The Closet Professor

Pic of the Day

2026-08-13T18:00:00.000-04:00

Reading for Pleasure

2026-08-13T06:30:00.000-04:00

Sometimes a picture can strike inspiration when I’m trying to figure out what to write about. The picture above caught my attention: a young man, nude, relaxing in the grass with a good book. There are certainly worse ways to spend a summer afternoon.

Usually, when I post a picture of a guy reading, I look up the book first, just to make sure it isn’t something I’d come to regret posting. The book he’s reading is Le Prince Pédant II. I don’t speak French, so I had no idea what the title meant. It turns out to be The Pedant Prince II by Taram Boyle, the second and final volume of Le Prince Pédant.

According to the book’s description:

Tristan fait face à un tribunal éclésiastique. Son crime? Une relation contre-nature avec un homme. Tristan n’est pas dupe. Il sait bien que l’Église vise en réalité le Prince Hamelin de Hardourie. Les témoignages s’enchaînent et sont accablants. Tristan réalise qu’il ne pourra pas échapper au bûcher déjà dressé devant l’église. Seul un miracle pourra le sauver…

In English:

Tristan faces an ecclesiastical court. His crime? An unnatural relationship with a man. Tristan is not fooled. He is well aware that the Church is actually targeting Prince Hamelin of Hardourie. The testimonies follow one another and are overwhelming. Tristan realizes that he will not be able to escape the stake already erected in front of the church. Only a miracle can save him…

It sounds like it could be an interesting book, if only there were an English translation.

Currently, I’m reading the Chester Falls series by Ana Ashley. It’s not exactly highbrow literature, but these days I mostly read what I often jokingly call “trashy gay romance.” It’s not really trashy; I simply read for enjoyment, and sometimes I need a bit of fluff. There’s nothing wrong with a book whose main purpose is to entertain you.

Some of my favorite authors of M/M romance are May Archer, Lucy Lennox, and J.E. Birk. Their books are fun, easy reads, and sometimes that’s exactly what I want.

I also enjoy M/M romance mixed with mystery, especially books by Josh Lanyon. I particularly enjoyed Lanyon’s The Art of Murder series and the Secrets and Scrabble series. They’re quite different from one another: The Art of Murder leans more toward hard-boiled crime and suspense, while Secrets and Scrabble is firmly in cozy-mystery territory. Both give me the romance I enjoy along with a mystery to solve.

The first book I ever read by Josh Lanyon was The Darkling Thrush, and when I finished it, I had absolutely no intention of reading anything else by her. Quite frankly, I thought the book was awful. Susan eventually convinced me to give Lanyon another chance, and I’m very glad she did. I’ve since come to love many of her books and series. Trust me, The Darkling Thrush is an anomaly among Lanyon’s books, and I’m glad Susan talked me into giving her work a second chance.

There are several books by different authors that rank among my favorites, but Lanyon’s Winter Kill is easily in my top three. I rarely read a book more than once, but I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve reread Winter Kill. It has everything I enjoy—a romance, a mystery, and more than a little thriller thrown into the mix—and I absolutely love the two main characters. If you can have a crush on fictional characters, those two men would certainly qualify for me. Of all Lanyon’s books, Winter Kill is the one I’d most love to see made into a movie. I already have the whole thing pictured in my head; Hollywood just needs to get around to making it.

For much of my life, I read because I had to—for school, for teaching, for research, or because there was something I needed to learn. These days, I’m perfectly happy to read simply because a book is fun. Maybe that means a mystery, maybe a romance, or maybe some unapologetic gay fluff. A book doesn’t have to be profound to be worth the time spent reading it.

Of course, if I could spend the afternoon stretched out naked in the grass with a good book like the young man in the picture, that wouldn’t be such a bad way to read either.

So, what are you currently reading? And are you reading it because you have to—or simply because you want to?

Pic of the Day

2026-08-12T18:00:00.000-04:00

The Doldrums

2026-08-12T06:00:00.000-04:00

I don’t have much of anything to write about this morning. I haven’t done anything particularly interesting lately, and I don’t have any future plans that might make for an interesting post either.

If the weather is nice on Saturday—and it’s supposed to be—maybe I’ll drive up to Lake Willoughby and go for a hike. The lake is a fjord-like glacial lake in Westmore, Vermont, framed by Mount Pisgah and Mount Hor. It’s an incredibly beautiful place, and I haven’t been up there in a while. We’ll see if I get energetic enough to actually make the trip.

Otherwise, there just hasn’t been much interesting going on lately. Work has been boring. Life has pretty much been boring. And, frankly, I’m just bored.

I wish I had a history post for y’all this week, but inspiration hasn’t struck, so I don’t have one planned. A history post isn’t something I can really force. I want y’all to find the topic interesting, and I don’t think I can make it interesting for anyone else if I don’t find it interesting myself.

