Man Club

My husband Charlie recently divulged information regarding an event in his life to which he had sworn secrecy. And I'm about to tell you all about it. Because, quite frankly, it is too damn funny to keep secret.
While it was happening to him, there was nothing funny about it. But he sees the humor in it now, and I think is a little excited about breaking the secrecy oath. I wish he had told me about it when it happened, partly because I think I could have calmed his nerves about it, but mostly because I could have gotten the whole story. His memory of the events of that day is patchy at best, and I would love to hear the rest of the story that his subconscious seems to have repressed.
With artistic license, I have taken the liberty of filling in the blanks of his memory with my own imagination.

Charlie was about 20, and living on the UCSC campus in the Village. For those of you that don't know, UCSC is a mecca of hippies. It's where aging new-wavers go to teach young minds to “subvert the dominant paradigm,” and nubile tom-boys go to become full-blown lesbians. I think even the wildlife smokes pot.

 

The Village is a little housing structure nestled in the center of the campus, completely hidden among the trees, down in a little valley. It's like the petri dish of Santa Cruz; a perfect place for hippies to spore and proselytize.

So, Charlie's bumming around, ditching class, not getting out of the Village enough to remember that life is worth living – and gets to talking with neighbor and friend-quaintance Steve Capootie. (that's not his real name, but it's really close, and sounds hilarious. Capootie, haha. Plus, any of you who knows the real Steve “Capootie” knows exactly who I'm talking about.)

The two aren't by any means close friends, but Steve's always been a really nice guy and hasn't ever done anything to make Charlie dislike him. Back then, Steve mostly just came off as a Sensitive Guy – maybe your average Thinking-of-majoring-in-women's-studies kind of guy, or even a Raised-by-two-moms kind of guy, or maybe just a perfect Teva-sandals-wearing-bonzai-tree-trimming UCSC student.

This is only the very beginning of their second year at UCSC, so some of the stuff we now know about Steve, neither of us knew at the time.

I don't mean to sound as if “back then Steve was cool, and now he's a freak” - but knowing that Steve later confesses to many of us that he is a habitual masturbator who sometimes stays inside all day just to see how many times he can jerk off, to the point of painful chafing and rashes, and challenges himself to strict periods of celibacy – kind of makes the story a lot creepier. Should I elaborate? I will. 
 

 Do you recall the bar scene from that amazing comedy The Great Outdoors where “Lightning Rod Reg” has just been asked how many times he's been hit by lightning? The guy has a stutter, and says “six, six six -” so John Candy thinks it's six times – but the guy finishes by saying, “sixty-six times, in-n-n-n the head!” This is one of the greatest movies of all time, and one of the funniest scene's ever written. I laugh like an idiot every single time I watch this clip. 

 

Years after that day in the Village, Steve approached several of his friends to “take a poll” of how many orgasms they'd had in one day. I don't recall if Steve shared his own answer to the question without being asked or what – but the moment he answered the question, “Well, Steve? How many orgasms have you had in one day?” was a lot like the scene from The Great Outdoors. The split second after Steve says “Nine” you have a half-moment to think - wow, that's a lot - so when he adds “Teen” you find yourself thinking, No fucking way. No way has this guy has had NINETEEN orgasms in one day..... oh! Oh no! I sat on his bed once! Apparently, finding out that his count was much higher than anyone else was what made him start a celibacy challenge.

Charlie is pretty relieved he didn't know about Steve's rosy palms while living in the Village. And like I said, it's not like I think Steve is a freak for not being able to keep his hands off his penis – to each his own, for all I know he has an irresistibly persuasive penis– but it definitely makes the story better. So, back to the story – Charlie and Rosy Palms Steve are sitting around the Village hashing out life's disappointments and Steve starts talking about how much help he has gotten from a weekly men's support group he's been going to. It takes a bit of convincing, but ever the open-mind, Charlie agrees to accompany Steve to next week's meeting.

But you know how it is – something that sounds great one day, doesn't sound so great a few days later, and something that vaguely resembled a good idea usually looks like heap of shit a few days later. The day of the meeting came, and Charlie more than regrets his commitment to attend. But he didn't want to feel like a jerk for ditching out on someone who had reached out to him while he was feeling down. So, he sucked it up and went.

He went... as the guest of a habitual masturbator to a men-only group therapy session. Henceforth to be referred to as Man Club.

 

Because both of them are poor college kids with no cars, they take the bus. I can just imagine how nervous Charlie is waiting at the bus stop with Steve, not knowing what to expect but not wanting to seem doubtful by asking too many questions. The bus arrives, and they get on, but there's only one seat left.
 

 

Steve – the human version of those overly polite Warner Brothers' gophers Mac n' Tosh – insists that Charlie take the last seat.

 

 

This leaves Steve to stand and grip the overhead hand-holds. It's always a little awkward to have a conversation in this position – one person sitting and the other standing and swaying back and forth with their hands raised over their heads and their crotch directly in the face of the other person. This really puts Steve in a power position here.

