It's Been a Business Doing Pleasure with You: Stories of a Colt Studios Model

HAPPINESS

THE RECKONING

I had thoughts of a different nature from early on, dreams of manly men, everywhere, and always.

Instead of being just like Dad, I was a gay son, a warrior of man love, born into a family of soldiers. My secret was safe until that fateful night of confrontation. An interrogation by the commandant, my father, came from above one night when I was eighteen and had left evidence of my life strewn around the landscape of my world. My nasty gay porn collection was found out and left about by my darling younger brother Peter, in the midst of his own self-discovery. And my mother had found it and notified the authority, that being my father. Then there were the calls from men my parents were surprised to find out I knew; or rather, they knew of me. And there was ne’er a call from a girlfriend, no sign of girls. No girls.

I had gone to sleep that night a little early, tucked under my Sears bedspread, warring fighter jets in picture frames above my bed. I fell asleep only to be jolted awake minutes later by the door to my room being burst open and my father flicking on the overhead light.

I have reason to believe that you are a homosexual! he blurted out. I woke up real fast, erect at attention, and said all I could have at such short notice.

Uh-huh, I grunted back. I didn’t deny that he might have a reason, several in fact. Holy Most Shit! My father’s unbelieving and blank face changed to outrage and then to a horror of the most unimaginable kind. He moved his head in a slow No, as his eyes slowly narrowed, a short and well-bellied man looking like Napoleon at my Waterloo. Or was it Caesar just waltzing into my Senate? I couldn’t tell which since his Air Force buddies always called him Little Buddha anyhow.

Jesus fucking Christ, you’re...! he barked back to me as he slammed the door in his dark blind anger and confusion. Semi-stunned, I rubbed my eyes a bit and stared back at the door. Had this been part of some wishful dream of mine? No, this was no dream; this was a nightmare come true finally. Let the shit hit the fan, but batten down the hatches, mate—it’s going to be a long voyage!

This was it, D-Day deluxe for the gay son in the house von Snyder. I had waited for this battle all my teen gay days, both wanting and dreading for it to happen. I had backup plans but there was no Battle Royale; it was over before it began. My father had finally acknowledged something about me, but for the most wrong of reason a lieutenant colonel could have ever imagined. I had forced him to peer over that wall that many military dads have, the Oh my God, my son’s queer wall, and his fear of fears was realized the second I didn’t deny the charges. Instead I confirmed them: Uh-huh, I said back to the door. Horrors echoed down the hall. The house groaned.

The rest of the night was all angst as I lay in my bed wondering what lie ahead. Would I leave? Would I get the hell out of Killeen, Texas? Out of the stifling white bricked house shaded by cedars in a golf community by Stillhouse Hollow Lake?

I couldn’t wait. Wait to be kicked out? No, there was no chance of me giving up any of my dignity. Screw my father. Damn those fighter jet models floating above my bed, like butterflies now, fluttering down in spirals after a life of the Cold War between us, mocking the moment, uncertain. I struggled to sleep, a gay son now, soon to be on the road. True and free.

The anxious red dawn came quickly and thrust to me a reply, an answer to questions of my freedoms long denied. My exit here was entrance everywhere else. I knew I was a jutting All-American idiot for love and was ready for the rest of the world, and it was ready for me.

I didn’t have to wait long that morning to find out what my father truly thought of me. He left before I got up for work and not a sound could be heard throughout the house, as if a small neutron bomb had gone off in response to my gay volley hurled the previous night. I treaded lightly out to the kitchen, where my very short and mousey brown-haired mother and pesky and chubby brown-haired brother Peter awaited me. My brother launched his report from his perch.

Dad said no cock sucking son of his was going to college where he did. He said it quickly, staring back at his bowl of Cap’n Crunch.

Peter! My mom’s lame reprimand of him just made him more courageous. He knew his timing was ripe as well as mine. So Peter, my brother, just went on and on and over the rainbow, my rainbow.

He said that when he ‘comes home he’s going to run your ass out of his house with his goddamned shotgun.’ Peter turned to me waiting, for his day was coming. He had some definite gay flames showing.

