As a gay man, you may be surprised to hear that one of the biggest hurdles I faced was going into a gay bar for the first time.
True Stories – Going To A Gay Bar For The First Time
At 17-years-old, I was in awe of my straight mates. They’d been wandering into bars and nightclubs for the last year with the only threat of getting asked for age identification.
At 17 years old, my straight mates were not only getting drunk most Friday and Saturday nights but were boasting about sleeping around with members of the opposite sex without any worry. Whether they’d slept with many of those they mentioned was open to debate.
At 17 years old, it was against the law for me to sleep with a person of the same sex. If I boasted about it, I could get myself into trouble. The law stated that, for my safety, sex remained on hold until I reached 21.
Of course, I overlooked that particular part of the law. Like any red-blooded male at 17, my hormones made my brain think of little else but wanting to (putting it mildly) get laid.
By the time I reached my 19th birthday, I already had what I had considered a boyfriend. He was over the age of 21 and thought I was too.
On one particular, wet Saturday evening, I found myself sitting in my boyfriend’s car. Holding hands with him, we listened to the patter of the rain on the roof as we watched the raindrops splatter on the windscreen. For weeks, we’d both built up the courage to go to a gay bar for the first time.
The bar was out of town and miles from where we lived. However, neither of us wanted to get out of the car and walk up the steps to the bar. Instead, we both sat there trying our best to peer through the spattering of rain, trying to make out the figures going into the bar.
“It’s nice and warm in here,” I said.
“Yeah, too wet to go outside,” responded my boyfriend.
For the next half an hour, we made an excuse after an excuse as to why we should stay in the car. Even though curiosity ran through our minds about what was on the other side of the doors to the gay bar, our bodies remained fixed to our seats while we continued peering at figures entering and exiting the bar.
“What if we bump into somebody in there who recognises us?” asked my boyfriend. “If there’s somebody in there from work, I could end up getting beaten up or sacked.”
Not only did those words cut me in half, but I began to worry that if the police raided the bar, my boyfriend and I would be in serious trouble because of my age.
Although at 19 years old, it wasn’t against the law for me to go into a bar, I questioned if it was against the law for me to hold hands with another man in a public place.
Terrified of the consequences of entering a world where people would have welcomed and accepted us for who we were, we drove off and went home. Hiding who we were and how we lived our lives seemed a much safer option.
It would be months later when I talked about that night again.
“If somebody you worked with had been in that bar, wouldn’t they have been as terrified as we were at being spotted?” I asked.
“I never thought of that,” came the reply. “But it’s still a risk, isn’t it?”
Six years later, as I made my way on a coach to a new life, I left behind a boyfriend who had been secretly sleeping with another man he worked with.
Have you ever been terrified to do something or go somewhere for the first time? Please share the details in the comments sectionor, even better, contact me about submitting your story as a guest post.
Did you enjoy reading this post? Then you may also enjoy…
I’m delighted to welcome Judith Barrow to my blog today, who shares a true story about the perils of holiday letting an apartment.
Having read some of Judith’s other stories of holiday letting, there’s always a humorous side to them which I believe would not only make a fanatics book, but a television comedy show.
Confessions of a Holiday Let – A true story by Judith Barrow
Will Judith’s story have you laughing as much as I did when I read it?
***
For many years we summer let the apartment which is attached to our house.
We had many visitors from other countries staying in our apartment and shared great times with them.
Couples from the USA, Australia enjoyed barbeques on the lawn; long boozy evenings of wine and slightly burned kebabs and steaks, of tall tales and laughter.
Visits to restaurants with people from France and Italy. Long walks and talks on the coastal paths with a couple from New Zealand that we’d met from there on holiday in Christchurch, followed by drinks in local pubs.
We had a German man stay with us for three weeks who’d come to participate in the Iron Man Wales event. He’d worked hard for twelve months, he told us and had to acclimatise himself to the course. Three days before the event, he caught a chest infection and had to drop out. Despite his anti-biotics, he still needed to join Husband in a double whisky that night.
Oh dear, I’m sensing a common theme here.
This is the story of our last visitor for the season one year.
He was a single man. We’ve had people come on holiday alone many times over the years and thought nothing of it. When he arrived, we quickly realised he could only speak a little English, and we couldn’t speak his language at all.
He hadn’t been in the apartment before he came to the door brandishing an empty bottle of washing up liquid.
“Oh, sorry,” I said, “I thought there was plenty in it.”
“Used it.”
An hour later, washing powder was asked for by a demonstration of vigorous scrubbing at a pair of underpants.