Steve takes this opportunity to let Charlie in on the One Rule of Man Club: Don't talk about Man Club. Of course he doesn't phrase it like that. He probably says it in a way that panders to Charlie's youthful, naive idea of privacy and respect. Remember when you were young and dumb and thought that everyone really deserved the same amount of respect and privacy? Pssh, grow up.

But this is Charlie Kelcy we're talking about. Charlie Kelcy at 20 was a sponge – soaking up everything around him with wide-eyed abandon. So he sat there, with the dick of a habitual masturbator swaying inches from his face, and agreed to keep his mouth shut about Man Club. If this shit had gone down with grown-ass-man Chuck Keltzer (note to readers unawares, Charlie and I both changed names when we got married - to a conjoined, not hyphenated, half-breed mutant name... Seitzer + Kelcy = Keltzer) sitting on that bus, I don't know if he would have made it as far as Rule #1 – let alone all the way into the residential neighborhood where he ended up. Yeah, a residential neighborhood...

Steve leans over and pulls the cord to signal the driver to stop in the middle of suburban Santa Cruz, and the two get off the bus. Charlie follows Steve up a bamboo-lined walkway headed by a large Buddah statue and ducks under several hanging lines of prayer flags. He doesn't ask about the location, but recalls with absolute clarity that there hadn't been a single word uttered previously about this men's support group taking place in the living room of some guy's house. I say “some guy” because he isn't a doctor or a licensed therapist or anything like that – he's just some old new-wave (what an oxymoron) hippie fag with hair too long for his age and crusty old feet that prove he's been been barefoot more days than any respectable adult man should ever have been.

Aside about the word Fag: (I don't need anyone to get up-in-arms about me using the word fag to describe this guy. Everyone knows I love queers, and queers love me. Many people use “fag” to describe a zealot of any kind.... those Harley riding motorcycle fags, those Bible-spouting evangelical fags, those tree-hugging crusty feet fags, and even those twinky eyeshadow-wearing disco fags, I could go on and on with this one – a fag is anyone who spends extra time in the morning or invests half their income just to make sure everyone can tell just by looking at them what hobbies they are into. There are just certain things that are faggy: unicorns, leather pants, glitter, meditation.... So, I guess if anyone I love is offended by me using the word – you don't understand comedy, or me for that matter – But I am sorry you feel bad.)

All asides aside – Charlie is standing on the porch with Steve when This Guy opens the door:

This is not the actual guy. But it's as close as I can get. We'll just call him Dan. Dan the Buddah Man- Club Host with with the Most. Dan immediately embraces Steve in a close, full body hug that lasts a very long time – Steve is hugging back; he's into it. Charlie's next in line – there is a brief introduction and Charlie too gets a good long hug. The smell of the patchouli oil Dan apparently bathes in lingers on Charlie for days.

Let me paint a mental picture of a Santa Cruz Trustifarian Hippie's home, close your eyes and imagine, wait – open your eyes, you need to read this, but keep imagining – There is a smell of burning sage all around you, with little breezes of no fewer than four other smokey incense smells. The wood floors have been waxed with Sandalwood oil and display hand-woven rugs acquired on a spiritual journey through India in the 1980's. There is very little usable furniture – a futon, an old armchair, and a japanese style coffee-table from IKEA. The bulk of the furniture is bookshelves and small tables that cover most of the wall space and are so teeming with worldly knick-knacks that you may think you are in a CostPlus World Market Bazaar.

What space is left on the walls is filled with unframed canvas paintings that most closely resemble vaginas.

 

 

The boys make their entrance and they are the last of the attendees to arrive. Besides Dan, there are four other guys in their 40's, and one other guy who is at least 60 and looks like Father Time's younger brother.

 

Already Charlie is thinking, What in the hell goes on at a meeting with this many old dudes and a nineteen-year-old kid? … Am I about to go ass-to-ass?

The dudes are lounging around on pillows and cushions on the floor, like some sort of ass-backwards harem. They all get up and hug and make too-long eye-contact with the new arrivals, and invite Charlie and Steve to sit. After the introductions, Dan makes makes sure that Charlie is aware of the one rule of Man Club – it's a confidential meeting, and anything that goes on here today is not to be spoken about with anyone outside of Man Club. Then they all go around the room and inroduce themselves, and say a little something about why they come to the meetings. Oddly enough – this is where Charlie's memory goes to shit - which seems highly suspicious and at the very least indicates the suppression of an incredibly traumatic event, and I find myself wondering if the director's cut would have a rape scene.

I know without a doubt that he isn't withholding any information based on his sworn secrecy, because he is the absolute worst liar I've ever met. So, I have to assume his subconscious just blocked it out. I also wonder if he may have no memory of what went down because there was a voice in his head screaming at him to get the hell outta Dodge the whole time. It's hard to concentrate on what's being said when you can't stop thinking about how freaked out you are.

