The Evolution of Desire

When Nelson Wong saw the tall, hot athletic boy across the dance floor, his reaction was straight-up primal.

“When I first encountered Cole,” recalls Wong, “I was swept up with this amazingly sexy boy I saw, struck by his eyes, his lips and his build. I was so attracted to him.”

That description of boy-on-boy desire has been written and rewritten millions of times, but this particular chemistry defied the traditional fag-traction model.

As Cole Dodsley remembers it, after seeing Wong at repeated club nights, their desire turned physical.

“We would make out upstairs,” remembers Dodsley, “and when you make out with a person your hands roam, right? I hadn’t had [breast removal] surgery yet and I knew that he could feel the binder on my back and knew that he was noticing something, so this is where I’m saying, ‘He needs to know,’ and ‘Oh shit if I tell him, will he hate me, will he not wanna make out with me, is he totally going to be grossed out and freaked out?’”

In fact, Dodsley (a transgendered man who identified as a lesbian before transitioning) and Wong (a gay man) discovered their desires were growing and made the decision to evolve along with them.

Wong wrote about the experience for Gayze magazine: “I pulled down his black jockeys to reveal a neatly trimmed mound of dark hair and warm tissue. At 28, this was my first time with a female-bodied person and I was nervous. I worried that I would be repulsed or stifled by the sight of it. Seeing him naked, however, was a total turn-on.

“Seeing his soft sensitive tissue exposed made me incredibly horny. I leaned him back on a log and licked and sucked him. It was warm, wet and heaven.”

Since that experience four years ago, Wong says his own attraction options have widened.

“My experience with Cole was fantastic and I am so happy it happened. It definitely broadened the spectrum of people that I can engage with to find intimacy. It sounds cheesy, but it has opened up my world. I don’t have to look solely to 10 percent of the population -that is gay and bio-male -to explore what turns me on.”

While Wong’s journey was a positive one, he admits he was shocked and disheartened by some of the judgments coming from his community.

“I definitely knew that some of my gay friends felt revulsion. Lots of comments dealing with female genitalia, that sort of thing.

“I have friends who don’t believe in transsexualism; they don’t accept it,” he continues. “Some of them don’t believe that trans issues should be lumped together with queer issues. They believe that it is social- and self-hatred issues rather than their gender identity. It is difficult to respond to that. ”

In a lot of ways, the simple existence of transgendered people in the gay community throws many gay comfort zones right out the figurative window.

After years of fighting for the right to exist, of coming out to family and friends and in many cases being ostracized for being attracted to people of the same sex, many gays and lesbians feel deeply attached to their hard-won labels.

Wong reveals that beyond the external pressures and chastisements from his gay male friends, his newly identified desire caused him some stress internally as well, specifically regarding his identity as an out and proud gay man.

“There was definitely a voice inside my head that alerted me to the fact that I had fought so hard to be a gay male, to create this identity and this strength of character despite this mainstream, heterosexual world and the expectations of my parents. There was a voice inside of me that worried that I was betraying some of that.”

Transgendered porn star Buck Angel -who bills himself as “the man with a pussy” -makes a lucrative living selling and starring in adult DVDs (Buckback Mountain, Buck Off) and streaming videos.

The demographics of his audience offer some surprising insight regarding gay and lesbian desires.

“Eighty percent of my customer base is gay men. Twenty percent is female -bisexual, straight and gay,” explains Angel.

“I get a lot of gay men writing me letters about how they are so turned on by me and they can’t believe it and what does that make them, are they now straight? My vagina freaks people out, especially gay men,” he says.

“They are attracted to me as a person but because I have a vagina, it just totally throws them for a loop, they can’t wrap their head around it.”

Angel says he has seen and heard many horror stories about the treatment of trans folks by gays and lesbians. “Twenty years ago, I identified as a dyke. When I started transitioning, the dyke community ostracized me; every single one of my friends wanted nothing to do with me. There was no knowledge about what was going on then.

“Funnily enough, a lot of people have called me since then, asking me how they go about transitioning now.”

If trans people are challenging many gays’ and lesbians’ notions of desire, so too are they often broadening their own scope of attraction.