I glanced over to my quiet mother, who had stopped eating, as if at attention to oblivion, mine. Then I turned to Peter. Are these direct quotes from him? I wanted to know and feel what it was Dad was feeling, as my next move was dependent on the accuracy of this report. Then suddenly Mom tried. He didn’t mean to..., she said, trailing off. Peter and I looked up at her and said nothing. As in other families across America, saying nothing was better than opening one’s mouth. Silence had power. Then I laughed out at the both of them. It doesn’t matter—it never has. I’m out of here. My mom tried again to somehow save something. He...but Jeff.... I cut her off. Sure, mom. This queer black sheep had had enough of their lies to themselves about what their son was, let alone whom.

What, wait until he gets his shotgun? Do you expect me to wait until tonight? I said. I don’t need to hear anymore—I’m leaving this morning. I left them both silent at the kitchen counter and went back to my room. I started to pack but a strange thing happened. As I tossed all that would fit into my Boy Scout backpack, tears started falling into the pack. The irony of using this backpack was not lost on me during that moment but it was not funny. It was all sad. I was using the pack to escape to a world I had known within myself, from a world I’d left by the wayside long ago—my normal boyhood. Then my gay boyhood tears joined my shorts and T-shirts to form a new me, a gay young man, packing out, getting the hell out, coming the hell out, free.

The pack filled fast and stood ready by the front door as I went back to the kitchen. For some reason I began to try to explain to my mom but she only pursed her lips and nodded as she tried to wipe the countertop again and again in futility. She would not say anything to Dad and risk insubordination.

She did not look up to her now-gay son. Peter just looked on, staring at his future. Going back to my room, I couldn’t tell if I was sick or exhilarated. Why doesn’t she try to stop me? But I knew why and it made me hate him even more. She agreed with the commandant, her son was queer, and she didn’t like it. Angry, glad, excited, and free, I grabbed more things from my room and went out to the Early American living room, burdened by a bar from Spain, and my father’s military rituals. Our dog Mach, a handsome black and rusty-trimmed Gordon Setter, followed me from my room, sensing as dogs can. He rubbed his head against my leg, as if to say, Don’t go, buddy, but I had to. He didn’t want me to go, because he loved me so. I reached down and rubbed his head the way he’d always liked it.

It’s okay, boy, I said. His look said he wanted to believe me, as best friends, but he knew better. I wondered if I would never see my best buddy again, which made me ache even more. Mom and Peter just watched me from the bowels of our kitchen as time seemed to slow down. To counter this void as I waited for my ride I’d called earlier, I turned on the TV, the great nullifier of the masses, and sat on the couch with Mach. We snuggled up one last time, my best and only friend. There came no words from the other two; they could not vocalize what no heart wanted to feel.

A loud car horn blurted out into our play within a play, as we were just humans being human to each other in a love-hate script of life. I arouse from the couch and headed to my pack by the front door. Mach followed loyally, tail wagging. The other two just waited from their kitchen stronghold and came out and went to the front door. I grabbed my pack and looked back at them and smiled. Mom tried a little smile that ended up a grimace; was it for me or her? Peter tried a little wave, a kind of I’m sorry, but his day would come. Mach seemed to sense the darkness of the moment and barked out at me once as if to say, Good-bye, buddy. The remnants of the perfect military family stood fast as I opened the front door and presented the real world before them. The walls stood at attention as well as the remnants.

Bye, I said.

Bye, the two small voices said.

I turned and gave Mach a great big hug. Bye boy. I’ll be back, I said, knowing I might not see him again. His big, sad eyes said everything there was to say about a dog getting left by the boy who had raised him and loved him. Then I picked up my pack and walked out the front door. I looked back to Mach and his loyal true eyes. My face contorted into pain. Eighteen years I had served, and for what? All that hard-assed military love I could have done without. The only love I felt was from my dog. There was only one thing to understand now. I bucked up and just wiped my face off.

I was free now, wasn’t I? At what price this freedom? It no longer mattered—I was completely free. I swallowed hard and walked gamely out to the curbside, my body tight and wound up. I didn’t know what lay next, but that was the scary beauty of it all.

I gazed back at the home that never was, at the three figures at the front door. My little mother, a perfect German-American house frau; my brother, a soon-to-be fairy tale, and Mach, the most loyal and true soul I knew. The house was like all the places we had lived, houses that were not meant to be homes, just dwellings. Not shelters of the mind and heart, but bunkers cold and gray, shelters of emptiness.