So, sorry for the rambling and probably somewhat melancholic post this morning, but it’s all I’ve got for today. Maybe Saturday will bring a little scenery, fresh air, and inspiration. We’ll see.

Pic of the Day

2026-08-11T18:00:00.000-04:00

August Moonrise

2026-08-11T06:00:00.000-04:00

August Moonrise

By Sara Teasdale

The sun was gone, and the moon was coming
Over the blue Connecticut hills;
The west was rosy, the east was flushed,
And over my head the swallows rushed
This way and that, with changeful wills.
I heard them twitter and watched them dart
Now together and now apart
Like dark petals blown from a tree;
The maples stamped against the west
Were black and stately and full of rest,
And the hazy orange moon grew up
And slowly changed to yellow gold
While the hills were darkened, fold on fold
To a deeper blue than a flower could hold.
Down the hill I went, and then
I forgot the ways of men,
For night-scents, heady, and damp and cool
Wakened ecstasy in me
On the brink of a shining pool.

O Beauty, out of many a cup
You have made me drunk and wild
Ever since I was a child,
But when have I been sure as now
That no bitterness can bend
And no sorrow wholly bow
One who loves you to the end?
And though I must give my breath
And my laughter all to death,
And my eyes through which joy came,
And my heart, a wavering flame;
If all must leave me and go back
Along a blind and fearful track
So that you can make anew,
Fusing with intenser fire,
Something nearer your desire;
If my soul must go alone
Through a cold infinity,
Or even if it vanish, too,
Beauty, I have worshipped you.

Let this single hour atone
For the theft of all of me.

About the Poem

There is something about an August evening that already seems to carry the faintest suggestion of an ending. Summer is still very much with us, but the days are growing shorter. Darkness comes a little earlier than it did only a few weeks before. There may still be hot afternoons ahead, but occasionally there is a coolness in the evening air that reminds us autumn is not so far away.

Sara Teasdale captures one of those evenings in “August Moonrise,” but what begins as a beautiful description of the natural world gradually becomes something much more profound. She watches the sun disappear, the moon rise over the hills, and swallows dart across the evening sky. The colors deepen from rosy pink to orange, gold, and finally a blue so intense that it is “deeper…than a flower could hold.”

For a moment, everything else disappears.

“Down the hill I went, and then / I forgot the ways of men,” she writes. I love that line. There are moments when we need to forget the ways of men for a little while. The world can be exhausting. People disappoint us. We disappoint ourselves. There are worries about tomorrow and regrets about yesterday. Sometimes we need an evening when the air is cool, the moon is rising, and the rest of the world can simply wait.

But Teasdale does not remain in that peaceful landscape. The beauty surrounding her makes her think about something much larger: the fact that she will eventually lose everything.

Her breath. Her laughter. Her sight. Her heart. Perhaps even her soul.

That sounds bleak, yet “August Moonrise” does not feel like a poem of despair. Teasdale knows that sorrow is unavoidable, but she refuses to believe that sorrow negates beauty. She writes:

“no bitterness can bend
And no sorrow wholly bow
One who loves you to the end”

There is tremendous hope in those words—not the hope that nothing bad will happen, but the knowledge that pain does not erase every beautiful thing that came before it.

We sometimes think happiness means reaching a place where nothing hurts anymore. Life rarely works that way. Joy and sorrow have an inconvenient habit of existing beside one another. We can grieve someone we have lost and still laugh at a memory of them. We can carry disappointment and still be stopped in our tracks by a beautiful sunset. We can have no idea what tomorrow will bring and still enjoy the moon rising tonight.

Perhaps that is enough.

Teasdale ends with two remarkable lines:

“Let this single hour atone
For the theft of all of me.”

Everything will eventually be taken from her, but she has had this hour. She has seen the moon rise. She has smelled the damp evening air. She has watched swallows crossing the sky. She has experienced beauty so completely that, for this moment at least, simply having been alive to witness it makes the eventual price of mortality seem worth paying.

We cannot hold on to an August evening forever. We cannot hold on to summer. We cannot hold on to youth, the people we love, or ultimately even life itself. Perhaps that is precisely why we should pay attention while they are here.

There will always be another worry waiting for us tomorrow. Tonight, perhaps, we can look up at the moon.

“August Moonrise” begins almost as a landscape painting. Teasdale establishes the scene through color and movement: blue Connecticut hills, a rosy western sky, darting swallows, black maples, an orange moon turning to gold, and hills deepening into blue.

Her imagery is unusually vivid, but it is not static. Everything is changing. The sun has already disappeared. The moon is rising. The swallows move unpredictably through the sky. Colors shift as daylight gives way to darkness. Even before Teasdale explicitly introduces mortality, she has created a world defined by transition.