For many trans people who identified as gay or lesbian before transitioning, it wasn’t just their bodies that evolved upon transition; they discovered their desires were shifting as well.

Dr. Christopher Shelley is a professor at the University of British Columbia and author of the book Transpeople: Repudiation, Trauma, Healing.

He thinks the evolution in desire experienced by many trans people is the result of feeling freer in other aspects of their lives.

“When people start to become -to grow and let themselves be -they can let down all kinds of defenses and open themselves up to new experiences and attractions,” he says.

“Once you are, for the first time in your life, comfortable in the body that you should be in, new doors can open for you. There’s a lot of trans people who never had orgasms, who never let themselves go or be sexually. They couldn’t even touch themselves because they were wrongly bodied. Once they are rightly bodied, they are simply more honest and more comfortable with themselves and with others,” he explains.

“Trans people teach us about the complexities of life and that it isn’t just the easy categories of straight, gay, lesbian, heterosexual, homosexual,” Shelley says. “In many ways, I think that trans folks challenge all of our categorical assumptions. That makes them a very potent group of teachers.”

Dodsley is no stranger to Shelley’s theory of shifting desires.

“Almost all the trans men in my life are more attracted to men than they were before they transitioned. That’s not to say they aren’t attracted to women anymore, they totally are, but almost all of them are attracted to men,” he says.

“I now realize that I’ve always been attracted to men but previously thought, ‘Oh I am attracted to men because I wanna be one. Then I realized that it wasn’t that -it was that I was attracted to them!

Before transitioning, Dodsley identified as a lesbian. Now, he says, his relationship is “anything but heterosexual.”

“I don’t think that many people on the street would see us as heterosexual because my partner has her own masculine features as well,” he explains. “We still don’t look like a heterosexual couple and I think that keeps me pretty queer too. She’s queer and I’m queer.

“If everybody likes everybody, I’m happy. We should all feel free to love whoever we want to in terms of gender,” he adds.

Roz Shakespeare was the first openly transsexual police office in the Vancouver Police Department. She sees the evolution of trans desire this way: “In the beginning, we’re presenting a body that we don’t feel comfortable in. It’s not that we don’t belong there, it’s that we were pushed there. You’re not free to be engaged fully; you’re always holding a part of a veil there so nobody can see beyond that.

“As we come out and can be who we are fully, that canvas is blank, usually at an age where we’re now a little more comfortable exploring who that is and feeling safe,” she explains.

Most of the people interviewed for this story believe there is a significant difference in terms of how the gay community responds to trans men and women.

While trans men by no means have it easy when it comes to flirting, dating and even friendship within the gay community, they seem to have it easier than most trans women.

“I think it hearkens back to feminist theory -what is strong and what is weak,” says videographer and trans man Erek Tymchak.

“If you look in the gay men’s community, there is a hierarchy, isn’t there? Butch men are top of the pile; then, the young good-looking guys that can pass as possibly straight and then it goes down from there,” he says. “The effeminate men are always near the bottom. Drag queens are somewhere down there, and god forbid you want to be a woman.”

“The queer community as a whole has phobias against femininity, especially when it is expressed by male-bodied individuals, regardless of their gender identity,” agrees Gwen Haworth, producer and star of the award-winning documentary She’s a Boy I Knew (a film about her own transition and her family’s response to it).

“Whether it is an effeminate gay man or a trans women, femininity is undervalued in society,” Haworth continues.

“When trans women begin that journey, I think that their sexual power in society gets diminished. It is like watching Jack on Will and Grace, or the cast of Priscilla Queen of the Desert; they become these farcical characters. There’s a lot of other reasons behind it I think, but society’s devaluing the feminine is a major part of that.”

Shannon Summers finds it disheartening that “trans women are invisible to gay men.”

“We can go to gay bars and we are accepted there,” she says, “but it is not just that gay men don’t hit on trans women, gay men don’t pay any attention to trans women.

“They don’t talk to us, we don’t interact at all. Gay men want men who look like men and when they see a trans woman, they see a female and if we’re not a drag queen -if we’re not making fun of the gender and the genre -then we’re not on their radar.”