“There’s a box of it under the sink.”
“Used it.”
Sunday brought him to the door twice. First, with the sugar bowl.
“Used it.”
Then the salt cellar.
“I thought I’d filled it—”
“Used it.”
‘Used it’ quickly became the watchword whenever we supplied tea bags, vinegar or handing over shoe polish.
Monday, he arrived with an empty tube of glue.
“Sorry, we don’t supply glue.”
He stands, smiling, waggling the tube. “Used it.”
Husband went into his Man Drawer and produced a tube of Super Glue. Scowling. We never found out what the man wanted it for, even though Husband examined everything he could that would need to be stuck the following weekend.
Each day, at least once, the man came to the door to ask for something by waving the empty bottle, carton, container or label at us. Unlike most holidaymakers, he didn’t knock on the back door but always came round to ring the doorbell at the front. In the end, Husband and I would peer through the hall window.
“It’s Mr Used It,” one of us would say. “It’s your turn to go.” Pushing at one another. “You see what he wants this time.”
On Wednesday, he arrived with a cardboard roll.
“There are six more toilet rolls in the bathroom cabinet to the right of the hand basin,” I offered helpfully.
“Used it.”
Seven rolls of toilet paper usually last a couple the whole week. I handed over four more.
“What’s happening in there,” Husband grumbled, “do-it-yourself colonic irrigation?”
On Friday, Husband produced a list. “We should charge for this lot,” he declared. “See?”
It read like a shopping list: milk/salt/sugar/vinegar/butter/tea bags/ coffee/soap/soap powder/toilet paper/shampoo/glue/shoe polish.
“Really?” I said, even though I knew the chap had been a pest. “You’ve been keeping tabs on our guest?”
“Too true.” The husband was indignant. “We could even charge him for overuse of the battery in the doorbell.”
“Except that it’s connected to the electricity.”
“Even worse!” Husband grumped off to his shed.
Saturday morning came, and the doorbell rang. Smiling, the man put his suitcase down onto the ground and, vigorously, shook hands with both of us. He waved towards the apartment.
“Used it,” he said. “Very nice.”
***
Judith Barrow
About Judith Barrow
Judith Barrow is originally from Saddleworth, a group of villages on the edge of the Pennines, in the UK. She now lives with her husband and family in Pembrokeshire, Wales, where she has lived for over forty years.
Judith has an MA in Creative Writing with the University of Wales Trinity St David’s College, Carmarthen. She also has BA (Hons) in Literature with the Open University, a Diploma in Drama from Swansea University.
She is a Creative Writing tutor for Pembrokeshire County Council and holds private one to one workshops on all genres.
She has written all her life and has had short stories, poems, plays, reviews and articles published throughout the British Isles. She only started to seriously write novels after having breast cancer twenty years ago.
When not writing or teaching, she enjoys doing research for her writing, walking the Pembrokeshire coastline and reading and reviewing books.
1914 – and everything changes for Jessie on a day trip to Blackpool. She realises her true feelings for her childhood friend, Arthur. Then just as they are travelling home from this rare treat, war is declared.
Arthur lies about his age to join his Pals’ Regiment. Jessie’s widowed mother is so frightened of the future, she agrees to marry the vicious Amos Morgan, making Jessie’s home an unsafe place for her.
Before he leaves, Arthur and Jessie admit their feelings and promise to wait for each other. Arthur gives Jessie a heart-shaped stone to remember him. But with Arthur far away, their love leaves Jessie with a secret that will see her thrown from her home and terribly abused when she can hide the truth no longer. Faced with a desperate choice between love and safety, Jessie must fight for survival, whatever the cost.
Click on the book cover to buy The Heart Stone
More Books from Judith
Saga of the Howard family
The Memory
Click on the book covers to buy Judith’s books.
My thanks to Judith for writing this guest post.
If you have any questions or comments for Judith, please leave them in the comments section. She’d be delighted to hear from you.
Do you have a true story you’d like to share on my blog? Contact me via the ‘Contact Hugh’ button on the menubar.
Continuing my series of true stories, I’m delighted to welcome Liesbet Collaert, who shares her story of how life changed the direction she was travelling.
If it feels right, can it be wrong?
Although Liesbet leads a different life to me (read and follow her blog to find out more) her true story is one I gasped at even though I’ve had similar experiences. It makes me believe in fate even more and why we find ourselves in certain situations for a real purpose.
Will her story bring back memories of a familiar position when you read it? Has fate played a part in your life?
