Category Archives: General

Bye, Bye, Burger

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cloth hamburgerI am saying goodbye to  the burger.  Thirty-eight years ago, I was taking art classes and working as a night assistant manager at a Hardee’s hamburger joint in Newton, Kansas.  In the course design-class exercises, I made a soft walnut, a la Claes Oldenburg–shell, nut meats, and all the papery dividers–made from cloth. After weeks of drawing and painting and color-matching walnuts, I began to look at my work world from a design standpoint too.  Each night, I trotted off to Hardees, where  I noticed the particulars of the Hardee’s hamburger (humble though it might be). Continue reading →

Wearing Cowboy Boots to Church

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cowboy bootsI wore cowboy boots to church today.  Why?  I would not have been caught dead in them when I was growing up in Kansas.  I never even owned a pair of boots until country dancing swept the bars sometime in the 90s.  Then, as a gay man, I would not be caught dead dancing without the proper footwear for the occasion.  And I discovered that I liked the way they made me feel–masculine and sexy.  How queer that being queer would turn me on to what epitomized its opposite in my youth.

But why wear those boots to church?  Continue reading →

Desire to be Desired

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old body figureI’ve been in this relationship nearly 30 years now. But I still check out the good looking men I see on my train ride and walk to the office each day. I fantasize about a little encounter. Would my Gay Old Soulmate object?  Maybe he’d be thrilled to see me actually try something interesting and a little risky for a change.

I’m at the age where I could use a novel adventure. But being “at the age” is just the problem. Continue reading →

Four Themes in Gay Old Soul Living

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As I become more and more a gay old soul, life’s challenges fall roughly into four themes: spirit, body, relationship, resources.

Candles

Spirit

After I first came out we dreamed of a fairy godbrother circle.  A sort of gay spiritual order with its own spiritual discipline to weekly:

  • Perform one action to nurture one’s growth
  • Perform one action to promote justice for others
  • Perform one action that is outrageously gay.

Continue reading →

Who Are We as Gay Old Souls?

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Who are we? The gay old souls. The men who cling to “middle age” while our bodies nudge us into elderhood.

We are sons of the original gay old souls. We follow the generations that at first finessed the closet and then shattered its doors. In the wake of the Stonewall generation, we took up the struggle to create an out, gay culture. A defiant and fierce people, we sought full equality in all aspects of business, society, education and spirituality.

We are the survivors, the righteous remnant of a lost generation. We lost more brothers than we can bear to remember and can never forget.

And ours has been a generation of firsts. Fill in the blank. “First openly gay . . . .” We accomplished far more than most of us ever expected. So much that a generation follows us that has little grasp of what “it was like back then.” There seems no need for them to take up the struggle–at least in this country.

So what is our role?  Now that the quest is nearly over?  What is the purpose of gay old souls?  What is our experience?

Age ought to bring wisdom.  For me it brings mostly questions.  But the journey still excites.

To Gay Old Souls Everywhere

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We are joining you.  Progressing in age.  Progressing in body. Progressing in spirit, in mind, in society and in economy.  It’s a new gay adventure.  For my generation, just being gay was an adventure.  We were the warriors–building on the foundation of the ancestors from Stonewall and before..

As we live into an age where gay seems nearly normal, if not equally legal, This website will explore the personal, relational, and spiritual experiences of progressing into our new existence.