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3.5: Sex: a homoexual awakening

It was also a question of switching from an interest in God, to an increased interest in sex. So it is now time for me to recall how I had been evolving in that particular direction.

When I had first arrived at Ludgrove, my huge curiosity was in discovering that a few of the boys had deformed cocks. My father had followed the upper class fashion in having all of his sons circumcised, (as indeed was he himself.) At Ludgrove, which was a distinctly aristocratic school, there were only a few uncircumcised cocks to perceive: or to hazard a guess, I might say no more than one in ten. They were certainly an odd spectacle, as we all stood there queuing up for our baths.

There was one occasion when I took [Y], my best friend from Dorm 27, into the lavatory so that we could each examine more closely what this particular anatomical difference in the other entailed. But I judge that this only ranks as sexual curiosity, rather than an instance of homosexual practice. And if it so happens that there was a potential affair between the two of us over that period, then it was eclipsed about a year later, by his decision to drop me as a friend.

The message was originally conveyed to me during one of the school's Sunday walks, when we theoretically paired off with our best friends, to traipse in a cluster vaguely around the master who was accompanying us. My particular friend kept accelerating, or decelerating, until I finally got the message that he didn't want to be paired with me. It was a wounding experience, but one that everyone needs to receive, sooner or later, and no matter from which sex.

In case this makes it sound as if I was becoming too puritanical over this period, then let me hastily interject some less savoury detail. My dog Charlotte got herself pregnant shortly after I went to Ludgrove, because of Miss Vigers' neglect - according to Nanny, - or because of the attentions of the local farmer's dog (called Bubbles) according to others. Anyway she produced seven puppies, who were a great delight to me during my first winter holidays back at Sturford.

I say a delight because I do remember giving these puppies the tip of my penis to suck. I don't suppose that I did it very often, or even for very long, but it was a pleasure which I still recall. And I suppose that within any statistical enquiry, I should now be listed amongst those who have indulged in bestial sex. I just mention this - to keep the record straight.

In other matters, I was learning how to behave correctly. Mr Barber was concerned to promote what might now be regarded as a male chauvinist attitude of males being brought up to give gentlemanly deference to females, on principle - because it was self-evident that males ruled the world. But there was also this idea of modesty. Prior to going to Ludgrove, I had displayed no inhibition about my naked body being viewed by other members of the family. But at Ludgrove I had learnt that it was more genteel to conceal my `private parts' (as Mr Barber described them) from the eyes of ladies. I regarded my mother as one such lady, so on the first occasion when she walked into the nursery bathroom, with me sitting there in the bath, I hastily crossed my legs. Her reaction was one of irritation. ("Don't be so silly!" - or some such remark.) I remember feeling confused as to whither the true direction of my education might lie.

That was a situation when dealing with ladies, of course. But there were other situations when I was dealing with females of a different kind. Up to the war there had always been a nurserymaid to assist Nanny in her tasks, and the convention continued until briefly after I had gone to school. The penultimate employee was a sexy little maid, who was probably no more than fifteen years of age. When I came home from school, she was up there in the nursery, and I was full of my own self-importance - being the one and only schoolboy, and all that. I daresay that I did try to pose as Mr Big to her, but she certainly posed as Miss Sexy in response.

It was a matter of wrestling with her while she was seated in an armchair, if I remember correctly. I knew that there was something erotic in what we were doing, because the talk between us had been veering that way - if for no other reason. But in the process of wrestling with her, we were both aware how we were actually doing more than that: to the point when her hand slid between my legs and gave a furtive grasp to my genitals. Unfortunately Nanny walked in at this moment. No one ever told me why this nurserymaid departed, but her mother came to collect her the very next morning. There was a silence over the whole issue which I felt to be safer not to question.

My sexual development over this period was really somewhat static. Our Vivian cousins had come to stay with us at one time, and the visit had been returned to the house where they now dwelt, near Ringwood in Hampshire. I was still very much aware of Sal's attractiveness, but we no longer felt quite so much at ease in one another's company. We were becoming self-conscious about the difference in gender, which entailed divergent paths towards maturity.

I was also a bit confused by some of the ideas which Cal was now feeding to me with regard to my sexual identity. She imagined that I participated within a similar cultural environment to the one she herself experienced at Longstowe. For example, she was full of the notion that I ought to have a crush on someone. She told me the name of the girl upon whom she had affixed her own emotions, and demanded the fair exchange of me telling her whom might be the object of my own. She didn't seem to understand that schoolboy cultures worked differently. I wasn't expected (when at Ludgrove) to have a crush upon anybody at all. But she continued to harass me on the subject until I pronounced that it must be [Z], who had at least served as a sort of elder brother figure during the first terms. It was an incorrect analysis of my relationship with [Z], but Cal preferred to think that she had unearthed something crucial to an understanding of my soul.

The religious fervour phase was superseded by a burgeoning curiosity about sex. And this too stemmed from the influence of the particular dormitory monitor, who gave direction to what we all whispered about after the lights had been turned out. In Dorm 3 under [A], the emphasis was most definitely upon sex. We all pooled our knowledge on the subject, vying with one another to furnish more extensive detail than the others.

I had already been told about the facts of life by Caroline, when I was seven years old, and I was now regarded as being relatively advanced in my education on such matters - by contemporary standards. But here in Dorm 3, I found that my authority was disputed, by one of my new best friends. This was [B]. His version of the reproductory process was that it is milk, as opposed to urine, that the male injects into the woman: but it was into the tummy rather than into whatever women called their sex-things. (The most ingenious suggestion was that they might be called `turkeys', in verbal contrast to cocks, and because they looked a bit like turkeys on a butcher's slab.) Anyway I became marginally more confused than previously as to what exactly takes place at the conception of a child. Or perhaps he accepted my version of the procedure. I don't actually remember.

The conversations about sex went on deep into the night, with [A,B] and myself being the principal participants. And it gradually took a more active turn. [A] told us how there was a boy from Hastings that he knew in the holidays, who had shown him how you could produce that milk-like stuff, from which babies are made. All you had to do was to pull the skin on your cock rapidly up and down, until it squirted out. So all three of us lay there, trying our damnedest to achieve that result - without any success, I might add. But the sensation was certainly pleasant, and we encouraged each other with a certain manual assistance.

So thus it was that I learnt how to masturbate. And now that I knew, I taught it to others. There was [C], to whom I demonstrated what needed to be done while we were isolated up in the sick room that term, suffering from flu. It all helped to pass the hours of a dreary illness, which became enjoyable as a result, once we were recuperating. The only problem is that, on remeeting [C] in adult life, he is always liable to greet me with the public pronouncement: "Why there's the man who taught me how to masturbate!" And there was [D]. In his case the tuition was delivered in the school latrines. And he shocked me greatly , by peeing (as I then supposed) up my arm while I was milking him. I simply didn't believe him when he said he couldn't help it. Only much later, once I too had mastered the art of orgasm, did I appreciate that this, in all probability, is what had then occurred.