A single tear gathered in my eye yet refused to fall and be counted like the many before it. I got into my friend’s car and off I was to Houston and other friends I’d met. I saw my mom and brother turn away to go in, but not my buddy Mach. He stuck his head out longer. His sweet eyes just looked into mine to say, Bye, Jeffer. I’ll miss you, buddy. I kissed out the window at him and said, Bye, Maching Bird. I love you, booger. I kept looking back to him.

The car pulled slowly away as my thoughts drifted to times in my brat hood military and how it had shaped me, all my life, as we moved almost every two or three years. It never made me feel on solid ground, in a solid life. How I craved a white picket fence, gleaming in safe predictability!

God has his ways, and he was having fun with me. Life was always another assignment via the military; Vermont, Japan, Texas, California, Florida, Germany, Germany, Germany, Texas—never one place to call home for very long, no lasting friends, ever. At least any friends my parents would have wanted to know of. I would go on to find life and friends on my own solid ground, made by me and for me, even though my parents didn’t want to know that their son, one of them, was gay—or worse, a homo. My thoughts of men at an early age were more than mere passing metaphors. They were penultimate moments to a son well on his way—nay I say—practically skipping his way down the rainbow-bricked road.

It’s a laughable story to some, so let’s see what you think. You do think, don’t you? Good. Let’s hope you can feel as well. My gayness at ten was going nuts at an age most boys just wanted Hot Wheels, and not hot males.

THOSE OLD SOAP BALLS

Mom, Mom! I had yelled at the top of my ten-year-old voice, because at the time I had installed into myself a somewhat deep and vexing problem—rectally that is. My young gay mind had always been fascinated by these little pink and blue soap balls that sat waiting on the bathroom counter in a glass jar. In fact, everything about them was so nice and, well, clean that something overcame me, something queer I tell you. Those balls of soap seemed forbidden, mysterious, and round. Much like myself, I mused that morning. We were going to be one and the same. They were decorative, my mother told me. I agreed—decorative and then some. The very nature of them made it necessary for me to free them from their jar and taboo. They had called to my ears in little lilting voices, Jeffrey, Jeffrey. I decided to answer them.

Leaning out of my warm bath, I grabbed some pink and blue balls from the jar and sat back in the tub to soak. Then during the course of events I somehow managed to sit, lodge, and ram several of the beauties inside my tender yet curious and eager young butt. Dr. Freud?

It seemed that my fascination with dark and mysterious things began at an early age. I was a loner, left by myself to explore and create my own world. The military parenting I had was a gift; it propelled me into enlightenment...and a few other things. There was nothing that was forbidden, no guilt and no shame. Instead of a cold warrior I wanted to be a warm warrior; I wanted to feel all that life could give to me. Mom, I yelled again. She came running to my emergency not ready for the reality. What? she snapped at me, wondering what all the fuss was about. What could I say to her? How does a budding young man tell his mother that he had not one but several of her dainty soap balls up his ass? I opted for the innocent yet honest approach. I told her, as I looked over to the jar, that I had sat on them whilst taking a bath. A very disturbed look of questioning came over her face as she stood above the tub and me. She could not, apparently, believe her ears, shaking her head to dislodge what it was she thought she’d heard. What? What do you mean...what do you mean by ‘sat on’? Seemed she needed a more in-depth explanation. So I gave her one. I pointed at the jar of soap balls and then to my butt in the bath to help her understand the dire nature of my deep and slippery predicament.

Oh, my God! she gasped in panic, grabbing at me in anger at the foolish eroticism of my act. "I’ll bet you sat on them," she muttered under her breath.

Mother! She yanked me out of the tub and threw a towel at me. Wait here, she barked her tone a satire of frustration and disbelief. She turned and went into the hall to call the military hospital, even though she was a trained nurse, though I doubt she had training wheels for this. Evidently I had somewhat unnerved her.

Hello? Yes, my son of ten has..uh..he has..you see..uh..he has some soap balls up his rectum. She paused, listening intently.

Far away, loud guffaws and hilarity echoed down the halls of an Air Force hospital.

That’s right, I said soap balls! I don’t know, about an inch in diameter. What? How did he? Why are you laughing? How do I know? More laughter, tears on the other line. He sat on them if you want to know. What? How many? Several.

More laughs, the whole ward in hysterics. Exasperation is coming from my mom.