***
Liesbet and Caesar arriving in San Francisco
San Francisco. A fascinating city I only know from movies and guidebooks. So close now! I can almost see the Golden Gate Bridge, smell the salty air of the bay, and feel the breeze in my light brown hair. The promise of a new adventure causes my ear-to-ear grin as I hop into our small camper to grab a CD of dEUS, my favorite Belgian band.
After crisscrossing the United States, Western Canada, and Alaska in our truck camper for the last year and a half, my boyfriend Karl, his dog Caesar, and I landed in California. Karl’s friend Nik, a DJ, had invited us to share his studio-apartment in Oakland, as a base to explore SF. Nik also rents out two apartments in his house.
CD in hand, I enter the yard again and stop dead in my tracks. Two gorgeous dogs with fluffy tails had run up to me. I smother them with cuddles and praise.
“Hi, I’m Mark. And these two are Kali, the white one, and Darwin, the grey one.”
Liesbet with Kali and Darwin
I look up from admiring the wagging furballs.
My eyes meet those of a tall, skinny, short-haired, and attractive man in the doorway of apartment #1.
“Hello. I’m Liesbet. My boyfriend and I are staying with Nik for a week to visit San Francisco. Our home on wheels is parked in front of the house.”
“Home on wheels? Why are you living in a camper?”
“It lets us travel around with our own bathroom and kitchen and plenty of storage and provides much more comfort and security than dingy hostels and a backpack,” I tell him with an unfaltering smile and raised voice; telltales of the excitement I always feel when elaborating on my pursuit of freedom.
“I detect an accent. Where are you from?” he asks, after I had described a handful of places I visited while backpacking for almost two years on the other side of the world.
“I’m from Belgium, but I haven’t been back in a while.”
Mark seems entranced, which encourages me to ramble on about my passion. After some time of telling stories and trading questions and answers, he exclaims, “That’s incredible! I need to travel and find myself a Belgian girlfriend!”
I blush. It dawns on me that we’d been chatting for a while.
“Do you know what time it is?” I ask. An hour has passed. I rush to Nik’s place next door.
“Where have you been?” Karl asks.
“Talking to a neighbor, the one with the big dogs. He seems like a nice guy.” I hand my CD to Nik, who is always eager to discover new music.
Our planned week in the Rockridge area of Oakland turns into four, as all of us become friends and Mark unintentionally draws me closer and closer. Karl encourages my contact with the neighbor. “Soon we’ll be out of here and it’s just you and me again,” he says. “Enjoy the company!”
I embrace Mark’s presence until I crave it.
One night, the Hollywood-moment arrives… our first kiss. An arm around my shoulders. A fluttering body. Touching of lips. Mutual desire. He loves me back!
We never allow anything more to happen. Mark is a realist. He knows I am leaving Nik’s place shortly and that I am in a serious relationship.
Our dreadful last evening together eventually arrives. We hug strongly and kiss tenderly.
“I’ll come pick you up wherever you are, whenever you’re ready to leave Karl.” Mark’s parting words sound sweet. Is he serious?
Mark and Liesbet
That night, I lie awake, heart racing. By morning, it’s time to pack up the camper and leave.
I exchange glances with Karl. His eyes beam with excitement about continuing our adventures; mine reflect trouble and sadness.
I take the plunge.
“I can’t be with you anymore. My attraction to Mark has grown too strong.” I sound more determined than I feel.
Shock.
Karl stares at me with intent. “We’re driving to Mexico. We both looked forward to this.”
Silence.
Did he not notice my enthusiasm to continue our overland journey had diminished these last weeks?
I swallow hard.
Can I really give all this up? Our past explorations on the road? The year and a half before that, where he tried so hard to fit into my Belgian life? How about my American visa that will run out if I don’t leave the country soon?
The consequences of my impulsiveness finally trigger some brain activity.
Karl continues, “I love you. Caesar and I will miss you so much.”
We both cry. Three years together is not nothing. I think about the good times we shared. Karl and his dog – and me, too – had been ecstatic when I showed up at his Maryland apartment, ready to roam North America. That was the summer of 2003. I had thrown a goodbye party at my parents’ house in Belgium and hopped on a plane. Little did I know I was never to return.
I remain quiet. My heart bleeds for him. Karl is a sensitive man who understands me and cares about me. We have the same passion: traveling the world on a budget. Yet,I crave more romance in a relationship…
Am I seriously giving up my travels for a man?
That would be a first. It’s usually the other way around. My gut knows how this predicament will end. My mind has nothing to add.
I face Karl and finally utter, “If I leave with you, I will want to come back here at some point.” It is the only conclusion I can muster.