Tymchak says his transitioning wasn’t very well received, either, within the gay community. “I can tell you about numerous comments that people made before I transitioned, which halted my own transition,” he says.

“It is ironic that they have fought so hard and yet are being so ruthless towards another,” he adds, referring to the gay community.

That said, Tymchak believes that evolution is inevitable. Trans people have a lot in common with gays and lesbians, he says. “This is just another way for traditional gay and lesbian people to be challenged.

“It is funny to think that gay and lesbian people amongst us are conservative, but they are!” he continues. “They need to open their hearts and minds to us, just as they’ve asked the rest of the world to do for themselves. Realize the activism is not over.”

Haworth is optimistic about the future of the queer community and its openness to gender and sexual fluidity when she looks to the generations younger than her.

“Queer folks in their 20s are a lot more comfortable with gender fluidity,” she says. “As someone in my mid-30s, I’m learning from that.”

But, she says, queer desire won’t truly evolve until gays and lesbians address the transphobia that still shapes many of their responses to trans people.

“The LGBT community has to really bring this to the table and re-think where their hearts are,” she says.

“We as trans folks have to re-approach how we are going to connect with the queer community because there is this divide that is happening right now,” she continues. “Sometimes I think it has to do with the difference between proactive or preemptive politics and reactive politics. That is detrimental to us all. Let’s take down our guard and talk to each other, learn about each other, see where our similarities are and grow together. I think that is the next glass ceiling.”

As for Shelley, he hopes the future of queer love will be more focused on desire and chemistry than on conventional understandings of gender and same-sex attraction.

“If we have any impact at all, in the future it will be that queer people will be more queer, that people could be able to appreciate the complexities of human sexuality and gender,” he says.

“Rather than being fixed in the body of one thing only, and strive to be one thing only for the whole of one’s life, maybe we’ll be -to quote Bette Davis -much more ‘this and that.’”

Denise Sheppard (scribe at shaw dot ca) is a self-employed journalist/editor who likes long walks, candlelit dinners and writing for U.S. and Canadian national mags and websites. Her fave topics are human rights-related pieces and entertainment journalism.

Cheap & Dirty? You are what you eat

I remember eating dinner once with a friend’s family and hearing my friend’s 17 year-old step brother say, “It’s hard to make good food with bad ingredients.” Once I could hear again over the din of my gay-dar, I realized how right he was. I had made that discovery at 34, only a year or two before he made that dramatic statement across a crowded dinner table. I allowed him his early insight because he is a child of privilege. The son of two doctors. I grew up middle-class. In a family of 6, food was for survival. And not much else.

However, once I made this discovery, I couldn’t quite look at dinner in the same way. I knew if I spent a bit more on certain ingredients, meals would come alive. Food wasn’t entirely about survival anymore. It had started to become about pleasure. Spending a bit more on a good olive oil, using fresh ingredients instead of canned or frozen (both of which have their place), or buying good cheese; combined, all of these things made for a great experience.

This all may sound a little strange in the midst of a recession. Aren’t we supposed to be cutting corners? Living more simply? Saving what we can so we don’t get into trouble again? Have you learned NOTHING food_geek?

Well, perhaps.

But say it’s Friday night. You order a pizza ($20) and pick up a 6 pack of beer ($10). You’ve just spent $30 on food and drink that will feed maybe 2 people. Do you have any idea what ingredients you can buy for $30?? I catered the following 5-course dinner party for 15 people just before Christmas:

Course 1. Fresh fig wrapped in prosciutto with balsamic and honey glaze
Course 2. Roasted beet salad with chevre, fresh dill and lemon
Course 3. Seared scallops with cauliflower puree and wilted arugula
Course 4. Pork tenderloin with oyster mushroom and green pea risotto
Course 5. Rum & raisin bread pudding with butter sauce and fresh whipped cream

Five courses for 15 people cost me $100. One hundred dollars! Six dollars and 66 cents per person. For five courses!!

So how WAS that pizza, anyway?

