I don't mean to turn this thread into a competition, but I'm possibly the oldest and biggest whore posting on LPSG. Why I've I never contracted HIV remains a mystery. If anyone should have succumbed to the virus in 1979 or 1980 I would have bet large sums of money on me.
For me, having as much sex as possible with as many partners as possible from 1967 (remember "The Summer of Love" in '67?) and into the early 1980s was a political statement. Although I tended to always have a lover with similar sexual proclivities for getting our ya ya's off as many times as possible every night at the tubs, expressing open, blown out as much as possible sex had more to do with being an over reaction to gay liberation and sticking a big fork in the eye of those who insisted gays were/are bad, evil, going to Hell, and, of course, don't forget to lock up your sons! After all, we gays have to "recruit" to keep our numbers up.
Even being a serial monogamist through most of the 1980s and 1990s wasn't a means of avoiding infection. I look at The Squeeze and wonder if I should ever tell him that all of my past long-term lovers died of HIV-related illness -- with the exception of three. My first glamorous hunk-of-a-hot-daddy lover sucked on a shot gun in 1973. My 7-year perfect relationship in the 1990s ended when Kenji-chan stroked out at 42 and was pronounced dead 15 minutes later in the parking lot of the hospital emergency entrance, slumped back in the passenger seat of my Jeep. I was certain HE was the one and we'd grow old together, plucking out each other's ear and nose hairs in our 80s. At least I still have the Jeep. And then there's my long-time ex from 1975 who is very much alive and healthy but sometimes I'd just like to kill him because he's so fucking perky! He became a Reverend in the Church of Religious Science, the most unnervingly happy group of people on Earth! KILL THEM ALL, I SAY! At least until I've had my third cup of coffee. (Actually, I'm very glad my committed promiscuous partner in crime from 1974 to 1976 is still alive and thriving -- but how can ANYONE be so permanently happy without the assistance of drugs or a frontal lobotomy?)
As for the rest of my long-term fucks and erotic bedwarmers, well . . . they've all passed away from AIDS-related diseases. And along with them the most talented, intelligent, and outright brilliant collection of friends a person could have are also gone.
As for why I'm still HIV-? Your guess is as good as mine.
Together The Squeeze and I have safe sex as safe as sex can be and frequently with other people. We're still "out there" enjoying the kind of sex we both enjoy. And we are regularly tested. Thus far at least 10 years of being an major cum hound who never hesitates to swallow hasn't resulted in me contracting HIV. But I wouldn't recommend my sexual interest and activities as being a safe model for anyone else. In no way do I profess bare backing or other unsafe sexual practices.
However, recently I discovered -- much to my chagrin -- that my oldest grand nephew has become a "porn star" with an infamous San Francisco-based porn factory (with the initials TIM) for the last 3 or 4 years. He's currently "touring" Europe with his significant-bareback-other along with their expensive video equipment. He and his SO stayed with us for three weeks in May and I found it impossible to lecture him on his current "career." He's not dumb -- stupid, maybe -- but not dumb and has the same cavalier philosophy of dying young and leaving a handsome corpse that I used to profess to believing in. Who am I to lecture? A year ago The Squeeze and I started our own porn-for-pay web site.
My nephew and I talked openly about our different views on unsafe sexual behavior as well as what got us both hot as Hell. I had the opportunity to grill him about what the TIM pool of video guys were like, if they are tested regularly (they are not) and if he and his SO know if they are positive or negative. He insists they remain negative. But from his "best some things left unsaid" attitude I sort of picked up that he fully expects to sero-convert eventually. And after watching just one of his videos downloaded on his lap top I have grave suspicions he's not negative.
At the moment, knowing that he and his partner spent three weeks whoring about Barçelona and Sitges, I've become paranoid. Did my grand nephew and his partner reseed the relatively stable male gay community of Spain with a new variety of HIV? Probably not. Since BCN and Sitges tend to become the center of Europe's gay community during the summer we are always at risk of a new wave of HIV infections from all over the world. Safety is a personal responsibility.
But I am not for one minute regretful, sorry, or embarrassed by the vast number of sexual encounters I had from 1966 to the present. I'm definitely not as active at 59 as I was in my late teens and twenties, but I had a serious good time. There's only one regret I would change about my life, and that is I should have picked a better place to attend graduate school. UT Austin, Texas was just too hot and sticky.
Maybe my ex who oversees a congregation of The Church of the Perky Attitude will diagnose my current situation as being on the horns of a dilemma. But the stabbing pain of horn has never got in the way of me having satisfactory sex. So, I continue as I have since hooking up with The Squeeze. We've been turning each other on since 2001 and are legally married. So far, the worst thing he's brought home was a scenic piece of porteño meat for a three-way who, unfortunately, upon closer inspection had a case of pubic lice. We took him to the pharmacy, bought the fastest-acting "repellente" and invited him back for a second audition the next week. But HIV cannot be so easily treated.
It's summer '09 in BCN and the season is now in full swing. Although The Squeeze and I both understand the consequences and work together to play safely, who knows what the next major killer sexually transmitted disease will be? Possibly a rapacious incurable form of gingivitis that kills within 24 hours, sort of like meningititus? We just do the best we can under the circumstances.
To Hell with the 70's and 80's, I'm more concerned about surviving the world economic crisis that began to unravel when Reagan began the popular pass time of the rich: wholesale government deregulation.