I have fallen in love with another guy, the “guy next door.”
Mark with Kali and Darwin
“If that’s what you want,” Karl replies with a sigh, “then you should just stay.”
In the hours that follow we split the money from our communal account; I gather my belongings; and we discuss a contingency plan for the truck camper. I pet Caesar goodbye and give Karl one last, heartfelt embrace. Then, misty-eyed, I watch them drive away.
I close the door of Mark’s apartment behind me. Unlike other times when Karl and I returned his dogs after walking them with Caesar – today, I don’t leave.
My pile of clothes and gear clutters the corner of the bedroom. I settle on the bed with Kali and Darwin. My tears soak their fur within minutes. Mark has found his Belgian girl without having to travel; she appeared right on his doorstep. He probably thought he’d never see her again. Surprise!
Liesbet and Darwin
What will he say when he comes home from work?
What if he doesn’t want me here?
As usual, I don’t have a back-up plan.The rest of the afternoon, I cry. I feel bad for Karl.
I’m such a selfish bitch.
The front door opens. The dogs jump up and run towards their human. I stay behind in the bedroom.
“Hi, guys,” Mark greets Kali and Darwin with a sad voice. “I guess they’re gone, huh? You two don’t seem too excited to see me. What’s up?”
I walk into the hallway. My eyes sting.
Mark looks up.
“What the hell are you doing here?” His words crush me. I shuffle towards him. We hug. I don’t want to let go.
“I’m staying with you,” I whisper, as if he doesn’t have any say in this. Mark’s face relaxes into a smile. His grip tightens. I guess that means it’s okay.
***
Writer & Blogger Liesbet Collaert
Liesbet Collaert’s articles and photos have been published internationally.
Born in Belgium, she has been a nomad since 2003 with no plans to settle anytime soon. Her love of travel, diversity, and animals is reflected in her lifestyle choices of sailing, RVing, and house and pet sitting.
Liesbet calls herself a world citizen and currently lives “on the road” in North America with her husband and rescue dog. Follow her adventures at www.itsirie.com and www.roamingabout.com.
Liesbet’s true story is taken from her new book, Plunge.
Plunge
Tropical waters turn tumultuous in this travel memoir as a free-spirited woman jumps headfirst into a sailing adventure with a new man and his two dogs.
Join Liesbet as she faces a decision that sends her into a whirlwind of love, loss, and living in the moment. When she swaps life as she knows it for an uncertain future on a sailboat, she succumbs to seasickness and a growing desire to be alone.
Guided by impulsiveness and the joys of an alternative lifestyle, she must navigate personal storms, trouble with US immigration, adverse weather conditions, and doubts about her newfound love.
Does Liesbet find happiness? Will the dogs outlast the man? Or is this just another reality check on a dream to live at sea?
I’m delighted to welcome Graeme Cumming to my blog. Not only is Graeme somebody I class as a friend, but he’s also a very talented author, writer and blogger.
A guest blog post by Graeme Cumming
Graeme’s true story opened up my eyes to something I’d never thought about when it comes to passing on wisdom and mistakes I’ve made in my life to those younger than me. Read his story and let him know how you pass on words of wisdom to the younger generation.
Unlike Bryan Adams, my summer of ’69 had nothing to do with playing guitar. Having struggled to play triangle during a school concert, I think it’s safe to say my musical abilities wouldn’t have stretched that far.
When I chose the wrong moment to hit the triangle, I was even more mortified than I might otherwise have been because my dad was in the audience. He didn’t tend to turn up for school stuff because of work – not many dads did back then. So, when he was able to put in an appearance, I wanted to impress him. Clearly, I was to be disappointed and, at the time, I assumed the same was true for him. It’s funny the perceptions we have of our parents.
That summer, we took a rare holiday. I suppose they were rare because we didn’t have the money for them. In those days, it was common for the husband to go to work and the wife to stay home and look after the house and children. With one wage-earner, a holiday was a luxury. Even better, we had two weeks at Mablethorpe, not just one.
Fifty-one years later, I still have great memories from that holiday. Great, though not all of them filled with joy. Not at the time anyway.
There was an incident where my dad and I were playing football on the beach. Sport had always been his forte. He’d even been signed as a professional footballer back in the fifties – though a foot injury put paid to his sporting career within weeks. Nevertheless, even with the injury, he was a good all-rounder. In his time, he played cricket, tennis and squash to a high standard, and even walked away with a trophy on the one occasion he played golf.