The swallows are particularly effective. Teasdale compares them to “dark petals blown from a tree.” Petals are beautiful, but fallen petals also suggest impermanence. They have separated from the flower that produced them and are being carried away. The image quietly anticipates the poem’s later concern with everything that must eventually “leave me and go back.”

The poem’s major transition occurs with the lines:

“Down the hill I went, and then
I forgot the ways of men”

Until this point, the speaker has primarily been an observer. Now she enters into communion with the landscape. The “night-scents, heady, and damp and cool” awaken an almost ecstatic response. Beauty is no longer merely something she sees; it becomes something she experiences physically and spiritually.

Teasdale then directly addresses Beauty itself. By capitalizing the word, she transforms beauty from a quality into something approaching a divine presence. She has been “drunk and wild” on Beauty since childhood. The language resembles religious devotion, and by the poem’s end she explicitly declares, “Beauty, I have worshipped you.”

Yet her worship does not promise immortality. Teasdale entertains several possibilities for what follows death. Perhaps the individual is somehow remade into something new. Perhaps the soul continues alone through “a cold infinity.” Perhaps the soul itself simply vanishes.

She does not claim to know.

That uncertainty is important. The poem’s consolation does not depend upon certainty about an afterlife. Whatever awaits her—or does not await her—she knows that she has experienced beauty while she was alive.

This gives particular force to the final couplet. The “theft” is mortality itself: everything life gives us will eventually be reclaimed. Yet Teasdale asks that this one perfect hour of beauty “atone” for that loss.

It is an extraordinary exchange. One hour cannot literally compensate for death, of course. But poetry is not concerned with balancing an account. Teasdale is expressing the immense value of being fully present for even one moment of existence.

The poem therefore becomes less about death than about how to live in its presence. Mortality gives urgency to beauty. Because the moon will set, we should watch it rise. Because August will end, we should notice its evenings. Because our lives are finite, the moments when we truly see the world around us matter all the more.

About the Poet

Sara Teasdale was born in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1884 and became one of the most popular American lyric poets of the early twentieth century. Her poetry is known for its musical quality, emotional clarity, and frequent attention to love, beauty, nature, solitude, and mortality.

Her first collection, Sonnets to Duse and Other Poems, appeared in 1907, followed by Helen of Troy and Other Poems in 1911. Her 1917 collection Love Songs received major recognition, including what is now regarded as an early form of the Pulitzer Prize for poetry.

Although Teasdale’s poems often appear deceptively simple, their accessible language can conceal considerable emotional complexity. She frequently places moments of natural beauty beside loneliness, longing, loss, or an awareness of death. Rather than diminishing beauty, however, mortality often seems to intensify it. What is temporary becomes precious precisely because it cannot remain.

Teasdale died in New York City in 1933 at the age of forty-eight. Her poetry has endured in part because of her ability to express enormous emotions without elaborate language. She could take something as ordinary as watching the moon rise over distant hills and transform it into a meditation on beauty, sorrow, mortality, and what makes a life worth living.

In “August Moonrise,” she leaves us with a simple challenge: notice what is beautiful while it is still before us. Summer will end. The moon will set. Every perfect hour eventually passes.

But first, we get to experience it.

Pic of the Day

2026-08-10T18:00:00.000-04:00

A Slow Start to Monday

2026-08-10T06:00:00.000-04:00

It’s Monday again, and I did not want to get out of bed this morning. I slept fine, or at least I seemed to have slept well. Isabella still got me up at her usual 4 a.m., but after I fed her, I went back to bed—and, surprisingly, back to sleep. I slept for another hour and a half, which is very unusual for me.

Even after that extra sleep, I still did not want to get out of bed. Part of it, I know, is the beginning of a migraine. I have a meeting this morning that I really don’t want to put off, so I’m going to get through that and reassess how I’m feeling afterward. Hopefully, the migraine won’t amount to much and the extra sleep this morning helped rather than simply delayed the inevitable.

It’s not the most auspicious start to my work week, but hopefully things will get better as the day goes along. Sometimes Mondays just require a little more effort to get moving.

Have a great week, everyone!

Pic of the Day

2026-08-09T18:00:00.000-04:00

There Is Still Room

2026-08-09T06:00:00.000-04:00

“Then the master told his servant, ‘Go out to the roads and country lanes and compel them to come in, so that my house will be full.’”

—Luke 14:23

There is something beautiful about a table with room for one more person.

Throughout the Gospels, Jesus repeatedly uses meals to teach us about the kingdom of God. He eats with people others consider sinners. He sits at tables with people respectable society would rather avoid. He feeds crowds who have nothing to offer him in return. Again and again, the table becomes a place where the boundaries separating people begin to disappear.

