Then I waited in the parking lot for the street to be empty so I could rush to the door unseen. I drove past it two or three times before working up the nerve to enter. My entrance to the arcade was exactly what you might expect. What we had instead were black-painted plywood booths, complete with glory holes that the management occasionally (vainly) tried to cover up. We also didn't have space-age plastic cubicles.
For one thing, VCRs weren't in vogue yet, so they used movie projectors (8mm?) playing short, five minute scenes in an endless loop. I didn't have a convenient guide to tell me where to go (I wasn't old enough to get into the gay bars, anyway), so I picked the only place I knew about-an X-rated bookstore/arcade.įor the benefit of the younger readers, I should explain that video arcades then were different than they are today. The place was Kansas City, the time was the mid-1970's. When I moved out of the old home at age 19, though, I decided the time had come to explore.
To continue, I first realized I had gay inclinations in high school, but I didn't act on them (out of ignorance and fear). My dad was in the Air Force and we travelled all the time-I didn't have close friends to 'experiment' with, shall we say.
