“I
just go into this escape world and I exist there. I live.
I go through the motions of pretending that my life is great,
I’m fabulous, I’m all this and I’m all
that. I pretend that I have a great life, a great body,
a boyfriend, plenty of money, and I’ve got my act
together. I wish I could deal with things in reality and
not have to go into this fantasy world. It’s like
I don’t succeed in real life because I’ve got
my escape world that I can live in. I’m a disappointment
to my parents and I’m disappointed in myself.”
Jeff dances the way he moves through life: enthusiastically,
energetically, seductively. His regulars eagerly watch as
he moves deftly over drinks, puddles, and ashtrays to favor
them with a word, a wiggle, or a touch. New fans are born
each time they see his lithe body and tight buttocks pass
across their line of vision.
On the job at the 247 Bar, Jeff bounds across the floor
to take his position on the makeshift stage and immediately
becomes one with the music. This night he wears his GI Joe
outfit: tight white tee-shirt which hugs his lightly muscled
chest; the modified camouflage shorts highlight his ass
and emphasize the bulge in his crotch. Black combat boots
compliment the rest and give him a masterful and commanding
appearance.
His movements are smooth, sexy, enticing. The audience responds
immediately and cheer for him to be brought closer to dance
on the bar. Some fans jump forward and place tips in his
boots, in his shorts, at his feet, then stare at him adoringly,
hopefully, wistfully.
Swaying to the music, Jeff smiles his devilish and inviting
smile drawing them in, making them want him, want more than
he will give. He strips off his tee-shirt, rolling it over
his flesh enticing the men to touch and feel, yet never
letting them near. He uses his hips to speak to the men
who desire him and they hear what they want to hear –
that he will be their fantasy alone. Each thrust is a word
of encouragement to the hungry audience, a promise that
he will be that much closer when he comes to them on the
bar.
Carefully slipping off his black leather belt he drapes
it over his neck and plays with it – as if it were
one of the men he has wrapped around his flesh. He toys
with the men through the belt then tosses it away –
as he will eventually toss their dreams and hopes onto the
floor when he leaves without them.
Eagerly awaiting the removal of his shorts, the customers
carefully watch his moves. Jeff does not oblige them quickly,
instead he employs the art of the tease. It is a playful
tease, a tease that says, “You can have this if you
wait long enough. You really can.” And he smiles that
smile which makes them feel that what he wordlessly promises
is really true.
When they least expect it, he allows them to see his white
satin g-string as he quickly drops then raises the camouflage
pants. A cheer and a whistle zing through the smoky bar
and Jeff responds with a wiggle and an enticing thrust of
the hips. But it is not yet time to drop the pants and reveal
his skin.
Finally, the shorts fall away revealing the shocking, satiny
white of the g-string, the fleshy mounds of his ass, and
the fullness of his performance self. Jeff is whole now
and theirs for as long as he is performing. He knows he
has their attention and is their fantasy.
Moving to the bar, Jeff honors a customer or two by placing
his arms around them and using them to balance himself as
he hoists his 170 pounds of muscle and flesh to the top
of the bar. The smiles of the customers so used are a mix
of embarrassment and pride. They have been touched by the
demi-god and they are special. To emphasize this, Jeff performs
for them first, gyrating slowly before their rapt faces,
thrusting his crotch gently out and into their view. Turning
adroitly, combat boots stepping over glasses, his fleshy
well-formed ass is now presented to the panting faithful.
Hands dart out with dollar bills which are carefully placed
beneath the band of the g-string. Those same hands inevitably
stray and caress his flesh. They wonder what it would be
like to possess that flesh even for one night; his movements
give them an inkling and a morsel of hope.
He turns again and playfully shakes the bulging pouch of
the g-string, his cockhead outlined clearly against the
material. Delighted eyes gaze up, embarrassed smiles widen
like parting curtains, hands hesitate then duck beneath
the bar as if to avoid temptation.
Jeff is a poem in motion: balanced and rhythmic, yet the
dissonance lurking between the lines of that poem never
shows. The smooth and graceful body, object of dreams and
fantasies, is wrapped around insecurity and doubt. His adeptness
of physical movement belies his uncertainty about what his
next moves in life should be. He craves independence yet
needs an anchor to stabilize him. He is a wonder of contradiction
and a marvel of insecurity. Yet, no one can tell or is allowed
to know just how conflicted he is. Jeff for them is fun
and fantasy and will never spoil their party. That is also
part of his personal code.