In contrast, my own sporting skills have always bordered on the inept. So there was very little surprise when I kicked the ball in the wrong direction, sending it hurtling out into the sea. The tide was going out and, before long, it became apparent that the ball was going with it. My dad did go after it – inevitably, he was a bloody good swimmer, too!
Like most kids, my dad was my hero. I thought he was capable of anything. So, when he swam back to shore and I could still see the ball in the distance, it’s fair to say I was disappointed. In short, I wanted my ball back.
Standing at the water’s edge, he pointed to where it was, bobbing further and further away. I felt very let down that he’d come back empty-handed. And I let him know it, too.
“You can still get it.”
“Graeme, it’s too far out.”
It didn’t look that far to me, a point I expressed pretty sharply.
“The tide’s taking it,” he tried to explain.
Perhaps the concept of tides was too difficult for a six-year-old. It was another thirteen years before I experienced the terrifying pull of the sea as a Moroccan beach seemed to recede very rapidly from my line of sight. And the overwhelming sense of relief as I somehow managed to scrabble my way back to shallow waters.
To this day, I don’t know whether my dad had ever gone through a similar experience, but he knew what he was talking about. I didn’t.
Hands on hips, I looked up at him and, in the manner befitting a child who isn’t getting their own way, let him know just how disappointed I was in him. After all, this was my hero. He was my Simon Templar, my Robin Hood, my Tarzan.
“Aren’t you brave enough?” It was an idea that was, frankly, shocking to me.
Exhausted from swimming against the tide, and faced with a similarly unreasonable question, I’d like to think I could show the same level of patience he did (I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t).
“Sometimes, Graeme, there’s not much difference between being brave and being stupid.” He glanced out to the ball. “I’m not going to be stupid today.”
Naturally, this quite profound life lesson went straight over my head at the time. And yet, strangely, the incident and the words stuck with me, until one day they made sense.
I’d like to say my dad was not only a great sportsman, but a philosopher too. But I can’t. Like each and every one of us, he was a flawed individual, and over the years I learnt as much from his mistakes as I did his wise words. And I’ve learnt even more from my own mistakes, especially from my youthful certainty that I was right, that I was invincible, that I would be my own hero. But that’s part of growing up.
Now, as a father myself, I see my children making their own mistakes, and hoping they’ll learn from them too. I’ve shared my words of wisdom, and hope they’ll remember some of them when the time is right. Sometimes those words have been dressed up in stories – because sometimes it’s easier to learn when you’re being entertained.
And I do like to tell stories.
Graeme Cumming
Graeme Cumming lives in Robin Hood country. He has wide and varied tastes when it comes to fiction so he’s conscious that his thrillers can cross into territories including horror, fantasy and science fiction as well as more traditional arenas.
When not writing, Graeme is an enthusiastic sailor (and, by default, swimmer), and enjoys off-road cycling and walking. He is currently Education Director at Sheffield Speakers Club. Oh yes, and he reads (a lot) and loves the cinema.
When I woke up that Saturday morning, little did I know that something I was hiding from view from others was about to have the key put in the ignition and set me off on a journey that was to become the life I was born with.
True Stories: Gay Memories
It was a Saturday morning like any other Saturday morning. I always got up first because I’m an early bird.
After breakfast, I’d sit down and watch Multi-Coloured Swap Shop – a children’s TV show on Saturday morning.
The theme to the TV show Swap Shop
The fact that I was 17 years old didn’t put me off from watching it. I loved watching it. It got my weekend off to a perfect start.
Just after midday, I always went into town to buy an array of snacks for myself for the evening. I still preferred to spend Saturday evenings indoors watching television like I did on Saturday mornings.
My parents thought it unusual for a boy my age to want to stay in on a Saturday evening. At the time, I thought they knew nothing about why I did not want to go out. Years later, I discovered my mother had already suspected I was gay.
Whereas boys my age were going out to drink alcohol and date girls, my Saturday evening treat was the snacks (including a small trifle from Marks & Spencer) and Saturday evening television.
I always visited the same shops to browse or buy something. On this particular Saturday, though, something I’d seen on TV that morning made me go into a shop I hardly ever visited.
Scanning the shelves full of newspapers and magazines for the music newspaper I wanted, it soon caught my eye.
On the front was a picture of the singing duo Chasand Dave. I didn’t particularly like their music, but I found both men sexually attractive.
Picking up the newspaper, I flicked through it, pretending not to notice the picture and taking little, if any, notice of who was around me.
Towards the back of the newspaper, I stumbled upon the advertisement section, and one of the adverts immediately got my attention.
It was a significant point in my life that opened a door and invited me to step through.
