Rod Stewart: Gay Rumors, Heterosexual Songs

This song has been going through my head for two days:

It's late September and I really should be back at school
I know I keep you amused, but I feel I'm being used
You led me away from home, just to save you from being alone

You stole my heart, and that's what really hurts

"Maggie Mae" (1971) is about a college boy who hooks up with an older woman, and finds that she has taken control of his life.  I had a similar experience with my first boyfriend Fred -- an older man (well, 28) who convinced me to leave home, drop out of college, and follow him cross-country to Omaha. I lasted five miserable weeks.

Rod Stewart's songs are overwhelmingly infused with "girls! girls! girls!" heterosexism, but when you are growing up in a world where gay people are assumed not to exist, you find meaning where you can. 

"Twisting the Night Away" (1972)
Here's a fellow in blue jeans, who's dancing with an older queen
dolled up in her diamond rings, twistin' the night away
Man you ought to see her go, twistin' to the rock and roll
Here you'll find the young and the old twistin' the night away

I didn't realize, at age 11, what a "queen" was, but by the time I got to West Hollywood, I did.

"Tonight's the Night" (1975):

Come on angel my hearts on fire
Don't deny your man's desire
You'd be a fool to stop this tide
Spread your wings and let me come inside

I didn't realize, at age 14, that this was a graphic image of heterosexual sex. I thought he was trying to get someone to "open up" metaphorically, to find an emotional connection.  During my first year in high school, I was trying, with little success, to find something "real," a boy I could actually care about, amid the incessant "date girls!  have sex with girls!" rhetoric.

"You're in my Heart" (1977).

I didn't know what day it was 
When you walked into the room
I said hello unnoticed
You said goodbye too soon

During my junior year in high school, I was depressed because I had never experienced this jaw-dropping, forget-your-name attraction.  Well, I had, but I didn't recognize it, because I thought that boys could only ever be attracted to girls.

"If Loving You is Wrong, I Don't Want to Be Right" (1977)
Your mama and daddy say it's a shame
It's a downright disgrace
Long as I got you by my side
I don't care what your people say

The song is about a girl in love with a married man, but it could easily be applied to "the love that dare not speak its name."

Back in the 1970s, Rod Stewart had the androgynous air of a drag queen in training, and his highly publicized friendship with "bisexual" Elton John raised some rumors.  But closeted gay performers are usually homophobic, just to be on the safe side, and Stewart has always been gay-positive. 

His "Killing of Georgie" (1977), about a gay guy who leaves his small town for New York, and then is murdered (not in a homophobic hate crime), was the first pop song to talk about gay rights. In 2016, he noted that his youngest son Aiden, age five, liked dressing up like a lady. so he might be gay (most likely transgender, or just having fun).

Tracking Down My High School Crush..

This is a photo from a February 2018 tweet about a high school swim team in the Quad Cities.

I'm interested in the one on the left, who has a very distinctive name, so I'll call him Bill to maintain his privacy. 

1. So extremely ugly that he resets the ugliness meter and becomes cute. Funny how that happens.

2. But respectable beneath the belt gifts.

3. Most importantly, he has the same last name as a boy I met during my sophomore year in high school -- "Scott F." a freshman at St. Ambrose College, four years older than me, a thin, bushy-haired 19-year old with an enormous penis (I surmised from his bulge).

His girlfriend couldn't be with him because he was an atheist, so  I offered to try out my Nazarene soulwinning expertise.  I didn't manage to win him for Christ, but he became a frequent subject of romantic fantasies.

Could Bill be related to my long-ago crush?

1.  First I checked Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. No Bill F.___.

2.  Google: all I could find were newspaper articles about Bill's swimming career, plus one where he won an egg hurling contest at age 13.

 

3. Time to search on Facebook for other people in the Quad Cities with that last name.  There are about 15! I imagine they all belong to the same extended family, but which are Bill's parents?

Finally I found Aric who graduated from Moline High and is now studying electrical engineering in college.

Who has Bill as a friend!  Here are the two of them together, before Bill F___ went blond and pushed the ugliness barrier.