That personal code and everything he is, Jeff attests, comes
from his family and the way in which he and his brother
and sisters were raised. Having broken free of them, his
life since then has been a search for a place in the world,
a search for order, success and love. Seemingly unattainable,
these things are made more elusive by his inability to do
without someone to care for him. Whether it is a parent,
a manager, or a lover there is usually someone in Jeff’s
life who will take him by the hand, choose his clothes,
frighten off the raucous customer, and generally pave the
way for him.
“I don’t know that I have a sense of my place
in the world yet. I think that’s part of my problem
right now. I have a sense of who I want be. I want be someone
who is working in business, who is successful, who is contributing
to society. I want to be a good husband to someone. I want
to be in some ways the stereotypical person: good relationship,
good job, good life. I’m clearly not there yet, and
that’s part of a lot of the self-doubts that I’m
having right now, y’know? Will I be the person who
is successful in finance? Why is it I can’t get off
my ass and get a job? This is the quintessential job market,
you know? There’s no reason not to get a job and the
only reason I haven’t is that I haven’t applied
myself to find it. Part of it is the way I was brought up,
part of it is I’m just too lazy, part of it is I don’t
like the whole process.
“I’m getting a lot of pressure from my parents.
They’re very disappointed. When I was growing up my
family was very centered in on itself. It was really Ozzie
and Harriet in a lot of ways. Scary stuff! We did not interact
a lot with other people, we were very isolated in some ways.
That’s the way my parents wanted it, they were all
about the kids. They hardly went out. For us to get a babysitter
was very rare. Vacations were all done together as a family.
Everything was done as a family together. We did little
league and stuff like that. But the interaction socially
was very minimal. You could say my independence training
wasn’t good.
“My family was everything when I was growing up. They
did everything for us. All my childhood memories are of
my family. My childhood friends are irrelevant. It’s
my family that I remember. Even like the accident I had
when I was a child when I was attacked by a dog. It was
just another day in a lot of ways even though it was a huge
ordeal.
“When I was four, I was attacked by a German Shepherd.
I was with my sisters and brother and we went to the birthday
party of a neighbor kid. The dog, he was kind of a guard
dog, was chained up in another part of the house. I wandered
away from the party, went around the house and saw the dog.
We had two dogs in my house, so I put my arms around the
dog’s neck to give him a hug like I did with my dogs.
Because the German Shepherd didn’t know me and was
more aggressive, he went wild and shredded my face. I was
hospitalized and it took them ten operations to rebuild
my face. But even with all the memories I have of going
through all that, the strongest memories in that time are
always of my family. How they got me through it. My memories
aren’t actually of the attack but of my family. They
were my whole life. I depended on them.
“So, I think that leaving my family and going to Drexel
University was a defining moment. It was really important
that I leave the house and leave my family. That was the
first time I seriously got away from their influence. It
was a defining moment because growing up in such a socially
isolated family you didn’t develop socially. When
I got to college I had no social skills at all. It was amazing.
I couldn’t hold a conversation. I couldn’t make
small talk. Didn’t have a clue how to do it. Didn’t
know how to interact with people.
“My first year in college was okay. It was like a
review of high school and so I aced the courses. My second
year, they totally got into new areas for me. I was in the
wrong major. I wasn’t applying myself and I was failing.
Everybody had always told me, because I was so smart and
so good with math, to be an engineer. I realized that I
didn’t wanna be an engineer. I didn’t like the
class work. It just wasn’t what I wanted to be. I
was struggling to find out what I wanted to do with my life.
I was going through really difficult times. So, I was failing
out of my classes. Technically I was kicked out of the college
of engineering but not out of Drexel. When my parents found
out, they called and said, ‘Well, that’s it.
We’re cutting you off. No more money. If you’re
going to get grades like that , we’re not paying for
your college.’ And I was like, ‘You’re
cutting me off, then I’m cutting you off.’ I
hung up on them.
“This happened, in a lot of ways, for all the wrong
reasons, but I’m so glad it happened. This was a big
thing for me. We didn’t speak for six weeks. I had
never done that before. I called home a lot before that,
but I stopped. They’d call and I’d hang up on
them. I was a real dickhead.
“But it was kinda nice because for the first time
I didn’t have them. That safety net was gone. I thought,
‘I’m responsible for life now.’ That was
tough and very, very scary. But I learned a lot.