What can I do? Oh. Uh-huh. Okay. Yes. Thank you. Jeffrey Scott Snyder! She came fuming back to the bathroom. Little man, she began, move your little fanny over to that john and poop that, those, soap balls out this very moment! A finger pointed to the can; I needed no further instructions. It was all in the steely tone of her voice. So I jumped to it as she hovered over me. Deadly was her motherly stare as I tried to rid myself of my deeper convictions. So, little man, she dug in, just how many of them did we manage to squeeze in there during our bath?

I looked up—plop, plop. Oh, I don’t know.... Her eyes narrowed. I guess about.., Her eyes glare,. about six.

Six! Her eyes were as big as saucers now, but not her mind.

Six, she blurted again. Just be glad your father’s not home. Her hand went to her throat as she looked down at me. I tried to smile at this very delicate juncture but instead got plop, plop, plop, five? No wait. Plop. Yep six.

Yes, six, Mom, I said as if I couldn’t remember in the throes of my very own soap ball epiphany. Instead my rectum had to reply to her like a trained horse counting. She turned abruptly about and swept up the soap ball jar as she got herself out of that bathroom.

Go get dressed and say nothing to your father! she shouted from down the hall.

Was she kidding? I may have been but a gay lad but I knew this wasn’t something that would go over big with my father, the lieutenant colonel. Like I’d say, Gee, Dad, guess what? I just stuck six soap balls up my young yin-yang this morning! Isn’t that great, Dad?

And he’d say something like, So what do you do for a fucking encore?

What would I do for an encore? So he wanted encores, did he? Why, he’d have to wait years to find out. Encores, like revenge, are a dish best served cold.

No, today there would be no father/son gay discourse. I left the bathroom and finished drying in my room, climbing into bed, and thinking about the far-reaching powers of mothers on the planet. Screw dads. What did they know? Somehow moms always know something is different about that son. I also knew something was different about me then. So I ran to it as a child, laughing. And as I grew older I got a couple of skinned..well..knees, and a story to tell, and I’m still laughing. Ho, ho.

There were other times later on of, shall I say, excursions most boys my age never imagined. Like the time when I was ten and my mother caught me wading naked with a naked older teenage boy/man down the neighborhood creek. He was a jock and had asked me if I wanted to go wading naked! How could I have said no? The creek had lots of trees and grasses, so I wasn’t that bad. She spotted us from her car on a bridge over the creek.

Screech! She slammed her brakes on our yellow Oldsmobile Vista Cruiser. Jeffrey Scott Snyder! she yelled, seeing us amongst the reeds and such being young men of nature. You get your ass home! Okay. I knew I was in trouble then, though my spirit was soaring.

These were the early manifestations of a lifetime of men on the Plane of Eros in the House of Homo. I slowly explored everything in the name of life as a curious and horny young boy. Though isolated as a kind of brainy jock—yes, there was football and wrestling later—with Air Force–issue Coke-bottle glasses, I grew into awareness as I created worlds other than mine. My imaginary worlds provided protection from the real world, which I sensed didn’t like my thoughts about men. But I knew that if I wanted to survive I had to be a fighter, and retain the me of myself. I went from soap balls and solitude to freedom. I still have my freedom; the soap balls are resting in a jar. It was hard growing up in Texas queer, when the ruling religion in the Snyder fort was militarism and the ruling religion outside our fort was Southern Baptist. But in the eyes of a boy, all was beauty, even in Texas, even in me.

PINEWOOD DERBY DOWN

One night stands out distinctly from all others in my childhood. On that crisp, Texas autumn evening, a beer glass ranked higher than a boy’s life in the family of warriors, amongst the honor of good military men.

The memories that stick in a young mind, so strong and vivid, stand forever as sentinels—some guards of darker things, all metaphors. A life can be transformed one moment, or not. This was one of those moments, a cold and windy night, a night when stars fell from the black sky in answer to a boy’s sense of being nowhere and belonging to no one. That night, this boy wished that he could simply fly away from it, just like his father, the man who always just flew away.

For a month I had taken to my little rectangle of pinewood, shaping and whittling it with my Cub Scout knife and hands into a British green racer.

Every year my Cub Scout pack would hold these races, and now it had become my turn to race for my place in the sun. So every ounce of invention went into my racer: sleek aerodynamics, filed-down wheels, and some lead ballast in the front to help gravity pull it down the track. These Cubs cars