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oy, girl, penis,
vagina, penetration, the end. I was a queer virgin on a
mission. I simply could not experience life without
experiencing sex as most defined it – I just couldn’t.
But in order to remove the metastasized testicular
cancer from my abdomen and finally enter the world of
cancer survivorship and LiveStrong bracelets, one final
hurdle was placed before me – the abdominal surgery
which would potentially leave me with a life sans
ejaculations.
Sentimental survivorship
stories be damned, I headed back to my college home of
Ann Arbor, Michigan with but one item on my agenda:
lose heterosexual virginity before ejaculations become
retrograde and the threat of knocking up a woman becomes
mere fantasy. I think my only possible rationale for
trying to lose my virginity to a woman was that I was
friends with Third Wave feminists and Second Wave
lesbians, exclusively, in Ann Arbor and I really wanted
to prove that I could have sex just like them. Or as
close as I could get. Regardless of the plan’s logic, I
arrived raring to go.
Like the beginning of
some stupid joke, I was a virgin on a crashing plane,
looking in all directions for someone to do me one last
wish. One dying wish… Oh, and I would also see some
friends who were worried that I had died in the four
months since leaving college, assuring them that I was
alive and breathing after my chemotherapy. Admittedly,
seeing those friends was not truly my week’s primary
goal. I never shared my cherry-popping agenda with
anyone, though – anyone – for fear that I would lose my
status as esteemed cancer patient and just be judged as
an emaciated, hairless leach.
After I arrived back at
my pre-cancer home, Ruth’s Co-op, I began conceiving my
plan. Which woman was the easiest? Most attractive?
Most noteworthy? Was there anyone I actually cared
about? I didn’t care about caring, though… I didn’t
have time to care about caring - nor about
attractiveness, cup size or reputation. I evaluated
each of my potential lifesavers in an efficient,
misogynistic and desperate cost-benefit analysis; how
much money-slash-time-slash-emotional self would I be
required to spend in order to have sex with any given
woman.
I first turned to
Raquelle Staffler, who had attempted to take my
virginity four months earlier. Raquelle was my academic
and artistic colleague at the University of Michigan,
and, more importantly, the only other virgin I knew. We
spent countless hours talking about our virginities on
the steps of her Co-op, generally while smoking cloves
or something similarly pretentious. (Please note that I
didn’t have cancer at this time, so my smoking wasn’t
offensive just yet.) We weren’t prudes, just choosy,
and figured that since we had waited long enough, it was
best just to keep waiting. She was a fabulous,
French-speaking Jewess with starlet hair who always
threw elegant affairs, with good booze and a range of
guests that included jocks, bookish-scientists and men
comfortable enough with their masculinity that they wore
butterfly wings on Halloween.
Four months before the
pressures of boy, girl, penis, vagina, when she first
heard of my diagnosis, Raquelle was quickly moved to
action. On the eve of my departure from Ann Arbor, at
the start of my cancer, I was packing at 2 AM, when I
heard pebbles being thrown at my second story window at
Ruth’s Co-op. At first I thought it might be my
8-day-gone right testicle, finding its way home like a
faithful St. Bernard to my scrotum… And instead I saw
her, Raquelle - the next best thing. I motioned her up
and within seconds we were kissing, groping and
feverishly dry humping. I fumbled with her shirt and
black bra, grabbing and feeling around what was still a
relatively uncharted area of the human body to me.
 What Raquelle didn’t
know, however, was that for the past three days I had
been making regular and somewhat painful trips to the
area sperm bank before receiving a fertility-destroying
dose of chemotherapy, and that getting my blood to even
enter my shaft’s erectile tissue, as she desired, was a
near-impossible task… or maybe I just didn’t really
want to have sex with her. For the first time since my
diagnosis, I pulled away and lowered my head, lips
pursed. My cancer-face inspired immediate attention.
She was powerless to its pathos. Raquelle quickly
buttoned up her shirt, kissed my freshly shaven head,
and wished me the best of luck.
Presuming a similar
passion for my maidenhead, I figured that Raquelle, four
months later, would be the easiest, breeziest – and
that’s exactly what I had time for. Boyfriend. Over
coffee, she enthusiastically divulged that she now had a
boyfriend… who? The guy with the butterfly wings. She
had lost her virginity a few weeks earlier – and
apparently, sex was amazing. Amazing. Yeah, I bet.
With no time to lose and
less time to dwell, I quickly turned to Sandra.
Beautiful, talented, intelligent, and she had a shady
record that no one quite understood, which therefore
meant that she could have been a major dl hooch, or a
virgin like myself. Either one would work for my
specific purposes. Lunch date, Cosi. We chatted for a
while, but after a few minutes over matching Asian
chicken salads, I realized that she was acting earnest
as opposed to flirtatious as I had hoped -- I was an
idiot to think that getting laid by a woman was that
simple. I wallowed in my inability and lack of game with
women and then tried to pass off the lunch as shop-talk
about theater and art (which I of course didn’t care
about at all during this week-long jaunt in Ann Arbor).
I was on a mission. A precious and now wasted 90
minutes later, Sandra hugged me gently -- lest I break--
and after brief pecks on cheeks, we were on our way... (continue reading)
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6 COMMENTS ON THIS ESSAY:
Brilliant, concise, evocative, and funny. I should take some pointers from you. Seriously, though, stories like make me despair of ever fully understanding queer communities and lives - and I wouldn't have it any other way. Thanks for sharing.
i kept waiting for the part where he expresses his regret for such a misogynistic crusade. did i miss something?
In response to the previous comment, this essay feels to me like a critique on queer misogyny. I believe the description of the scene during the Vagina Monologues between the author and Adam alludes to this. Not to mention the reference to Cynthia Nixon, a lesbian, and dare I say, feminist icon. This is a funny, challenging essay and I can't wait to read more of his work.
Feminist lesbians be damned. I agree with the previous comment and add, he adores lesbians and considers himself a feminist. He's making fun of them, but in doing so making fun of himself. His crusade seemed more like a means to an end than misogyny. He wasn't afraid to admit the truth of his quest.
Having been an anxious virgin myself, I admit I'm less interested in the politics of Brian's feelings than I am in his having expressed them. I think it is really important to describe fear and desire in a masculine context (as well as all other possible contexts) because so many find these two emotional states inextricably intertwined in themselves and in social expectations of personhood. Also, I thought the piece was well-written and easy to read. Thank You.
Excellent writing...intriguing storyline. I am curious though, what was with the homosexual connotations and "queer" references in your story? Once finished reading your story, I reflected that this is a story about a bisexual man struggling with both cancer and sexual identity. Was this the purpose of your story? If so, great, but I get the impression that you were trying to convey something else.....?