TetRefine

Grown ass housewives fawning over a 16 year old boy....

Heat of the Moment, by Asia.

There was a guy, maybe 25 or 26, clean cut and well dressed, who I noticed leaning up against a column by the waiting area, with a look of absolute desperation on his face. I discreetly moved closer to him to see what was going on, and all I hear is "baby please don't leave me" before the line on the other end of the phone goes dead. He looks at the screen, and it's clear the call is over before his plea ever got answered. He lowers his head against the column and quietly begins to sob right in the middle of Penn Station on a busy Sunday afternoon. I look around and absolutely nobody seems to notice this guy and his obvious pain. They say in a city people are too busy or rushed to care, and here I am the only one in all of Penn Station who seems to take notice. Maybe it's because I feel him more than he realizes. Maybe it's comforting to me knowing that someone else feels your pain, even if they don't realize it. He finally pulls himself together, the occasional tear still running from his eye and disappears into the mass of people waiting in line for a train bound for Boston. I know the feeling man, even if you don't know it.

Eastern State Penitentary in Philadelphia. They've turned it into a high-end haunted house for tourists but every local knows the place is haunted for real.

Eastern State Penitentary in Philadelphia. They've turned it into a high-end haunted house for tourists but every local knows the place is haunted for real.

I first read this as "Beware the Fleshlight App". WTF, now they have an app?!?! Sigh, I was sorely disappointed when I realized it said "flashlight".

I remember a lot of these. I was in 7th and 8th grade in 2005 and I still have seven of these songs in my iTunes library.

Good for them, but I still will never go back to being part of their outdated social club.

I would hope that it would be common knowledge to anyone with half a brain that traveling to a country that is almost 99% Muslim for gay sex tourism is a bad idea. This guy was asking for trouble.

He was going to meet a 20 year old, and he was 69. He sounds more like a sugar daddy to me.

So I haven't been around much on here lately, and I've neglected talking to people on here who I really do enjoy talking to. Anyway, life has been insanely busy the past month after I got my new job, as well as pretty damn stressful, but it's also been a lot of fun. As many of you know, I got a job as an Assistant Teacher at a school in a rough, ghetto section of Philadelphia. I work with first graders, many of whom come from the typical broken home scenario that infects ghettoized neighborhoods of inner cities. Many of these kids have behavioral issues that stem from all the stress they experience outside of school in their home lives, and that spills over often into the classroom. My main focus as an Assistant Teacher is working with the remedial-level kids in our class, of which there are many. A lot of these kids don't even have reading/math/writing abilities of kindergardeners, so I spend a lot of my time helping them hopefully getting to a level where they can participate in activities with the rest of the kids who are already at grade level. The hours are long, as I leave my apartment at 8 and often don't get home until 7, then go spend from 7-9 at the gym, and then fall asleep by 11ish. My job is mentally, physically, and emotionally exhausting most days, but I've never been so motivated in a job before or believed in what I was doing. These kids were basically left behind by the rest of society, and not given much chance to succeed. I'm under no illusion that the majority of the kids I work with now won't be lost to the streets in 10 years when they get older, but hopefully you catch a couple who you help succeed in the long run. It takes a lot of patience to understand and adapt to how these kids work. The hardest part was that before this I was working at a summer camp for wealthy, white kids from one of the most affluent suburban areas of the country. The complete 180 to this job at an inner-city, almost entirely poor black school was difficult at first. But I'd much rather work with these kids than the well off kids who will get the best of everything regardless if I am there or not. I can see myself doing work like this for the long haul, and I'm glad I found something I am passionate about after deciding to ditch any potential career in policing. On an ending note, some of you have asked about my story, The Gauntlet. I have another chapter written and self-edited but I'm not sure whether to post it or not. As I wrote chapter 3 and the unpublished 4th chapter, a lot of old emotions that I have long sense gotten over began to come back and remind me of old, bad memories of growing up gay. While my story is basically entirely fictional, all the emotions I put into my main character are very real and ones I've drawn off personal experience to put in the story. In short, I'd rather leave them in the past, dead and buried where they belong. How's that for a depressing ending? And on a side note, the title of my blog refers to Alex Kotlowitz's book, There Are No Children Here: The Story of Two Boys Growing Up In The Other America. It basically chronicles the true story of two young brothers growing up in the crime-ridden West Side of Chicago in the late 80s. I read it in college and it offers an amazing lens of understanding into the world that many of the kids I work with now still live in.

Lets be real here. Age matters in this world, and it matters immensely in the gay world. You are 48, he is 24-26. Unless you have a ton of money or are a smokin' hot daddy type, it probably won't happen. Just trying to be real with you.

Ahhh, how old is this guy your talking about?

My gym is majority young, gay men and everyone gets naked in the locker room. 90% of the guys I see during the week are the same ones I run into at the gay bars and clubs on Friday and Saturday nights. I plan to stay a member there for as long as I live in this city.

The view on both sides of 76 of Center City is beautiful of the skyline. I used to see it every morning and afternoon on my way to work at my old job in the suburbs. Though my favorite view of the skyline is still the one you get coming on I-95 North on the Girard Point Bridge. Center City looks absolutely massive from that point of view.

Nico and Vinz's Am I Wrong dubstep version by Feliz Zaltaio and Lindh Van Berg

Here in the city, flying low as I call it is only done by white trash and stupid thugs. It is literally one of the trashiest and dumbest looks that has come out of fashion in the last 30 years.

One of the best Alt-Rock songs to come out in a long time.

A lot of people seem to be picking books you'd find in the 'High Literature' section of a bookstore, so I guess my list is a bit "dumbed down". 1.) The Godfather, by Mario Puzo 2.) Red Storm Rising, by Tom Clancy 3.) A Separate Peace, by John Knowles 4.) Sleepers, by Lorenzo Carcaterra 5.) Vortex, by Larry Bond Ironically, I first read A Separate Peace as a 10th grader in English class and thought it was one of the most uneventful, plot-less books I had ever read. It was only after having read it again in college that I came to see the beauty and tragedy of Gene and Finny.

"So the thumpa thumpa continues. It always will, no matter what happens, no matter who's president. As our lady of disco, the divine Ms. Gloria Gaynor has always sung to us, we will survive."

Useless? Maybe. But very interesting to ponder? Absolutely.

Cards To Your Heart, by Groove Armada. This song became somewhat of a gay anthem after it was featured in Black Spark's 2010 video Dance In My Heart Now.

In my opinion, this site bent over backwards to the whims of a few people who got butt-hurt because someone challenged their opinions in taking the Soapbox down. Taking away the Soapbox took away a huge dimension of this site that many of GA's most active members participated in. Was it dirty, nasty, and bare-knuckled? Hell yes, and thats what made it fun. But it was also a place where many a intelligent discussion took place and valuable debate was had. Why they couldn't just leave it unmoderated like it was before it's death is beyond me, but again, someone has to keep a very small few from being butthurt at the expense of the many.

A lot of Queens is already gentrified, especially the parts closest to Manhattan. Philadelphia is the last Northeast city to still be mostly affordable, but I predict within 10-20 years that will change too just like it already has for Boston, NY, and DC.

Happy birthday man!