The online diary of a gay courtesan.

Before I begin, I want to first acknowledge (though not necessarily apologize) for the way in which my writing goes through some definite mood swings. There are times when I have a great many situations to discuss, and I can pick more variety of tone; however, I am having one of those weeks where everything blog-worthy is heavy… I’m writing this at 5:30 a.m., which seems to be more the norm than the exception lately. I do this, because some experiences are best described after some times passes, and others need immediate comment.

I know a patron who has always spoken to me in spiritual terms. The first time I ever met him he wanted to give me a massage and align my chakras. Such is the club: You meet people of all backgrounds and beliefs. This particular person is a mystical type, though I am not quite convinced his powers are attuned to the level he himself believes. At any rate, when he asks me to pray for something on his behalf I generally agree to the wish and send out a private moment of hope. I have done this, because his requests have always been constructive and/or productive (if not odd and eccentric).

This time, however, I am having difficulty…

He wants me to pray for his father to die. Dude, I just wanted to dance naked for you for like eight minutes. This is getting to be rather more than I bargained for. On the one hand I understand that he wants his father’s suffering to end (and by extension, his mother’s), but on the other hand how am I supposed to send out an earnest wish for this person to fall down dead?

“Well, when I had a prayer circle to ask for his recovery after his first surgery, that went well. So I figured if I could get enough people to pray for him to die during his second surgery, he’d finally just get on with it.”

Normally I would just smile and nod at a strange request without really doing anything about it, but something about the way this patron sincerely hopes his father dies struck me as something worth talking about, even if I’m not entirely sure how I feel about being asked to contribute in any way to someone’s demise. I have known friends and family members who have sickened, or been injured, and who have passed away. I have had many friends who have had this experience and talked about it with me. Of course I don’t want their deaths to be painful or protracted, yet do I dare to admit that I hoped for their passings? Maybe, but only as a reprieve from suffering. But I suppose the real question behind this post is this: How lonely (or insert other adjective here) does someone have to be to ask in the middle of a nude dance an exotic dancer he sees once or twice in a month to synergize with the others who are sending out a prayer for death?

What am I even supposed to pray, even if I agree to this (which I’m not sure I do)? “I ask for a peaceful resolution and transition for this person’s spirit.” That’s an eloquent way of saying “God, please kill this person.” What if this patron’s father goes into his operation praying for life? (This is a good example of how ridiculous it is when opposing armies of the same faith both intone God’s favor as justificiation for victory on the field of battle.)

Honestly, this may very well be the first post I’ve written on here for which I feel absolutely zero closure after describing what I’ve experienced. Jeez… I was just shaking my pecker at him… and he unloads this on me… I need to be charging more for VIP’s.

Here’s something that comes up with a little bit of frequency: When I’m not doing anything more productive with myself, I enjoy chatting on ManHunt. While I was still hiding in my cave in 2008, it became my primary source of socializing, since I had trepedations about being around people face-to-face. Because I don’t dance in Charlotte it hasn’t happened much, but occasionally someone in another city will check out the Charlotte list, and then I’ve got a patron talking to me on a site that is designed specifically for hooking up.

How awkward.

This is the reason: ManHunt is a place for getting free sex from other users. I chat there primarily to socialize through chat (although I have met people from the site as well – some were for coffee, others were for sex, others were friends I knew from off ManHunt). So then, exactly how does one navigate the situation when a patron who pays for lap dances sees an adult entertainer online at a place like ManHunt, and then makes a proposition for free sex? The patron isn’t out of line, since the entertainer is in a sexualized environment, but how can the entertainer walk the tight rope of not blurring business and pleasure?

It really depends on the situation. I have one friend in Columbia, we’ll pretend his name is John, and when we see each other on the site we flirt and chat, but he never crosses any lines. He’s a gentleman and a friend, and it’s simply not an issue with him. He’s not overbearing in person, and he doesn’t make presumptions online. I’m his doodle bug, and he’s my wee boy. I am totally comfortable talking to him on ManHunt. I see a couple of the other dancers from Columbia, and that too is a non-issue. None of us sleep together, and it’s just chat. However, there have been ManHunt members who are patrons from Atlanta and other cities who do try to make a sexual connection through ManHunt.

I simply keep the conversation polite and simple. I don’t flirt or use innuendo. I answer questions simply and keep my inquiries general. It would be very complicated to hook up with a patron. I can invision far, far too many difficulties in such a scenario. I do not suggest allowing the two to overlap. The other option is to simply not visit these types of websites, but I’ve made some nice chat friends on ManHunt, and bumping into patrons is rare. It’s even more rare that the few patrons I see try to go futher than chatting. Thus far it’s not been a problem, but when it comes up I treat it like I do when I bump into a patron unexpectedly in public. Be aware that cyber stalking is a potential risk from chatting online at hook up sites. Pay attention to whether or not a patron’s behavior changes in person/online after he has found your username.

