It was New Year's Eve 1970 when I saw Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice with David and Lisa (not their real names). Otherwise, this is a true story that has nothing to do with real estate.
David was my college dorm roommate between January to June 1968. He replaced Richard Sanger who dropped out of college. What a shame. We lived in a co-ed dorm with male and female sections separated by a large common area with ground floor cafeteria and second floor lounge and tv area. Nobody had a personal tv in those days. We lived on the first floor southwest with the best group of guys I knew in my dorm days. David and I became fast friends or friends fast.
David was a nerdy intellectual hippie. He had an engaging personality and a forever smile. He stood perhaps 5'7" tall and maybe weighed a buck twenty if that. His shaggy hair constantly looked like it needed washed. It draped to his collar but never below. He took showers nightly - he just didn't come out looking fresh as a daisy. He wore horn rimmed glasses which appeared to be permanently anchored to the his pronounced mutton chop sideburns. He always wore Levis and a flannel shirt which looked like it needed to be ironed. His father was a full professor at another university who he spoke of with pride. He had an older brother who I learned more about, later.
David and I kept in contact after the 1968 term ended. I got a summer job as a clerk at the Jefferson County Courthouse in Golden, Colorado thanks to my political work for Judge Frank Jamison. David asked me to ask the Judge to officiate his marriage to Lisa. The Judge agreed. The wedding took at
Genesee Park just before sunset on a Saturday a week or so later. There were just five people present: the Judge, the Bride, the Groom, the Best Man (David's best friend from high school) and myself. I decided that I had to be the Bridesmaid since David declared his friend Steve as the Best Man. The parents were not invited, nor were any other friends. The ceremony was short and sweet and over in a few minutes. If you click the link you can see for yourself why the couple chose this place to be married. The Judge returned to Denver. I seem to recall that we made hamburgers after the ceremony. Then we returned to our homes.
David's parents held reception at their home in Boulder a couple of weeks later. His brother was at the reception - a normal looking guy. There were a lot of people at that party. I still did not understand why the families and friends were not invited to the wedding. It was David and Lisa's decision and none of my business. We stayed in contact after that but lost the wonderful interactions you have when roomies really like each other.
David and Lisa lived in Boulder and drove to Denver on New Years Eve 1970. We went to see Bob & Carol & Ted and Alice. It was one of the first movies about the sexual revolution and included mate sharing and sharing too much personal information - the kind personal information that people just did not reveal in real life - until then. I don't remember the movie as much as I remember driving back to David and Lisa's trailer in Boulder where I spent the night. They brought out a Ouija board. I had never seen one before. Nothing physical just asking the board to reveal all - that was some scary stuff.
A few years passed. Our contacts became fewer and fewer. It was the summer of 1976. I met someone who changed my life. I admitted to myself that I was gay. I felt the need to tell my family and Judge Jamison, the man who became such an important part of my life. He said something like "I wondered when you would figure it out." And then I thought about telling David. I called him. We agree to meet at Tulagis - a beer hall on the Hill in Boulder.
David greeted me with his famous "Roomie!". We embraced, drank beer, and talked about old times. I eventually summoned up the courage to tell David my big secret that I was gay. That was a really big admission to make in the early 70s. Nobody would admit to being gay. I wasn't sure how he would react. I hoped he would be cool. Instead, he said
he had an admission: he was a cross-dresser. What? Did Lisa know? Yes. Within a millisecond I envisioned mutton-chopped, oily-haired, horn rimmed glasses wearing David modeling a long silky slinky red dress. It just did not compute. It never did and never would. He was not joking.
Then
he told me more. His family lived in a far away country for a couple of years where his father taught at a university while David was a young teen. His brother was a year or two older. David said they had sex with each other on a regular basis. What? He said it was only mutual masturbation or oral. He thought nothing of it. I did! I could not believe this kid was more odd than I thought I was.
David and Lisa eventually divorced. David and I lost contact with each other a couple of years later. Earlier in my life when I was a lawyer and later worked in banking, I dealt with people undergoing challenging life experiences like divorce, drug and alcohol addiction, foreclosure or loss of business, being charged with a crime, and death. Over the years I have dealt some very successful and even famous people teetering on the edge. Now I sell houses. We all have our secrets and our vulnerabilities.