The one thing Charlie has a vivid memory of is waking up naked with a blinding headache in the trunk of an old Cadillac in the Arizona desert. That didn't really happen. A direct quote from Charlie on this, “I know I wasn't molestered, but I can't really remember why I was so sure I was going to be.”

The one thing Charlie actually has a vivid memory of is the Find Your Inner Man exercise. Which sounds like anal-sex, but isn't. This exercise is where you sit across from another member of Man Club and stare into his eyes without saying a word for three minutes. Yeah, three fucking minutes. If you would like to see what three minutes of silence feels like, you can check out this incredibly faggy shit http://www.3minutesofsilence.org/ But I don't recommend it. Besides – It would pale in comparison to spending three minutes staring into this guys eyes:

That's not the real guy. But it's close. And the picture evokes a reaction in Charlie – which tells me something.

We all grew up having staring contests – and some of us were good at them and had plenty that lasted longer than three minutes. But this wasn't a normal staring contest kind of stare... The guy had a pure Megan's Law look on his face; the corners of his mouth were upturned in a knowing smirk, one eyebrow was slightly raised, and Charlie couldn't be sure if he was really being soul-searched or if the guy was just thinking about oral.

To add the the awkwardness – Charlie was having a really hard time not laughing. Remember when you were a kid, and you'd be sitting in class or church or somewhere you're supposed to be quiet, but you had the giggles? And you were trying so hard to keep a serious look on your face, but you could feel the laughter about to burst out of you? Think of that... or of every Jimmy Fallon SNL sketch you've ever seen.

During the three minutes, Charlie describes an oscillation of emotions that goes from I'm about to be raped by a gang of old hippies and I need to find way to get out of here – to – This dumb old burn-out keeps staring at me like I'm a giant bong he can't wait to smoke and I'm about to crack up right in his stupid zen face and all the other emotions that fit between maniacal laughing and fear of rape – which is a really wide range of emotions.

On a scale from Fear of Rape to Really Funny - with Really Funny being the highest - I would rate this scenario at a Dental Hygienist with a Boner.

It was soon after the Find Your Inner Man exercise that Dan asks Charlie what his feelings are about the meeting so far. And – Can I just say how much I sympathize with Charlie at this point? How hard would it be to have a room full of men who are really really into what's going on... they're having breakthroughs and Oprah Ah-Hah! Moments®... while you're sitting there trying not to laugh, and hating every single minute of it, and then someone asks you your honest opinion? So Charlie says, “Sorry man, this just isn't my cup of tea. I think... I think I'm just gonna bail.”

Which is the nicest way possible to say, “This is complete bullshit. I'm fuckin' outta here.”

But, just before Charlie can actually unhinge his sore knees and get up from the floor (chairs were created for a reason, people) Dan reminds him to be respectful, and to refrain from speaking about anything that happened there. Which I'm starting to think is some sort of curse or chant of amnesia – like a hypnotic mantra designed to erase a person's memory.

So Charlie agreed, and left, and went home to the Village. He moved out of the Village not too long after, not because on the Man Club or Steve or anything – just because it's miserable. And he told me this story about nine years later. He said his vault stays closed for about seven years, and I don't really have a vault, so I can tell the story without any waiting period.

It isn't even really a “story” in the sense that there is a plot, and a conflict, and a resolution. There is no real climax. It's just a recollection of the most awkward day Charlie has ever had, as told by me. The fact that he wasn't supposed to ever tell anyone about it is intriguing, but also completely pointless because Charlie was so busy freaking out in his own head that he probably didn't hear a damn word any of those guys had to say, let alone remember it. I'm sorry if those of you hooked into reading the blog by the first line were expecting something more secretive, like a story of Charlie being approached by a CIA agent for a top-secret sting operation, or being recruited by Jimmy Carter's grandson to plant a hidden camera at a GOP fundraiser.

Think about it from my point of view – Charlie has been one of my closest friends for ten years. We lived together, went to school together, worked together, and then started dating over six years ago. We've been married for over three years – and only now I hear this story. I wish I had video of him telling me – it was interview style on the couch, with me cracking up and taking notes while he sheepishly discovers the humor in the story and forces himself to remember events he's done his best to lock away. I asked him before I picked up the pen, “Can I write about this?” and his answer – and I really love him for this, “Pssh, you can write about whatever you want. It's not me telling it, it's you.”

This is probably the first publicized lesson in If You Don't Want Anyone to Know Something About You, Don't Tell Meg. But in reality, if Steve had said “I have a masturbation problem, and I've had nineteen orgasms in one day – please don't ever tell anyone about this – let alone publish this information someday in a barely-read blog,” I would have at least asked him before I wrote the piece. Probably, most likely.

I'm not exactly sure where free speech ends and libel begins – and so if I receive any official cease and desist orders from anyone worth a second thought I will abide. Current or past Man Club members do not qualify, Sorry. Until that happens(never), I'm going to continue not giving a damn about crossing any lines and just tell it like it is.