The Aurora Sextology: Book One - A Sailor's Tale

As I drove back toward the base my mind wandered and I considered my situation. I was returning to a life I loved, a life I had wanted. I had been drawn to the sea and despite the hatred, and the bigotry, the hiding and the constant lying; I wanted to be a sailor.

The problem, I finally admitted as I approached Esquimalt Road, was that deep down I was heartily sick of the whole deal. I think that everybody, sooner or later, comes to a point in his life when he has to admit the truth, and the truth was not at all pleasing to me.

I was 27, and was 14 months away from finishing my "12". I had joined the Andrew just five months shy of my 18th birthday, right out of high school and signed up for the maximum tour - 12 years. All too soon I would have to sign on for a second tour of eight years, with a 20-year pension at the end of it. Or I could say to hell with it and send in my papers.

I drove past the gates to the Dockyard and swung onto Fraser Street, driving down to Saxe Point Park. I parked the car and walked for a bit, and then settled down on a body of water called, ironically, Inspiration Cove!

I settled down on the beach and tried to think. The thing was, I couldn't make up my mind. On the one hand, I was still young enough to be thinking about a new career. I had enough money saved to keep me afloat for at least a year, and I was half thinking about going back to school. I could keep my money and find a job in Civvy Street, although I could not see too many career opportunities coming my way any time soon. I was a trained gunner, but sadly 4.7-inch guns, the caring and feeding of, did not look too impressive on a resumé, especially in the anti-war, anti-military climate of the times.

I absently played ducks and drakes, skipping stones across the placid waters of the cove and smiled inwardly. If all else failed I could always join the Corps of Commissionaires, a quasi-military security guard service that limited its recruitment to former military personnel and ex-RCMP officers. This did not appeal to me at all. The Corps was run on military lines and run by old soaks that hadn't had an original idea since the Corps was formed back in England in the 1840s!

I was considering all my options because, always in my mind was the knowledge that sooner or later the law of averages would catch up to me, and I would be out on my ass. Sooner or later I would make a pass at the wrong guy, in the wrong place and I would be sitting in Naden glasshouse waiting for my administrative release. The RCN did not deal kindly with faggots.

Nor did the rest of the world. This was in the days before the Gay Rights movement. Gays had no rights. I could go on about it but what the hell, we've all been there. As far as the RCN was concerned, gays were a security risk, and not employable. The least that could happen was a quick discharge. Depending on the circumstances it could mean jail, either in Edmonton (if one were found out in Esquimalt, or in Gagetown, for those unlucky enough to meet an SIU operative in the Maritimes). Not a pleasant prospect at all, if you get my drift. Any gay serviceman with an ounce of sense was deep, deep in the closet and not about to come out any time soon. And I was right there with them: gay, and very much in the closet.

I thought of Brad being the belle of the barracks. The guy obviously had a death wish. Keeping his barracks mates happy was one thing, but Goddam, Goddam It, blowing them in the heads was inviting trouble. What irked me was that Brad didn't even bother to pretend! He was a skank, liked dick and enjoyed living up to the accepted stereotype that a queer would suck or fuck anything that showed hard. I couldn't then, and don't now, understand people like him.

Thinking back, I know I was being judgemental. As a gay man, I should not have been, but I was. I didn't want to be associated with him, or other gays like him. I didn't was not in the least effeminate, I played sports, joked with the boys, and did everything I could think of to conform to the "masculine" mystique demanded by my peers. I avoided any and all temptations. I also did not put the moves on the Fleet, and I sure as hell didn't give out blowjobs in the heads. Again, thinking back, I was a right, guilt-ridden prat! I had been hiding in the closet for so many years that I failed to see the coming revolution on the horizon.

The times were changing. More and more people were questioning the prohibitions and demanding the right to live their lives, as they wanted to live them. More and more people were turning their backs on the accepted norms and poking society in the eye and saying: "This is me, this is who I am. Accept me if you want, but if you can't, than fuck off and leave me alone!"

Sitting on that beach, seeing, but not seeing the placid waters of the cove, I could have said to hell with it. But then, I thought, if I did that, I would be giving up on myself, on my conviction that I could be just as good at what I did as the "straight" sailors. In other words, I would be admitting defeat, and giving in to the prejudices - and that I could not and would not do. The Navy might not want me, but I wanted the Navy.

Was I being selfish? Probably, but damn it, I was good at what I did, and it was not that I did not know what I had to do if I wanted to stay in. Hell, I'd been doing for 11 years. More if you counted my childhood and teenage years. I knew when I accepted the Queen's Shilling what I must do to survive, to prove my worth, to prove, if only to myself, that I was a man. I had determined a long time before that I was gay, but I was going to make my career in the Navy. I knew the rules, and I obeyed them. I didn't like the rules, but I obeyed them!

******

Being gay, and in the Navy, meant I lived a double life. During the day I was all macho, and while I played the silly games, and told the anti-fag jokes, drank beer and smoked "with the boys" I would lie in my bunk at night, fantasizing about those same guys, beating my meat for all it was worth. I never touched any of them. They were off limits. They were in uniform and guys in uniform, well, I couldn't take the chance. Not in the Mess, not in the Dockyard. Not in Esquimalt after a large night in the Legion or the Fleet Club. Were there other gays? Sure. The signs were all there. I even knew a few.