I’m not saying that you need to break the bank on everything. But the following are things for which I will pay good money. For the most part they are like an investment because, properly stored, they will last awhile.

Olive oil: I have a relatively inexpensive bottle for cooking and an expensive bottle for garnishing soups, making vinaigrettes, and finishing tomato sauces

Butter: I like the taste. I also tend to like things that are bad for me. And a little goes a long way.

Dijon mustard: French’s mustard = blech

Good rice: Basmati, Jasmine, Arborio

Black olives: nothing from a can

Balsamic vinegar: the older it is, the sweeter and more flavourful it will be. Look at the label, it should show how many years it’s been aged, displayed either as a number or a number of barrels. 8 years and up is good.

Peppercorns: I don’t buy pre-ground pepper because while there is heat, there is little flavor. And I like controlling how big the grind is. Some things, like steak, should just have larger chunks of pepper.

Salt: Sea Salt, not table salt. I like it a bit coarse.

Maple Syrup: the real stuff

Spices: Everything! I prefer whole seeds - like coriander, fennel, cumin, etc. They stay fresher and hold far, far more taste than their pre-ground counterparts. Grind them in either a coffee grinder or mortar and pestle (but only as much as you need for whatever you are making).

Fresh herbs: Nothing lights up a dish like fresh herbs either thrown in at the end of the cooking process or added, freshly torn, to the plate. It can be difficult to buy fresh herbs in quantities that won’t go bad, so I usually have a small garden (indoor in the winter, outdoor in the summer) of my favourites… Italian parsley, thyme, basil, cilantro and chives.

Having certain ingredients in the house, for me, is an invitation to start cooking. Sometimes, when I buy something special, like truffle oil, I’ll just uncork the bottle and smell it. It smells rich and earthy and extravagant and it makes me want to find a reason to use it. Good ingredients can be a source of inspiration to create something wonderful. And they are extra special if you are creating it for just yourself.

Roasted Beet Salad

1 bunch of organic beets, with beet greens attached
Good Olive Oil
Salt & Pepper
1 lemon
1 package of chevre (goat’s cheese)
Fresh dill

Preheat oven to 375F
Cut off beet greens and save for another dish (they are delicious cut up and sauteed briefly in olive oil or butter).
Peel beets and cut into quarters.
Drizzle with olive oil, season generously with salt and pepper and wrap in aluminum foil, shiny side IN. Place in oven for approximately 45 minutes - 1 hour. You’ll know when they are done by sliding a knife into the center. If the texture feels consistent the whole way in (firm, but not crunchy), they are done.
Remove from oven and allow to cool. They can be served either warm or cold.
Get yer rasp out and remove the zest from lemon. Mix zest with beets.
Squeeze a little lemon juice and drizzle a little more olive oil over beets - enough to coat
Roughly chop fresh dill and mix with beets. Quantity depends on how many beets you have cooked, and how much you love dill.
Taste and add more salt or pepper, if required
Plate beets either alone or on a bed of arugula, also dressed lightly with olive oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper.
Place several small pieces of chevre on top and around beets. Or don’t and make it vegan.
Garnish with larger piece of dill.

Serve and enjoy.

Written by food_geek

food_geek was once a successful finance professional. Tired of money, nice things, equity, and the possibility of retirement she decided to pursue a career in the food industry at age 35. She is now a sous chef at a small restaurant in a tiny Quebec village where she works the fry station. She looks forward to being promoted to Manager, Drive-Thru. food_geek has been cooking professionally for 30 months.

When Worlds Collide

A strange thing is happening over on Facebook. As the sons and daughters of some of my high school friends are reaching high school age themselves (!), suddenly their parents are showing up on FB. And while it’s great to see them, it’s presenting an interesting cross-pollination of the neat compartments of queer mommy life.

For a while, it was all neat and tidy. Queer friends online, mommy friends offline or e-mail only. That kept things nicely compartmentalized, so I could plan play-overs in a totally separate world from checking out a friend’s erotic art-photography or reading critical analysis and comparative theory of vaginas over on the boards. As someone who is a tad bit paranoid by nature, I’ve been something of a lurker in those discussions, but you know, I’ve shown ya’ my legs and all.