I overlooked Bill F____  before because his profile pic is a Led Zeppelin album and there's no information, other pictures, or friends listed.

4. But Aric  has a lot of Facebook friends with F___ last names.  I rummaged through them until I found the profile of Anne, with photos of Bill and Aric (and another boy) as children -- their mother!

5. Then their father is Todd,  who graduated from Rockford High School and now lives in the Quad Cities, where he works as a golf pro.

6. Todd is friends with nearly everyone with the F____ last name:

Aiden
Curtis
Lester
Ty

For obvious reasons, I checked the women last:
Leticia
Susan (is that Bill with her? Maybe a cousin.)
Tamara

7.  Tori, an elderly woman who worked at Rockford High School for many years.  She has only three photos on Facebook:  one of her house; another of her standing in front of a "Swimming and Diving" logo; and a third of a high school or junior high swimmer!

Looks like Bill from a couple of years ago.

And "My handsome husband, Scott!"

Scott doesn't have a profile on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter.  But he must be the same Scott I knew -- and fantasized about.



Um...so this is what he looks like now.

4 years older than me -- I guess he's 63.

When you don't see someone for a long time, you forget that they get older. I was unconsciously expecting the same thin, bushy-haired twink that I met when I was a 15-year old, not-yet-out Nazarene boy.

See: In Bed with my Girlfriend's Boyfriend

The Best Week of the Best Month of the Best Year for Music

The best year for music was 1977, the best year March, and the best week March 14th-20th  It's a scientifically proven fact.

I was a junior at Rocky High, 16 years old (but not able to drive yet).  I had learned that gay people exist last November, but I hadn't figured "it" out yet.  I don't remember anything specific from that week, but probably Darry and I worked on our heroic fantasy novel, Verne the Preacher's Son and I double-dated, I ran around the track during free days in gym class, I read poetry at Writers' Club and practiced for the jump quiz.

And dreamed of a world where I didn't have to answer the question "what girl do you like?"every five seconds.  I dreamed of freedom.

And I listened to the radio.

1. "Evergreen" (Barbara Streisand, the theme from A Star is Born.  My brother was obsessed with that movie, and played the sound track over and over.  Whenever I hear it, I think of him, how he was the first person I came out to, and how he was ok with it, in small-town Illinois in 1978

Love soft as an easy chair
Love fresh as the morning air

2. "Fly Like an Eagle" (Steve Miller Band)

I want to fly like an eagle, to the sea.
I want to fly like an eagle, let my spirit carry me.
Oh, there's a solution.

I wanted to fly like an eagle, out of Rock Island and over the prairie to where the lights were bright and there was joy everywhere.

3. "Dancing Queen" (ABBA)

You are the dancing queen

Young and sweet

Only seventeen.

You can dance
You can jive
Having the time of your life

I was only sixteen, and Nazarenes thought that dancing was a sin.  Probably jiving, too.  This song offered a glimpse of a seductive, alien world.  Maybe I wanted to be a dancing queen.

4. "Year of the Cat" (Al Stewart)

There's a hidden door she leads you to
These days, she says, I feel my life
Just like a river running through
The year of the cat

Many songs of the 1970s were about time passing quickly, your life slipping away into nothngness.  I didn't understand then.  Now I do.

But in 1977 I was more interested in the hidden door.  What secret world did it lead to?  A disco full of dancing queens, perhaps?

5. "Go Your Own Way" (Fleetwood Mac)

You can go your own way,  go your own way
You can call it thunder. 

At least, that's the way I heard it.  I wanted to go my own way, avoid the trap of job-house-wife-kids, find freedom, and call it thunder.

6.  "The Things We Do For Love" (10cc)

Like walking in the rain and the snow
When there's nowhere to go
And you're feelin' like a part of you is dying

And you're looking for the answer in her eyes


Of course I know it's heteronormative now, but in 1977, who cared?  I always was looking for the answer in someone's eyes.  Or someone's bulge.

