Charlie

I probably should have mentioned in my post that my high school friend and I both came from lower middle class families, and none of our parents had finished high school. They wanted us to go to college mainly because they were told that was how we would improve our financial and social prospects. Our high school guidance counselor was only interested in getting students into good colleges because it made her look better, and she did a good job at that--we both went to good private liberal arts colleges, with financial aid packages, and a few of our classmates went to the Ivies. She was annoyed that one of the brightest guys in the class opted for a technical school.

Getting higher education degrees did improve our social and financial status, though in my first college teaching job I made less money than my father, who worked in a cardboard box factory. That didn't bother me, because I had a job I enjoyed and the prospect of rising farther in a stable career. However, I didn't have a family to support, and before long I had married someone who had gone to college to pursue a specific professional career, so together we ended up financially better off than my parents had ever been.

7 minutes ago, Rockey said:

English was the toughest class for me in high school. I loved reading literature, but writing my ideas out coherently was a challenge. When I went to college, I had to take a remedial English class first. Charlie, you’re a great writer. I love reading your messages!

Thank you. I imagine that I would have loved having you in one of the remedial English classes I enjoyed teaching.

If someone has a specific career goal and successfully pursues a college education targeted at that goal, then college is probably worth it. For anyone else, it's a crap shoot. My best friend thought he wanted to enter the diplomatic corps, so the guidance counselor told him that since he was good at languages, he should go to a top tier liberal arts college, and major in Russian, which he did. Unfortunately, he didn't have any idea what kind of person the State Dept wanted for the kind of job he envisioned, and he wasn't it (he came from a rough working class family and had no social graces). However, a major insurance company was looking for young grads to train for their data processing department, and their theory was that anyone who had demonstrated that he could become proficient in a difficult new language would be able to learn programming skills, so they took him into their programmer training program. He turned out to be so good that the NY Stock Exchange recruited him away from the insurance company as a programmer analyst, and he ended up making more money than he ever would have at the State Dept, where he probably wouldn't have risen above the level of a translator. He was just lucky that college turned out to be worthwhile for him.

On the other hand, I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life, but everyone told me that I should go to college because I was smart and would "find my path" there. After two years, I still had no idea where I was going, and since I had to declare a major, I just made a list of all the courses I had taken, with the grades, and chose English literature because those were my highest grades. My mentors kept pushing me towards becoming a literary scholar, and when a national organization awarded me a fellowship to pursue a Ph.D., I couldn't turn it down, even though I still wasn't convinced I wanted to keep going. After two years of graduate school, I had had enough, and I started to look for a real job. To my surprise, I was hired immediately by a hospital as their data processing coordinator, for the same reason as my friend: the boss assumed that anyone with a degree in a language could teach himself to program a computer. Duh! No. I had always thought I didn't want to be a teacher, but I found that a job teaching English was the only reasonable alternative, and to my amazement, I discovered that I loved it, and did it for 37 years. So although I took a long way around, going to college did help me "find my path" after all.

Although I was longtime Philadelphian (38 years),  I have never kept up with Philadelphia politics in the 20 years since I left, so I was totally unaware of this woman. Obviously I need to do some research..

1 hour ago, samhexum said:

Damn!  I was all set to make a few jokes about her being named after a nondescript Chevrolet model from the 1960s & 70s, and it turns out her name is Cherelle.

At least I can joke about her being raised by a famous American poet, writer, critic, wit, and satirist:

Cherelle was born to a single teenage mom and raised by her grandparents James and Dorothy Parker. 

 

Something is screwy here. The Dorothy Parker referenced here is not the same Dorothy Parker who was a famous American writer.

6 minutes ago, WilliamM said:

Her grandparents are still alive.

I don't remember the car we had, I think it was a Mercury.

 

 

??Dorothy Parker died back in the 1960s!

9 hours ago, Whitman said:

1959 CADILLAC BROADMOOR SKYVIEW - SEATING FOR 12 in FOUR ROWS!

I believe these were a special design built for the Broadmoor Hotel and golf course in Colorado Springs.

Does he strip completely when he reaches the top?

From the definitions I have read of findom, it is not a single act that is part of a possibly one-time sexual experience with the escort, but an ongoing commitment to the escort, and one from which it could be difficult to extract oneself. If a client is interested in that experience, I doubt that he would mention it while setting up a first appointment with a provider; therefore, I don't see any reason to include it in an ad as an interest of the provider. Listing it in the ad makes it appear that the provider is thinking about it as a possibility before he has even been approached by the client, which is why it is a red flag for many potential clients who consider it as frightening as being tied up and fucked by a thug who is high on drugs.

I would assume a provider would actually prefer email to texts, since emails are easier to ignore or mull over and consider, especially when one is busy.

With a moniker like that, and a self-description like that, I was not expecting photos of a little boy. If there are 150 lbs on that slender frame, are they hiding under the towel?

7 hours ago, Whitman said:

https://media-2-albums.gayboystube.com/contents/albums/sources/1438000/1438314/192521791.jpg

Now that's an office party!!

4 hours ago, Whitman said:

They look a little old to be frat boys. Maybe it's the alumni who come back because they have fond memories of spanking.

To my surprise, I didn't hear any of the usual illegal fireworks in the desert behind my house last night. I went to bed at 9pm. expecting to be awakened by the explosions at midnight, but instead slept soundly through the night. My dog was pleased, too, because he was able to sleep on the bed instead of under it, where he usually goes when the booms start.

