Moho Road

We've sent our investigators across the globe, combing the world for further signs of far-reaching knowledge and awareness of mohodom.

Our most recent discovery is sent by an affiliated investigative researcher (Addendum: We shall call the secret investigator "Tara" and thank her immensely for her sacrifices to obtain said photo at great peril) who reports to an agent we shall call "Greg" for anonymity's sake. This image shows the support and commitment of the Hawaiian people for mohos everywhere: Moho Road.

We're on the map, baby.



Addendum: check out this post for more information.

Changing Orientation vs. Maturing

So...a random but not-so-random thought I've not blogged about yet: to what extent are some of the changes people undergo regarding their same-sex attraction attributable to orientation, and to what extent are they attributable to finally leaving behind the angst and intensity of teenage-style sexuality?

Maybe a tiny bit more explanation is called for. A lot of the time, when I hear guys (sorry, ladies--I haven't spoken with many of you) talk about how they feel like they're changing, it's framed in the context of not wanting sex with every attractive guy at the gym or not fooling around with their gay friends anymore. So because they no longer have a seemingly uncontrollable urge to get it on with every attractive guy they meet, they consider themselves somehow less homo than before.

Now pardon my bluntness, but isn't that simply what we call maturing? I really don't mean this to belittle those changes in any way. They're great, they're very important, and they're huge to the person undergoing them. I love seeing those changes in people because I'm pretty sure their quality of life will improve, and they'll have more control over themselves.

This thought was partially spurred by an old radio interview I heard a part of today in which the interviewer asked the "ex-gay" mormon subject how he reacts when he sees an attractive male. He responded with a sufficiently vague response about being able to appreciate the beauty of all people, male or female, and I just didn't know what to do with that response. It seemed entirely evasive. He and his mom made some valid points about our culture's oversexualization of attraction, but I was just left feeling like the question went completely unanswered, which is how I sometimes feel when talking to people who have undergone reparative or otherwise change-oriented therapy. It seems they have gained control over their appetites but are afraid to then examine their remaining attractions honestly. This isn't the case with ALL people I've discussed it with, mind you. But it most often is.

So I guess that's it--just how much is an actual change in sexual orientation or diminishing of attraction, and how much is simply a maturity most people reach at an earlier age?

Bill O'Reilly Strikes Again

I personally bristle at probably the majority of what Bill O'Reilly says, partially because of what he's saying, and mostly because of how he says it. Nevertheless, my beloved roommate is struggling--and we, his roommates, are trying to help him--with a growing Fox News addiction, so The O'Reilly Factor was on the other night, and I was subjected to his inflammatory rhetoric, and it was a doozy of a night.

They were discussing "gay gangs" and a story of someone who was badly beaten by a supposed gang of lesbians. The guest he was discussing this with insisted there was no proof it was a "gang" but was a group of women. So Mr. Bill quickly retorted with something like, "OK, fine, not a gang. A pack of lesbians..."

My eyes widened at the hugely offensive nature of his comment in a moment of disbelief and amazement that he could be so viciously inflammatory. Then I remembered who I was watching, and I could only gawk in amazement. "No Spin Zone" indeed.

Yet I'm only human--I cracked up until I cried.

The Winds of Change

I never did post this when I first wrote it several weeks ago, so I thought I'd post it now.


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I feel them. I'm not sure when or to where or for what, but I feel the winds of change. I have for a while now. It hasn't gone away, this feeling so appropriately matched by the fresh, warm breeze rushing through the living room window behind me as I type this out. I feel I could change jobs easily. I could move to another city, even one in which I know nobody. I love where I live, but I could move too. It's that feeling of being cut loose and floating in space above a world of limitless opportunity but being so high above the earth that none of those opportunities are clear. OK, so the feeling is hard to describe, and I'm tired. The imagery isn't really working.

Sitting in the gym today, numb to the temptation of the beautifully sculpted physiques being flaunted in sleeveless splendor and a bit bored with life in general (yesterday I felt great...maybe I have a chemical or emotional imbalance going on...or just have plenty of emotion secretly wrapped up in my friendships and interactions), I realized this is a familiar sensation, this liberation of the winds of change. It seems to often come when I'm just beginning to find depth in friendships and falling into a routine.