7. "New Kid in Town" (Eagles)

The Eagles was a group for "real men," an antidote to the glistening feminine disco crowd.  I can't help it that their songs were always so wistful and melancholic.  I wanted to walk away and escape the constant gossip.

There's talk on the street; it's there to remind you
It doesn't really matter which side you're on.
You're walking away and they're talking behind you.
They will never forget you till somebody new comes along.


8. "Hotel California" (Eagles)

"Relax," said the Nightman. "We are programmed to receive.  You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave."

I was trapped in Rock Island, trapped in a heteronormative prison, and there was no way out.

9. "Carry On, Wayward Son" (Kansas)

Kansas was another group that specialized in sad songs about the futility of life, just what an angst-ridden not-yet-out adolescent wanted to hear.  Except I couldn't figure out how you could "carry on" and "be gone" at the same time.

Carry on my wayward son
For there'll be peace when you are gone
Lay your weary head to rest
Don't you cry no more

I'm starting to get depressed.  Here are some swimmers celebrating a victory.

Uh-oh.  Now I'm thinking of Queen: "We are the champions, my friend..."

Revisiting Luther College, the Site of my First Sexual Experience

I  had my first sexual experience when I was fifteen years old, at a summer music camp at Luther College, in the far northeastern corner of Iowa  (See: Spending the Night with Todd).

It was a memorable week for other reasons, too: hanging out with real college boys in the dorm lounge, touring the town of Decorah with two cute cellists, buying books in the college bookstore (The Iliad), feeling a little frisson of Nazarene dread at the presence of so many Lutherans.

Having free time, without every moment of my day planned out, like at Nazarene summer camp.  The first time I really felt free.

I always thought of Luther College as ultra-conservative and homophobic, which makes having my first time there especially ironic.

But it turns out that they've had a LGBT student club since 1979. They have a LGBT student center and a PRIDE festival and classes with gay content.  Plus classes on topics like neo-colonialism and Islamophobia.

They have an online gallery with hundred of photos of every aspect of campus life, from art class to guest speakers to swim meets to the statue of Martin Luther.  Thus allowing us to check the beefcake potential.  Are there still cute college students hanging out in the dorms and the student union?

Wrestling singlets are always nice, of course.

Even those of rival schools.

And there are many beefcake photos taken at the swim meets.

But what makes Luther College unique are the candids, shot after shot of guys going about their business, walking across campus, posing with friends and romantic partners, taking selfies.  Sometimes shirtless and buffed.

Sometimes just shirtless.

Usually neither.

I like these photos the best. They remind me of that long-ago week at Luther College, where everything was fresh and new, and I could hang out with cute college guys in the dormitory tv room.

The Swim Team Jock and the Ridiculous Name

After 40 years, I'm still fuming about the American history class I took during my sophomore year of high school, in spring of 1976, when Mr. Manary told us that sometimes pollsters make up names on
survey questions, to see if respondents are answering honestly.

Shortly thereafter, he gave us the names of some potential candidates in the upcoming presidential election, and asked which one we favored.

One was Birch Bayh.

"Birch Bay?" I exclaimed.  "What a stupid name, obviously fake."

Birch "Bye", David, a very cute and bulgeworthy swim team jock, said.

"Yeah, bye-bye, Birch!" I continued.  "No one's going to be fooled by such a stupid name. Birch Bay!"

Birch "Bye," David repeated in frustration.

Guess what?  There really was someone named Birch Bayh (pronounced "bye"), an Indiana senator who really was seeking the Democratic nomination for president that election year, but would drop out after the primary (Jimmy Carter ended up defeating Gerald Ford).

How was I supposed to know that impossibly obscure bit of trivia?  I couldn't even vote yet. And how did a swim team jock know it?

Turns out that everyone in the class EXCEPT ME knew it.  I was usually the smart kid, but now I was the dolt.

And my lack of political savvy summarily ended the possibility of getting with the cute and bulgeworthy swim team jock.

I still think it's stupid for someone with a last name "Bayh" to name their kid Birch.  I suppose if their name was McKinley, they'd name him Mount.

