I don’t usually reminisce on the blog, but you’ll understand why by the time I’m done with the story…

I moved to New York in 1990 to go to grad school. When I came here I was pretty inexperienced sexually. I had had sex for the first time just 8 months before, and had sex with a total of 3 guys at that point. A one night stand who was “my first”. An older guy I dated for the Spring semester of my Senior year before he moved to San Francisco, and a party boy I dated over the summer before I moved to NYC.

New York was like a big playground and I was this shy, sorta geeky, guy who didn’t know how to make the most of it. In hindsight I really should have gone to the big sex (“j/o”) club everyone was going to, but it scared me. I was taking things at my own pace, which in hindsight was way too inhibited…

Long story short, I ran up credit card debt (in part by going out to see the ex-boyfriend who moved to SF) and by the end of January I needed money. I knew there was a respectable hustler bar over on the east side – Rounds @ 53rd and 2nd avenue, so I went there and started doing sex work which I did for about 9 months to supplement my income.

Despite the fact that I had dated someone who did drugs every weekend, I hadn’t done drugs until after I moved to NY – and then only X and only a handful of times. One of those times was the Saint-at-Large White Party. I went out to clubs a lot back then, but the White Party was huge. I had nothing but these skimpy white little shorts on that didn’t leave much to the imagination. I remember seeing guys walking around in K holes… And then there was him – this adorable Latino who I saw on the dance floor. He was muscular, very little body fat, short, great smile – in other words totally my type (even today). I’ll call him “Alex”, but that’s not his real name…

He liked me, I liked him and we left the dance floor together. I was on cloud nine. From my perspective he was totally out of my league and here he was just wanting me. I had never had someone that hot want me before… We made out, talked (as much as you could in a club) and then he mentioned he was working the party – that he was a bartender and had to work the second shift.

If you know anything about circuit parties the White Party is up there and being a bartender at the White Party is about as good as it gets if you’re a bartender. When he had to go check in for work I followed him back into the kitchen and saw a guy from my gym. Alex asked me how I knew Jason and I said he went to my gym. I knew Jason managed a club – what I didn’t realize was that he had been the General Manager of the Saint, he was then the manager of the Saint-at-Large, and he then became the General Manager of the Roxy until it closed a couple years ago. Funny how small the world is – even in a city like New York. Anyway, Jason was Alex’s boss.

Alex then went on duty. He’d sneak me a drink every now and then, but there was a guy watching him and he could really only give me soda… Finally, I went home. Since I couldn’t really hang out with him and didn’t have any intention of hooking up with anyone else, there wasn’t any point in staying once I had gotten the dancing out of my system.

The walk home was magical. I was in love (so to speak), it was sunrise, snow was gently falling, and I was coming down from a wonderful high on X. If you’ve been in NYC on a quiet morning when it’s snowing you’ll know it’s really special even when you’re not high and coming home from meeting a really hot guy… The City gets really quiet when it’s snowing… As I walked through Times Square the lights were brightly flashing, and the subway generators, which you can’t even hear on a normal day, seemed incredibly loud.

It was puppy love – infatuation – whatever you want to call it. It only lasted for six weeks, but it was a really memorable six weeks… On the plus side – he was bartending at Uncle Charlie’s which was one of my favorite bars (and a really popular bar back then), and then he quit there and started bartending at the Roxy. In fact some nights he was the only gay bartender at the Roxy. The owner was straight and tended to hire straight guys who’d sorta half way pretend to flirt with the gay guys to get good tips. And then right about the time we broke up he started bartending and then go-go dancing at a club named Parallel Bar where John Blair was throwing parties (but it turned out to be a bit of a flash in the pan).

Sexually things were pretty intense. He had this wonderful uncut cock that was always hard as steel. Back then I was “versatile”, but he was always a top with me. My memory is pretty fuzzy, but I’m pretty sure he’d always want to fuck me raw, but I’d always put a condom on him when he fucked me (we’re talking the height of the AIDS crisis). At some point before I met him I had gotten a tear “down there” and wasn’t the best bottom, and I always felt like he wanted more from me sexually. Maybe it was just my insecurities – I don’t know…

There were some notable firsts with Alex… He showed me how to trim my body hair with a beard trimmer. I still have a trimmer just like the one he used on me that first time. He taught me to use black hair care products to style a short “Chelsea boy” haircut. And he had me buy my first pair of combat boots…

But there were some downsides – he worked weird hours. Even though he’d been here for years his English was pretty rough and it was hard to communicate. That was particularly difficult when I went out with his friends and they were all speaking Portuguese and I didn’t have a clue what was going on around me. We were also just very different. I still remember him always watching this “feel good about yourself” sorta “spiritualist” who was on late night community access TV back then. I thought the guy was silly, but Alex was his #1 fan.

And the other big problem was that I was escorting and there were nights I needed to make money and he’d ask me what I was up to and I had to lie. I think he felt something was going on. It was, but it wasn’t what he thought it was… The escorting was also an issue ’cause I had started doing it a year after I had first had sex, which was confusing enough, and then I was trying to balance letting old men fuck me with having a hot go-go boy as a boyfriend…

Eventually he broke up with me. I was crushed – I’d see him out at the clubs and bars – he was friendly, but it was over. Curiously his next boyfriend was a blond Latino I had fucked the previous fall/winter. His English was really bad too – and they didn’t last long together since one spoke Spanish and the other Portuguese and neither spoke English all that well.

A few years later (’94/’95) I was at a gym and saw him. He had moved to Miami, but was in town for some reason. I still remember his face lit up when he saw me. There was a chemistry between us, even if we weren’t meant to be…

Fast forward 13 or 14 years to last night. I get an e-mail with pictures the new models on ManifestMen.com. I go and download some of them – there’s Zeb Atlas, and a few other guys. Loving Latinos like I do, I download pics of this one guy they call “Alexandre” and as I’m looking at the pics I realize it looks a lot like the guy I dated. He had been on a club flyer back when he was go-go dancing which I had kept, and I pulled it out and I’m almost certain it’s the same guy. It’s 17 years after the picture was taken, but the mouth is the same, his facial features are really similar. His body has changed a lot over those 17 years – far bigger and more ripped now.

I don’t know if he’d even remember me, but I’m just glad to see he’s still around and looking well…

Here are the recent pics of him from ManifestMen.com…

And here are the pics of him back in 1991…

Since some of you will find this interesting – here’s pics of what I looked like back then. These are from a photoshoot I did for Playguy within a few months of dating Alex… I did the photoshoot ’cause I was tired of having guys fuck me for money, but the photographer (Roberto Romo) fucked me in the middle of the shoot. I went away thinking it was pointless – I didn’t avoid getting fucked and now my pictures were going to be public. The reason why my ass looks so puckered is ’cause it’s freshly fucked 😉

What’s funny is how insecure I was back then. I really didn’t think I looked all that hot. But looking at the pics, I’d totally fuck that… 😉

So how’s that for a blast from the past? Don’t see an ex for over a decade and he winds up on Manifest Men. It really is a small world…