It seems that a few folks are still talking about my fantasy scene at the Mr. Philadelphia Leather 2008 competition, sponsored by The Bike Stop bar (www.thebikestop.com), which also is sponsoring my IML run over Memorial Day weekend. 

(We were also fortunate to have co-sponsorship by RECON for our local event, which brought some serious beefcake into town.)

So for the folks who were unable to attend, but curious to see what I did, and for those sick bastards that are still talking about it and want an encore, this is for you.

A very special thanks to Richie Madden for capturing the evening's events on video camera, and for graciously allowing me to share it with you.  Richie, I couldn't have asked for a better souvenir of one of the biggest nights in my life.  Thanks!

 

 

Over CLAW weekend, I met a couple of young men from Columbus, Ohio, who wanted to learn how to organize their local community and how to run for a leather title.

Since I frequently hear older folks (like me) asking other older folks (even older than me), "what would it take to bring young people into the community?" I thought this would be a good opportunity to ask members of The Next Generation about the challenges they see in entering the leather community.

I hope this conversation might help to start others in a dialogue about outreach and support to our newest and youngest members of the community.

Scott

 

 

Over the last week of April, I attended the Cleveland Leather Awareness Weekend (CLAW), ogling porn stars and other impossibly sexy men, attending parties and workshops and educational panel discussions, and taking opportunities to meet some of my fellow “classmates� of the 2008 IML competition.

 

One highlight of the weekend for me was attending an interview with the outgoing Mr. International Leather Mike Gerle, which was recorded for the Leather Museum and Archives in Chicago (which happened to be one of the beneficiaries of the weekend). 

 

Watching Gerle tell his story, you cannot doubt his sincerity and genuineness.  Likewise you cannot doubt his appreciation for his relationship, his passion for community, and his love of kinky sex.   He spoke of where he found inspiration and support and of his experiences with his biological family and with his leather family.  As he spoke of his mentors and the people who he has come to know and care for over his current term, I absolutely believed each word he spoke.

 

His story was a positive one, and yet it devastated me.

 

As I wiped tears from my face in that half-empty ballroom space, I had a moment of self-discovery: I was damaged goods.  It was a painful and a liberating epiphany.

 

But let me take a step back.

 

At leather events across the country, you will more than likely hear someone give a speech about how being a titleholder is a life-changing experience and how connections made with others in the community during their title year (and beyond) have forged deep and profound friendships that will last a lifetime.

 

For the longest while, I was genuinely moved by these pronouncements.   It was speeches like these that initially made me yearn to be a part of this incredible family of friends and lovers.  And the more events I attended and the more propaganda I heard, my desire grew to not only be a part of such a community, but to be a leader among them. 

 

After all, like many leather men, I am a sentimental sap and I respond well to emotional triggers.  

 

I not only cry while watching Extreme Makeover, but I well up over that perennial Folgers coffee commercial where the hot college student surprises his family by coming home for Christmas and making their favorite (if nasty) morning brew.

 

So how could I resist the call to be a part of this loving community, or calls to be part of the new leadership?  I couldn’t. 

 

But somewhere along the line I changed, although I can’t pinpoint the exact date or time.

 

After many attempts at trying to forge deep and profound friendships that were promised to me (or so I thought), and finding all too often that people wouldn’t even talk to me when I’d go out, I became cynical.   And over time—and I can say this only with the kind of insight that comes with hindsight—it  now seems clear that the cynicism turned to bitterness without my even being aware of it. 

 

I’d go to events hoping to have some fun, but I started “managing my expectationsâ€? that I wouldn’t be making deep connections, good friends, or probably even get laid.  That was my reality, and I was sticking to it. 

 

My perspectives began to be filtered (unknowingly) by the pain and hurt of past rejections.  As this filter kicked in, I felt like I was seeing the objective truth, which was so different from what others were talking about that I could only deduce that all of these titleholders had been lying to me. 