I didn’t personally know any other gay people, yet here was an advert in a music newspaper about a world I belonged to yet knew little of.
Gay? Then you should read Gay News. Once fortnightly. For a copy, send a postal order for (I can’t remember how much) to –
At that moment, a member of staff entered the shop and shouted over to the cashier –
“I see the library is open again, Karen.”
She was referring to me and a few other customers who were all flicking through various newspapers and magazines. I quickly closed the paper to see if anybody noticed me reading the advert.
At that point, I wanted to put down the paper and rush out of the shop, but the chance of being in touch with other gay people stopped me from doing so.
I told myself to be brave, quickly walked over to Karen, and nervously placed the newspaper by the cash register. “Got everything you need today?” she asked me as she pushed the keys on the cash register.
Nodding my head, I could feel myself blushing. I thought she knew which advert I’d been reading and was about to stand up and announce, ‘This one’s queer!” Of course, that never happened.
As I walked home, my heartbeat raced. I kept looking behind to check if anyone was following me. After all, unlike my straight friends, it was still illegal for me (as a gay man) to have sex with a same-sex partner until I was 21.
Precisely one week later, I waited patiently for the postman to arrive. When my first copy of Gay News came through the letterbox, I rushed downstairs before anybody else got to the post.
I was relieved that the people at Gay News did as they had promised to do in their advertisement. My copy of the paper arrived in a plain brown envelope.
My hands shook as I took the envelope up to my bedroom. Carefully tearing it open, I allowed the life I’d been hiding to start coming out of the closet.
Have you ever had a life-changing moment? Contact me if you’d like to share the details in a guest post.
Did you enjoy reading this post? Then you may also enjoy my new series. Click the link below to be taken to the first post.
I’m delighted to introduce Paul Ariss to my blog. Paul is a songwriter, screenwriter and new to blogging.
Guest blog post by Paul Ariss
Paul shares a true story about travel which gave me goosebumps when I read it because I knew exactly what he was experiencing.
Over to you, Paul.
Image Credit – Paul Ariss
In the early evening of Wednesday, 28th October 1987 I walked into a bar in rain-sodden Flagstaff, Arizona with Randy Jones, a two-tour Vietnam vet.
I’d met Randy hours earlier that day, just minutes after midnight in Albuquerque bus station.
Randy was a mad-eyed but good-hearted individual who happened to be stopping off in Flagstaff himself on the way west to an altogether different destination. Randy and I were polar opposites.
Probably fifteen years older but with a lifetime more living, Randy had fought the Vietnamese in the Mekong Delta and had spent the last two months in a cave in the Rocky Mountains killing animals for his supper.
I was a pasty-faced young English office-worker whose closest shave with conflict was with a drunk in an airport who’d subsequently fallen over his own suitcase.
Yet somehow, me and Randy hit it off immediately.
After getting off our Greyhound bus and booking into our motels we decided to find a local bar, and there we laughed about the cultural differences between the US and the UK, and I let him tell as little as he felt able to share about his time as marine.
Mostly however he was fascinated about my overwhelming desire to see the country that had demanded of him as a young man to go and fight but had largely abandoned him since he returned home.
We were joined after a short time by a huge bear of a Native American man who largely just smiled and kept his own council.
But it’s true to say this night I was restless and struggled to stay convivial. After a couple of beers, I made my excuses and headed back to my motel. I had an inexplicable need to be alone.
By now the late afternoon had given way to early evening and the darkness through my motel window matched my state of mind.
Keeping Hold Of The Promise To Myself
Just ten years earlier I had made a vow to myself that I was now just hours away from fulfilling. At the time of the promise I was unemployed, and giving £5 of the £7 per week Social Security to my recently widowed father for board and keep.
Contrary to the punk counter-culture so many youths of my age were immersed in at the time, I was spending my days listening to the Eagles and dreaming of the open highways of America.
But I was a dreamer without substance. On the day I signed on for social security benefits, I was two-thirds of the way through an 18-months stint of unemployment.
Drenched by a steady drizzling rain, I needed something to aim for, something so far removed from my current situation to be almost too ludicrous to consider.
And then it came to me. I made the decision that one day I would get to The Grand Canyon.
Geographically it was over five thousand miles away from my small town in north-west England, though metaphorically it felt closer to a million. But right at that moment the thought of eventually getting there made the day feel that little bit more bearable.
And so it was, with a decade of steady employment behind me and a modest but committed savings plan I had enough for the journey and sufficient fire in my belly to make the trip.