34 minutes ago, WilliamM said:

I was visiting a friend in New Zealand, wasn't concerned with  points

I think Mike was replying to Rod Hagen, not to you.

The photos could be real, but the claim that he has seven years experience as a masseur (since he was 16?) and that he is "a former owner of a health management center and fitness studio" (at 23?) is less credible. Age shaving is more likely, especially since he could pass as older even if the photos are really his. One reviewer mentioned that he used a phone translation device and is "working on his English skills," yet his text sounds professionally written. Something is not right here.

9 hours ago, muscmtl said:

Acually poz (dream come true), killer bod, and will do everything the client wants...  Hum... "Willdoeverythingyouwant" escorts don't exist, so catfishing?

https://rentmen.eu/msclslv_foruse

He advertises as an eager sub and probably means that he is open to anything the client wants to do to him, though of course one has to take any statement like that with a grain of salt. (If he will let the client do something that would kill him, what's the point of getting paid?)

I rarely drink scotch, but my spouse has a small glass every night "for his health" (he has been doing it as long as I have known him, which is 55 years). He is particularly fond of Shieldaig, which is reasonably priced at our local Total Wine store.

On 12/29/2023 at 6:02 AM, newatthis said:

One has to wonder why someone would ask such a question (in general; obviously there are specific circumstances or conversations where it might be appropriate).  

When I was 17, back in the Dark Ages, I was cruised by a young man in the men's room of the  Port Authority bus terminal in mid-town Manhattan.  Curious, I followed him outside, where he introduced himself with a slight accent as "Michel." He smiled and asked, "Are you gay?" I was familiar with that adjective, meaning "light-spirited and enthusiastic," and since his name suggested he might not normally be an English-speaker, I figured it must be his awkward way of asking if I were interested in accompanying him. When I said, "Yes," he smiled and invited me back to his rented room nearby. When we arrived, he took off his clothes, so I did the same. To my surprise, he then kissed me passionately, threw me on his bed, and started preparing to fuck me. Shocked, I said, "Wait! What are you doing?" Giving me a puzzled look, he said, "But you said you were gay?!" I replied, "I thought you were asking if I were happy to meet you!" That's when he realized that he had picked up a complete neophyte, and he had to stop and calmly explain what "gay" meant to someone cruising in New York. He then proceeded to teach me everything that gay males did together. I was a willing pupil.

2 hours ago, Charlie said:

Oooh! Do you think they're gay? (Love the capri pants!)

BTW, the car on the left is a "58 Buick, not a Cadillac.

17 hours ago, Danny-Darko said:

2 Men in Capri Pants with 2 Caddys! 

Oooh! Do you think they're gay? (Love the capri pants!)

It is always more comfortable to simply be out than to be outed involuntarily, or to have to find an appropriate opportunity to explain one's sexual orientation to someone. One of the advantages of legal same sex marriage is that I don't have to declare to anyone, "Hey! I'm gay!" In casual conversation with someone, I am likely to mention my spouse, and when I use the pronoun "he" to refer to him, the job is done.

Sometimes younger Americans forget how dangerous it often was in the past to be "out" in America, and how dangerous it still is in many parts of the world. Gay men anywhere have many reasons other than legal or physical danger to want to stay "in the closet." Being openly gay may affect their livelihood, their acceptance in a religion that is important to them, their personal relationships with family or other important persons in their lives. One's sexual orientation or sexual behavior is something that one can manage to hide more easily than one's race, physical disabilities, lack of education or financial means, and other issues that affect one's social interactions.

That being said, staying in the closet can have psychological repercussions, given how important one's sexuality is to a healthy, integrated personality. In my late teens, I had what was loosely called a "nervous breakdown," and my parents sent me to see a counseling psychologist. He gave me the best advice--and surprising advice in those days--which was to always tell the truth to myself about who I was, and to be honest with my loved ones, even if it was hard to do. In other situations, be as honest as you could be pragmatically (this was in the early 1960s, when being homosexually active  was illegal and could get one expelled from school, fired from a job, banned from the military, and even sent to prison). I went home from his office, and told my parents I was "homosexual" (they had no idea what "gay" meant), and to my relief they did not seem openly upset (my mother asked, "How do you know?" which caused me to start laughing and relax). I was already out to a couple of my closest friends, and from then on I was ready to admit my orientation to anyone else who asked. Within a couple more years I had met new friends who were very active in the burgeoning gay rights movement and had joined them in their activities; when a photo appeared in a major newspaper of me taking part in a protest, I gave up any pretense of not being gay.

I do not condemn anyone who stays in the closet for a good reason, though I still would encourage them to be as honest with themselves and as open with others as is possible for them. I agree that those who are stridently homophobic are usually fighting against fear of being perceived as gay by others.

20 hours ago, 56harrisond said:

What is she doing there?

To answer your question: no, I have never been introduced to something new by a provider and found that I liked it. The first time I had sex with another man, we tried almost everything I could think of (though fisting wasn't one of them), and I decided then which things I liked and which ones I really didn't want to repeat.

Two of my closest friends were members of FFA (that is not Future Farmers of America!), and they sometimes tried to explain to me why they found fisting so satisfying, both as tops and as bottoms, but since I don't even care very much for getting fucked by most men, I can't imagine having a fist in my ass would be at all pleasurable. I did fist  men a couple of times when they asked for it, but I was always rather nervous about it, worrying about whether my fingernails were manicured enough.