In Luke 14, Jesus tells the Parable of the Great Banquet. A man prepares a great dinner and invites many guests. When everything is ready, he sends his servant to those who have been invited, saying, “Come, for everything is now ready” (Luke 14:17).

But the invited guests begin making excuses.

One has bought a field and needs to go see it. Another has purchased five yoke of oxen and wants to try them out. Another has just married. One after another, the expected guests decide they have something more important to do.

When the servant returns and reports what has happened, the master does something unexpected. He does not cancel the banquet. He does not sit at an empty table lamenting that the people he originally invited refused to come. Instead, he widens the invitation.

“The owner of the house became angry and ordered his servant, ‘Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame’” (Luke 14:21).

These were people who could easily find themselves pushed to the margins of society. They were not necessarily the people anyone expected to see occupying places of honor at a great banquet. Yet suddenly they are being sought out and welcomed.

Then comes one of the most beautiful moments in the parable. After the servant does what he has been told, he returns and says, “‘Sir,’ the servant said, ‘what you ordered has been done, but there is still room’” (Luke 14:22).

There is still room.

Those four words offer a powerful message for LGBTQ+ Christians.

Many of us have encountered Christians who seem determined to convince us that there is no room for us. We may have been told that we can be Christian or LGBTQ+, but we cannot be both. Some have been told they may enter the church only if they hide who they are. Others have been welcomed through the doors only to discover that the welcome comes with conditions: you may sit among us, but you cannot marry the person you love; you cannot serve in certain positions; you cannot fully participate in the life of the church unless you become the person we think you should be.

Some LGBTQ+ Christians eventually find affirming congregations where they are welcomed wholeheartedly. Others struggle to find a church where they feel at home. Some remain connected to traditions they love even when parts of those traditions have made them feel unwelcome. Others have walked away from organized religion altogether after being hurt too many times.

But the people guarding the doors do not own the banquet.

God does.

That distinction matters.

The Parable of the Great Banquet is not specifically about LGBTQ+ people, and we should not pretend that it is. Jesus tells the story in a particular setting and for a larger purpose concerning God’s kingdom. Yet its vision of an abundant invitation speaks powerfully to anyone who has been made to wonder whether there is a place for them.

And LGBTQ+ history gives us a powerful example of what it can mean to go toward people whom others have abandoned.

During the darkest years of the AIDS crisis, gay men were dying while much of the world looked away. Some were rejected by their families. Some were shunned by churches that should have offered comfort. Fear and ignorance about HIV meant that there were even people who were afraid to touch those who were sick.

But others came closer.

Gay men cared for their friends, lovers, and partners. Lesbians became caregivers, advocates, and some of the community’s fiercest allies. Nurses and doctors offered compassion when compassion was desperately needed. Clergy, volunteers, friends, and sometimes strangers sat beside hospital beds, brought meals, held hands, embraced bodies others were afraid to touch, and stayed with men who might otherwise have died alone.

When I read the master’s command, “Go out to the roads and country lanes and compel them to come in, so that my house will be full” (Luke 14:23), I think of people like them.

They went toward the people others had abandoned.

They did not ask whether those suffering were respectable enough, righteous enough, or acceptable enough to deserve compassion. They saw someone who needed love, and they went to them.

In doing so, whether they understood their actions in religious terms or not, they demonstrated something profoundly Christlike. They showed what it means to refuse to leave someone outside simply because others have decided that person does not belong.

And perhaps one of the most powerful things they offered was something remarkably simple: human touch.

Throughout his ministry, Jesus touched people others avoided. When a man with leprosy approached Jesus and asked to be made clean, Jesus did not recoil from him. Matthew tells us, “Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man” (Matthew 8:3).

He touched him.

Before the healing is even completed in Matthew’s telling of the story, there is that extraordinary gesture. Jesus reaches toward someone others would have kept at a distance.

During the AIDS crisis, when fear caused so many people to withdraw, the hand that reached across a hospital bed became its own kind of testimony. The embrace offered to a dying man proclaimed something that hatred, fear, and rejection could not erase:

You are not untouchable.

You are not forgotten.

You are not alone.

There is still room for you.

There is another important lesson in the Parable of the Great Banquet. The people who are welcomed are not reluctantly allowed to occupy a few leftover chairs. The master sends his servant looking for them.

“Go out quickly,” he says in verse 21.

Then, when the servant reports that there is still room, the master sends him farther: “Go out to the roads and country lanes.”

The desire of the master is not for an exclusive table occupied only by the right kind of people. His desire is for a full house.

Too often, Christianity has been presented as though God’s table were extremely small. We have constructed fences around it and developed rules determining who is worthy to approach it. Christians have sometimes behaved as though God has entrusted us with a guest list and appointed us to stand at the door checking names.