“I graduated – finally majored in finance –
and I got a job in a company. But I was having a lot of
trouble with myself because I was uncomfortable with who
I was. I’d always thought I was gay but I hadn’t
come out. When I was 24, I finally broke down, it was time
to deal with it and come out of the closet. I went to a
friend who had been my coach at Drexel. I was on the cheerleading
team! Swish! Big Girl! I wore one of those skirts and I
looked damn good in it! I’ve got the legs for that
skirt, I’ll have you know.
Seriously, he was my coach for
two years on that team. I kinda kept in touch with him,
maybe because I had heard rumors that he was gay. I knew
he was very smart and very worldly. He grew up in New York
and came out at the age of 15, I think it was. So, he had
been through a lot and he understood a lot. He’s gifted
with insight. He’s amazingly wise and amazingly young.
He’s 32 this year. As it turns out for the next six
months he was like a mentor to me. He was very helpful in
my coming out, guiding me and all that good stuff. Everyone
should have someone like that. I couldn’t imagine
coming out now without someone helping me and explaining
what’s what, helping to deal with a lot of issues.
Lenny was the best; he was someone to talk to but he was
more. He’s my biggest role model. I depended on him
a lot. There was a lot that he showed me and helped me experience
without me having to fumble around in the dark and figure
it all out for myself. He taught me a lot about gay relationships.
“But, it’s funny because my relationships are
affected by my family, too. In my history I have had a lot
of three-ways. Mostly one night stand type threesomes but
I was also in a three-way relationship for almost a year.
The reason why I’ve done that kind of relationship,
I think, is that I’m trying to get back to my early
childhood. My family was very tight, very nuclear. I realized
that I did all the three-ways because I’m trying to
get back to the place where I’m in a secure relationship
with two people. They have their own bond and I’m
interacting with that somehow like being in a family.
“It’s kind of wild, I can look back at all my
relationships, even when I’m with just one other guy,
I can see how that family thing affects me. It even affects
what I look for in a boyfriend. Because what you want in
a boyfriend and what you end up with in a boyfriend are
two totally different things. I say I want someone who is
a partner for my life but I always end up with someone who
is a parent for my life. Like my last boyfriend, Tip, who
is very good at cleaning and decorating the house and taking
care of me.
You know, helping me choose
my clothes. You can see that I’m not Mr. Fashion sense.
He did a lot of that for me. I was very comfortable and
happy with that relationship. It’s not what I wanted
but it’s what I kept going to. I needed that in a
boyfriend.
“Our relationship fell apart for a lot of reasons,
and I kicked Tip out eventually. He just couldn’t
see me for who I am. He had a stereotype of dancers as loose
and as being hookers and he applied it to me. He kept saying,
‘I know what goes on at those clubs, I know you’re
fooling around on me.’ I didn’t like that. This
was a big problem in our relationship. Some people will
take you as you are. I’m a stripper, some people can
handle it, some people can’t. Tip couldn’t handle
it after a while.
“For a while, I couldn’t go without having a
relationship. I needed another person in my life. I dated
and went from person to person to person, from relationship
to relationship. I’m trying to break that because
when I’m not in a relationship, it’s really
difficult for me. I’m too dependent on that. I’m
beginning to be able to be out of one but it’s not
easy. I’ve finally come to the realization that it’s
pretty immature to be that way, but I’m still always
looking for a relationship. If I do get into one again,
he’s gotta respect what I do. Like stripping.
“I got into stripping after I lost my job. My company
went out of business. I wanted to move to New York but I
didn’t have a job. So this friend of a friend, who
was a stripper, said that a great way to make money was
to strip. He told me he was paying for his Ph.D. by stripping
and he said, ‘I’ve seen you dance and you dance
really well. You have a nice body. You should try it. Stripping
pays really well and it’s odd hours.’ So before
I went to New York, I figured I’d go into the 247
here and see how the guys worked the crowd, what they did,
y’know. After I was there a while, the manager, Steve,
came up to me and asked if I wanted a job. So I was like,
‘Yeah, sure. Why not?’ I figured I’d start
stripping there, get some practice before I went to New
York. I started stripping at the 247 and I never made it
to New York, yet. I’m still in Philadelphia working
for Steve’s agency, Hardbodies.
“Steve is incredibly nice and makes it easy. Very,
very easy. He takes care of everything and keeps us out
of trouble. He won’t let anybody get away with anything.
He’s got my best interests at heart. I don’t
think I’d work for anyone else but Steve. I know when
Steve books me, I don’t have to worry about anything.
He always negotiates the money which makes it easy for me.
