A Gayboy's Childhood from the Ninth Circle of Hell

In my childhood, I learned well the pain of abandonment, homophobia, incest, two consummate narcissists for parents, a brother who was as fucked up as I was when we were kids, and I learned my beloved music.  Daily practicing at the piano three hours per day, and two two-hour piano lessons from 7:30-9:30 twice a week, and four times daily jerking off, seeking in these activities some refuge from the pain of not being able to express pain nor anger and rage nor sadness and certainly no crying--that was my life.  I expressed it all at the piano.  My parents seemed so proud of me, because I played so expressively.  Little did they realize that it was their daily torture, which empowered me to do that.  I remember that one night, after I had played a competition when I was eleven and won, my piano teacher at a lesson read to me the comments of one of the adjudicators.  He was not supposed to do that, but I was so frightened by my tears when I played sad pieces of music, especially that of Brahms, and frightened by my raw rage when I played Beethoven, that he probably thought I would feel better if my feelings were validated.  The adjudicator wrote something close to this: "No child this age should be able to express such deep sorrow and anger.  His playing is not of his age, but that of a much older man who has experienced much of life and its pain.  His performance was magnificent, and it is sad to hear such deep pathos in one so young."  My piano teacher must have known that there was something terribly wrong in my house, because he kept me for four hours per week, and he loved me as if I were his own son.  He kept me safe and sane, at least for my time with him.  Thank you, Mr. E, for having saved my emotional and physical life, for loving me and teaching me to be the musician I was and continued to become.  I will be forever grateful.

My parents, Florrie and Gerry, constantly accused me of "turning tears on and off like a water faucet" and, therefore, they were not real, thus my feelings were not real.  Florrie accused me of being fat and ugly (and she kept feeding me and feeding me and feeding me some more like the wicked witch in Hansel and Gretel until I was, indeed, fat and, I thought, ugly, and she would say "get out of my sight, you fat, ugly pig. You disgust me"), of not ever amounting to anything, ending up living on the streets "like a bum", being useless (except for my piano playing which I came to understand many years ago to have been a narcissistic projection of both my parents.  It had nothing to do with me).  In Green Rooms after concerts when I was a teenager, my mother would stand directly in front of me with her arm extended and greet audience members who wanted to meet me and have some time with the young man who gave them so much pleasure for two hours, and she would say even before I got to shake hands with them, and have a word with someone, "How do you do.  I'm Florence Goodman.  I'm his Mother".  She never said, "How do you do.  This is my son Roger".  She never introduced me.  She took up all the time there was with the audience talking about the wonderful teacher whom she "found" for me, how many hours she made me practice so that I could be the musician I was, how she was "the proud mother".  It was all about her and her narcissism, never about me.  They both would praise me to other people, but never to me.  Through decades of psychotherapy and countless psychotherapists, I understood their narcissism and that I was just a mirror for them of themselves.  Two consummate narcissists getting married!!!  Can you imagine what that was like for my brother and myself?

Gerry was my boy scout troop scoutmaster, and he treated me like shit, especially when we went on camping trips.  I am not saying that lightly, he really treated me like he would his own shit, just useless waste to be disposed of, to be flushed away, to be scraped off the soles of his shoe.  He was a tyrant, constantly smoking his fucking pipes with his breath foul from his tobacco, which was his own "private" blend, of course, and I was utterly miserable.  When the other boys cruelly teased me, the fat and ugly weak Gayboy, he never stopped it. He never came to my aid.  There was no justice in him, no love.  I had to chop the largest logs for the fire, and I did not wield axes too well.  They frightened me, and they were terribly hard on my hands, my soft and beautiful piano hands.  I had to pitch not only my tent but also the tents of the other boys, and it was exhausting.  I had to go into the woods by myself to cut kindling for the fire.  I was terrified of the darkness of the woods, especially at night,  I had to haul ten gallon water buckets from the fountain to the campsite, which was very painful to my hands and shoulders.  None of the other boys had to do any of this.  He criticized me harshly in front of them, and when I finally got home after a particularly painful camping trip and told my mother about his treatment of me he said, "But Rog (he always called me Rog, which I hated and still hate....my name is Roger!!), I have to bend over backwards to not show you any privilege or favoritism".  Bend over backwards, for Christ's sake???  Bend over backwards my ass!!!  He could have treated me just like he treated the other boys, but he had to be hard and mean to me.  He was a pig.

