BijouBlog

Many many years ago, I was waiting for a bus on a bitterly cold day. Typical Chicago winter. The bus stop was located across the street from the local ABC station, in Chicago known as the Channel 7 Eyewitness News. The weatherguy, Mike Kaplan, emerged and strode resolutely across the street, and before I could say Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up, I was on television. And I didn't freeze up in front of the cameras like Cindy Brady on The Brady Bunch. 

Mike just asked me some general questions about the weather situation, and if there were any issues with the CTA (Chicago Transit Authority) that day. I said I had experienced no problems with the buses, and I proceeded to explain my fashion strategy for keeping warm, layering, ear coverings and hat, big scarf around the neck. I said cheekily, “If you want to stay warm, you have to dress like a dork.” 
 

Those who saw me on television later that evening (I appeared on the 6 p.m. broadcast) enjoyed a good laugh, but a couple of years later, when I did a vanity google search on my name, someone said, _____ said he was a penis on the ABC Eyewitness News. 

Yes, dork also means penis. Well, kind of. According to Leigh W. Rutledge inThe Gay Book of Lists, the word dick probably came from the the Middle English word dirk, meaning a small sword. Dirk actually came from the word dorke, which meant the horns (origin of the expression horny?) of an animal. Dirk and dork later became slang expressions for the penis. 

Now, there's some controversy that the work dork means a male penis. It actually means a whale's penis. And it's big. Really big. 
 

So, I am a big penis. And thus I am a small sword, and I am the horns of an animal. I guess I am not what I eat. 

All I know, is the day I wake up without that morning wood, I'll really feel like a big dork. 
 

 

Chuck Renslow, a legendary figure in LGBTQ history, passed away on June 30, 2017, at the age of 87. 

The the whole leather contest circuit actually began in a leather bar, the famous/infamous Gold Coast founded by Renslow. I know one person who remembers this bar; he is in his eighties (hard to believe). 

Much has been written on this place of LGBT history already; I’ll just add that it seems to be the granddaddy of places where like-minded men could meet others who shared their sexuality. 

Much of what is perhaps now the traditional dynamic of gay leather bars originated there: the leather biker look, the rough sex and BDSM, the hypermasculinity revealed in the famous artwork of Etienne aka Dom Orejudos, lover of Renslow now displayed in the Leather Archives and Museum. 
 

The Gold Coast closed in 1988 (alas, I never went there) at the 5025 North Clark location, having moved from its original location at 501 North Clark Street. Renslow later opened the Chicago Eagle in the 1990s; I remember the entrance being the inside of a truck, and the basement Pit. 

I actually consider this place my “coming out” bar as a leatherman. I was flogged in public down there, my first big BDSM scene. The Eagle closed in the early 2000s; the last time I went there was 2007; by that time the totally hot Pit had closed. 

Without Renslow's pioneering efforts that date back to the times when homoerotic muscle magazines were considered obscene by the government, the LGBTQ leather community might not even exist; in fact, he always showed the courage to navigate and eventually surmount oppressive political and social systems in that pre-Stonewall time when to even operate a gay bar one had to pay off the Mafia, when gay sex itself was illegal, a crime against nature. 

I consider his immense legacy (just look at his obituary) an inspiration, not just to LGBTQ persons, but to any marginalized group fighting for the right to full human dignity. 

In the recent funny and campy and touching movie Florence Foster Jenkins, Cosme McMoon, her naive waif-life closeted gay accompanist (played by the absolutely adorable Simon Helberg), is late to Madame Florence's infamous 1944 Carnegie Hall recital. Why? He claims breathlessly, implying perhaps post-coital euphoric exhaustion, he was “jumped” by a bunch of sailors, and that they were “most disrespectful.” (Interestingly enough, the real McMoon later in his life was a judge at ostensibly straight bodybuilding contests; some even claim he also ran a gay escort service or even brothel, but the latter is probably more faux news.) 
 

So, apparently, that “little McMoon” was into rough trade. I've thrown the term around a bit in blogs and tweets and other communiques, but I've always wondered what it actually meant, and, as it turns out, it isn't just the cliched doin' it with sex-starved sailors on the wharf (apparently, by the time McMoon experienced the joy of rough trade brothels for women weren't located seaside, another cliché, or were they?) 
 

Another variation is in comparison to regular trade, rough trade is more likely to be working-class laborers with less education and more physical demands of their work, therefore with a body developed naturally rather than in a gym. They may also exhibit a less polished or clean-cut style than an office worker or professional businessman. 

For example, remember that book Maurice by E.M. Forster and the movie made of it starring Hugh Grant as well? Aristocratic Maurice Hall, after being rejected by the bisexual Clive Durham (Grant's role) falls in love with Alec Scudder, the lower-class gamekeeper, played by Rupert Graves. Maurice and Alec's future as a couple is thus doubly doomed, not just because of their gayness, but because of the social division. It would be more acceptable if Alec was just a rough trade fling rather than a partner in a loving relationship. 
 

 

 

In fact, rough trade sexual encounters resulted in the deaths the gay silent film icon Ramon Navarro and the famous Italian cinematographer Pier Paolo Pasolini. 

Now, based on the above tragedies, I might think twice about the phrase “dick of death,” but I also remember how sex and violence and even death can erupt as one terrifying conflagration. Orgasm is after all le petit mort, both beautiful and terrible. 