Birch Bay happens to a town and a state park just north of Bellingham, Washington, near the Canadian border.

So who is this jerk named after a bay?

Born in 1928, Birch was elected to the Indiana House of Representatives in 1954, and continued in politics until 1981.  He was a liberal Democrat who favored the Equal Rights Amendment and Title IX.

Birch had two sons, Evan and Christopher.

Christopher is a lawyer in Indianapolis, and Evan is a conservative politician, a Indiana state senator and governor from 1989 to 1997.  He's anti-abortion but pro-capital punishment.  He wants to ban flag burning but not same-sex marriage.

His twin sons, Beau and Nick, are now attending Harvard.

They are rather buffed, but that doesn't excuse some crazy person from naming their kid Birch Bay. Who is the culprit responsible?

Turns out that Birch Bayh is the son of another Birch Bayh (1893-1971),  an Indiana University basketball coach.

The original Birch Bayh grew up in Quincy, Indiana, son of  Fred C. Bayh (1871-1947), a blacksmith and hardware merchant.

So it's Fred's fault that Birch Sr. and Birch Jr. got ridiculous names and tripped me up in American history class.

And that every time I try to do a google search on "Birch Bayh," it says "here are the results for Birch Bath.  You didn't really mean Birch Bayh, did you?  That's ridiculous!"

My Date with my High School Boyfriend's Grandson

Charlotte, July 2017

During my junior year at Rocky High, back in 1977, my best friend/ersatz boyfriend was Verne, son of the local Nazarene preacher.  A senior, hoping to become a minister, and painfully handsome -- you look at him, you wilt.

He was one of those guys who could get anything he wanted -- extra dessert from the lunch lady, an extension on the homework from the teacher, a date with anybody, anywhere -- just by flashing that smile.

And he was massive, and tanned, with enormous hands and enormous everything else.

Sigh.

We didn't do anything sexual.  I hadn't figured "it" out yet. But we talked about going to Olivet Nazarene College together and then becoming preachers at the same church, senior pastor and youth pastor, living next door to each other forever, a gay couple in everything but the name.

Sigh.

But Verne was also canoodling with girls.  In September 1977,  the start of my senior year, his freshman year at Olivet, one of his girlfriends ended up pregnant, so he dropped out to marry her.

Verne's dad resigned immediately, of course.  He couldn't continue to preach after that sort of scandal. And I was so upset over Verne's "betrayal," the loss of our future together, that I cut off all contact.

Years passed.  I went to college and grad school, moved to West Hollywood and New York and the Straight World, had boyfriends and lovers. Verne receded into memory.

Until a few months ago, when I was snooping among my sister's Facebook friends, and found Verne's sister, and then Verne himself.

He lives in Charlotte, North Carolina, where he runs some sort of business consulting firm that wrangles $700,000 per year (according to Linkedin)

59 years old, but still painfully handsome, with no cragginess, no wrinkles.  You still look at him and wilt.

Which, I imagine, is good for business.  He smiles at you, you're signing up for his service.

Verne was delighted to reconnect. "Man, remember all those crazy nights?  The double dates?  That camping trip?   Our plans to conquer the world?"

And then: "Hey, why don't you come out for a visit?  After all the stories, my daughter and her family would love to meet you!"

Well -- seeing old friends after 40 years is rather awkward, but  with that smile, he could say "Why don't you hop here on one foot?", and I would do it.

 Besides, I could fly out to Charlottesville to visit my friend Jonathan Peng Lee first.

And I was very curious.  Was Verne gay?  Was he single?  Could I get back a lost love?  Or at least get a sausage sighting?



So on July 30th I flew to Charlottesville (Bob stayed home with the cats)  After three days with Jonathan, it was time to visit Verne.

Sigh.

Flights were like $500, so I rented a car and drove down, 272 miles, with stops in Lynchburg and Durham, finally arriving at Verne's house about 5:00 pm.

