Saturday, April 22, 2006

Good Friends

A short while ago, a fellow blogger posted a bulletin relating to older gay men and the thoughts that some younger gay men have about them. There does seem to be a disproportionate number of older gay men who are attracted only to younger gay men than the other way around. No scientific studies done on this issue that I know of, but being one of those older gay men who likes younger gay men as friends, I have a few thoughts.

I was 40 years old before I came out and that was after having been married a having two children. I realized that I had a number of younger gay men as friends and more than one that I had a relationship with that included sexual interaction. When another older friend and I began to look at the phenomenon of May/December relationships in the gay community, we realized a very important point. None of the older men had been able to go through the normal sexual maturation process that most non-gay men had.

We had dated opposite sex people, gotten married, had families and all the while fighting, or at the least, ignoring feelings that we had for other men. Some knew that other side of themselves and participated in clandestine relationships and/or encounters. Some did not. They simply hid themselves from themselves and others and went through the motions of being acceptable in a predominately straight society.

Often, then, when they finally did come out, they sought the company of younger men to help satisfy that emotional longing of the maturation process as the person they knew themselves to be.

For me, as a geezer, I still have several younger friends who seek out my experience and some knowledge that I have gained over the years. We still get to laugh and giggle at the same things that we see and experience but not get caught up in trying to make our relationship into something it is not already.

Yes, when I do go out into the play community with them, we often get glances and even stares of disdain. My younger friends have to have a thick skin in order to slough it all off. Sometimes we are even approached by younger men who want to know what our secret is - thinking as they often do, that we are partners in life.

So, I would urge our younger population to look kindly on us gay geezers. After all, we are the ones that often paid a terrible price for you to have the freedoms you have today. And I can assure you, even with societal disdain, you do have so many more freedoms that any of us did that grew up being totally expected to follow the norm.

Bro. Hardy