And then, Gerry introduced me to his enormous and, I must say, magnificent cock.  A memory---my mother went away for a long weekend to the "milk farm" (I still do not have any idea what that was nor what she did there but it had something to do with "women's things"), and my brother was spending Saturday night at his friend Dominic's house.  Gerry and I were alone in the house, and he asked me if I wanted to go to a movie with him, and I loved, and still love, movies, so I said yes.  We saw a terrifying film called "The Cult of the Cobra", which my dear friend Patrick was knows film tells me was made around 1954-55, starring Maria Montez (do not ask me how I remember that name) in which this frightening woman who wore very tight silk sarongs and had a wasp waist and big breasts was the leader of a religious cult where she would turn herself into an enormous King Cobra, and they would worship the Cobra with drums and dark singing and torches, and afterwards, the Cobra would slither through open windows especially at night and slay people in their beds by slithering under the top sheets.  I could see the Cobra's motion undulating, and I cannot ever remember being so frightened as a child as I was that night.  When we got home, Gerry and I went in our separate bedrooms.  I lay there trembling, completely terrified that the Cobra Woman was going to come through my window to kill me.  I went shaking from fear into Florrie's and Gerry's bedroom and asked if I could sleep in his bed, because I was so afraid.  Of course, Gerry let his Gayboy-child sleep next to him.  Even though I had not told him I was Gay he sure seemed to know it.  He turned to me with an enormous erection, and I was frightened even more, but I was also fascinated by that big thing that was so incredibly beautiful. That perfect pole and perfect big head with its mysterious slit where piss came out.  It was magnificent to me even in all my fear of it.  He told me to lick it and suck it and that that was what "real men" did for each other, and I did, and he ejaculated in my mouth.  We did it again the next morning with clear sunlight pouring through the windows, and I could really see this thing, this beautiful thing that had so much power for me because it belonged to Gerry, my father, and I finally felt loved.  I inherited his cock which is really the only thing I can honestly say I actually inherited from him, except sometimes I catch his voice and intonation coming out of my mouth and I hate it.  I am convinced that Gerry planned the whole incest thing in advance.  After all, who takes a nine or ten year old child to such a terrifying film, except someone who has a very clear and hidden agenda.  Gerry knew I would be scared to death from the film, and would want to sleep in his bed. I am sure he planned the whole think from the beginning.  Floirrie and Gerry are both dead now.  

I do not miss my father at all (incest perpetrator, strutting peacock of a man who could, in his eyes, do no wrong, always talking very loudly and abrasively using enormous words which no one understood and adding a spattering of French--"real men always pepper their conversations with a little French, Rog"--thoroughly lacking in love, and rabidly homophobic.  I so miss my mother terribly, though, because in the last fifteen years of her life, our relationship was wonderful.  It happened after I told her I was HIV+.  That changed everything between us.  The last five years were the happiest she had ever had, and our relationship was deeply loving.  With all her sarcasm, control issues, and narcissism almost completely dissipated, now vulnerable and old, she became a fine human being.  Her lifelong depression, panic, and constant snxiety disorder just went away because of medication and because she was in a happy living situation finally, an assisted living facility in Santa fe, where she made friends and went out to concerts, movies, and plays.  Finally, she was happy, and was able to love her sons fully.  She even had some friendship with Gerry who divorced her when they were both 65, and she spent years afterward being bitter; bitter, that is, until we moved her from Miami to Santa Fe where my brother's family lived.  She lived to see her grandchildren.  She lived to see her great grandchildren.  In her late life, we made a good pair my mother and I, and even my brother and I who violently hated each other as adolescents (again we have my parents' narcissism to blame for that) love each other more than I ever thought possible.  I don't know what I would do without him.  My brother Len and his partner Susan, his children and their children, and my dear friend Allan are my family now, and I am content.  Florrie is a bittersweet memory, and Gerry is nothing more than an unimportant whisper in the wind.