My anticipation had remained unquenchable and here I was finally about to satisfy that first.
So why was I so downbeat on the eve of seeing one of the most stunning areas of natural beauty on earth?
When The Final Step Is The Hardest
I was lonely. Not for company, but for home.
I had been travelling on buses for nearly three weeks criss-crossing from one exciting destination to another on a plan of my own volition taking in New York City, Niagara Falls, Philadelphia, Nashville, Gracelands, Dallas, Denver; almost every day a new adventure, a new place I’d always heard about but never thought I’d visit.
Yet now, the day before reaching the destination I had planned and saved for over a decade, was the time I most wanted to be home.
The irony was crushing. I sat on the floor of my motel room and wept. Just a little. This feeling wasn’t what I had planned for.
I turned on the TV, a recording of Billy Joel live in Russia from two months earlier, the first rock star to play there post-Glasnost. Though not a massive Billy Joel fan, his energised demeanour helped fire me up.
“Don’t take shit off no-one”, Joel told an ecstatic crowd, each one no doubt loving the feeling of finally being able to let loose after a lifetime of social repression.
Oddly, a spark re-lit within me, enough to pick my emotions up off the floor and settle them enough to sleep after my long day of travelling.
I awoke the next day and pulled back the curtains to a welcoming early sunrise.
A slightly worse-for-wear Randy joined me for breakfast, telling me how the Native American had carried him back to his motel room at 2am. It seems I was right to have left early!
Randy saw me get on the shuttle bus that left for the Canyon.
Image Credit: Paul Ariss
Less than two hours later with a barely controllable anticipation I walked through a huge double door to finally see the most incredible, majestic wonder I’ve ever witnessed.
I smiled broadly and said hello to the Grand Canyon. We had finally met. I had travelled the millionth mile.
Image Credit: Paul Ariss
It had been a long, long journey but worth every step.
Later I thought about Billy Joel, performing so far from home yet feeling a kindred bond with strangers who had lived a life so culturally at odds with everything he knew. And I thought of my new friend Randy who had met someone in me who had expressed a feeling for his own country he had maybe lost something of over the years.
I thought of the Native American whose forefathers had their land ripped from them by Randy’s ancestors, yet felt the simple human instinct to carry him back to where was safe.
And as I turned away from the Grand Canyon at the end of that day my mind went back to where this had all begun and where for me the greatest riches still lay.
Home.
Writer and Blogger Paul Ariss
Paul started off as a lyricist in a song-writing partnership, before branching out into writing scripts. He’s now back to music, writing and recording solo material.
As a songwriter Paul has had songs published as part of a partnership, and as a solo writer has reached the semi-final of the UK Songwriting Contest and had a track chosen as Pick of The Week on a New York based online radio station.
As a script writer Paul has had material used on BBC radio shows on Radio 2, 4 and 5, and has been short-listed in two major script-writing contests as well as working as a Shadow Writer on Channel 4 comedy-drama Shameless, where he also contributed to its online platform.
Paul is new to blogging after getting the blogging bug in May 2020. He plans to increase his output very soon! His blog is called Songs and Scripts and Dunking Biscuits and can be followed by clicking here.
Songs from Paul are now on Spotify and all major streaming platforms have music videos to accompany them on YouTube, all of which can be accessed via his song-writing Facebook page.
Have you ever encountered the feelings Paul shared in his guest post?
My thanks to Paul for writing this guest post. If you have any questions or comments for Paul, please leave them in the comments section. He’d be delighted to hear from you.
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One of the biggest regrets of my life is that I never sat down with my mother and told her that I am gay. I chose, instead, the easy option of writing to her and telling her that I was a homosexual.
Facing Mum for the first time after writing that letter, I felt very nervous as I travelled to her home. I hesitated several times before walking up to the front door, ringing the doorbell, and announcing my arrival.
What a shock I got when she came towards me with open arms and, as she gave me one of her wonderful hugs, heard her whisper, “I always knew, I don’t know why it took you so long to tell me.”
Me and mum. Taken sometime in the 1980s, just after I had told her I was gay.
Not all my family was like mum, though. Some told me they were having difficulty accepting what I was because it wasn’t the sort of thing that happened to men in the area we came from. Hurtful words, but I already knew that the best thing I could do was to keep away from those who were upset by the life I was given, and let them live their lives as they wanted.
Over the years, I regained contact with some of those family members and, thankfully, have the changing face of society to thank for bringing us back together.
The fact that, in the past, there had been a few other men in the family who had never married never seemed to raise any suspicions that the family included gay people. It may have been discussed, but never while I was in the room.