 

I continued to attend events as I did before, but my perception now was the community leaders who gave good speech were really just putting on a show to bring new faces and energy into the community, and recruiting replacements for next year’s contests like some kind of kinky pyramid scheme.

 

Over time speeches about how close knit the community could be, stories that once moved me to tears, were now ringing false, like a cheesy infomercial where for only four installments of $19.95, you could get a run pin, a free drink coupon, and the family you never knew you had.

 

But as I sat there listening to Gerle speak of his mentors and inspirations, I completely believe he was speaking the truth and not spouting a public relations line.  And flashbacks of other speeches I’d heard by other titleholders and the connections that they’d made came rushing into memory.  If Gerle was speaking the truth… is it possible that the other titleholders were too?

 

Egad—if everyone else was capable of forging these connections and finding profound emotional and spiritual connections, it stood to reason that the only cause for me to not be making these same connections was… me. 

 

Whoa.

 

But how could I be the one stopping these connections when this is what I wanted most?!  It just didn’t make sense.  Let me take another step back. 

 

When I first came into the leather scene, leather empowered me to transform myself from a shy and timid man who couldn’t look others in the eye into someone that strangers looking for hookups called “Sir.â€?   I went from being the one picked last in gym class or ignored at the bars to someone being offered incredible (and sometimes incredibly bizarre) services.  In a very real way, I felt that leather turned me around 180 degrees in terms of confidence and empowerment.  The stronger and better that I felt about myself, the more I wanted to help others enter into this wondrous journey of self discovery and enjoy the transformation that leather offers those who are open to it.

 

So when I finally felt strong enough to do so, I ran for Mr. Philadelphia Leather.  And I was honored to win the title.

 

Then I was welcomed into the leather titleholder community by being attacked on a leather titleholder’s yahoo group and dismissed by Mr. Marcus in his column, both because of my moniker of Scott Daddy. 

 

So much for tight knit community and support.

 

It was hard to believe that the persona that I had created to care for and nurture others became a lightning rod against me.  I relish my self-identification as a Daddy (hence the name Scott Daddy), and more often than not, I have found myself becoming a sounding board for the boys I have met online (most of which I never even met) or even at the bars. 

 

I have counseled dozens of boys to care for themselves first and foremost.   If you aren’t fully present and accounted for as your own person, I would say, you can’t be fully present for your partners and play mates and community.   The more there is to you, the more you have to offer others.   

 

So when Gerle’s presentation was over, I rushed back to my room, dizzy with questions and doubts and hurts that I’d been denying. 

 

If I’m sincerely seeking close friendships and connections within the community, why would I be preventing myself having them? And how am I doing that?

 

That’s when the awful reality struck that I was as damaged as some of the boys that I have counseled.  And I realized that the service that I was offering to the community was as well intended as the service that those boys offered… and as imperfect.   I was putting my body or face out there to support a cause, but my spirit that longed for connection was being safeguarded elsewhere, bruised from the past and secured from future rejection.  Maybe I wasn’t connecting to others, because I wasn’t really available to connect with.

 

That realization just prompted other questions, and they came at me in quick succession, getting bigger and bigger like a snowball effect.

 

Was it possible that my outreach felt like a big effort because working through fear is a great challenge, but ultimately people couldn’t see that I was reaching out?   Maybe people weren’t reaching out to me because they didn’t see me reaching out for them.

 

Could my outreach efforts be competent, but connections failed by others whose own insecurities and personal demons held them back?   Is it possible that other titleholders and community leaders are as insecure and afraid as I can be? 

 

And could it be that I wasn’t being rejected all those times that I felt rejected?  Is it possible that people tried to connect with me, but couldn’t get past my defenses?

 

Sometimes understanding that you’re a mess can be both a revelation and a relief!  I began to feel a great burden lift off my shoulders.

 

Once I understood that I was part of the problem, I knew that I could be part of the solution.  For starters, I needed to change my framework of thinking: I wasn’t as put together as I thought, and it probably wasn’t a safe assumption that everyone except me was well adjusted either!  

