So you've made it to this page. This is where I am going to tell you the long and at some pointes funny story of my 'coming out'.

The first step of coming out is realizing yourself that you are gay. I always get asked when I knew that I was gay. Well to be honest I had the fist idea that I was attracted to men when I was probably 13 - 14 years old. It was the year when we went to live in California for 6 month on a university campus when I started looking at other men at the swimming pools. But not enough that I stared at the guys, no my body would react to it in what I thought was a very inappropriate way as well. But at that time I don't remember being very worried about that fact that it was men I fancied. 

I didn't have any girlfriends in school which was not a big surprise since I don't think I had may friends at school either. I thought I was ugly and dull and therefore a girlfriend was out of the question anyway. I had crushes on a lot of guys at school but never came near telling anyone.  It was only when I started going to dance school (no! not what you think. It was something all Austrian school boys my age did) in the evenings that I started to become more popular and had girls start chasing me. I didn't have a problem kissing girls and very frequently did just that. But I was never sexually attracted to them and therefore it never went any further. 

In dance school I met my first 'best friend' Gerald. We were sole mates. I knew what he thought at any given point and he knew what I thought. We were the best friends ever and closer that it was healthy for me given the fact that I had a huge crush on him. About a year later our friendship became a 'ménage a trois'. We became closet friends with Susi a girl we met at one of the High School proms. The story was (but that was nothing I knew at the time) that Susi had a crush on me, I had a crush on Gerald and he was to naive to see any of it. We have spend most of the time together and looking back at it there was more energy in this friendship with the two of them then in any other friendship since. It was like being madly in love with each other just without the sex. But it couldn't go on for ever and so I told Susi one night with the help of a lot of alcohol helping me that I felt more for Gerald then I should and that I thought I was gay. *fact* I was 17 when I first came out to someone else *fact*. She took it pretty well, but then again what else could she have done taken the fact that I was crying like mad when I told her.  In the end she and Gerald got together for about 2 weeks as a couple and then split up breaking up not only the their relationship but also our closeness as a threesome. Up until today I wish I could relive the happy moments with them both. Gerald is now married and has got a baby he adores. I have never had the guts to tell him that I was gay and in the end I just broke our friendship over it. He still keeps in contact with me and I still adore him.

At about the same time I have started to organize myself some gay porn magazines. And I used to hide them at a very secret place in my bedroom but sometimes just pop them underneath my bed before falling asleep. It was one of those days that I forgot hide them in the morning and as I grabbed underneath my bed in the evening one of my parents has replaced the TORSO magazine with a HUSTLER. I was petrified at the thought of explaining my parents why I was looking at gay porn. But neither of them ever mentioned the incident. God bless them, did they really think that by replacing the magazine with the right stuff for the boy I would become straight?? 

*fact* It was not until I was 22 years old that I had sex with another man *fact*. Or should I say two other men. I was in Los Angeles at the end of a 3 weeks trip through California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona and New Mexico that I met this guy the night before I was due to fly back home. He approached me and asked me if I wanted to go for a drink with him. With the knowledge that I would be off the next day I agreed to it. We didn't quite make it to the bar but ended up at my motel room jerked off together. I think it lasted about 5 minutes and had pretty much the excitement of a stale bottle of sparkling wine opening without any sound. Later that evening when going to some bars in West Hollywood together we met a friend of his who just happened to have one of the best bodies I have ever seen. That night Michael told me what 'gaydar' is and pointed out all the men that were cruising me (I didn't see a single one looking at me). It didn't take much alcohol to convince me to come back to Michaels place along with his friend. That was the first time I had full sex with a man or to be precise with two men. It was just what I needed with the right people and in the right circumstances and I don't regret it at all.