I Had to Say Something (13 page)

A young woman in some sort of sleepwear came in. I had set up the room with candles and scented oils, and I was wearing boxers when she came into the room. After her, the others came in one by one. They were all under thirty. Only one woman asked me to keep my shorts on. Most of them were pretty liquored up. Hey, it was a party.

I spent about fifteen minutes with each woman. Some would strip only to their underwear. A few came in and wasted no time taking it all off as I stood right in front of them. It wasn't
turning me on, but I wasn't sure what I would be asked to do, so I had brought along some Viagra just in case.

Just like my male clients, most of the women that night just wanted to be touched sensually. I massaged their face, back, shoulders, and legs, and if they desired, I would massage their breasts, buttocks, and their groin area. I think some of them may have had orgasms, and some made interesting sounds, moving their bodies in curious ways.

“Can I put it in my mouth?” a couple of the women asked. “Whatever you want, baby.” I didn't know for sure, but calling a woman “baby” in that setting seemed to work well. Again, it did nothing for me, but they seemed to enjoy it.

One woman went even further. “Give it to me, Daddy,” she moaned. It was odd for me to hear that from a woman. But since it was my job that night, I gave it to her, even though I wasn't very hard, and it didn't go in very far. I of course used a condom, because I
always
practice safe sex.

Come midnight, I had completed my service. Talk about feeling like a stud. My contact paid me and off I went. I also collected several hundred dollars in tips from the women, so all in all I had one of my most profitable nights ever.

 

The July 2005 attacks on London's subway system and a double-decker bus, in which fifty-two people died, made a big impression on me.

Innocent people were killed because of differences in religious beliefs, so I started questioning the role of religion. As in politics, there are extremists. People claiming to have the Truth on their side can be the most dangerous of all.

Since I suspected that Art worked for a church in Colorado Springs, I wanted to ask him about his religious beliefs and his background. If he did work for a church, I wondered what
their policies or feelings were regarding homosexuality. There is no shortage of preachers and religious leaders who have taken joy in skewering homosexuals. It raised a lot of money for them, but I never understood why they had to be so vicious and so absurd.

For example, Jerry Falwell said this about the September 11th tragedies on the television program
The 700 Club
two days after the attacks:

This coming from a man who told the world that a little cartoon character named Tinky Winky from the television program the
Teletubbies
was a homo because he has a triangle on his head and he carries a purse.

“What's next, polygamy? . . . Why not? And why not bestiality?” Falwell told CNN's Wolf Blitzer in 2004. It was enough to make me scream.

Maybe the reason all this was coming up now was because of my mom's illness. The problem I have with organized religion getting mixed up in politics is connected with something my mom taught me long ago—that my relationship with God is personal. That proved to be true for me. I have found religion to be far more effective when it isn't crammed down my throat.

I've always had a problem with comments from leaders of organized religious groups who feel the need to force their beliefs on everyone else. They make comments, then deny
making them, and all the while it's apparent they think a lot more about gay sex than I do.

According to
mediamatters.org
, Falwell has a history of denying his own inflammatory remarks regarding homosexuality. In 1984, Falwell publicly denied having verbally attacked a gay community church until a videotape surfaced showing Falwell calling members of the church “brute beasts” and “part of a vile and satanic system [that] will one day be utterly annihilated.” The Associated Press reported that story on September 25, 1985. When Falwell was ordered to pay five thousand dollars to a former pastor of the church, he responded, “This situation is only one more example of harassment by a militant homosexual group.”

The fact that people like Falwell use religion and spirituality to justify such comments is what angers me most. To say that God loves you but only if you are heterosexual goes against any kind of true Christian feeling.

In 2004, Pat Robertson called lesbians and gays “selfabsorbed hedonists . . . [who] want to impose their particular sexuality on the rest of America.” Based on the fact that around 15 percent of my clientele worked in a church or for an organized religion, that's hardly what I'd call
us
imposing our beliefs on
them
. Basically, they seem to be able to find gay sex wherever it may be—and to take advantage of it.

All that fire and brimstone coming from the mouths of the homophobics makes me angry. I suppose what really concerns me is how one of the world's oldest and largest religions feels free to call me a whore while its followers have no problem taking advantage of my services.

I've heard it said that anywhere from 30 to 50 percent of Roman Catholic priests are gay. Friends of mine who grew up Catholic or are priests will tell you the percentage is much
higher. Yet rather than embrace the gift of sexuality that these men bring, the Vatican sees fit to view these men as evil and undesirable.

That's the definition of hypocrisy. When you have people like Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Bakker getting dethroned for preaching one thing and doing something different in the dark, that's hypocrisy. Nothing makes me more upset than people of faith who support church policies against homosexuals and other alleged sinners and who have
themselves
acted on homosexual feelings of their own.

In 2005 the Vatican put out a paper called
Instruction Concerning the Criteria for the Discernment of Vocations with Regard to Persons with Homosexual Tendencies in View of Their Admission to the Seminary and to Holy Orders
. Wow, that's a mouthful. Basically, here is what it has to say about queers: “Regarding [homosexual]
acts
. . . Sacred Scripture presents them as grave sins. The Tradition has constantly considered them as intrinsically immoral and contrary to the natural law. Consequently, under no circumstance can they be approved.” So are they talking about the homosexual act of cocksucking or interior decorating?

