First, and I think I just realized this, I loved the attention. I had tons of pictures, good quality, up on Flickr. And people would mark them as favorites and even comment and I will important somehow. People would like me and that felt nice. At least at first.
With time that attention wears out. You just stop needing it or maybe you want more or different. I have no idea. The thing is I just stopped liking the attention. I had that account for five or six years. It was an important thing in my life, as funny as that may be.
I have to clarify: not all the pictures were nudes. I would upload "urban" shots too or maybe just portraits or whatever I found was nice to look at. I guess I wanted to make others see I had talent for something. Of course, I didn't. I'm a professional photographer and my "work" on Flickr lacked any real quality. I knew that all along and never really cared about it. It wasn't the point.
I would love to post one picture per week, normally I would post at the first second of a new day so the statistics would more accurately show how much a picture was liked. When I uploaded an urban view, a building or trees or whatever, the picture was not that well received. Maybe a couple of people would say "yay, it's great". And that was it.
But me, naked, showing maybe my ass or my penis (never an erection, mind you), was always received by what I can only call "critical acclaim". Of course this acclaim came from people I had never met, mostly men. All men to be honest. And they were all horny. I mean, I should be an idiot not to see it.
I used to be more naive, more innocent if you will. When I remember those times, I don't know if it was a good way to be back then or if I should've been more intelligent, more perceptive.
Like, when I was nineteen I think, I went out with this guy. Just cute, not really a beauty or anything but you know. We went to a gay café and chatted and kissed and I felt awesome. It wasn't muy first time kissing but it felt right and beautiful and all that shit. Any way, it ended soon after and I never really understood why. Why he behaved like he did, always distant and weird.
He was fucking (or being fucked, who knows) others, kissing others while dating me. He actually kissed another guy that same night I was in the café with him. Somebody would later tell me all of this and I just understood it all. I also understood men were not to be fully trusted as, it is true, a man always acts commanded by his dick first, then his brain. And it's even more real in gay men and they know this is true.
Many people judge me saying "Hey, why haven't you been to a gay parade? Have you really never been in one?". And my answer is simply because I don't believe in it. It's not a casual walk to just show how proud we are to be who we are. That's what is SHOULD be about. But it isn't. That parade has mutated to be many people's chance to just rub in the faces of everyone what they do with their lives. Well, good news: no one gives a flying fuck.
There are homophobes. Of course there are. But there are others that just don't care. They don't think twice if someone is sleeping with a man, a woman or a horse. They don't care. And I don't think that is a reason to be pushy and annoying. I am fucking gay and the only person I need accepting me is myself. If the world doesn't, believe me, I don't care.
There's no gay marriage, that does not exists. The only thing that does exist is two people who get together to sign a paper that says they must share everything and live together. That's it. It's nothing more than that. You're not selling yourself there, in any sense, and it shouldn't matter who does it. Who cares?
But I digress. I made those pictures, the naked ones. And all that attention and it felt nice for years, yeah. I don't like discos or whatever they all them now. I just don't, I feel like an octopus in Japanese restaurant. Just like that. I've gone to a couple and that was enough for me. So I was happy to have some guys attention.
But that faded away. I got bored. To be honest I'm bored and fed up with people every second of my life now but that made me even more bored. All those empty comments and no one coming to me in real life to say "hey, you cute". And before you give me shit, I say "coming to me" because I deserve that. I won't crawl to a guy simply because I won't give an inch of myself to someone who would just expect everything.
The thing with gay guys, and all guys I guess, is that you must test them. And no, that doesn't mean annoying them and being jealous 24/7. I mean asking them things, getting to know them for real. Just being interested to get to know the person, take time.
But no. Most people fuck after 24 hours of meeting, if not before. I'm not saying people should be nuns and monks but, come one, love yourself.
And then I started having problems with the Flickr people and they ended up closing my account. You know why? Because it happens I didn't only do those pictures for the attention. I also did them because they were like therapy for me. I have hated myself for too long and that outlet made me feel good about myself. I almost fully stopped having crazy crisis every month.
And, besides that, I personally think the human body is beautiful. I don't believe in a god so I say nature is pretty smart and resourceful. Just get naked in front of a mirror and stare at yourself. Take a good look at the details, not the superficial shit of society but your actual biologic body. It's a work of art, inside and out.
So, that ended for me. It stopped existing, that outlet, that I needed so bad for so many years. To be honest, when it ended, I said "Fuck it, I have something new now: writing". So around that time I started working on some small things and it all came down to this blog with which I have a really hard relationship.
Today, for example, I had more than five ideas. I couldn't write more that ten lines for each. I felt awful, like an idiot, because this is my thing, my only thing. And if I couldn't write, I would go insane. Simple as that.