Jesus gives us a very different picture.

The kingdom of God is a banquet, and God keeps sending the invitation farther outward.

That does not mean that nothing is asked of us. God’s grace calls us toward lives of faith, love, mercy, justice, repentance, and compassion. Jesus never teaches that following him requires nothing from us. But there is an enormous difference between being transformed by God’s love and being told that we must first transform ourselves into someone else’s idea of acceptability before God will love us.

Grace works the other way around.

We come because we have been invited.

We grow because we are loved.

And we learn to love others because we have discovered how extraordinary it is to be welcomed ourselves.

For LGBTQ+ Christians, believing that can sometimes require an act of faith. When enough people have told us that God rejects us, it can become difficult not to hear their voices when we think about God. Human rejection can begin masquerading as divine rejection.

But they are not the same thing.

Jesus tells us about a master who looks at an unfinished banquet and sends his servant farther outward because there are empty places that he wants filled.

Perhaps those of us who know what exclusion feels like are particularly well equipped to understand what that invitation means. We know what it is like to wonder whether there will be a chair for us. We also have examples from our own history of people who refused to leave others outside when the rest of society turned away.

We can follow their example.

We can go toward the person others avoid.

We can sit beside someone who feels alone.

We can offer the hand others are afraid to touch.

We can move over.

We can pull out another chair.

We can welcome the person standing hesitantly at the doorway.

And we can remind someone who has been told otherwise that God’s love is not a scarce resource reserved for a fortunate few.

When someone tells us that people like us do not belong at God’s table, we should remember something important:

It isn’t their table.

The invitation comes from God.

And there is still room.

Pics of the Day

2026-08-08T18:00:00.000-04:00

Moment of Zen: International Cat Day

2026-08-08T06:30:00.000-04:00

Happy International Cat Day! Whether they’re demanding breakfast at dawn, claiming the best spot in the house, or curling up beside us for a peaceful nap, cats have a wonderful way of bringing a little more joy and calm into our lives.

And, of course, no Moment of Zen would be complete without Isabella, quietly watching the world and reminding us to slow down and simply enjoy the moment.

Pic of the Day

2026-08-07T18:00:00.000-04:00

A Slow Start to Friday

2026-08-07T06:15:00.000-04:00

TGIF!

Isabella woke me up this morning, purr her usual. I got up, fed her, and since I’m working from home today, I crawled back into bed and managed to sleep for another hour. That’s always a nice way to start the day.

Now I’m up with my coffee, mostly ready for the day ahead. I have a presentation to work on, but beyond that and answering a few emails, it should be a fairly quiet Friday. Those are the kinds of workdays I don’t mind.

The weekend begins this afternoon. Rain is in the forecast for Saturday and Sunday mornings, but I’m hoping the afternoons will clear up so I can get out for a while. I don’t really have any plans, though sometimes those are the best weekends—just taking things as they come.

I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!

Pic of the Day

2026-08-06T18:00:00.000-04:00

I really need to get back to the gym!

Dreams Interrupted

2026-08-06T06:00:00.000-04:00

It was awfully hard to get out of bed this morning. Not because I was especially tired—though I certainly wasn’t eager to face Thursday—but because I was having a rather… enjoyable dream. Let’s just say it was the sort of dream that makes waking up feel like an interruption rather than the start of a new day.

I wasn’t completely asleep, but I wasn’t fully awake either. You know that wonderful hazy state where your dream is still hanging around, just waiting for you to drift back into it if you don’t move too much. There really ought to be a word for that in-between place. If there is, I’d like to spend more time there.

As you might imagine, one part of me had already decided it was time to greet the morning, even if the rest of me hadn’t. Morning optimism, I suppose.

There was a strong temptation to stay right where I was and let the dream slowly become a daydream. After all, why rush into reality when your subconscious is doing such a fine job of keeping you entertained? I figured I could enjoy a few more minutes under the covers while… appreciating the situation.

Unfortunately, Isabella has absolutely no sympathy for these kinds of personal dilemmas.

When breakfast is five minutes late, she begins poking at me with her paw as if to say, “Excuse me, your priorities are all wrong.” Personally, I’d have much preferred to continue dreaming about being poked by someone a little less furry than my persistent feline companion.

Well… perhaps a bit furry in all the best places.

Eventually, duty won. Isabella got her breakfast, I got out of bed, and the dream faded into that frustrating place where you can remember just enough to know it was good but not enough to request a sequel tonight.

Now all that’s left is coffee, a shower, and wondering whether tonight’s dreams will be kind enough to continue where this morning’s left off. Here’s hoping tonight’s dream gets a sequel—and that my furry alarm clock waits until the closing credits have rolled before deciding breakfast is more important than my subconscious.