The document goes on to say that, “[We] believe it necessary to state clearly that the Church, while profoundly respecting the persons in question, cannot admit to the seminary or to holy orders those who practise homosexuality, present deep-seated homosexual tendencies or support the so-called ‘gay culture.'” By gay culture, are they talking about
Queer Eye
and disco?

Cardinal Adam Maida of Detroit helped further explain the Vatican's position when he commented on the sex-abuse accusations against Catholic priests. “It's not truly a pedophilia-type problem but a homosexual-type problem,” he said in 2002.

Or to Cardinal Francis George of Chicago, who at the time wanted to make a distinction between a man who sexually abuses boys and one who sexually abuses girls. Referring to John Geoghan, a former Boston priest accused of abusing more than one hundred children over a thirty-four-year period, George said, “There is a difference between a moral monster like Geoghan . . . and someone who, perhaps under the influence of alcohol, engages in an action with a seventeen- or sixteen-year-old young woman who returns his affection.”

I understand wanting to serve the Lord. Such devotion can give meaning to one's life, especially when you have a positive impact on the lives of others. Anyone who is willing to make such a sacrifice should be given all the tools possible for success. Forcing people into the closet and calling it the Lord's will is wrong.

I admire the truly brave ones who come out of the closet and admit that they are gay but still desire to serve to humanity. Unfortunately, the Catholic Church and most other churches have made it impossible for people who are honest about themselves to live a life dedicated to their fellow humans.

 

About five years ago, I got a phone call from a gentleman named Jack visiting from a neighboring midwestern state. He told me he was on the faculty of the Department of Religious Studies at a university in his home state. It may or may not have been true, but I did notice that my caller ID showed he was calling from a university in that state. He told me he was married with a family and yet wanted to have intimacy with another man.

During our first meeting, I could sense his hesitancy with the sexual act. He felt guilty, and he was uncomfortable. The more he saw me over time, the more comfortable he felt, and
he appreciated the fact that I would listen to him, even when he wanted to talk about religion, and that I would let him pray if that was what he wanted to do. In fact, he was so grateful that he sent me a package containing spiritual books that he asked me to read. Enclosed was also a card:

One time we were talking about religion after he had achieved release. Since it was a subject he enjoyed, I figured it was okay.

“Are there some sins that are more extreme than others?” I asked.

“A sin is a sin is a sin,” he told me as he lay naked on my table. “It doesn't matter if you are a homosexual or a mass murderer.”

“There is no distinction?”

“No, there is not.”

You can imagine what I was thinking. Here's this hypocrite rubbing my ass while his wife is at home with his kids, telling me that I am no better than a mass murderer. I said nothing more.

Most of our sessions, however, were not as intense on the verbal side. Sometimes we talked about religion and sometimes we'd just get naked. Mostly, he wanted to hold me and talk to
me, and sometimes he wanted something raunchier. His prayers went something like this: “Dear Lord, thank you for letting me be with Mike and thank you for letting us share our time together. Please let Mike have a happy life, let him be complete.”

How the hell did I start attracting men who wanted to pray instead of jack off?

 

By the end of 2005, I was starting to tire of being an escort. I had been one my entire adult life, and while the money was good, I was feeling burned-out. Like most jobs, you can only do it for so long before you have to make a change. I pulled many of my ads and started telling clients that I was going to close the business.

Art had scheduled another afternoon appointment, and he was on my list of clients to inform that I would no longer be taking appointments. I performed our usual routine, wanting to make sure he achieved release because that would make him feel better. As he lay with a towel over his penis, I figured that was the best time to tell him.

“I'm not going to be an escort anymore,” I told him, trying to get the words out as fast as I could.

Art sat up quickly. “What?”

“I am, for lack of a better word, going out of business.”

“But you can't!”

I grabbed his hand and tried to calm him.

“Would you consider seeing just your current clients like me?” he asked anxiously.

“Art, I can't . . .”

“Please, then, just see me, okay?”

Wow, he sounded desperate. I couldn't have predicted that he would be so upset over my decision.

“I can't, Art.”

“Please, Mike.” He then grabbed his wallet from his pants and pulled out three—not two—hundred-dollar bills. “Please, Mike, I need to keep seeing you.”

I winced and took the money.

“Art, you don't understand . . .”

“Please, Mike, for me?”

I sighed heavily. “Let me think about it, okay?”

“Okay, that's good.” Cupping his nakedness with his left hand, he made his way to the bathroom, closing the door behind him. He came back into the massage room and put on his clothes right in front of me. “Thanks, Mike, you're a good man,” he said as he put on his shoes.

On the way out the door, he gave me another big hug. “Please, for me, okay?” he said, putting his finger to my lips as if to quiet me.

As he walked down the hall, he did so walking backward, looking at me as though his train were leaving and it were the last time he might see me.

I was feeling uncomfortable about how Art had reacted to my announcement. No one gets as nervous as he did unless there are deep feelings involved. He had clearly fallen for me, perhaps not in an obvious romantic way, but he was infatuated. That happens a lot with clients who see me for several years. We may meet just once a month, but our session involves feelings that come from their core.

That night, I couldn't get Art out of my mind. His eyes followed me wherever I went. As I looked back on our last year, I realized that Art had “the look.” It was there in his eyes the whole time, and I was only now seeing it. His eyes would follow my every move in the massage room. At our first sessions, he used to avoid looking right at me. Now he couldn't take his eyes off me.