Monday, March 27, 2006
On Being Bisexual (Pt.1)
My first entry into the realm of the bisexual was in the late 60s, early 70s, and it came oddly enough because of males in my life.
One of them was E, from a prominent east coast family. He had been booted out of a prestigious prep school in Switzerland for fooling around with other guys. His father was very annoyed. He had made his fortune in railroads, and he was going to be damned if his now worthless son was going to get any more money than he deserved to indulge his new interests. So he put E on a budget of only $35,000 a year. In terms of 1971, this went a rather long way.
He basically lived without working at anything, in a house in the farthest reaches of the San Rafael woods in Marin County, California, with his wife of several years, D, and their year old son, B. I had actually been introduced to E through his wife, with whom I was already becoming good friends. But sadly, I did not feel the same interest in her that I did in him, as it turned out. She seemed to accept this with equanimity nonetheless.
E identified quite freely as a bisexual male. He seemed to have no hangups about it and I looked for that as a good sign at the time. It was an omen to me that the guy had some sense of stability about him. He freely admitted to needing men and women. But in terms of daily life, he did what many bisexual men do, they marry women and pretty much live heterosexual lives with their wives, with forays outside of the marriage for their male company. His wife was just discovering that she was a lesbian, and beginning the process of shedding her heterosexual lifestyle.
I got to be good friends with them all. I would babysit little B sometimes when his parents went out. At the time I rode a motorcycle, and I would make the now familiar jaunt up from Berkeley into Marin. I spent a lot of time with them as a couple, socially, and with E alone. We would drive around in his Mercedes, talking about our endless stream of topics we talked about, politics, travel, living abroad, and of course, relationships, gay relationships, hetero, bi. He was a triple Gemini, I am a native of that sign too, so we had much to talk about with one another. He was fun and attractive, in a big, burly, Oliver Reed kind of fashion, circa early O.R. of 1971.
And he was fun in the sack. I was fascinated to see how such a creature operated in practice. I was about to find out.
TO BE CONTINUED.
One of them was E, from a prominent east coast family. He had been booted out of a prestigious prep school in Switzerland for fooling around with other guys. His father was very annoyed. He had made his fortune in railroads, and he was going to be damned if his now worthless son was going to get any more money than he deserved to indulge his new interests. So he put E on a budget of only $35,000 a year. In terms of 1971, this went a rather long way.
He basically lived without working at anything, in a house in the farthest reaches of the San Rafael woods in Marin County, California, with his wife of several years, D, and their year old son, B. I had actually been introduced to E through his wife, with whom I was already becoming good friends. But sadly, I did not feel the same interest in her that I did in him, as it turned out. She seemed to accept this with equanimity nonetheless.
E identified quite freely as a bisexual male. He seemed to have no hangups about it and I looked for that as a good sign at the time. It was an omen to me that the guy had some sense of stability about him. He freely admitted to needing men and women. But in terms of daily life, he did what many bisexual men do, they marry women and pretty much live heterosexual lives with their wives, with forays outside of the marriage for their male company. His wife was just discovering that she was a lesbian, and beginning the process of shedding her heterosexual lifestyle.
I got to be good friends with them all. I would babysit little B sometimes when his parents went out. At the time I rode a motorcycle, and I would make the now familiar jaunt up from Berkeley into Marin. I spent a lot of time with them as a couple, socially, and with E alone. We would drive around in his Mercedes, talking about our endless stream of topics we talked about, politics, travel, living abroad, and of course, relationships, gay relationships, hetero, bi. He was a triple Gemini, I am a native of that sign too, so we had much to talk about with one another. He was fun and attractive, in a big, burly, Oliver Reed kind of fashion, circa early O.R. of 1971.
And he was fun in the sack. I was fascinated to see how such a creature operated in practice. I was about to find out.
TO BE CONTINUED.
