The Days Of The Great War

So that they would know, that long before he found his peace,

the phanksmaster waged a bitter war against his own homosexual self.

- introduction

---

Back in Freshman high school. I had a classmate who used to be ignored by everyone because of his excessive referrence to his seemingly notorious perversion. Since the main group of boys in our classroom decided to leave him out of their circle, he was forced to join us - which the other group dubbed as the "tropang batibot" due to our small stature and elementary-like interests.

One time after class while walking along the street, he invited me to hang out in his place. He blatantly said that he was terribly horny that afternoon and needed someone to jack him off. Out of disguss, I told him "putang-ina mo!" then left him to continue walking towards the jeepney stop.

I never told anyone his remarks out of fear that they may tease me because of it. One thing common among the tropang batibot is that aside from our gentle behavior, some of us were hinted to be future homos by others. I never realized that until recently, when I remembered a friend who in second year, fantasized being used by a parlorista he met in the arcade.

Anyway, it appears that he had forgotten the incident.

But not me.

One evening, several months after I discovered how to jack off myself... I imagined ourselves doing what he had asked me to do and for the first time, it felt great. I even had two rounds with no breaks during my session that evening.

It was the official start of my so-called confusion period.

---

A year after, I was hoping that he survived our first year in high school despite the fact that he messed up during the later months of our previous year. I told myself that this time, I would befriend this guy and vowed that I would be more open to experimentation, if ever he is still interested.

Unfortunately he was dismissed from the school because of his failing grades. Realizing that I would never have the opportunity again, I decided to focus my attention to the girls who were linked to me during the past year.

---

Despite the confusion occasionally disturbing my straightly existence, I managed to remain in control of myself. There were times I would (semi-consciously) fantasize this neighbor who appears to be pervert as well. But it was just it, it never crossed my mind doing the act itself believing that those were just a by-product of my excessively perverted mind and repressed self.

Eventually, the entire confusion stage briefly ceased when I met a bunch of straight guys who would become my tropa during my senior year in high school. While other guys with the same age as ours were busy courting girls and started exploring their teenage lives, we preoccupied ourselves by going to different places taking pictures of us in different poses. We were like loose pinoy rock bands who were making cover photos for their upcoming albums during those days.

Girls were only our second priority. And since two of our members belong to the "church"and all of them were considered good-natured guys, most of our activities were done during the day and they were purely clean fun ones.

That was the reason why when I went to college, I initially suffered from a brief culture shock after encountering students who were relatively wild and "experienced" compared to my puny achievements.

---

It was the sophomore year; height of the phone chat sessions that lasted for hours at night and the beeper-mania that became the fad of the teen culture. Mobile phones would just have a debut a year after and pirated audio CDs were just being introduced in the tiangges and street boutiques during those years.

For some reasons, I had a openly gay phone pal. I could not remember how we found each other's number, but he was the first person who introduced me to the life of a PLU. Eventually, I admitted to him that there's a big chance that I would end up like him in the future. He even wished that I would not suffer the same fate befelled on him.

He was a crew at McDonalds and one afternoon, I decided to drop by his store and pay him a visit. After a brief encounter, he never talked to me again. Perhaps he was pretty disappointed on how I looked like.

---

After the revelation, the same confusion that haunted me years before began to emerge again.

I don't really remember how it felt like being in the same shoes but all I could remember is that whenever someone teases me about my apparent tendency, I easily get upset and disappointed. Despite my straight barkada surrounding me all the time, I felt that I was never really comfortable hanging out with them. There is something in me that kept on asking, "ano ba talaga ako?"

Believing that homosexuality was a curse, a sickness and existence I must avoid at all cost; there were times I literally burned my finger with a lighter just to remind myself not to fall into the pit. I knew that a part of me terribly wants to experiment with the same sex, but there was no avenue. All I could see were the effeminate guys who never appealed to me even from the very start.

Good thing, I never encountered a guy who is open to experimentation like me. If that happened, I might have been living this existence as early as 18 years old.

---

During the same year, I discoved the place were pirated porn flicks were being sold. At first, I was happily buying straight porns from Muslim traders. However I discovered that some of them are starting to sell M2Ms as well.

At first I tried to resist the temptation of buying them. However my desire and curiousity soon prevailed. My thoughts were telling me that why should I deny such feelings when it was already there from the very start? Why should I deny myself of an existence that was beginning to shape my consciousness during those confusing times?

On a pretext of just being "curious," I bought my first M2M along the narrow alleys of Carriedo. It was a daring attempt to acknowledge my "other" self despite my tropa's overall animosity towards homosexuals. Immediately after my first purchase, I bought another blue porn from Quiapo. This time, my excuse was I would "sell them to my clients" together with the other several straight porns I bought with it.

While I added more and more blue porns into my porn fleet, I never recognized that I was beginning to become the person I desperately tried to resist during my straight entire life. The wars that I have waged upon myself proved to be useless. Realizing that I was already between two worlds, I began to feel empty and isolated. I have always thought that I am just a mere bisexual who is curious about the world, but my attempts on reaching out to others like me proved to be a failure.

It's either everytime I tried to meet someone who potentially shares my sentiments, my fears were always that they might appear too effeminate or out for my taste, or the one's like me were too good in hiding their other selves. I was too scared to open up since in my mind there might be a chance that they would tell my tendencies to others.

As I remembered it the way I wrote my final poem airing my fears of being consumed by my queerness, it tells of a hopeless boy in the verge of loosing a personal battle he fought against himself.

Come and see
the wide gaping flaps
blood soaked and oozing with pus
from the laceration
I sliced with a blade
in my brain
to mark the peripheries
between those held
by the dreaded, cursed,
and much condemned disease
of this world,
from those firmly controlled
by my still resisting and restraining
self.

WB's box* has been opened,
pushing me hard towards
the very, very edge
of my sane, normal but
continually weakening me
ceasing myself to existence,
turning me to a creature
they humiliate mercilessly

[I don't want to be it]**

One final blow and I
may loose this war

[Loosing much ground but still holding on]

One single atrocity
before my crumbling fortress collapses

[Let light shine to me in this dark age]

One last battle before I
finally surrender this infected
yet quarantined heart.

---

Six months after, light did finally shine on me. The war ended in victory, for the sickness and infection I thought was consuming me was actually my repressed and chained self. It took me quite some time though before I have finally accepted that I am... but eventually I got there.

Looking back, it was a long and bitter struggle. I was a victim of the stereotype prevailing in the minds of straight people. Who would have thought that after all those battles, I would eventually turn around and accept my other self.

In such quiet moments like tonight, when remembering the painful times I tortured myself just to restrain my tendencies, how I wished I could just appear at that moment to console my younger self.

How I wished I was there to prove to him that there's nothing wrong accepting one's homosexuality. Who knows, I might have granted the wish of my younger perverted self...

But of course, it's just a part of my trashy imagination: some potmarks left by some lost fantasies I had when I was still younger and eager for experience.

---

* WB - the box where I kept my porns
** it - since he is for boys and she is for girls, they designated it for homos and lesbians.