 

Throughout the rest of the weekend, I found myself reaching out more, bit by bit, in tiny steps.  Sometimes I was successful, and sometimes not.

 

Yes, there are some folks who simply won’t talk to you if you’re not their type and they are only looking for action.  And yes, there are folks who are simply jerks.  And, as I came to find, there were titleholders like me: feeling out of place, awkward, without mentors or a sense of community either locally or among titleholders.

 

One titleholder I said hello to three times before (on the fourth attempt) he finally responded.  And when he did, he was as friendly as a stranger would be expected to be.  He spoke to me as if I’d never approached him before... and, I realized, perhaps he never got the message before that I was reaching out. 

 

Someone who I might have dismissed earlier as a jerk, I now saw as distracted.  Maybe he was battling his own issues.  Maybe he was thinking about his volunteer responsibilities for the weekend, or his next play session… but because he wasn’t present in the moment before when I reached out didn’t mean he was a bad guy.  And it didn’t mean that I was a reject.

 

At the formal dinner on Saturday night, I met some of the folks who had dismissed me on the yahoo group and I observed Mr. Marcus from a distance.   And as I watched them interact with others, I had to conclude that these weren’t bad guys.  Their “attacksâ€? on me were insensitive, yes, but not truly malicious.  These men were decent enough, quirky and imperfect and funny and fallible.  Not unlike me.

 

Damn. 

 

I could no longer dislike them.

 

Not surprisingly, as I looked at my interactions with a new frame of reference, and as I challenged my emotional responses to people and comments, I found my heart opening more and more.

 

I had heart-to-hearts with a couple other titleholders who were very much in the same boat as I found myself in.  I spent a good deal of time with a true kindred spirit in the form of a Kansas City titleholder.  Over the weekend, Mr. Dixie Belle Leather 2008 Brian Heinen and I spent a good deal of time standing against walls and on the sidelines, watching others mingling and connecting.  We joked about being leather wallflowers and realized how similar we were in spirit despite being incredibly different in almost every other way (shape, size, hair color, top/bottom, etc.).

 

Over a very short period of time, we got together for dinner, killed ourselves on cardio machines, laughed and even cried together.  Over a Chinese buffet dinner, we joked about starting a new “SMâ€? group—meaning Social Maladepts.  When we shared this joke with a few others, there was actually a bit of excitement about it.  As it turned out, quite a number of titleholders felt alone or alienated or awkward about making connections.  Who knew?!   If there’s not always strength in numbers, there’s at least some comfort in knowing you’re not alone.

 

Next month is IML.  Sponsored by The Bike Stop bar, I’ll be going out to Chicago to represent Philadelphia and our leather community.  I hope I’ll do well and make my hometown proud. 

 

Going into CLAW weekend, I was nervous and feeling out of my element.  Now, surprisingly, as I look ahead to IML, I’m actually looking forward to seeing some of the men who shared with me their time, experiences, fears and joys.  I also look forward to getting to know some of the guys that I’ve interacted with in the past, but who only got to see the safeguarded side of me.  I’m willing to bet that when I let my guard down with them, I’ll get to appreciate them more too.

 

So maybe it’s true that the leather community and titleholders can make a family.  It feels like it’s starting to come together for me. 

 

As I continue to process what happened over CLAW and how to prepare for IML, my head spins wildly, like Dorothy in a cyclone. 

 

I couldn’t wait for the plane to return me to Philadelphia and to my two loving partners and my bulldog baby.  Yet despite my own disbelief, I’m now looking forward to Chicago and to seeing my IML classmates of 2008.

 

After all, there’s no place like home.

 

At the Cleveland Leather Awareness Weekend, I met an extraordinary young man, Mr. Dixie Belle Leather 2008 Brian Heinen.  We had lots in common, and even more differences.  We chatted for about 30 minutes about his experiences coming out into leather in Lawrence, Kansas, his desires as a sub-slave, and his views on relationships and the upcoming IML competition in Chicago.

I hope you enjoy our chat as much as I enjoyed chatting him up.

Scott