I don’t know if any of those men ever ‘came out.’ Probably not, but it must have been tough for those who were gay when they lived. This made me more determined to live my life as I wanted and not as others expected me to.
Moving to live and work in London in 1986 was one of the most important decisions I’ve ever made. Although the city acted like a wall that seemed to shield gay people, I was still struggling to ‘come out.’
It was a strange situation because the first two jobs I took in London were in industries where other openly gay people worked.
When I took my next job, which would last 23 years, it took me six years to come out, and that was only when I heard the words “Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?” Of course, nobody cared that I was gay, yet for all those years I had been terrified of what some of my work colleagues would think about me had I ‘come out’ of the closet.
Fast forward to today, and being gay is widely accepted by much of society. Or is it?
When we moved to our current home in South Wales, both my partner and I felt a little hesitant about whether people would accept us. There are fewer residents here than in the area where we had lived for over 30 years. We were returning to that place where I’d been told that ‘being gay didn’t happen.’ We could not have been more wrong!
People have been so welcoming, and we’re as much a part of the community as anyone else. Strange, though, is that every now and again, when I meet somebody for the first time and am asked who the other guy who walks our dogs is, I find myself hesitating before saying, “He’s my partner.”
Maybe some of the scars from our past never heal?
Swansea Bay. A 5-minute walk from our new home.
All photos in this post belong to me, Hugh W. Roberts
What? I almost married Lara Croft? OK, I don’t mean ‘the’ Lara Croft, do I, just somebody else with the same name as her?
Well, no, I mean the most famous Lara Croft there has ever been. She is a full- has the body most men desire and most women envy.time tomb raider and
Our relationship started in August 1997 when a friend loaned me a copy of “Tomb Raider” for the Sony PlayStation 1. I’d had the PlayStation for some months but was already bored until my friend introduced me to Lara Croft.
When I inserted the game disc into the PlayStation and pressed the play button, I fell in love with the only woman who would ever pull at my heartstrings.
I would spend countless evenings, nights, and weekends with Lara. It even got to the point that I would no longer go out on a Saturday night. Instead, I would spend the evening at home with Lara while my friends danced the night away, having fun, socialising, meeting new people, and enjoying each other’s company, while I only had eyes for Lara.
She’d take me to far-off places worldwide, Peru, Mongolia, Egypt, and India, to name a few. She’d protect me from killer bats, bears, lions and weird monsters I never knew existed. I followed her everywhere and ensured nothing horrible happened to her while on our travels.
I even remember that Saturday afternoon, I sat down with her at 5:15, and before we knew it, the clock told us it was 4.05 Sunday morning. But it didn’t matter then, as we were both in love and saw each other daily.
The day we got engaged was beautiful. By now, I knew I had met the perfect woman, and I was sure that Lara felt the same way about me. Why wouldn’t she? After all, I’d spend all my free time with her and tell my work colleagues about her. I know some of them envied me for having caught myself one of the most beautiful and sexiest women in the world, but others were happy for me and wanted to hear more about the adventures Lara and I were having.
I begged Lara to let me buy her an engagement ring, but she was having none of it. Well, not at that moment anyway, as she had dangerous work and would never forgive herself if she lost the ring while working. She promised me I could buy her an engagement ring just as soon as she had solved the mystery she was working on. But that day never came, and it wasn’t long after that when things started to go downhill, and our wedding day kept getting further and further away.
I’d gone everywhere with her on her first two adventures. While she worked at solving mysteries and puzzles, I earned the money that would pay for our wedding and first home together. We both knew that nothing could part us when she started her third adventure, but how wrong we would be. I’ll be honest and say that her experiences were getting too difficult for me. But that was because I’d started going out again, socialising, meeting friends, having a real laugh, enjoying the world around me, catching up on gossip, TV and the movies. Meanwhile, Lara continued her adventures without me, never wanting to accompany me.
“Most of your friends don’t like me”, she’d told me the day it all went pear-shaped, and I’d realised she was right. I also learned that Lara had put quite a big gap between my friends and me and that I was almost losing them and my life! Not only that, but she’d also put a strain on another relationship, the most important one, the one I’d had since 1993 and, to this day, is stronger than ever. Would my partner ever forgive me?
I finally ended my relationship with Lara and called off the wedding. I thought she’d be distraught, especially when I told her I was also selling my PlayStation. But she simply walked away with the man who had purchased the PlayStation from me, and I never heard from her again.
Do I have any regrets about what happened? No. I’m happy I found my life again and have never been tempted to contact Lara…Ever!
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