I got my first inkling, however, that things were changing, tectonics in motion, the day earlier this year when my eleven-year-old called from the kids’ computer in the kitchen, “Did you know that if you Google *** (my Significant Other’s first/last name) you don’t get anything relevant at ALL?”

This is like suddenly the needle on the seismic event monitor of my life starting to bounce like a superball. Shit. What might be out there? I’m pretty Googlesafe, but what about her? Or my other friends who hang out here at my house all the time? I know, I know, we’ve all dealt with the ‘what happens if my mom Googles me’ question forever. But there are some people quite dear to me, whose lives (when they’re not playing videogames with my kids in my basement) aren’t rated G. Or PG. Or PG-13.

As the weeks went by after those first tremors, the aftershocks continued, for this was the year my daughter and her friends enveloped themselves in the interwebs, cruising YouTube for Fruits Basket vids; Google-chatting about endangered animals, Twilight, and who’s crushed out on whom; sending brightly colored e-mails splattered with emoticons. I try to be a responsible mom, monitor as best I can, and have some small advantage that I’ve conducted friendships via IM and e-mail, and can counsel appropriately that sometimes the medium is lacking. By being the Parent Over Shoulder I’ve also discovered that she and her friends have a larger vocabulary of cuss words than I thought, and are all finally learning to touch type with some speed. She’s still too young for Facebook or MySpace, but I know that’s coming. And Google? She’s dangerous with Google. So it’s only a matter of time.

See, over on FB, somehow I friended a couple of my best buds from high school. I don’t have my full name on my FB (see note above about paranoid), so I’m not easily searchable. But either they found me or I found them, and it’s been great to have them back in my life. These were my closest circle for some important times, who happened to be online types, so we added each other in. Then, some of my other high school friends appeared. And then my brother found me.

This means I now sit in the middle of a FB friends list with my bro and his wife’s Mormon family on one side, and my queer erotic-arts and porn producing friends on the other. And my high-school-friends’ Mason buddies circling. Is it any wonder I keep telling my daughter, no, no FB until you’re fourteen?

Then it hit me one afternoon… if I’m on my brother’s friends list, then my mom can find me. And if she can find me she can find my friends… she can find you, Queerky, she can find you! And oh boy, if my mom can find you, that means your mom can find you too! And I sat there (in an almost Dr. Seussian way… too many bedtime readings of The Cat In The Hat), and thought… what does your mom think when she’s reading you talk about your cunt? When she’s reading about those life changing moments? When she’s looking at the pictures you took of the guy at the doctor’s office’s boner? What does she think of my legs? (No really, what does she think of my legs…?)

And circling back to the beginning… what do your kids think? Those of you with five-year-olds have a while to ponder this one, but those of you with older kids or pre-teens are facing it square on.

I belong to a book site too, one of those places where you log what you’re reading and have read, and can see your friends’ books as well. I was recruited there by my kid, and have her and a few of her friends on my friends list. But I have some of my grown up friends there too. Some who occasionally read rather grown up books. And whose settings aren’t locked down tight, their lists are public, their lives not guarded and girded against inappropriate onlookers.

I pondered this one as well. I don’t really have a problem with my eleven-year-old reading through my friends’ booklists and finding books like Exhibitionism for the Shy or The Ethical Slut. Well, maybe a little, but not enough to shut them down. However, because her friends link to her and to me, I found myself reluctant to take responsibility for putting those titles in front of someone else’s kid. Thus I created a second me. Now I have me and me lite. I feel like new Coke.

But when I stopped to think about it, I’d just done the kind of thing I wouldn’t want my kid to do, sneaking around, hiding parts of me that are real to try to look better in someone else’s eyes. So I sat her down and we talked, and I explained my reasoning, and that I get to parent my kids but not other people’s. She nodded and agreed, and I’m sure made the mental note, ‘oh, so you can make a second name and just not tell everyone, cool!’ And I went back to pondering the Facebook conundrum: tattoo artists and teeball mommies…can they all just get along? And what will they think of you?

Written by Darby Blue