The Obligatory Coming Out Story, Part 2

Louie’s Lower Level and My First Night at Jekyll’s

Previously on Battlestar Galactica…

One Wednesday night in February 1977, less than a week after David had moved out of our shared dorm room, I found myself sitting on a plastic folding chair in a brightly lit meeting room on the third floor of the UofA Student Union. I had just walked in to my first GSO (Gay Student Organization) meeting. After coming out to David, I asked myself, “What now?” This seemed to be the next logical step.

When I first walked in, I was immediately greeted by an older—and by older I mean he was probably all of 26 or 27—guy named Phil Oliver. He asked my name and said, “So…are you gay?”

This was the first time anyone had ever asked me point blank. Minor panic attack. Breathe and remember why you came.

“Yes,” I said. “Yes I am.”

“Good! We’re glad you’re here.”

About twenty other people arrived and introductions went ’round. I don’t remember anything of that—or indeed any other of the many GSO meetings I attended, but I most certainly do remember when the meeting was adjourned and we regrouped downstairs at Louie’s Lower Level for refreshments.

Louie’s was the so-called “hip” Student Union cafeteria located in the building’s basement. 30 years later all I can really remember of the place is lots of dark wood and the pervasive smell of greasy cheeseburgers. Well, that and John Marion deep-throating a frozen chocolate-covered banana there one afternoon—but that’s another story.

Apparently there was one table at Louie’s that had become the unofficial gay campus gathering place. I swear I must’ve been blind to this, because during the entire previous semester I had frequented Louie’s probably a hundred times or more and had remained completely oblivious to the crowd gathering there each day.

After that first evening, however, I started making the table at Louie’s a regular part of my day. I headed there for lunch and returned after my last class, oftentimes staying on through dinner. Soon I got to know all the regulars (some of whom were in the GSO and some who weren’t): Ric Hathaway, Abe Marques, Chas Dooley, Brian Lea, James Uhrig, John Maguire, and many others.

John Maguire and I soon discovered we shared many of the same interests, so we started hanging out. John was the guy who originally turned me on to Bette Midler, a performer who—as unbelievable as it seems to me today—I’d never heard of, by playing her then-new Live at Last album to death. Despite the fact he was fun to be around, John was not someone I was attracted to physically and apparently that was mutual. So I found it kind of odd that when we discovered admitted we were both still virgins, he suggested we do something to rectify the situation—together.

I didn’t exactly jump at the offer, but I was intrigued enough that I remember returning to my dorm room that afternoon with a knot in my stomach and agonized for hours before finally calling him and agreeing to at least give it a try. “If not now, when?”

Well, let’s just say that our mutual “first time” was a disaster. Perhaps disaster is too strong a word, but it was a small miracle that afterward neither one of us didn’t swear off gay sex completely.

About a week or so after this greatest disappointment of my young adult life, I was down at Louie’s, and Ric (who I found extremely attractive) asked what I was doing that night.

“Hmmm…Friday night. Probably going back to the dorm and watching TV.”

“Tina and I are going to Jeckyll’s. Why don’t you come out with us?”

“J-j-jeckyll’s?” I asked. (Jeckyll’s had recently started putting full page ads in the Arizona Daily Wildcat—the school paper—promoting itself as Tucson’s newest and gayest nightclub. )

“Yeah, sure. It’ll be fun. Here’s my address,” he said, handing me a slip of paper. “Come by around 9 and we’ll take Tina’s car.”

Lord have mercy! I was going to my first gay bar.

Butterflies does not begin to describe what I was feeling as I returned to my dorm room and watched as the minutes slowly ticked down to 9 pm. I showered and dressed, not having any idea what one wore to a gay bar. (I think I settled on jeans and a rugby shirt.) Around 8:30, with my heart just about leaping out of my chest, I locked my door and began walking over to Ric’s house.

My mind was racing. What would the bar be like? Would there be half naked men waiting to pounce on me the minute I walked in? Was it going to be freak central? What exactly was going to happen?

Ric and his roommate Tina knew they had a an absolute novice on their hands. Not only had I never been to a gay bar before, I’d never been to a bar before. To their credit, they made my transition into the gay club scene absolutely magical—and unforgettable. (Obviously!)

On the drive over I kept telling Ric (an old hand at all this at the ripe old age of 21) how nervous I was. “Relax,” he said. “It’s going to be fun. I promise! If you don’t like it, we can leave.”

At around 10 pm, after paying our $3 cover charge (outrageous!) we walked in. First impressions: the most incredible music (was that called disco? ) I’d ever heard, dim red lighting, that curious smell I later came to identify as stale beer and sweat, and an absolute sea of the most amazing—yet at the same time most innocuous—people I had ever seen. For the first time in my life, I was in a totally public venue surrounded by people just. like. me.

Guys—regular guys—dancing…together! Men kissing! Women making out! Lions, and tigers, and bears, OH MY!

Ric and I had a few cocktails. We danced. (Who knew I could dance?) We talked. We laughed. He introduced me to all his friends, including one of the most ravishing women I’d ever seen. After she left our table, Ric leaned over and said, “You know she’s a man, right?”

“OMG, really?” I said. “You’d never know!”

“She’d be very happy to hear you say that!”

So many misconceptions were shattered that night. Ravenous, sex-starved men did not pounce upon me, and three-toed freaks did not lurk in the darkness waiting to steal my soul. I discovered that for the most part Jeckyll’s was simply full of regular people, most of whom were fellow college students. They were shy and boisterous, stunningly beautiful and stunningly plain. The common thread that linked them all, however, was their affinity for what Oscar Wilde called “the love that dare not speak its name.” I felt like I’d come home.

In fact, I was so wrapped up all that was happening that it came as a shock when I heard, “Last call!” and realized that three hours had passed in the blink of an eye. Twenty minutes later the house lights came up, signaling the end of the evening—and indeed the end of my entire life to that point. In those three short hours, I had moved from one world into another, and nothing was ever going to be the same again.

(To be continued…)