When I was twelve (maybe thirteen) I inadvertently discovered the joys of jacking off. I think I woke up in the middle of a wet dream, turned myself on to my belly, and finished myself off. My brother then began to complain about hearing my bed frame squeaking (we shared a room, and thank goodness at that time my dad has taken down the bunk beds). Since then, I don't think I have missed a day, though I have changed my position to the most popular one. In fact, the day I wake up without a morning woody, I know the Angel of Death is just around the corner, and I won't change my name to deceive him (old Jewish bubby's tale). 

One interesting book in the Bijou archives called The Gay Book of Lists by Leigh Rutledge enumerates some jack off positions in some detail, also helpfully guiding the potential wanker offer to their specific advantages and disadvantages: 

“Lying on Back” is the most popular (illustrated by Tom Cruise in the movie Risky Business); advantages include a good angle for thrusting actions with the hips; the sheets don't get messy; easy reach for either tit. Disadvantages include it can be a bad angle for pictures (well, with these new-fangled cameras on phones, perhaps not) and it can become monotonous when done day after day (Maybe one could do it while lying on one's back in the bathtub; I tried it once, but I became so relaxed because I was lying in water not much happened; maybe I should have done it in a dry tub, but that would have been uncomfortable.) 

“Standing Up” is also popular, especially for those who cruise public bathrooms and want to show off (I would add especially if one is a grower). An advantage especially for those who are narcissistic: one can look at oneself in the mirror. It is also easy to do anywhere. Disadvantages include tired knees and legs, cum-splotched footwear, and it can be difficult to keep a dildo in the ass. 

“Legs Thrown Over Head” is a position where a guy lies on his back and throws his legs back over his head so that the head of his dick is aimed right at his mouth. This position is often used in BDSM scenes as a way for the master to force his slave to eat his own cum. Advantages include an intense orgasm; one can satisfy a hunger for cum; and one can watch oneself jack off. Disadvantages include a sprained neck and back (yikes!) and eyes filled with cum. 

“On The Belly, Rubbing Dick Against Sheets, Pillows, Etc.” is quite fun and sensual, especially if one is in a lazy mood, and it also works while one is being fucked up the ass. Disadvantages include messy sheets and also, as I mentioned in the first paragraph, don't do this if one's bed squeaks a lot and one's roommate is in the room supposedly sleeping (unless he wants to join in).

"Sitting on Toilet” is excellent if one can't find any other way to be alone and clean-up is quite easy. In fact, Portnoy, among others, helped make this position famous, and it became almost iconic in the movie The Right Stuff. More recently, based on craiglist missed connection postings, this seems to be going in men's room stalls everywhere, so perhaps for many it's not a distasteful location to pull the pud. 


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One can also stream movies at bijougayporn.com and watch other guys jerkin' the gherkin to stimulate your own pole dancing. 

I guess maybe the whole adult bed issues ties into marriage. You know, the marriage bed, and dowry chests often contained linens and other items to furnish the bed. And this bed would be for the couple only, a major rite of passage, as for many centuries siblings and unmarried family members routinely slept together in the same bed. Why? Most people were poor. Privacy was lacking. Bedding was expensive. 

Of course, in the United States, most young adults live with each other, cohabit before marriage. In fact, I even remember when I was living in the dorms, the sign when a guy and a girl (two guys was of course taboo at that time) began to cohabit was the double bed. Sometimes two beds pushed together, and usually in the guy's room. Apparently the guy's dorm was a more acceptable place for sex than the girl's dorm. The few times guys even visited the girl dorms was for let me eat with or even fix dinner for you in my room. Sexist, oh yes! 

I've often wondered if a certain type of bed makes better sex. I mean, some bed sex fantasies involve frills and canopies and flowers but also rough sex. Really rough. I think of those bodice-ripper historical romance novels, where the guy who ends up being Prince Charming, but not after some often an often mind-boggling I love him, I hate him, I love her, I hate her, and the result of this confusion is a heroine deflowered before the wedding, sometimes on the same bed where she ends up after the marriage. 

In contrast, the man-eating, predatory Sue Ann Nivens on the Mary Tyler Moore Show ended up doing the deflowering on her indescribable bed. We see this bed in one episode, where the WJM-TV gang congregate to comfort her when she realizes her sister will be staying in Minneapolis to host a rival cooking show. Erosville, USA. Cupids, flowers, pink satin. It vibrates. And when the climax occurs (and in Sue Ann's world, her climax is the goal), the florid theme from Tchaikovsky's Romeo and Juliet sounds forth. 
 

I'm not entirely sure how LGBTQ persons fit into this dynamic, because for ages they were banned from participating in traditional heterosexual rites of passage. In the days of the closet, when lovers had to present themselves as “roommates,” I'm sure a double bed would more than raise eyebrows. But then, those were the days when heterosexual icons Lucy and Ricky had to sleep in separate twin beds after the first season of I Love Lucy as a double bed was too risque. 

I just bought some bed risers for my futon frame. I sleep on a futon, which used to be on the floor, then on a low wooden frame, then on a black metal sling frame (still low). Now the sleeping structure resembles a bed, at least the height. Have I grown up? Maybe, but the best sex I've had occurred on the floor of a van.