Pic of the Day

2026-08-05T18:00:00.000-04:00

National Underwear Day

2026-08-05T06:00:00.000-04:00

Today is National Underwear Day, and after writing last week’s post, First Crushes in Plain Sight, I realized there was another chapter to that story.

For many gay men of my generation, underwear wasn’t just something we wore. It was one of the first ways we noticed the male body, even if we didn’t yet understand why we were looking. Department store catalogs, magazine advertisements, and those cardboard underwear packages all offered perfectly acceptable reasons to admire handsome men. Eventually, though, we grew up, started buying our own underwear, and discovered that what we wore could say something about who we were—or at least who we wanted to be.

When I was a kid in the 1980s, briefs ruled. Hanes, Fruit of the Loom, and Jockey were what almost every boy wore. If you were in elementary school, you probably also had a pair of Underoos featuring your favorite superhero. There was something magical about putting on Superman or Batman before heading off to school.

That changed surprisingly quickly.

By the time I reached high school in the early 1990s, briefs had practically disappeared from the boys’ locker room. Everyone seemed to wear either boxer shorts or the then-new boxer briefs. Wearing briefs wasn’t just considered old-fashioned—it was often dismissed as “gay.” Looking back, it’s ironic considering how popular briefs have become again, especially within the gay community.

As gay culture developed its own fashion trends, underwear became something entirely different. It wasn’t simply about comfort anymore. It became another way to express personality, confidence, and sometimes a sense of humor.

One company that deserves special recognition is Ginch Gonch. Long before novelty underwear became commonplace, Ginch Gonch embraced bright colors, cartoon-inspired graphics, and playful designs that felt like Underoos for grown men. They proved men’s underwear didn’t have to be plain, and they helped pave the way for many of the brands that followed.

No discussion would be complete without Andrew Christian. For nearly three decades, Andrew Christian defined gay underwear marketing. The company’s colorful designs, playful advertising, and signature pouch technology influenced countless competitors. Although Andrew Christian recently retired and closed the brand, its impact on gay fashion is hard to overstate. In many ways, it marks the end of one of the most influential chapters in gay men’s underwear.

Another thing that changed the industry was the use of gay adult film stars as underwear models. I can’t remember whether Andrew Christian or Ginch Gonch embraced the idea first—Topher DiMaggio became one of Andrew Christian’s most recognizable faces, while Benjamin Bradley was synonymous with Ginch Gonch for many years—but once the trend caught on, it spread quickly. Today, it’s common for underwear companies to feature well-known gay models, adult film stars, and social media personalities in their advertising. Coyote Jocks, for example, has featured Oliver Marks in campaigns. It makes sense from a marketing standpoint. These are men who already have devoted followings, and they bring a level of confidence and authenticity that resonates with many gay consumers.

Other companies soon found devoted followings. Brands like 2(X)IST and C-IN2 helped bridge the gap between department store underwear and underwear designed specifically with gay men in mind. Today, companies such as Charlie by Matthew Zink, CellBlock 13, Nasty Pig, PUMP!, Cocksox, 2EROS, Rufskin, Coyote Jocks, Bang, Hung, and Papi each serve their own corner of the market, whether that’s athletic, luxury, fetish, nightlife, or simply fashion-forward basics.

Designer labels have also played an enormous role. Calvin Klein, in particular, transformed men’s underwear advertising into something aspirational. Those iconic campaigns made underwear sexy in a way it had never been before. Emporio Armani, Hugo Boss, and Diesel continued that tradition, making underwear something worth showing off instead of hiding beneath your clothes.

Ironically, the brands many of us grew up wearing have found a second life in certain gay communities. Hanes, Fruit of the Loom, and especially classic Jockey briefs have become favorites within some nostalgia and underwear fetish circles. What was once considered ordinary—or even embarrassingly plain—has become appealing precisely because of its simplicity and familiarity. Sometimes yesterday’s basics become today’s fetish.

Then there are the styles themselves. Today, briefs have enjoyed a remarkable comeback, especially within the gay community. Boxer briefs remain an everyday favorite for many men, while trunks offer a shorter, more modern silhouette. Boxer shorts still have their loyal fans, even if they’re not nearly as common as they once were. Bikini briefs, jockstraps, and thongs each have their own devoted audiences, and today there’s far less concern about whether one style is somehow “more masculine” than another.

Of course, if you’ve spent any time on gay social media, you’ve probably encountered one of the countless “gay underwear spectrum” memes that supposedly explain your preferred position based entirely on what’s in your underwear drawer. I’ve included one of my favorites below.

They’re completely ridiculous.

That’s also what makes them so funny.

