The Aching Void

I found this interesting blog, written by a bisexual married man in New York. I made different choices to him. He has a secret male lover and he's married, and I've always tried to remain faithful to my lady. Not moralising or criticising: everybody has to make their own choices. God knows I am very far from perfect. Very, very far. If you fall in love with a man, even if you don't actually make love to him, aren't you being unfaithful? Which is the greater infidelity, to love someone other than your wife, without sleeping with him, or to have safe sex with anonymous partners without involving your heart? I've been in love with a few blokes in my time. It cannot have been easy for my lady to live with. So, judge not, lest ye be judged. A curiously forgiving sentiment from St Matthew, who otherwise spends a lot of time talking about punishment.

A recent post on the blog highlights the very hard choices married gay or bi men face. It's written by a Mexican (and you have to admire his fluent use of 3 languages--how many Anglophones could do that?) and describes how he found out, totally out of the blue, that he was capable of loving a man. You can read the original post here.

That was the first time we made love. No second thoughts, no regrets, no alcohol. I just wanted to give myself to him, and I was craving the feeling of him giving it all to me. The sex was un-fuckin’-believable! No anal intercourse, but hot as I never thought sex could get. It was somewhat, aggressive? But tender at the same time. He was a man, I am a man and that empowered us both. There was no submissive/dominant role neither in him not in me. What I remember the most is that I was so damn turned on by the fact he was rock hard. When you have sex with a woman, you can tell when she’s aroused, but you have to pay attention to notice! Nothing is more graphically eloquent than a stiff cock to truly convey how hot you are for someone. Knowing that I had that kind of power; to turn him on, and having his throbbing cock to prove it, was like nothing else I felt before. We suck each other. We kissed a lot. I blew in his chest a huge load, he cum’s in my mouth while I beat the shit out him. We cuddle. No need to clean up.

From that day on we were together. I spend the best summer in my life traveling with him. We actually lived together as a couple the whole year. We spent Christmas and New Years. By the end of the term I had to return home to graduate. So did he. I left first, thank god I didn’t have to empty our place. We kissed, hugged and cried in the middle of the CDG Airport departures gate. I haven’t seen him ever since. We stay in touch a lot through skype.

I find it fascinating how often straight men approach love through deep friendship. Somehow they 'click' with another man, and if the circumstances are right, they become lovers. It suggests to me that this is natural, that it is wired into us as humans. I've talked to you about Cross Currents and It started with Brian. Although these are stories, they are partly based on the truth--I know, because I was lucky enough to get to know these guys--about mostly straight men who grew to love other men.

Later on in the post, the Mexican talks about what so many bi guys feel: If I get married, do I really have to live my life like you live yours [i.e., the life of the blog owner, having a hidden relationship with a man] in order to stop feeling this void inside me since I haven’t been with a man?

I've accepted most of the mildly shitty things in my life: poverty, getting old, having failed at so many things. But my need for male companionship leaves a void in me. Not sex, so much as love. Affection. Comradeship. That void aches. Every day. And I think every bisexual man feels this, sometimes. Is there a solution? Not that I can see. Religion provides no consolation, which it might for all the other slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, for according to the Abrahamic religions, we are evil abominations, and our sorrows and voids and unfilled needs are of no consequence, and if they are, it is no more than we deserve.