He lived south of downtown Charlotte, so close to South Carolina that you could jump over the border.  A middle-class house, Georgian style, not the mansion I was expecting from the $700,000 thing.

Verne answered the door, smiled -- sigh -- and drew me into the back yard for iced tea and cookies. Oddly, we didn't talk about high school.  He told me about his business, and about his life in Charlotte -- coaching kiddie basketball at the Y, going to 49ers games (whatever that is), going hiking and fishing, church (not Nazarene), canoodling with an endless supply of lady friends.

"What do you want to do while you're here?"  he asked.  "I have the whole weekend free.  We could drive down to Crowder's Mountain -- some great hiking trails.  There's some museums in town."

"Well, I definitely want to go to the gym," I said, images of Verne and his locker-room sausage sightings rushing through my head.  "And I heard that there's a Vietnamese Buddhist Temple in Clover, South Carolina."

"I didn't know you were into Buddhism now.  You should meet my grandson Daniel.  He's 21 years old, majoring in Asian Studies at Chapel Hill.  Fluent in Mandarin!"

"Wait -- you have a 21-year old grandson?  How is that possible..."  I trailed off.  Daniel must have been born in 1997.  His mother, born in May 1978, was...19 at the time. Pregnant in high school, or just after?

Verne grinned.  "It's hard to believe that we're almost senior citizens, isn't it?  But you know what they say about snow on the roof -- I'll bet you get a lot of action, out on the Plains."

I gulped.  Surely he looked on my Facebook page and found out that I was gay.  I didn't make hotel reservations, so if he suddenly got violent....

Reaching into my pocket for my car keys, I said "Well, I have a steady er...boyfriend.  His name is Bob.  He's 21. Would you like to see a photo?"

"Really? 21, huh?" Verne seemed delighted.  "Now you have to meet Daniel.  You guys are going to hit it off like nobody's business.  I'll give him a call.  Hey, want to see a picture?"

Was Verne trying to fix me up with his grandson?

The full story, with nude photos and explicit sexual content, is on Tales of West Hollywood.

The Homophobic Horrors of Gym Class

The homophobic horror that is high school gym class began in 1855, when the state of Ohio made the ill-fated decision to require it of all students.  It took off during the 1920s, when "physical culture" was all the rage in Europe, and students were doing gymnastics in the yard.

By the time I entered junior high in 1972, the diabolical structure was in intact.

1. The "class" was actually called Physical Education or "p.e.," but only girls said that.  Boys had to say "gym."  Unless you used the term "class" with it, in which case it was "p.e. class," not "gym class."

Got that?  Better not slip up, or you would be called a "fairy" or a "girl."

2. The two most gifted athletes in the class would then become team captains, and choose their team members.  "Fairies" were constantly ridiculed and degraded during the process, and left unchosen at the end, while the two team captain argued over who had to take them.  "I'm not taking the fairy -- you take him!"  "No way -- no girls on my team -- you take him!"

Then we played a sport.  No instruction in rules or strategies -- the "teacher' assumed that we already knew the rules.  If we asked, we were yelled at: "Don't be a smart-ass!  You know the rules!"

3. In junior high the sport was usually dodge ball, which involves trying to kill each other with hard round projectiles while yelling homophobic slurs: "Take this, fag!"

4. In high school the sports were football in the fall, basketball in the winter, softball in the spring.  Same procedure: no instruction, two jocks picking teams and deriding the "fags" and "fairies" while the "teacher" looked on.







Football was the worst.  "Stand here, facing this big, hulking man-mountain.  You're going to try to stop him from passing this line."

I just stepped aside and let him through.

We also got brief instructional tours, single class sessions, of golf, archery, and tennis, barely enough to learn what the equipment looked like. 

And rope-climbing.  I never understood that one.

I was very happy during my junior year, when the "teacher" gave up and just gave us free days to do whatever we wanted.  I ran around the track.  No homophobic taunts, no humiliation, and no projectiles hurled at you.

