Sexuality is a many varied thing. Trans dudes know a thing or two about this. Hell, queer folks definitely know something about this. We've spent many precious moments trying to fit one thing or the other. Eventually some of us realize that who and what we desire is either much simpler or more complex than what dominant culture pushes on us. Hooking up has showed me the many erroneous assumptions I held about nontrans men and their sexualities.
I remember during the early days of my sexual journey, I played with Donald (not his real name), an IBM consultant who'd never met or been with a trans guy before, but was exceedingly curious and titillated by the idea. We connected at Applebees of all places, over beers - blue moons actually. At first glance, he appeared to be one of those company exec types. Suit and tie. Properly pressed slacks with the straight lines running down the front legs. I wasn't sure what to expect as we walked back to his hotel, a stone's throw from the restaurant. The conversation was kind of stilted. The usual "what do you do?" "oh really? how do you like it?" blah blah. He inserted his key card into the slot and I walked into his luxurious hotel room. The plush couch. Meticulously made bed. "Paint by the number" adorning the walls. I took note of it all and hoped our fucking would sully the room at least a little bit. The room was a little too pure and neat for my tastes.
I sat on one of the chairs by the dining table. Yes, the room had a dining area. He sat across from me and smiled. It was a relaxed smile and I realized he'd been nervous. "So tell me when you first knew?" he asked. Finally, we could start being human with each other. The conversation took on a familiar trajectory from there. I did the trans 101 convo I usually do in my every day life. He asked questions I'd answered a number of times. Somehow, though, he didn't make me feel like a freak.
After he'd exhausted his long list of questions I finally got to ask mine. "So, why trans men? What's appealing to you?" And the crypt door swung open. I'm pretty used to blowing people's minds, especially when they learn I'm a trans guy who likes to fuck other guys. However, Donald's story was far more fascinating. From the swingers' parties he frequented with his wife, to the sex parties he "curated" at his home, it all was the most intriguing thing in the world to a sex neophyte like me. There were also the exploits with men, bears mostly, because Donald really liked to get fucked in the ass by men who looked like they could kick the shit out of him. He also had a thing for trans women. I'd expected your run-of-the-mill company exec, complete with pre-packaged heterosexual tendencies (with slight twists and turns here and there - he was about to hook up with a trans boy after all), and instead I got...what? Was he queer? Pan-sexual? How did he see himself? "Straight. I prefer women, but I'm open to exploring new experiences." Straight. Okay. Self-determination. I get it. You choose your tags. But what would you call yourself if we didn't live in queer-phobic society?
Donald's story, as I came to find out, was by no means unique. There was Robert, who, while surfing the porn web one night happened upon trans guys going down on each other and got really turned on by it. From then on he couldn't get enough, preferring to top with trans guys and bottom with nontrans men. "The terms straight or gay don't apply," Robert explains, "I'm drawn to masculinity in whatever form it happens to take and that's that." Yurie, on the other hand, identifies as straight, even though he likes to be rough handled and fucked by dudes. "It only happens once in a while...not enough to make me anything but straight." All these different expressions of sexuality, some covert, others overt, forced me to re-examine my ideas on nontrans men and desire. I realized that there were certain types of men I expected to possess a more complicated sexuality - men who are gender nonconforming, i.e. who obviously don't conform to society's idea of manhood. And there were other men I expected to be more, well, "vanilla" in their sexual tastes. Men like Donald or Yurie, who do the "straight man" performance to a T.
What's particularly interesting to me is how a lot of these dudes say they're straight. In fact, my best friend laughs at me about this, but I poll every guy I fuck about their sexuality. Is identifying as straight a byproduct of internalized homophobia and transphobia? If we didn't live in a homophobic society, would they identify as anything other than straight? Or is it just that sexuality is beyond gay, bi or straight, and is more like gender, where there is an infinite range of possibilities? Who knows, in the meantime I just like fucking dudes, even the "straight" ones.
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