I know tops who wear briefs, bottoms who swear by boxer briefs, versatile guys who collect jockstraps, and plenty of men whose favorite underwear is simply whatever happened to be on sale at Costco. Like most stereotypes, the memes are funny because they exaggerate tiny grains of truth into something absurd.

Looking back, it’s amazing how much underwear has changed during my lifetime. What was once a purely practical purchase has become fashion, self-expression, nostalgia, and, for many gay men, a celebration of the male body. It has also become another way for gay men to recognize ourselves in advertising. Where department store catalogs once gave us anonymous models to admire, today’s underwear campaigns often feature men many of us already know—from fitness influencers to adult film stars to social media personalities. That’s a remarkable evolution in just a few decades.

So, in honor of National Underwear Day, pull on your favorite pair of underwear and celebrate the day—whether it’s a classic pair of white briefs, comfortable boxer briefs, colorful trunks, a favorite jockstrap, or anything in between. After all, confidence is always in style.

I can’t resist asking: What’s your favorite style—and has it changed over the years? Do you have a favorite brand? I’d love to hear your answers in the comments.

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Pic of the Day

2026-08-04T18:00:00.000-04:00

The More Loving One

2026-08-04T06:00:00.000-04:00

The More Loving One

By W. H. Auden

Looking up at the stars, I know quite well
That, for all they care, I can go to hell,
But on earth indifference is the least
We have to dread from man or beast.

How should we like it were stars to burn
With a passion for us we could not return?
If equal affection cannot be,
Let the more loving one be me.

Admirer as I think I am
Of stars that do not give a damn,
I cannot, now I see them, say
I missed one terribly all day.

Were all stars to disappear or die,
I should learn to look at an empty sky
And feel its total dark sublime,
Though this might take me a little time.

About the Poem

Most of us have, at one time or another, loved someone more than they loved us. It may have been a crush that was never returned, a relationship that slowly faded, or simply an admiration that remained one-sided. Those experiences can leave us feeling embarrassed or even foolish, as though loving deeply were somehow a weakness.

W. H. Auden offers a different perspective.

He imagines the stars as beautiful, distant, and completely indifferent to us. They neither know nor care that we spend our nights gazing at them. Yet we continue to marvel at their beauty. We do not expect the stars to love us in return. So why should we believe that every human affection must always be perfectly balanced?

The heart of the poem is one of the most beautiful lines Auden ever wrote:

“If equal affection cannot be, / Let the more loving one be me.”

At first glance, it sounds almost heartbreaking. But I don’t think Auden is encouraging us to become doormats or to remain trapped in unhealthy relationships. Instead, he is recognizing that love is never a competition to see who gives exactly fifty percent. Love is a gift freely offered. If we only choose to love when we are guaranteed an equal return, then our love is really a transaction.

As a gay man, I also hear something else in these words. For many LGBTQ+ people, especially those of earlier generations, first loves often existed only in silence. We admired classmates, coworkers, neighbors, or friends who never knew how we felt—or who could never return those feelings. Loving from a distance was, for many of us, a painful but familiar experience.

Yet those loves were not meaningless simply because they were unreturned. They helped shape us. They taught us compassion, patience, and empathy. They prepared us for the day when we would finally find someone capable of loving us back.

The final stanza reminds us that even if the stars disappeared, life would go on. We would grieve their loss, but eventually we would learn to appreciate even an empty sky. Healing does not erase love. It teaches us that our capacity to love survives disappointment.

The greatest risk in life is not loving too much. It is allowing disappointment to convince us never to love again.

“The More Loving One” was first published in W. H. Auden’s 1957 collection Homage to Clio. Like much of Auden’s later poetry, it combines philosophical reflection with conversational language. Rather than writing a traditional romantic poem, Auden uses the stars as an extended metaphor for beauty, admiration, and emotional imbalance.

The poem asks whether love must always be reciprocal to have value. Auden ultimately suggests that it does not. Loving another person—even when that love is not fully returned—is not a failure but an expression of generosity and humanity.

The final stanza shifts from longing to acceptance. The speaker acknowledges that loss would be painful but also believes that the human heart possesses an extraordinary capacity to heal and continue finding beauty in the world.

About the Poet

W. H. Auden (1907–1973) was one of the most influential English-language poets of the twentieth century. Born in England, he later became an American citizen and wrote extensively on love, faith, politics, psychology, and the human condition. His poetry ranges from highly intellectual meditations to deeply personal reflections, often blending formal structure with everyday speech.

Auden was also one of the most prominent openly gay literary figures of his era. Although society often forced LGBTQ+ people into secrecy during much of his lifetime, his experiences informed many of his reflections on love, longing, intimacy, and belonging. His longtime relationship with poet Chester Kallman was complex but enduring, and themes of imperfect love frequently appear throughout his later work.