If he sends me to a place where he can’t keep an eye
out, it’s like, ‘Just show up. This is what
they’re gonna hand you in cash and this is what they
want you to do. Then you get out of there.’ When he
can, he stays around the place to make sure nothing goes
wrong. Like at the 247 he watches real close because they’ve
had so many violations. He’s very protective. Whenever
it gets out of hand, I’m like ‘Steeeeeve! Get
me out of here!’ And that’s it. He comes over
and removes the guy.
“When they see things go on in a club, people wonder.
They ask me all the time, ‘How can you do this?’
But, I love to get up there and dance. I’d do it for
free. I would. I love dancing up there. And I like the attention.
This is a great way if you need a little ego boost. You
get all this great attention. People give me all this money
just to look at me. It doesn’t get much better. Really,
it doesn’t get much better than this.
“I’ve gotten one hundred dollar bills! To this
day, I’ll never understand why people give me money
to see me. I can understand , when they come in and they
give me a dollar because that’s expected. But when
people give me one hundred dollar bills, I don’t understand
that. I do not value looking at me as being worth one hundred
dollars. I’ve seen hundred dollar bodies before and
I’m not one of them. It just blows my mind when people
are very generous. The only thing I’ve got going for
me is a personality.
Some guys tell me I have a great
smile or nice legs but they all say I have a great personality.
In the world of strippers, I’m clearly not the upper
tier, y’know? There are a lot of bigger and better
bodies. Go to New York. Those guys are steroided out and
they’ve got nine inch dicks. I don’t hold a
candle to those boys. That’s why they’re in
New York and I’m in Philly.
“I really like it when customers tell me I do a good
job. That means a lot when somebody comes up to me and tells
me, ‘Man you did a great job. We thought you were
really hot tonight.’ People who tip me with one hundred
dollar bills sometimes don’t tell me they liked what
I did. But when somebody says, ‘You were turning me
on so much tonight.’ Or, when somebody gets a woody
and they point at it and they’re like, ‘Look!
This is you!’ It means a lot that I’m appreciated
on that level.
“I’m really neurotic about my appearance. It’s
like, ‘I’m too fat. I’m not big enough.
I’m looking pale tonight.’ I’m very neurotic.
Up on stage I’m like, ‘Don’t hit that
pose they can see your love handles.’ Or ‘Should
have shaved my body.’ Or ‘My hair doesn’t
look good tonight.’ I’m very tough on myself
when I’m up there working. I’m a basket case.
“I guess what else I’m thinking is, ‘Why
are these people paying money to see me? My body’s
not great, my dick is not big. Am I insane to think that
people are gonna pay to see this?’ All the self doubts
come out. I’m not happy with my body. I’d trade
a lot of people for their bodies. I don’t think I’m
ready for New York. If I had implant surgery, I guess, maybe
then.
“Stripping has been good and it’s been bad.
For every good thing its done, it’s done a bad thing.
It helps your ego, your self-confidence. That’s the
upside. I’m more self-confident and I’m more
used to my body even if I’m not satisfied. The downside
is you see yourself in a much more shallow vein. You’re
more concerned about your façade and your image.
It places a lot more emphasis on that type stuff. And on
the limits you’ll go to in order to improve your appearance
like steroids and stuff like that. I’ve done steroids
but they haven’t worked really well for me.
“Stripping does shape how I see myself. But I think
our whole society as gay men is too image conscious. There
is an enormous emphasis on how you look. Enormous. I get
caught up in it, too. I have my type and I think everybody
knows what my type is. I like big bodybuilders. Beefy. I
want muscles! Give me muscles! If you’ve done steroids
in the past to get muscles, fine. Whatever it took. Just
so you’re great now, that’s good enough.
“I was at Woody’s on Saturday night and I said
to myself, ‘Ohmygod, there are so many ugly men.’
Then I felt awful and I thought, ‘Gee, that’s
a horrible thing to say. These are probably great people
who are wonderful and loving and giving.’ On the other
hand they’re screwed because of the looks issue.
“The only real fear I had when I got into stripping
was that I would eventually get into prostitution. That
I’d get too addicted to the money and that my standards
would start slipping and I’d start moving toward prostitution.
But it hasn’t happened. I have a firm belief that
it’s not the industry that does that to a person.
Either a person is predisposed to being a hooker or they’re
not. It doesn’t matter whether they’re a stripper
or not ‘cause there are a lot of prostitutes that
aren’t strippers. I think that being a dancer and
being a prostitute, there are a lot of similar characteristics.
They’re both a form of entertainment, and you’ve
got an exhibitionist nature, and that type of stuff. You’ve
just got a different line in the sand.
