Gay Life, Straight Work Page 2

  One memorable incident occurred when my stepmother returned home to find a girl with me. For reasons spelled out later, the situation was entirely ‘innocent’. I think I was showing off my boys’ toy chemistry equipment in the then car-less garage. In uncontrolled fury she screamed at the girl and threatened her before throwing her out. Subsequent appeals from the girl’s mother suggesting that they were a respectable family and there was nothing wrong with a normal friendship met with obstinate rejection. My father’s reaction to these conflicts was to talk with me indulgently in secret and to give me things that I was not to mention to my mother. The situation had its compensations. It meant that during the ensuing years much time was spent away from the parental home, in lodgings or elsewhere, so that, despite continuing shyness and an anxiety-prone temperament, I had to learn to look after myself.

  During school holidays I was farmed out, first to my ageing maternal grandmother, who was living alone in a remote cottage in North Wales, lit by oil lamps and served by an outside WC. In winter it was cold, and many evening hours were spent wrapped up in bed reading by candle light. In those days I was an avid reader of fiction, especially boys’ stories of fat boy Billy Bunter and the pupils of Greyfriars School, popularised by the long defunct ‘Magnet’ magazine. I was fascinated by the accounts of upper-class boarding school life and by the portrayal of a then fashionable macho culture and a muscular Christian morality. I also devoured the novels of Dickens, Thackeray and Trollope. It was the complex plots of the Victorian writers that attracted me; an appreciation of the social commentary came later. When I had pocket money I used to buy these books very cheaply at a second-hand shop in Crosby. During stays at Grandmother’s cottage the only other distraction was a bus excursion to the seaside town of Rhyl, where many solitary hours were whiled away in cinemas and amusement arcades. These are favourite venues for predatory paedophiles, but I never encountered any, or indeed anybody else, perhaps because of my shy, unwelcoming demeanour.

  One other solitary habit I had during the early ’teens was cycling, wandering for hours without any particular aim in mind, save to see what new place I could discover or how far I could go before having to turn back. A favourite route was along the banks of the Leeds and Liverpool canal, where I did once observe a man lying in the long grass masturbating. I cycled past without pause, but the image stuck in my mind for a long time. On another occasion I was fascinated on passing a group of naked boys, just emerged from bathing in the canal. These reactions foreshadowed realisation of my sexual orientation.

  After Grandmother’s death, I used to be sent to stay during school vacations with Mr M, a wealthy widower in Wrexham. My father knew him because the company of which he was Managing Director had dealings with Cunard. From time to time he invited my parents to accompany him on sight-seeing trips round North Wales in a smart, chauffeur-driven hire car. I was taken along too, gazing at the beautiful mountainous countryside through the car window. We used to stop at luxury hotels and consume the six-course meals that were a feature of those days. Mr M led a rather lonely life in his big house and seemed to like having me around. Being waited on at meals and seeing him ringing a bell for a servant when he wanted anything was a new experience. It was, however, a situation that lacked the company of peers. These visits carried on to my later ’teens. Trying to be helpful, Mr M introduced two girls to keep me company. We never got beyond platonic friendly outings, although they made some suggestive overtures. On one occasion I took them to a picturesque riverside restaurant in the country, where Mr M had previously taken me and my parents by car. We were turned away ignominiously because we had arrived on bicycles. This reinforced a feeling of class inferiority and social awkwardness.

  Scholastic Progress

  A serious, obedient and attentive pupil, I usually performed above average in classroom tests and examinations, preferring maths and science to languages and literature, possibly because the latter were less well taught. Many of the boys came from families where there was more appreciation of vocational studies than of art. The class for German language was so exceptionally unruly that the master was often near to tears. Learning was at a minimum, and the poor man committed suicide during the year he was supposed to be teaching us. The conversation at home was never about books or cultural matters; visits to plays, concerts or exhibitions were unheard of, and the only books around were those I got hold of myself. Nevertheless, my mother had been and my father continued to be convinced of the importance of education and determined to help me “get on”. They had more respect for school rules and teachers’ authority than most working class parents. On the great occasion of the maiden voyage of the first Queen Mary liner, my father wanted to take me to Southampton one Saturday morning to give me a tour of the ship. Only a few hours off school were needed, but instead of just taking me, he applied in advance and was refused. He then visited the school and pleaded that this was educational and the chance of a lifetime. At the last moment I was released and permitted to depart.

