If this 1st day of November is to set the trend for the rest of the month, then it’s a fantastic omen. Last night I went to my first real gay party ever, and I had a wonderful time!
It’s so difficult to explain in words how I felt last night, how I’m still feeling now, and what the party was like. In a way, I wish I could paint it, draw it abstractly somehow, or transfer those sensations, feelings, and emotions directly, almost telepathically, from within me to my readers…
It was an orgy of the senses. Entrancing and thrilling and liberating, and yet feeling so safe, so incredibly safe. To me, it felt wonderfully liberating and super safe.
It was an “Odyssey-themed” Halloween party in the town where I live, organized by the local gay community. One hundred and twenty six people attended, out of which I think there were about a dozen women. The rest were gay men, and I’m pretty sure the vast majority of them was cisgender. That’s what I had been expecting and one of my reasons for apprehension. I’m drawn to cis-men like no other group and yet, as much as I crave to be a part of different groups of men, I also still struggle. Struggle with being autistic and having difficulty reading in between the lines; struggle with having been socialized as a female, with having been perceived for most of my life as a girl or woman (& a physically/sexually attractive one); struggle with being gay (when I’m with straight men) and/or of being trans (& specifically not having a penis), with being high-libido asexual (when I’m with gay men). There are so many layers… And yet, last night, they all peeled off. Not instantly, not immediately, but pretty quickly. Wearing an outfit in which I felt relatively at ease and armed with the confidence coming from a few close friends who saw & approved of my outfit beforehand, I jumped into the mix. Trusting myself, my capacity to keep myself safe from harm, and also trusting the community into which I was stepping. Because after all, despite the stories or clichés about gay men being aggressive, that’s never been my experience with them and I trusted that the mere smallness of the local gay community would at least guarantee a level of safety due, if nothing else, to “peer pressure” coming from “everyone knowing one another”.
But I soon realized my apprehensions had no reasons here. While staying sober and to a certain extent alert all night, it took me no time to actually relax and truly enjoy myself. I stepped onto the dance floor almost immediately and there my magic started and spread out all around me. The palpable sexual energy in the room didn’t bother me in the least — on the contrary, it was fascinating, enlivening, inebriating, and liberating. Liberating for me because, at last, I was just another queer man in a group of gay men. The self-consciousness and concern about not having a penis fell away from me almost immediately. Did someone notice that I didn’t have a penis? Maybe. Did I worry about it for the three hours I spent there, dancing and socializing? No. I felt so comfortable in my body, in this beautiful body that is finally my own, in this sexuality that is finally my own (albeit complicated and somewhat still unclear to myself, too), so comfortable in this group that felt safe despite still being so new and relatively unfamiliar to me, that nothing else mattered. Only the senses mattered. The loud, entrancing music, the semi-darkness, smoke-effects on & off, my body moving, the beautiful bodies and sexual energy around me.
So much sexual energy. And yet, nothing creepy, just so alive. But also, probably feeling so welcome and comfortable to me precisely because I was a gay man among other gay men.
And then, I realize, I keep using the term “gay” for myself despite being aro-ace…
Usually, “gay” and “straight” refer to allosexual, not asexual, orientations. And yet, despite feeling firmly aro-ace, I also identify as “gay”, specifically as a gay man. I like being around men, and I realize that I’m drawn to men in a way that straight men are not. A straight man last night would have felt uncomfortable. I didn’t. I actually felt wonderfully comfortable and alive and in my element. And yet, I didn’t feel physically or sexually attracted to anyone last night — and I never do — despite all the palpable sexual energy and esthetically gorgeous bodies. I could feel the sexual energy and revel in it, embodying it and regulating it with my dancing and with fleeting, friendly interactions with some of the people there. So maybe what I experience is homoeroticity?
I’m not sure what to call it, but it’s there, it’s real for me and last night it was more palpable than ever. The homoeroticity last night was extremely palpable and in it, I felt comfortable, safe, and alive — like I belonged.