“Some dancers look down on hooking. I don’t.
I know a lot of prostitutes and my attitude is, you know,
if that’s the way you want to make your money, knock
yourself out. At this point I say to myself, ‘No,
I would never do porn, I would never do prostitution.’
But you always have to consider things on a case by case
basis. I’ve had guys offer me $60 to give me a blow
job. When that happens, you say no and later on you’re
thinking, ‘What’s wrong with this picture?’
You know?
“I don’t think I’ll ever change my attitude.
I don’t think I’ll ever do prostitution. But,
y’know, it’s always there as a back up. If I
ever really am desperate for money, I can imagine myself
doing it. Because you’d be amazed at what you do if
you have to.
“I’m not there yet. Right now, I’m okay.
When I had my job, I made a lot of money. I bought a house
and put away a lot of money. I was financially set but slowly
I’ve been eroding that because I’ve been living
outside of my means. It’s been slowly eating up my
little nest egg. Now I’m starting to get into a pressure
situation and I’m worried and that’s affecting
me.
“Things aren’t bad though. I’m proud of
who I’ve grown to be. The thing I’m most proud
of is that I learn from my mistakes. Part of the problem
with being a stripper is that you fall into looking at things
on the micro scale instead of on the macro scale. Because
you look at people who have a bigger dick, a better body,
who are better looking or younger or are more worldly. You
know, people who come out at age 21 and who have this great
package of their image and of who they are. And you get
jealous of all that. It’s tough for me sometimes because
I know people here in Philadelphia who have the epitome
of the gay image: they’ve got the great body and the
fabulous lifestyle and they’ve got boyfriends. Everything
I want but don’t have.
“I feel like I really messed things up. I’m
too complacent I my life. Stripping made my life too easy
and I took too much time away from my career. I’m
27 now, baby, I’m getting old. Financial firms will
wonder why I took three years off. They don’t buy
the “find yourself” crap anymore. I really cried
about this lately because my life is not working out the
way I want it to be. I’m not comfortable with myself
or about where I’m going with my life. I want to get
my life back into my business career and I think I’ve
reached a point where I’m ready to do that now.
“What I really want is to be considered a good person.
I never want to hurt anyone intentionally. I believe in
karma, that what you project comes back to you. It’s
a whole cycle. So I definitely want to be a good person
in life because that karma will come back to me. I want
to be a mature person and do things in an intelligent manner.
I look up to people who are very smart, who have their act
together, and act in a very responsible manner. That’s
what I want to be.
“When people meet me I want them to walk away being
envious because that’s the way I am. I walk away from
certain people saying, ‘Geeze, they’ve got it
all together. They’re great guys, they’ve got
a great life, a great body, and they’ve got their
act together.’
“The more I mature, the more I’m losing a childishness
that I have. But I have to maintain that playful attitude
because I just can’t take life that seriously. It’s
too short and my life has been too charmed. I go through
periods where I’m incredibly happy. I say to myself,
‘I’ve got a house, a roof over my head, I eat
decent food, I have good friends, and my life is really
overall, good.’ I don’t have to worry which
cardboard box I’m gonna sleep under tonight or where
my food’s gonna come from or if I’m gonna live
to see tomorrow. Many people I know have these issues. Their
lives are so much more immediate, compared to my life. My
concerns are insignificant compared to theirs. So I like
to keep that in perspective.”
The longing in Jeff’s eyes is almost painful when
you notice it and realize what it is. It lies well hidden
beneath the real joy he feels in his life as a stripper.
Casually glancing at this man of average height and above
average looks and musculature, no one ever guesses at the
depth of the discontent layered beneath the veneer of cheerfulness
and sexual frivolity. In truth, he isn’t pretending
when he seems cheerful because he is a complex mix of sadness
and joy, of deep discontent and ecstatic happiness. But
this dejection is a new feeling, a new experience to which
he is awakening. His contentment and self-satisfaction has
been nudged by a sense of time lost and years wasted. In
truth the sense of disappointment had been germinating long
before he began to strip. With time it has grown to fill
him with inner conflict.
Perhaps part of his distress lies in the fact that he knows
he will eventually have to grow away from the life of a
dancer which he so enjoys. Possibly the longing he feels
is not just for what he does not have materially but also
for the freedom and sense of abandon he will no longer have
once he returns to the reality of the work world. For now
he continues to dance and to strip.
I will be spotlighting
either an interview or a profile of one of the more than
one hundred-sixty male strippers interviewed for this
book. This is the first of the Stripper Profiles that
you will find on this website.
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