  Around the age of fourteen my parents had the idea of sending me away to a distant boarding-school. Father, generous as always, was prepared to pay for entry to a grander public school. Interviews were granted at a number of famous places, including Rugby. Surprisingly, despite my parents’ Liverpool accents and obvious unfamiliarity with public schools and my lack of any sports record, at least one such school was prepared to take me (I do not remember which). Everything seemed settled until one of the teachers at Merchant Taylors, learning that I was leaving, approached my parents and explained to them, what should have been obvious, that I was not the type to be suitable or happy at boarding-school. Rescued from what might have been either a catastrophe or possibly a radical cure, their next solution was to put me into lodgings, an arrangement that continued intermittently for the remainder of my time at school and university.

  For my last year at Merchant Taylors I won a scholarship, and father no longer had to pay school fees. It was suggested I should stay on another year to try for a scholarship to Cambridge. Had I done so and succeeded my experience of Cambridge University could have been very different from how it turned out, but I was keen to move on and opted for immediate entry to Liverpool University to study medicine. It had been thought I might study chemistry, which would have been helpful were I to seek a place in Mr M’s business. However, the war had already started and I was still terrified at the prospect of the physical training demanded in the forces. I was under age for call-up and medical students were reserved from service until they qualified. I admitted to nobody that this was one reason for my choice. Fear of the real dangers of warfare was nothing in comparison to this phobia. Air raids had not bothered me, I was amused at my stepmother’s panic when an incendiary bomb rolled off the roof of the house, and I quite enjoyed occasional ‘fire-watching’ on top of a Cunard warehouse with a view of the bombing of the docks. Ever indulgent, my father went along with the choice of a medical education, undeterred by the years of fees and maintenance expenses involved.

  Sexual Awakening

  When talking among themselves, gay men have the boring habit of endlessly exchanging early sex experiences. I shall have to do the same, otherwise it is impossible to convey honestly the context of subsequent life events. Infantile sexual sensations and curiosity are universal, but in a puritanical environment children soon comprehend that such matters are secret and unspeakable; so it was for me. While at kindergarten, I used to have fantasies of little boys being buttock-spanked or spanking me, never expressed in word or deed, and not understood as sexual. So far as I know. I had no comparable real-life experience to set this off. Although there were girls at the kindergarten, they never featured in this fantasy. At school, from a quite early age, certainly before any obvious physical signs of puberty, boys would chase each other and when one caught the other he would try to wrestle him to the ground and proceed to grab his privates. When caught, I would put up the resistance expected, but the sensations experienced w
ere exquisitely pleasurable.

  One day the headmaster was unexpectedly passing by and caught a pair of us engaged in this rude wrestling game. He told us to call at his study later. I was petrified with fear that he had seen exactly what was going on. I did not understand why, but I felt we had somehow committed an enormous transgression and would be disgraced and expelled. In fact that could indeed have been the case. Although I had no experience of it, in those days draconian measures could ensue when childish homosexual “indecencies” came to official attention. Fortunately there were some teachers, probably including this one, who would turn a blind eye. He let us go with a minor caution about nuisance behaviour. Such is the strength of sexual urges, this fright failed to put an end to the activities. In fact, throughout life, though in other contexts cautious and compliant with rules, I continued to take serious risks in regard to sex.