More than fifty years after his death, Auden’s poetry continues to speak to readers because it embraces life’s ambiguities. Rather than offering easy answers, he reminds us that love is worthwhile not because it is always returned, but because it reveals the very best of what it means to be human.

Pic of the Day

2026-08-03T18:00:00.000-04:00

Monday Morning Daydreams

2026-08-03T06:00:00.000-04:00

Monday mornings always seem to arrive a little too quickly. I wish I could wake up on a Monday actually looking forward to the week ahead. Instead, here I am with my usual routine—watching the news, drinking a cup of coffee, and mentally preparing myself for another work week.

One of my coworkers is on vacation this week, and another won’t be back in the office until Wednesday. That means I’ll have the museum to myself today. I usually enjoy the quiet, but first I have to find the motivation to get ready and head out the door. Eventually, the coffee will do its job, and a hot shower will wake me up the rest of the way.

If I could choose where to wake up this morning, though, it definitely wouldn’t be here. I’d much rather be in Montreal. I’d love to spend a week north of the border, with enough time to take a day trip—or maybe even spend a night—in Quebec City. I’ve visited Montreal in the spring and in the fall, but I don’t think I’ve ever been there during the summer. I imagine the cafés bustling, the parks full of people, and long evenings strolling through Old Montreal or the Village, people-watching and admiring all the handsome men passing by before settling in for a leisurely dinner on a patio.

Maybe someday. Until then, it’s a pleasant little daydream to help get me through the Monday blahs. I hope everyone has a wonderful week!

Pic of the Day

2026-08-02T18:00:00.000-04:00

Faith Is the Victory

2026-08-02T06:00:00.000-04:00

“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”

— Hebrews 11:1

There have been seasons in my life when finding a church home has been difficult.

Part of that comes from my background. I was raised in the Churches of Christ, and there is still something deeply moving to me about hearing a congregation lift their voices together without instruments. There is something beautiful about hearing nothing but human voices singing praise to God. Paul’s words have always resonated with me: “singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves, singing and making melody to the Lord in your hearts” (Ephesians 5:19).

At the same time, being an LGBTQ+ Christian can make finding a church complicated. Some of us have been told outright that we don’t belong. Others have quietly walked away after years of hearing that our very existence is incompatible with following Christ. Thankfully, many affirming churches now welcome LGBTQ+ believers with open arms, but not everyone has one nearby.

For me, there is another obstacle as well: anxiety.

I’ve never liked walking into church alone. Even when I know I would likely be welcomed, anxiety whispers that I don’t belong or that everyone is watching me. It’s much the same reason I sometimes struggle to go to the gym without a trainer. Once I’m there, I’m usually fine. It’s getting through the door that’s difficult.

For a long time, I wondered whether these struggles somehow made me less faithful.

Then I realized something important.

My relationship with God has never depended on whether I could walk through the doors of a church building.

Faith is what joins us to God.

The writer of Hebrews tells us that faith is “the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” Faith is not confined to a sanctuary. It is not dependent on someone else’s approval. It is the confidence that God is present even when circumstances make us feel isolated.

Jesus said, “Whoever comes to me I will never drive away” (John 6:37). The invitation is His, not ours to earn and not anyone else’s to revoke.

That doesn’t mean church isn’t important. Scripture encourages believers “not neglecting to meet together” but to encourage one another (Hebrews 10:24–25). Christian community strengthens us, teaches us, and reminds us that we do not walk this journey alone.

Yet there are seasons when gathering with other believers simply isn’t possible. Sometimes there isn’t an affirming congregation nearby. Sometimes illness, caregiving responsibilities, anxiety, or painful experiences make walking through those doors feel impossible.

Even then, God has not moved away.

Paul reminds us, “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come… nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38–39).

Not rejection.

Not anxiety.

Not distance.

Not the opinions of others.

Nothing.

Those words always remind me of the old hymn Faith Is the Victory:

Against the foe in vales below
Let all our strength be hurled;
Faith is the victory, we know,
That overcomes the world.

The victory isn’t that every obstacle disappears. The victory is that none of those obstacles can separate us from Christ. They may keep us from a building for a time, but they cannot keep us from the God who loves us.

Faith remains the bridge.

Faith remains the assurance.

Faith remains the victory.

If you are unable to worship with a church this week—whether because of geography, anxiety, past wounds, illness, or any other reason—remember that God’s presence is not limited to a sanctuary. Read Scripture. Spend a few quiet moments with Him. Listen for His voice in the stillness. And if you are searching for a church home, don’t give up hope. Trust that God will guide you in His time.

Until then, hold fast to the assurance that no one can stand between you and the love of Christ. As Hebrews reminds us, faith is “the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” Sometimes that assurance is exactly what carries us through until we find our way home.

Pic of the Day

2026-08-01T18:00:00.000-04:00