I wasn't all that bad looking, and for sure nobody was going to keel over in a dead faint when I walked by, but I was well built and had a good, muscled chest. I kept in shape by swimming as often as I could and I played baseball and a little soccer. I had a nice, firm butt. I kept my brown hair trimmed short, and, if I do say so, cut a pretty good figure when I walked down Esquimalt Road.

I had more than my share of come-ons, of side glances that glanced just a little too long, of little rubs, against my arm, a hand lingering just a minute too long on my knee, the guy "just making a point". But I had seen, and heard, what could happen if it got out that you were queer and fucking a fellow sailor. It was not a pleasant prospect.

Not too long before I returned to Esquimalt from an ill-fated tour with the UN in Vietnam, a Sick Bay Tiffy (Medical Corpsman) killed himself. This in itself was not uncommon. For any member of the military the isolation, the back biting, the unrelenting pressure, all took their toll. Some, hell, many, took refuge in the bottle. Others, an increasing number, sadly, sought solace in the contents of little dime packages sold by furtive, sly-eyed pushers on half the street corners in town. Others kept their secrets hidden, coping as best they could with their hidden fears. Some managed, some did not.

The death of any member of the Armed Forces, whether on duty or not, under what were described as suspicious circumstances was always investigated by the Special Investigations Unit, the SIU, the investigative branch of the Military Police - politely called the MPs, but also known as "Meat Heads" for their perceived inability to function above the level of an aspidistra or, in our politically correct, bi-lingual service, "Têtes de Viande".

The members of SIU spent much of their time ferreting out gays and other "undesirables". They never seemed to notice that the Barracks reeked of marijuana, or that not ten feet from the main gate an enterprising gentleman would sell you anything from meth to little blue pills that would make you happy for a week! SIU seemed to have a one-track vocation and, as the saying went, you could beat your wife but if you sucked the wrong dick, you were for it!

A collision at sea can ruin your whole day, but finding the pecker checker hanging from a rope in the cable deck can ruin your whole year!

The Duty Roundsman around 0230, halfway through the Middle watch, had discovered the tiffy. The MPs were called, as was to be expected, and after the poor guy was declared dead, and shipped off to the RCNH for autopsy (standard procedure, I learned later, even though the cause of death was more than apparent) and the MPs started asking questions. They spoke with the man's shipmates, the officers and, since the tiffy had been a very private person, got nowhere.

At first the MPs were only going through the motions. The popular perception was, and I suppose still is, that all tiffys are as gay as ducks, closely followed by the stewards. Still, they had to make a report and they searched the dead man's personal effects, and his locker. What they found in that metal locker changed many lives and had a profound impact on me.

At the bottom of the locker, hidden under dirty shitnicks and some magazines that were only sold in tiny hole in the wall shops and carried away in brown paper bags, they found the tiffy's diary, and all was revealed.

It turned out that the tiffy had fallen in love with a straight guy. The straight guy turned the tiffy down and then reported him to the MP's. The diary was very graphic, and very comprehensive. The tiffy had been very active and discovered the secret gay underground that existed, had recorded, by day and date, every guy he had sucked, fucked, or nibbled on. As they read selected entries the two investigating Meat Heads realized they that had struck the Mother Lode. They headed for the Ship's Office, and the photocopier. Then they called SIU. The MP's made a killing in selling copies of the damned thing and SIU had a field day.

The shit hit the fan big time. Signals went out to half the fucking fleet and SIU went into a feeding frenzy, names culled from the diary in hand. About 60 guys, officers and ratings, got the axe. Two followed the tiffy's example.

The whole thing became one big fucking mess and the word came down from the Flag Building - get the queers and get 'em out. SIU was more than happy to oblige and, as half the names in the diary were those of officers, it made the hunt all the more enjoyable.

One of the tactics that SIU always used was guilt by association. If it turned out that your best friend was queer, SIU reasoned that you might be one too! They also worked on the premise that their victim was guilty as not charged, or why else would they be involved? A name in a diary might just be a name, but it also just might be three, or four or ten more notches in the SIU belt. The whole base was turned upside down for a month as SIU questioned anybody remotely connected to the men named in the tiffy's diary. Training schedules were disrupted as SIU hauled in the usual suspects and questioned relentlessly.

Ships could not sail because essential personnel were at the cop shop being brow beaten. The PMO, the Principal Medical Officer, told the admiral that if SIU didn't leave the hospital tiffys alone he would either a) close the hospital or b) castrate the next SIU jerk that walked in the door! The Wardroom Manager cancelled three weddings and a testimonial dinner for the admiral himself - the stewards were much too upset to serve! The admiral put the hammer down, but then he didn't have too much of a choice. He could stand the carping of the PMO and the whining of the Wardroom Manager. What he could not ignore was the flame of outrage that stretched from Ottawa to Esquimalt. It seems that the son of a powerful MP had been implicated. The Member of Parliament roared, the son retired with honour, and life returned to normal. Special privileges for special folks, I guess.

Since I was new to the base, and no one knew me, I was not bothered. Still, I piled a few more clothes in front of me and burrowed deep. I bought a book of fag jokes and memorized them all. I was so fucking homophobic back then that I get sick to my stomach even now. I was a piece of work. But I was also the straightest guy in the fleet to everyone I knew or drank with. I was a proper asshole. But I was safe.