Dear Harlow,

I just watched the videos that were produced for the here! network, and I wanted to take a moment to tell you that your story has not gone unheard and unfelt. I want you to know that there are people who see that “even a gay porn actor” is innocent until proven guilty. I want you to know that there are people who are not entertained by your misery. I want you to know that you are right every time you say your name out loud, and that your mother is right to touch the glass as if she were caressing your face. I want you to know that when you are exonerated there will be people who will celebrate whole heartedly for you. I want you to know that there are people who hope you will survive, heal, and thrive. I want you to know that there is compassion for you, and that there is still beauty outside – it is waiting for you to embrace it when you return to the world. Do not come back to us broken. Please.

If you are found guilty, I hope it will be because there is a mountain of incontrovertible truth sustaining that decision, and not because you have lived your life in your own way. If you are found innocent, I hope it will be because you are innocent without any further doubt attached to your name. If you are found lost in the dark, I hope you will remember the points of light: They are the stars that will guide you home. If you are found alone, I hope you will remember that you are not.

Con mucha esperanza,

Devon

It occurred to me, after reflecting some about my experience, at that party from last week, that there is a Jekyll & Hyde phenomenon lurking in many club patrons, gay men in particular. It also occurred to me that there is a day & night phenomenon that I want to explore for a few moments. What follows isn’t researched or cited – it’s simply my dialogue with myself about the observations I have about the patrons who disturb me most (keeping in mind throughout that what I will be saying doesn’t apply to ALL people, but is presented as over-simplified generalizations).

People associate metaphoric values to light/dark and day/night, conflating them with good/bad. I have a hypothesis: People almost seem to have it coded into their socializing DNA traits to act rowdy, or to allow their “darker” sides to come out at night. It’s too easy to say that Night is Dark, and thus people let their destructive natures blossom under the moonlight (like lillies of death, I suppose), as if night/dark is the very source of this “bad.”

I think there is a practical connection that goes way back. Without electricity and artificial lighting, your work day effectively ends when the sun goes down. Ergo, your most productive (i.e. work related) activities happen in the light. Once it’s night and you can no longer really do much, it makes sense that people would socialize at night around fires and dance, mingle, or drink. Same with the winter in general: If it’s too dark and cold to farm your land or do any work, then it is an obvious time of year to pack full of festivals and holidays in order to pass the time: Hours not devoted to work or sleep end up becoming hours devoted to play or relaxation.

What if, over the course of thousands of years, we have simply been bred to associate day with respectability and night with scandal? If you follow that line of thought, then in a religious culture that values toil above pleasure (rather than in balance with it), everything done at night becomes frivilous (and therefore non-, un-, or anti-”good”) by comparison. Everything you wouldn’t want people to see you doing, you do at night, under the cloak of darkness where you can hope for some modicum of anonymity. Night becomes a place to hide your shame or guilt.

In this way, all around the world, good, productive people rise and shine to do their respectable work. For a good portion of them there is an attitude that anything of Night must be myseterious, evil, salacious, dangerous, or immoral, since it is the time when productive people are worn out and go to bed. Night is the time of the unseen/unseeable. It is the time when those with something to hide emerge, like monsters out of nightmares.

If you look at my description of that party, it was attended by “upstanding professionals” who mostly happened to be older white, gay gentlemen. This is where the Jekyll & Hyde amongst patrons comes in. Given the way they were acting like rutting pigs at a trough, and given the wild (in some instances dangerous) looks their eyes, and given their total abandonment of all social decorum, exactly what about them should have spoken to their being doctors, lawyers, architects, etc.? How would I, or anyone else who doesn’t know them, ever guess that these grasping, slobbering troglodytes were “upstanding professionals?” If someone is an “upstanding professional,” shouldn’t that define who they are away from work as well? (I can hear it now: “I’m not an upstanding professional, but I play one from 9-5.”)

I don’t understand this dichotomy. I am the same person at night that I am all day long. I am more polite at work than I would be at my house, but I don’t resemble Janus, looking in two directions with every passing moment. I don’t divorce my noctural self from my diurnal self. I am always me. I don’t understand the outright hypocrisy of wearing two diametrically opposed masks. Which is the real you? Do you even know? Are both of them you, or does one compensate for the other? Are neither of them you, and you simply have no idea who you even are? If you, like most people I know, attach part of your identity to your profession, then what does it say about you that this identity slides away so readily when the illumination dims?

