might see in a psychiatrists office, with no back or arm rests. I lay on top of him while he explored my body, my hands touching his face gently as I kissed him, and he devoured me. He stopped me soon into this and said, "Stop kissing me like that, it makes me feel like we're on a date." It was then that I realized something very important about myself, and that is this: I don't know how to kiss a man without passion and I'm not sure I ever want to learn.
But I stopped kissing him, and he flipped me over and began pleasing me while a group of young men and old men crowded around us. We were now the show, and I loved every second of it. I sent out invitations to my mouth quickly, and rejected those who did not ask. Among the rejected was Danny, and a man who tasted like garbage. Somewhere between putting my clothes in a trash bag and the man with the garbage cock, I had become intoxicated in a way that drugs or alcohol could never alter me and my judgement was gone. The room began to spin, I was in extacy but could still hear the voice of me screaming from a million light years away in the galaxy of my mind, "stop Ryan, stop!" Louder than the voice of me was the screams of climax from around me, from the sex swing room, from the spanking station, from the porn room. Louder than me was my climax, the few seconds of which was an out of body experience; it was when the voice of me was discarded completely and I as I knew me was pushed out of my physical self so that my body could feel what it needed to feel. This, was the first time my body won. This is why I love group sex: because my body always wins.
I spent many years fighting with my body. Not able to get erections around gorgeous men with flawless bodies because my mind would win. My mind wanted to be loved unconditionally, to be stimulated by conversation, to be appreciated and it always had a way of shutting my body down when it knew the stranger inside of me did not know what love was. My mind had control over my sexuality, and I could not preform unless I was in love, fulfilling both physical and emotional needs. I could not have one without the other and it was in the sexual liberation of group sex that I learned how to separate the two. I learned to quiet my mind enough to just let my body do what it does and to focus not on the need to be loved but the need to feel physical sensation. I have learned that I am an extremely sexual person and in order to be happy in a relationship and out of one, I have to let go of the shame so many of us have been taught to feel for being sexual.
That said, to this day, I still get twinges of shame that come and go as quick and with as much power as a lightning bolt, of the night I spent playing the part of a rag doll in the basement of a bank in Kansas City. I remember after I climaxed, I sat up and took a whore bath with hand sanitizer, which was available on a table in gallon sized jugs. The room slowed and I looked around me for the first time since entering The Dungeon, not with lust but with an indescribable horror. I ran to the pile of trash bags and began to dig through them for the one that had my number on it. Number 29. The naked door man found it before I could and I put my clothes on, my toes getting caught on every fold of my jeans. I said goodbye to Danny and bolted out of The Dungeon and into my car, where over the coarse of four cigarettes I decided what events of the evening I would forever omit from friends and from myself.
Those lightning bolts of shame I sometimes get, are those omissions.
And I have omitted more truths from my life than Quaker has oats.
