Submitted by PJ (not verified) on June 1, 2009 - 19:39.
This idea speaks to me a lot.
It actually took someone else to point the fact out to me; even though I'm very capable of truly casual sex, I prefer sex with lovers or friends. I am fundamentally a very emotional being, and being able to set free various emotions is a necessary component for making love to me. Sharing the physical experience is really only enjoyable when I'm naked with someone whom I'm capable of forming an emotional bond with. Especially if I'm going to bottom.
Although I'm perfectly capable of whipping out my dick and using any dude to get it off, i realized that wasn't doing anything other than getting it off. and i also realized that usually i kept my eyes closed and imagined being somewhere completely different in order to finish it.
I was a teenager when AIDS hit the world - I came out watching many of my daddies, older brothers, and even brothers my own age die slow, painful and ugly deaths. I came out afraid of my brothers' bodies. I came out fearing the terrible consequences of trusting the wrong man, in either a drunken moment or a lovestruck one. I've listened to lots of stories from my daddies and older brothers since I was a boy; of their world without fear. Most of them did just talk about fucking and fucking and fucking. But the ones who were inspirational to me, they talked of lovers, brothers, boyfriends. I saw a gleam in their eyes in the moments before tears would follow. They spoke to me of family in a sense that I had never imagined, not from experience with my own biological one at least.
What does this all mean to me today, 20 years later? Well, for one, it means I just lost my first little brother to AIDS last month. That one kind of kicked me really damn hard. The other thing it means is that I have an interesting love life. I settled down with the most wonderful man I've ever known nearly a decade ago. He's my husband, and I am bound to him for life. I also have a couple of lovers that I share a deep bond with. My husband has known almost all my lovers (we moved, I developed a different set of friends and lovers a couple years ago). They know my bond with him - and that it is not lacking in some department, I'm not cheating on him or looking for a replacement, or anything like that. Some of them are just close friends. A few I honestly love deeply. My husband is aware of that as well. It's not always easy for him to deal with, I'm not pretending like it is. He grew up hoping for the "perfect" nuclear family of one plus one. Let's just say that it's not the only preconception that either one of us has had to bend a bit. love is worth it...
But, this small collection of current and former lovers and my husband are my family. Unfortunately it took me almost losing my life to cancer over a decade ago to realize this. They are the men who took care of me. They are the men who helped me rebuild my life. They fed me, they sheltered me, they held me, they slept with me when I was afraid to be alone, and they made love to me when I was in need of tenderness. They are the men who helped me grow from a scared, lost, angry boy into a good, well rounded, successful man. They have done as much, no more, for me and my dreams, than my biological family has, ever. (Not to say that my bios didn't do their part to raise me and educate me, they certainly did that. They simply never encouraged me to be anything that I wanted... including not straight!)
What I wish that I could give to others from my life is just a little sense of this in the everyday. I honestly beleive that if we as gay and bi men treated each other more like lovers instead of fucks, even our one night stands, we'd automatically start to rebuild the sense of community we once had. Sex is really intimate, it's about time we admit that. Especially as the naturally sexual beings we are. We've been dying as a community for two decades now, slowly from sadness and exhaustion. Yes, we have built thriving businesses, parades, and even a little political clout. But we don't have a community anymore. I miss what I witnessed of that. I miss what my brothers testified to me. I know they idealized the past in many ways, I'm not naive. But I think that If we cared about each other more in bed, we'd start to care more about each other on the street. Then the more we'd care about ourselves, in turn. If we care about our own well being and our lovers' well being, then we'll naturally stop the disease ravaging our community. We'd know our HIV status without guessing or lying, and we'd take better care of those we choose to be with.
make love, don't fuck. but how to we spread the idea?
This idea speaks to me a
This idea speaks to me a lot.
It actually took someone else to point the fact out to me; even though I'm very capable of truly casual sex, I prefer sex with lovers or friends. I am fundamentally a very emotional being, and being able to set free various emotions is a necessary component for making love to me. Sharing the physical experience is really only enjoyable when I'm naked with someone whom I'm capable of forming an emotional bond with. Especially if I'm going to bottom.
Although I'm perfectly capable of whipping out my dick and using any dude to get it off, i realized that wasn't doing anything other than getting it off. and i also realized that usually i kept my eyes closed and imagined being somewhere completely different in order to finish it.
I was a teenager when AIDS hit the world - I came out watching many of my daddies, older brothers, and even brothers my own age die slow, painful and ugly deaths. I came out afraid of my brothers' bodies. I came out fearing the terrible consequences of trusting the wrong man, in either a drunken moment or a lovestruck one. I've listened to lots of stories from my daddies and older brothers since I was a boy; of their world without fear. Most of them did just talk about fucking and fucking and fucking. But the ones who were inspirational to me, they talked of lovers, brothers, boyfriends. I saw a gleam in their eyes in the moments before tears would follow. They spoke to me of family in a sense that I had never imagined, not from experience with my own biological one at least.
What does this all mean to me today, 20 years later? Well, for one, it means I just lost my first little brother to AIDS last month. That one kind of kicked me really damn hard. The other thing it means is that I have an interesting love life. I settled down with the most wonderful man I've ever known nearly a decade ago. He's my husband, and I am bound to him for life. I also have a couple of lovers that I share a deep bond with. My husband has known almost all my lovers (we moved, I developed a different set of friends and lovers a couple years ago). They know my bond with him - and that it is not lacking in some department, I'm not cheating on him or looking for a replacement, or anything like that. Some of them are just close friends. A few I honestly love deeply. My husband is aware of that as well. It's not always easy for him to deal with, I'm not pretending like it is. He grew up hoping for the "perfect" nuclear family of one plus one. Let's just say that it's not the only preconception that either one of us has had to bend a bit. love is worth it...
But, this small collection of current and former lovers and my husband are my family. Unfortunately it took me almost losing my life to cancer over a decade ago to realize this. They are the men who took care of me. They are the men who helped me rebuild my life. They fed me, they sheltered me, they held me, they slept with me when I was afraid to be alone, and they made love to me when I was in need of tenderness. They are the men who helped me grow from a scared, lost, angry boy into a good, well rounded, successful man. They have done as much, no more, for me and my dreams, than my biological family has, ever. (Not to say that my bios didn't do their part to raise me and educate me, they certainly did that. They simply never encouraged me to be anything that I wanted... including not straight!)
What I wish that I could give to others from my life is just a little sense of this in the everyday. I honestly beleive that if we as gay and bi men treated each other more like lovers instead of fucks, even our one night stands, we'd automatically start to rebuild the sense of community we once had. Sex is really intimate, it's about time we admit that. Especially as the naturally sexual beings we are. We've been dying as a community for two decades now, slowly from sadness and exhaustion. Yes, we have built thriving businesses, parades, and even a little political clout. But we don't have a community anymore. I miss what I witnessed of that. I miss what my brothers testified to me. I know they idealized the past in many ways, I'm not naive. But I think that If we cared about each other more in bed, we'd start to care more about each other on the street. Then the more we'd care about ourselves, in turn. If we care about our own well being and our lovers' well being, then we'll naturally stop the disease ravaging our community. We'd know our HIV status without guessing or lying, and we'd take better care of those we choose to be with.
make love, don't fuck. but how to we spread the idea?