Let me be frank: There are many wonderful patrons who act just as civil at the club as they do at the grocery strore. But there is also a sizeable lot who frighten me: When I bump into them during the day, they scurry from my presence, as if I am something toxic or tainted (when usually it is I who should be trying to get away from them). At night they come slinking back with flattering apologies and small tips, bribing me to forget they were espied pretending to be respectable in some other place and time. I might play along more completely, if the dollar earned so respectably wasn’t so disrespectably tucked under my perineum with a lingering grope and a lecherous wink. When Hyde grins at me with my privates in his palm, I simply laugh inside and wonder where the doctor/lawyer/ teacher/politician/engineer is hiding.

The sun is going to rise soon… did you forget that? Or are you ignoring it on purpose? Who is the “upstanding professional” in this scenario? Is there one? The patrons I like and respect the most are not necessarily the ones who give me the most money, but the ones who give me the most hope that I am right in thinking that people, by and large, really are the ”upstanding professionals” they seem to be.

I’m sorry to have to report that this weekend saw one of the more unpleasant aspects of exotic dancing come to bear on a situation at work: A potential stalker made himself known. His story to us dancers: He’s out on bail after serving 290 days while he awaits a trial for “breaking and entering,” and he is facing 15 years – life.

Alright, on the one hand this is good: He has made his dangerous persona and potential insanity transparent. Often you aren’t served up such a delicious platter of chaos with quite the same blunt finèsse this gentleman employed. On the other hand, it must be patently obvious that this man isn’t telling the whole truth: One doesn’t go to jail for 15 years – life for breaking and entering (unless one has entered said property with the intent of doing someone, not someone’s property, grievous harm). To have that kind of trial ahead of him, he must have done something pretty awful. Why he’s out in the first place is a whole other kettle of fish.

At any rate, I declined to give him private dances, sensing immediately (before his story came out) that something wasn’t right about him. His hygiene was horrible, his eyes desparate. He was far too oversexed and aggressive. He kept licking my boots while I was on the bar (which in and of itself doesn’t necessarily mark someone as bad – no offense intended to those with boot/leather fetishes), and he kept trying to put his mouth on my penis. (He tried to put my dick/in his mouth,but I said/”No, no, no…” – props to Amy Winehouse)

The newer dancers I was working with had not yet met anyone like this man and gave him dances, wherein he tried to do everything I’d expected… with the exception that he also began getting aggressive about leaving the club with us. Over the course of the night it became clearer and clearer that he was unbalanced and had the intention of following us, saying “Make sure you come get me when you’re ready to go. I don’t want to have to watch the door and run after you.” Mhm.

One dancer was feeling conflicted about this scenario, wanting the money for doing the dances. But ultimately he decided to avoid this when I told him this person would interpret the dances (even if he pays for them) as a sign of interest. As it turns out, all our gut reactions to this man were spot on.

We finagled a way of getting paid by the bar and then leaving together as a group, watching each other get into our cars and driving away. We also made a point of watching behind each other to make sure we weren’t followed. After getting home we all texted the “AOK” to make sure each person was at home, doors locked, and no followers noted.

Listen to your voice. You have it for a reason. We evolved to have this fight-or-flight response. In all situations in life you ignore it at your own peril. That isn’t to say you should be paranoid, but you must always pay attention and use good judgement (particularly in adult entertainment, which is rife with people who will take advantage of you with a moment’s notice):

When you’re faced with a stressful situation, you’ll probably notice that your heart starts to beat faster, you breathe more rapidly, your skin gets cold and clammy, your mouth feels dry, your pupils dilate and the hairs on the back of your neck stand up. There are also some changes you don’t notice, like reduced blood flow to your kidneys and digestive system. If you’re really terrified, you may even lose control of bladder and bowels.

The brainstem is situated at the base of the brain and controls a lot of our automatic responses and life sustaining functions, like breathing, which we do without conscious thought. When you perceive danger, a part of the brainstem called the hypothalamus sends a nerve message to your adrenal glands and hormones like adrenaline and cortisol are released into the bloodstream, where they cause the dramatic changes described above.

The overall effect of these changes is to sharpen all your senses and enable you to perform optimally in a life threatening situation. All your blood is diverted to your muscles, while non essential systems are shut down. Surface wounds bleed less, as skin blood vessels constrict. The faster, deeper breathing brings more oxygen into the blood and this helps the muscles to work faster. Opening of the bladder and bowels reduces the need for other internal activity, lessens your weight if you flee and may put off attackers. If you end up in a fight, you’ll hit harder, jump higher and think and dodge faster than usual. In case of flight, you’ll run faster, see better, hear more acutely. - http://www.brainskills.co.uk/FightOrFlight.html