I knew what I was doing when I ordered all those rum and cokes last night. I know that rum in large doses makes me out of control and it was opening night at the new Cock and I wanted to be out of control and I was.

There was a line of people out there at eleven waiting to get in, because the bar was not ready to make its debut yet even though there was an advertised open bar from 11-12. At eleven thirty, the new Cock opened and it filled up quickly, everyone paying the five dollar cover, which there never was on Monday nights at the old Cock. I am hoping it was just because it was opening night with an open bar that there was a cover. It is bigger than the old Cock, but smaller than the old Hole. The place is rumored to have two floors, but that may not be true - regardless, just the main floor (perhaps the only floor) was open, which is supposed to resemble the old Cock. They lowered the ceiling of the Hole and installed bathrooms at the back of the bar. There is that same long mirror that hung over the bar at the Cock. Black glitter is painted on the walls and it is lit by a red light to have that same sleazy darkness that the old place had. All that was missing was the scary "Watch Your Wallets" signs they had pasted all over the old place.

I found myself talking to various strangers, the bar packed with homos looking for scandal, everyone flirting. A few too many rum and cokes after getting there, I was relieving myself of some of those fluids at the urinal and I met some guy, exchanged hellos. And I cannot recall what the transition was. I know there wasn't much of one, but I would still like to know how you can say hi to someone and look at them for a long, pregnant pause and then find yourself walking to a back corner of the bar together to be naughty. There is no backroom at this Cock, but there is a little nook in the back of the bar that I am sure they did not design with a backroom in mind, but which turned into one last night.

People are always waiting for someone else to do something, so that they can do it also. So often, I find myself being this first person, letting other people do the things they want to do. Specifically, dancing. So often at bars or parties, everyone will just be waiting for dancing to start. No one wants to be the lone one out there on the floor. I don't care. And last night, I took this boy's cock out and starting giving him a blowjob while I sat on a bench and jacked off. Soon another boy sat next to me, and sucked this boy's cock also and sucked mine - and soon all these men who had been standing around horny in this little dark nook let loose their inner sluts. Last night was one of the most sexually charged nights I have ever seen at a bar. The number of hot people having sex I saw is enough masturbation fodder for months. Also, I performed some sexual gymnastics last night, coming in three people's mouths.

I would get a blowjob from someone and then head back out into the bar where you could not make it from one end to the other without being gropped at least a couple times. I would talk to some cute stranger until a distraction of some sort ended our chat and I headed back to the back of the bar to be a voyeur and watch hot people go at it. But would end up giving someone a bj, which turned into getting another one from some stranger, and repeat until the end of the night. It was so fun and I tell myself that I am proud of it, that I don't have guilt, but occasionally a whiff of shame will blow my way. It's hard work liberating yourself.

And the thing that fascinates me so much is how I would never hook up with these people in any other situation because of racial, class, age, or just body image boundaries that people normally don't cross. It doesn't matter if this person is a boring looking person in bad clothes in a backroom as long as they have a hard dick. I need to actually read Delaney's Times Square Red, Times Square Blue, where he verbalizes this in nicer language - calling these sex cultures democratic because it is one of the few public spaces where you interact with all these different people you normally never would. I love that idea and it has always stuck with me ever since I read an excerpt of the book, that casual sex is a democratizing agent. I am an agent of democracy!