I Spent My High School Years with Barry Manilow

Speaking of singers that you couldn't avoid hearing during the 1970s, I spent my entire three years at Rocky High and most of my four years at Augustana College  running in the other direction while Barry Manilow's syrupy love! love! love! love! crooning spewed forth from transistor radios, car radios, the p.a. at school, record stores, tv...but there was no escape.

Ninth Grade:
"Mandy": I remember all my life, raining down as cold as ice, sending Mandy away.

Well, he got that right -- all my life, I've remembered that song, no matter how much I don't want to.

"It's a Miracle": It's a miracle, a true-blue spectacle, that he is in love.

At least he's over his relationship with Mandy.

"Could it be Magic": baby take me, high upon a hillside, high up where the stallion meets the sun...come, come, come into my... 

This is the first song I heard that I knew was about having sex, although I wouldn't be asking anyone to come, come, come into my....for a few years.

Tenth Grade:
"I Write the Songs": I write the songs that make the young girl cry...I am music, and I write the songs...

Barry Manilow is music?  Rather full of himself, isn't he?

"Trying to Get That Feeling Again": he sees a doctor to get a pill, because he's gone up, down,all around,  trying to get that feeling again. 

You just need to relax, Barry.  It can be tiring going...um....up, down all around.

"This One's for You": This one will never sell, they'll never understand, I don't even sing it well.

He's got that right.  The song won't sell, he doesn't sing it well.

Eleventh Grade:
"Weekend in New England." Last night I waved goodbye, now it seems years -- I'm back in the city, where nothing is clear.  

I'd rather be in the city than stuck in a small factory town in the Midwest.

"Looks Like We Made It": Do you love him as much as I love her, and will that love be strong when the old feelings stir?  

Barry is talking to someone in love with a man about how much he loves a woman.  I can't figure out what's going on.

Twelfth Grade: 
"Daybreak" It's daybreak if you want to believe, it's daybreak, no time to grieve. 

Repeat 38 times. Don't try to figure out what it means. I hav no idea.

"Can't Smile without You": can't laugh, can't sing, finding it hard to do anything.  

So that's why his singing is so bad -- he's broken up with someone!   Quick, get back together!

"Even Now": Even now I think about you when I'm climbing the stairs, and I wonder what to do so she won't see.  

You still thinking about Mandy?  It's been four years!



"Copacabana": this one has a plot, about a showgirl with two boyfriends who shoot each other, so she goes crazy, and continues to come to the Copa, even though thirty years have passed and it's now a disco.  Sort of a Miss Haversham thing.  Cool.

When I was in college, his new songs started moving down the Top 40 charts.

Freshman:
"Somewhere in the Night": You're my song, music too magic to end.  

Wait, I thought Barry was music, and wrote the songs? So how can somebody else be music?

"Ships": We're just out of sight, like two ships that pass in the night. 

He's saying this to his father as they walk along the beach?  Seems weirdly romantic.

Sophomore:
"I Don't Want to Walk Without You."

We already know that Barry can't smile, laugh, or sing without you, so walking is a logical extension.

"Bermuda Triangle."  It's a region where planes disappear and weird things happen.  So Barry sings about losing his girlfriend in the Bermuda Triangle, except he means she got stolen away by another guy.

Junior:

"I Made it through the Rain." And I found myself respected by others who -- got rained on, too.  

At Augustana, we didn't say "I got rained on" to refer to people taking advantage of you.  We had an earthier expression.

I don't remember hearing any more Barry Manilow songs after that, but apparently he's been releasing an album every couple of years: Greatest Hits, Greatest Hits of All Time, A Swinging Christmas, Barry Manilow Sings Sinatra, Night Songs, Duets, The Essential Barry Manilow.  And performing live.  And not using the word "gay."

Oh, didn't I mention it?  He sang about ladies, but he never was seen on the arm of a lady. Everyone assumed that he was gay, but he never said anything, for fear that his fans were homophobic.

He finally came out in April 2017 at the age of 73, having been with his partner, Gary Keif, for 39 years, and married to him since 2014 (not pictured; this is just a random muscle hunk walking along the beach with him).

See also 12 Songs I Hated.