  At age twelve I used to achieve sexual sensations when alone in the bathroom by wriggling about naked while straddling the edge of the bath, eventually producing a first ejaculation. I soon discovered how to masturbate in the normal way. With the coming of puberty, activities at school became more openly sexual. On the back row in class, under cover of the desks, boys would put their hands in each other’s trouser pockets and grope. In empty classrooms or behind the bicycle sheds or the sports pavilion, small groups of boys would begin horseplay that would end up exposing someone’s genitals. I joined in quite happily and felt no particular guilt about these clandestine sex games. More secretly, pairs of boys would go off alone together for sessions of mutual masturbation, but I did not participate in this, having no willing friend. Sex of any kind was a taboo subject, never discussed with adults, and homosexuality was a concept unknown. The gay-bashing prevalent in schools today was absent. Bullying was directed to boys who were timid, unsporting and insufficiently macho. Participation in rough-and tumble sex between boys did not seem to matter.

  The teasing and mild physical bullying I suffered at school would sometimes take on a sexual character, when I would be pounced on by several boys trying to open up my pants and feel around. In truth, I enjoyed this, though I always struggled and pretended otherwise. On some occasions, an older boy and his companions (I still remember their names) would drag me (or was it lead me?) to some little-frequented spot, and while one of them would hold me from behind in a bear hug another would open my pants and masturbate me to climax. One time a boy who did not normally participate in such behaviour came by and was invited to join in. He declined, calling out that I should complain to the teachers. Of course I did not do so. Despite the spectacle of outrageous abuse, my apparent distress was a sham. One incident, however, was rather more than I bargained for. It happened in a full classroom while waiting for a class to start. Some boys grabbed me and held me down on the floor while one of them fished out my genitals. To my embarrassment I ejaculated uncontrollably in front of everyone. When allowed to get up I had to rush to clean up the spilled semen before the teacher arrived. One of the bystanders expressed some sympathy, but pointed out that I had “asked for it” by taking part in sexual games.

  Although I found contact with certain boys particularly desirable, sexual encounters were essentially physical incidents with no thought of special friendship. An exception occurred at around fourteen when I made friends with a classmate who shared an interest in cycling. His family, parents and older brother, were going on a summer holiday to Wales and to my great delight I was invited to join them. He and I were to spend a day cycling from Liverpool to their holiday apartment in Moelfre Bay on the island of Anglesea. We shared a bed and spent much time together roaming the coast and cycling around, stopping to sun ourselves in secluded spots. Physical intimacies began, but he resisted genital play and sought anal contact, not real penetration, but just poking the anus with stalks of grass. School sex had not included any anal erotic activity, but I enjoyed the new experience. It did not outlast this holiday, however, and it was many years later that I was introduced to anal intercourse. Other aspects of the holiday were a disaster. My chronic shyness in front of my friend’s parents made mealtimes a pain. My lack of sporting skills became spectacularly evident when, in full view of his father, my inability to row properly left my friend to struggle single-handed with a current that was preventing us coming back to land. The climax came when I overheard his parents discussing why they would never invite me again. That distressing confirmation of inadequacy heralded the end of my first experience of a sexualised friendship.

  In the later years at secondary school, talk about sex with girls became commonplace and I started to worry about my lack of attraction to them. The struggle to become ‘normal’ began. I cannot quite remember how, but I managed to meet up with a girl my own age and ask her to come with me to the cinema. Probably I had asked permission to fondle her, because I heard afterwards from another boy that she had told him that the trouble was that I asked first instead of getting on with it. I did, however, get to know a somewhat tomboyish girl who had no hesitation inviting me home where a group of youngsters used to play the board game Monopoly. We were in the garden one day with another boy who was dressed in a kilt. Some suggestive horseplay began, but nothing much happened. In any case I was much more excited by the kilt than the girl. This was the girl who was to be driven away by my stepmother. Not until a long time after, when a medical student, did I have anything approaching heterosexual contacts.

