Coming Out at Folsom

As a Leatherboy, I saw Folsom as a pig's paradise. A few of the bars that dotted the street were scenes of impromptu, after hours dungeon parties. Other darkened bars offered even darker areas where one could enjoy endless pleasures between beers. Going to Folsom was a return to my Tribe.

Folsom was also the weekend when I first came out as a Leatherman to my best friend, a straight man with a wife and two children. He was attending Berkeley working on his doctorate. "Meet me at Hamburger Mary's," I told him over the phone. "I'm dying to see you!"

"I don't go anywhere near that area, especially on weekends. Do you know what kind of men hang out on Folsom Street?" he asked. "Especially THIS weekend?"

"Yes I do," I answered. "I am one of those men. I am a Leatherman. Those men are my people." I remember how foreign the words seemed. The first time that I had actually said those words to someone outside of the Tribe. And how proud I felt at the same time.

Many years later, I would come out a second time at Folsom, admitting publicly a boot fetish that I had long harbored in private. Boots were so charged for me as fetish that I could not sit in a bootblack's chair without getting rock hard. To feel a bootblack's hands rub my feet through the leather of my boots was like feeling someone stroke the shaft of my cock. While some play partners knew about my fetish, I was reluctant to sit with my legs spread wide in public, demonstrating my lack of will power when someone worked on my boots. Like that deep urge to cum after edging for hours, I could not sit still in a bootblack's chair.

I finally conceded to sit for David Shorey, bootblack extraordinaire. David has that wonderful combination of sexual energy, physical presence, intelligence, and good manners that I find attractive in a Leatherman. As I sat for him in my tailored leather slacks and Corcorans, I felt him caress my arches with his hands, working in the polish. I watched as he knelt and spit shined the toes of my boots and then continued licking them with his eager tongue. I felt light-headed, as if I was reacting to a constriction of oxygen. I sat there and thought about how many layers of cum had just been covered by polish and spit. I was fucking turned on and knew that I was lost, with cameras clicking around me and tourists gaping. I didn't give a shit who gawked and stared. I was a Bootman and my boots connected me to another man. Fetish, the bond between us.

Tomorrow I leave for Folsom once again. So much has changed over the years. While the romanticized Folsom remains forever in my heart, I still feel excited each time I return to San Francisco the last weekend in September. I especially feel excited because I sit in David's chair once again. I hope he's ready!

Happy Folsom!