I hate routine. It sucks the life out of life. Is this why I'm such a vagabond? I crave change yet often fail to actively make change in my life. I defy myself in a way. Yet I value my friendships greatly. I love my friends but want other experiences...so I move on and maintain the closer friendships, albeit from a distance, while distancing myself from the more challenging ones.

Maybe it comes when I feel like those around me are moving on when I am not. Maybe I just want to abandon the game to avoid being the guy who's left behind. Geographically. Emotionally. Socially. Developmentally.

Or maybe it just really is time. Maybe I've experienced what I was supposed to experience here ("here" meaning in my current situation, not necessarily geographically), and I'm being released for my next journey. Up until just a couple of weeks ago, I felt there was still a reason for my being here, that I was to stay a while longer. I haven't felt that much at all lately.

I'm not saying I'm about to pack my bags and trek off to uncharted lands. But it is interesting to me how these things work, and I do wonder how much of it is simply my M.O. Arrive at the new place. Experiment: what can I conquer? Can I get a job? Can I assimilate into the culture? Can I challenge some norms? Can I make good friends? Can I keep them? Then when I feel like I've pretty much conquered my curiosities, I'm bored. The experiment is over. And I'm ready for another. I have to ask myself that. It's not about being non-commital; it's about getting bored.

I'd bet I'm exhibiting some sort of classic textbook homo symptoms, here. Feel free to enlighten me. *wink*
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Note: I since have not really felt this to any strong degree. I'm just left with the memory of it and the puzzlement over what to do with it. True to form, I have done nothing proactive to figure it out. *sigh* So I'm left to wonder if I haven't felt it because an opportunity has passed, or if I just needed to be spurred by it and now it's up to me, or maybe I'm just to wait and see what's around the bend. But I can't know which of those options is true, so for now, I'm just keeping my eyes open and looking for opportunities.

Desire Assuaged by Familiarity

My previous post, Sexualized Attraction, is related to another discussion going on in the online group at the time I posted it. I've included some of those comments along with additional thoughts, so this entry is a hybrid of old and new ramblings:

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I've seen other mohos say they're surprised how diminished an attraction has become when they actually get to know the object of their affection, and the object becomes a person. I've experienced the same thing. Heck, it happened at the last shindig at the Matises' (no offense to the hottie of whom I speak, who probably will never read this anyway *wink*). And yet I've questioned, isn't that pretty much what happens anyway, gay or straight? You want most what you can't have or what is, in your ignorance, able to be idealized, and when you get it, it's not the fantasy you might have pictured, and reality sets in. It doesn't mean the attraction wasn't real and romantic. I think most of us have also experienced the opposite, where the more you get to know the object of your affection, the more attractive they become. But most people aren't going to connect that well with everyone, so the majority of attractions probably will diminish as you get to know the person and realize you don't mesh as well as you'd hope but can still be friends.

As for getting to know someone you're attracted to (thereby alleviating the sexual tension created by your overactive idealizing imagination when reality stifles your passion), I think I tend to err towards excessive caution. I have, at times, over-focused on the attraction until it has interfered with the development of perfectly healthy friendships with other guys. When I was younger, I wasn't good at relating to other guys at all. Then, before my mission, I got better at it, and by a year or so after my mission, I really felt like one of the guys like never before.

But when I really faced my attraction to members of the same sex and began to deal with it head-on, my ability to develop those friendships seemed to freeze a bit for a while. I could still have and make guy friends to an extent, mind you, but I was letting the whole "when will homosexual feelings or prejudices about homosexuality come into play?" attitude stifle normal interactions. I probably still do sometimes. I've become more comfortable with "straight" guys again. Now, it's more a matter of remembering how hetero guys relate and interact fairly differently from homos. *grin*

I may have a tendency to be cautious, but on the other hand, I'm no longer afraid of my attraction to other guys. Call me past feeling, if you will, but I figure attraction is something I don't necessarily always have control of, so if I happen to find myself becoming so physically attracted that I'm likely to make an idiot of myself, I just back off and take a mental cold shower. Don't ask how.

