A Guide For the Naïve Homosexual
page 14
Gay Friends


If you are a woman I will take you to Charlie’s III or Champagne Charlie’s or B.J.’s. I will put you in contact with a number of lesbian friends of mine who can answer all those questions that this booklet does not begin to answer.

If you are a man who does not like smoke, drink and crowds I will take you to the Bull Ring. I will tell you about the various groups we have organized such as: a chess club, a bridge club, a classical music droop, an alcoholics anonymous cell, an over 30 club and a swimming club.

If you do not live in town, I will be able to send you the name of someone who lives reasonably close that will help you out by talking to you and by introducing you to the gay circles of your area. If you want to send me a write-up about yourself, your interests, your age — anything you feel is relevant, I will pass a copy of it along to some of the people in your area who fit the description of the kind of people you want the material sent to. Enclose a few photographs as well — the kind machines cough out 4 for 25¢.

I may be able to help you meet any of the literally hundreds of gay girls and guys I know. I don’t like playing matchmaker because people feel forced to we nice to each other just because I lined them up. Sometimes they give up after their first experience and somehow feel all gays are like the first one what I prefer to do is gather as many people as possible in one place viz. my apartment or the club and let them do their own matchmaking. Only you know exactly what kind of people you like.

The instructions I gave were about how to go to the B&B (short for Betwixt and Between) private social club in Vancouver. But if you cannot go to this particular club, the procedure I described will work with minor variations I am sure you will be able to cope with at any of the private clubs mentioned in the appendix.

Gay Friends

Please expect no sex on your first time out. The main thing I can do for you is find you a friend that you can talk to. As for sex — you will be too awkward at first and you will be too eager and so you must not expect some handsome youth wrapped in gold foil to be plopped in your lap. It takes a few weeks to relax and to catch onto things and so sex takes care of itself only after a few weeks.

But if you are a very shy person, it will take a lot longer before your sex life takes off. Before you can have sex with someone you have to get to know them and if you awe frightened you will seem unfriendly and will never get to know anyone. This problem is especially acute for people 26 and over. After so many years of hiding their homosexuality, they have forgotten how to be open with people. They have no close friends as close friends right find out their, dreadful secret. They have forgotten how to make friends straight or gay.

If you are one of those people, go to the library and get a book on making friends such as Dale Carnegie’s How To Win Friends and Influence People. Also you will have to be patient with yourself, as it takes a long time to break down all those barriers you built up around yourself during those long years of feeling so alone. Don’t expect people to be friendly to you until you can learn to be outgoing yourself.

You may find clubs very depressing as they are designed for extroverted people. Try breaking into the gay world through other means — such as our chess club. Don’t feel you are a failure just because you cannot fit into the social swirl of gay life centred around the private social clubs — there is lots more to gay life than that, but it takes a little more patience to find it and break into it.

Don’t make the mistake of heading off to the club each week just for sex. It won’t take more than 6 months before the emptiness of such a life will send you into a suicidal depression. Try to make friends and treat those new friends with the same respect you would your straight friends. Some gays don’t think twice about breaking an appointment with another gay — giving no notice. If even you don’t consider your gay friends as equals to your straight friends, how can you expect straights to accept us as equals?

If you want to get rid of your guilt about your homosexuality, the only way to do it is to surround yourself with people who have already done so. Very few people in this world are strong-willed enough to break those shackles of guilt all on their own. Your friends can help you with this. They will also help you out if you get yourself in trouble. There is a one-for-all and all-for-one camaraderie in gay groups. When my typewriter was stolen, my friends pitched in and bought me a new one. When one of my friends runs short of cash, sometimes we will pitch in to bail him out. When another friend who could net speak English well) had his car stolen, we helped him out in explaining to the police what happened. Maybe I am just lucky, but I feel my gay friends are the must loyal bunch of people I have ever met.


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