  STUDENT EXPERIENCES

  Life Opens Up

  Liverpool was a ‘red-brick’ university where students lived at home or in lodgings and attended lectures daily. It was possible for a loner to have no contact with fellow students except during the day. Even so, socialising went on during breaks and lunchtime, and there were student societies to join. As we were now a community of adults of both sexes, overt bullying, sexual or otherwise, was left behind and a degree of civilised reserve and politeness reigned. I could fit in up to a point, and make some real friends, although I had never learned to dance and avoided both parties and sports. The macabre setting of the dissecting room was for me the occasion for some enjoyable social contacts. Many hours were spent there in groups of four, slowly picking at different sections of a pickled cadaver. Conversations extended way beyond the task in hand. Holidays in the Lake District afforded another friendship-promoting situation, as I was able to join in with a small group who regularly stayed at a welcoming sheep farm, Cockley Beck, high up in the Duddon Valley. The sharing of beds as well as bedrooms with same-sex companions added to the intimacy. We were well fed on roast lamb, since meat from sheep that had supposedly met with accidents could be used to supplement the wartime rations.

  My first involvement in a crime (other than homosexual) concerned wartime rationing. By virtue of his work on ships’ supplies, father received various ‘gifts’ of food and drink, some of them clearly outside the ration allowance. Like many men over the age for military call-up, he had volunteered for part-time service in the community and had become a special constable. As a result, he received an unofficial ‘tip-off’ that someone had given the police his name as a suspected receiver of illegitimate foodstuffs and that he might expect a police raid. Cupboards stuffed with tinned foods, sugar etc. were quickly emptied and the contents transferred to his mother-in-laws’ house. Nothing happened for many months and the stuff began to dribble back. During one of my temporary sojourns in the parental home, I was alone in the house when the police eventually arrived. They went into the kitchen and started listing things and weighing butter and sugar, etc. Then they came upstairs, finally reaching the tiny bedroom-study where I waited fearfully, knowing that the main stock of guilty goods was in the wardrobe. I had a large, suspicious box housing a real skeleton, normal equipment for anatomy studies. When it was opened up, the friendly police were so intrigued they seemingly forgot to look in the wardrobe and scandal was avoided!

  Returning to medical training: like everyone else I quickly got used to witnessing gory operations, se
eing very ill people and having close contact with dead bodies. The theoretical teachings caused me no special difficulty, but when it came to practical matters, examining patients and recognising physical signs, from breath sounds heard through the stethoscope to retinal abnormalities seen through the ophthalmoscope or swollen organs felt through the abdomen, I was unconfident. In the clinical examinations for final qualification, I am sure I arrived at the diagnoses from the histories the patients gave me rather than from the observations I was supposed to make. In the operating theatre I was never among the minority of eager volunteers invited to assist the surgeon by handing him instruments and clamping bleeding points.

  The war had surprisingly little effect on academic routine, save for the Officer Training Corps that we were required to join. Medical students formed a company commanded by a professor of pharmacology dressed up as a major. We wore the uniforms of privates and NCOs. The activities were not stressful, consisting mainly of parade ground exercises. We carried ancient carbines and practised stretcher-bearing and first aid. Some of the activities took place in the huge Lutyens crypt which was all that existed of the Catholic cathedral, planned before the war as an enormous domed building to rival Saint Peter’s in Rome. Today, it serves a variety of secular uses, surviving beneath the much smaller modern cathedral, locally known, on account of its shape and Irish clientele, as Paddy’s wigwam. The nearest we came to actual military service was to help unload wounded men from ambulance trains.

  Vast changes have taken place in medicine since those days. In hospital the matron held sway. Her morning appearances, with her amazingly tall hat and retinue of followers, outshone the consultants’ processional ward rounds. Antibiotics had not long been in use and penicillin was in short supply. The induction of high fever was still in use for treating syphilis, sometimes achieved by placing the victim under a net with malaria-infected mosquitos inside. Cardiac surgery and organ transplants were yet to come. Tuberculosis remained a deadly scourge. Anaesthesia was relatively undeveloped and major operations were still being conducted with ether dropped onto a gauze mask held over the patient’s mouth and nose. One consultant anaesthetist I watched regularly placed his head so close to the mask he must have been enjoying the ‘high’. Prostates were being removed by singularly gory surgical dissection.