And there has been the very occasional friend I wished wasn't so freaking hot so I could hang out with them without always wanting a striptease (though I've never felt that way with my closer friends...maybe because I only let myself get close to the less hot ones? *wry grin*). But even with the freaking hot ones, the more I hang out with them in small groups where we actually interact, the less I want to shove money in their G-string and the more I begin to think of them in a fraternal sense. It hasn't always worn off completely, but it becomes more manageable.

So back to the earlier question: is it really that different for heteros? I'm not so sure it is. Maybe a hetero could comment on this...if any ever find, let alone read, my blog. *wink*

Sexualized Attraction

While I was reading through more old journal/discussion group entries, I found the following which I thought might be of some use for my humble blog:

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Fall 2005

After a recent fireside, I went to someone's house to hang out, and lo and behold, the guy I couldn't take my eyes off at the post-fireside 'mingle' was there. "Of course he would be here," I thought, "Great, I wonder if he caught me admiring him after the fireside? How awkward." I had been captivated. This guy seems like one of those ideal types: intelligent, engaging, good-looking, nice, fit, spiritual, great smile, relaxed, fun...I mean, everything you're either attracted to or want to be, right?

I remember thinking it was silly I should have my attention so arrested by a guy, so I forced myself not to stare and instead glanced often. It was fun to see the way he seemed to woo the ladies...or was it that I was being wooed? It still sounds strange to even suggest that possibility 'out loud'.

I was flustered. They were all playing a card game I wanted to learn, but I felt hesitent to interact with the object of my attraction. I felt inadequate next to him. I felt worried my attraction would become obvious and reveal my 'SGA'. I wanted to just sit back and watch. But I realized I was being a boob and decided to bite the bullet and jump in the game.

I'm glad I did--it was a fun game! And as we played, the feeling of being distantly and powerfully drawn went away, and I realized he's somebody I could quite possibly be good friends with. I realized the 'attraction' I was feeling may have been mostly a desire to get to know a cool guy as a friend.

Yeah, he's a looker for sure. Yeah, I think some of the stuff he does is totally endearing. But I'm not so sure that type of thing has to be sexual or romantic. Have you never found habits of siblings totally endearing? Is that romantic?

A female friend of mine once brought up the concept of 'friend crushes,' where you're sort of infatuated with a new friend during a sort of 'honeymoon' stage until you spend enough time with each other for the newness to wear off. Does this mean you're romantically attracted to that friend? Not at all. It does mean there are many types of and elements to attraction, and they needn't all be lumped into 'romantic' or 'sexual'. This made me wonder how often I've over-reacted to my attraction toward other guys and how often I freaked out and ran away from potential friendships for fear I would awaken a monster inside of me and beecome a raging queen.

So my question: How often am I feeling sexual or romantic attraction, and how often am I sexualizing attraction? Sometimes, I'm just genuinely attracted to someone, male or female, in the sense that I would really like to get to know them and get close to them because they have qualities I like or would like to emulate. But because I'm aware of SGA, and that person may also be a physically attractive guy (and I may very well be sexually attracted, as well), I seem to have been ascribing, in a blanket way, inappropriate attraction I shouldn't pursue to completely healthy and appropriate attraction towards potentially beneficial friendships, which isolates me more from healthy, constructive male interaction in the process!

I'm not proposing same-sex attraction is nothing more than misplaced feelings of friendliness or longing for masculine identification. I'm not trying to get into a discussion of whether SGA consists largely of misplaced and twisted senses of attraction and attachment disorder and early weening and got-made-fun-of-too-much-for-being-a-wussy-boy and seeing your mother naked as a kid, yadda yadda yadda.

I'm just wondering if anyone else has found him- or herself wondering the same thing...am I blurring the line between sexual attraction and 'friendly' attraction? And could it be costing me perfectly healthy, normal friendships because I am unnecessarily afraid of being attracted?
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