Meeting gay guys: San Francisco personal ads

Mid-70s.

Answering personal ads in San Francisco was a bit silly. Is there a city in America where gay sex is more readily found (especially back before AIDS enforced limitations)?

A friend of an acquaintance took me on a noon to midnight tour of San Francisco's gay bars. When I pointed to a nelly boy I thought attractive he ordered a drink for the boy in my name. The boy and I chatted a bit. I think he was willing but eventually my awkward, failed sociability drove him away. A more able man would've simply said "I'd like to pound your ass until your eyes pop out." Stupid? Yes, no: sounds like a lout, but, hey, sometimes loutish is called for.

Since I never picture myself as unappealing I guess the time comes when I have to say something about young Richard's looks. On leaving home I grew a mustache. Why? Might've been as much laziness as an attempt to fit a contemporary stereotype. A friend told me that I looked like a "hippie greaser." So I learned to keep my hair clean.

Otherwise I never thought about my looks or clothes. Possibly I looked like a street tough. More than one person I stopped on the street acted like they thought I was about to hurt them. In the primping 70s the indifference (and blessed genes) worked to make me seem more 'butch.'

After the time of the Decadents, casual masculinity, or as some would call it, 'real' masculinity has attracted many gay men. This was one of my strengths as a, er, 'hot number.' I never found myself attractive. My own sense of how I may have appeared lives only in the lovely young men who wanted me to fuck them. There were plenty of guys who never noticed me. Maybe I was more desirable than the average, but not impressively so.

If you are blessed with willing cuties and little rejection you accept what is offered without thinking about it. Ashamedly I'll own to early fears that my penis might not be big enough, and kindred erotic paranoias.

Shortly before moving to San Francisco my sainted momma sent me a care package of clothes: Army boots, jeans, plaid shirts. Little did momma know that she'd sent me the uniform of the San Francisco gay man. As Gordon would say one day when we were walking down Castro Street: "There are a lot of people who look like you here."

One personal ad that I answered gave me a nice affirmation: he said that I looked like a "typical golden boy." Then I spoke to the body fat fanatic. I knew when I wasn't wanted.

I answered one BDSM ad. He wanted money. Quickly I said goodbye.

Likewise the one transsexual I ever called on the phone. Ignorant in my peculiar appetite, her needs escaped me.

Lastly was a strongly appealing personal ad. It was the most beautiful boy. So lovely that when we met I was scared to death.

I'd move to and from San Francisco a few times. Meeting people the more ordinary ways, through friends, at work, was better. It is better to curl up with someone you've chatted with for more than 30 minutes over coffee. Startlingly I'd find myself with a biological female.

Part II

Part I