johnozed

Joe My God is a blog that I read most everyday. It’s an enjoyable read, definitely geared for gay men. Not so much erotica, but reports and stories that I find appealing. He lives in New York City. I believe he has hundreds of readers.

Last night in one of his open threads, he asked when was the first time you went to a gay bar, the bar name and what year. I responded as follows:

1981 Feathers in Bergen County NJ.
Didn’t speak with anyone, no one spoke with me. Probably ordered a soda. I was pretty much into Punk and New Wave at the time so I wasn’t into the disco. Which is the main reason I don’t go to gay bars. Not a fan of house music these days.

Everyone else’s entries were all positive experiences. Mine, while not necessarily negative set me apart from gay culture once again. It is true, I rarely, if ever, go to gay bars. It’s mainly the music that puts me off, and also the fact I am generally the invisible man when I go. Bartenders tend to ignore me. I prefer a mixed scene anyhow, not so segregated. Gay, Straight, Black, White and everything in between is fine by me.

I almost posted this on Joe My God following my original post.
Interesting side note. My brother who’s straight, liked the same type of music, Punk/New Wave and we both started going to this place in Hoboken called McSwells. Seeing great up and coming bands from all over the world for $5.00. At the time McSwells was listed as a Gay/Straight bar and it really was. Rock geeks and gays and lesbians all there for the music. It was also known in Hoboken as ‘that fag bar’. Flash forward a few years later, my parents are on vacation. They meet some people from Hoboken and my mother mentions that two of her sons go to a club called McSwells. The Hobokenites told her it was a fag bar.

This was before I came out to my family. My mother was distressed but I think the concept of gay and straight people able to mingle was a new concept to her. The subject didn’t sit well with her and it was never spoken of again, though I did have my mother come to Hoboken to have brunch at McSwells but by that time I was out. I don’t know what she expected but I do know she enjoyed herself.

Feathers was the first gay bar I ever went to, and I haven’t been back since. The first gay bar I had contact with was a bar called the Bell, in Hackensack NJ. The Bell used to be a rock and roll club or a disco, that my siblings occasionally went to. At some point in the mid 70′s it turned into a gay bar which put some people off. I was androgynous then, pre-pubescent.

Though when puberty hit and I knew I was gay, there was nowhere I could turn, no services available for a 13 year old boy in north New Jersey. Definitely could not talk to anyone I knew about what was happening to me. The confusion, from living in a straight world and hearing queer and fag and dyke jokes all the time and finding out those jokes were about me, was crushing and on top of that was the shame. I believe I had a slight nervous breakdown the summer of 1976. I kept it quiet.

The only thing I could thing of doing was to call the Bell. I was alone in the house that day, every one else off at work. I was left climbing the walls that summer day. At wit’s end I called the Bell in the middle of the afternoon. Some guy answered the phone, either a manager or someone setting up for the evening. I poured my heart and soul out to this stranger on the other end of the line.

How I didn’t know what to do, what I disappointment I was to my family, how I didn’t want to live like that. It seemed like we were on the phone a long time, maybe an hour I think. Whomever it was, they talked me in off the ledge. Someone I never knew before or since. Obviously I eventually came to grips with my sexuality and as out of step I was with the rest of the world before that, I was definitely marching to the beat of a totally different drum from then on.

I wonder whatever happened to the guy who answered the phone. I wonder how his night went. It must have been a heavy trip for him to listening to the anguish of a 13 year old boy coming to grips with his sexuality. He could have just brushed me off, hung up the phone and continued doing what he was doing.

Perhaps he did for me what someone might have done for him when he was coming of age, or perhaps no one was there to help him out back then and took it upon himself to give someone support that he never got for himself.

Just something that struck me as I read Joe My God.