I think people get this idea that just because you are homosexual that you live some wild lifestyle. I get up every morning like every body else, go to work and come home. I eat my dinner, watch my soap operas, visit with my friends, and go to bed. I don't know what people expect.

My parents taught my sisters, "You just don't jump into bed with a boy because you're feeling frisky or that's what he wants you to do. I'm not saying you have to wait until you're married, but you wait until you know the time is right, and you take responsibility for it." Even though I was a boy, I listened to my parents. I fooled around with guys, but I was 24 when I had sex for the first time with my first lover. To me it was a big deal.

I never asked to be gay, and if I could live a straight lifestyle, I would do it. If I had my choice, I'd have a wife and kids right now. I've tried. It just wasn't for me; but it was difficult growing up gay.

I was very young when I became aware that I was gay. I know it seems strange to a lot of people when I say this, but I was only five or six years old. Even that young, I knew the attraction--not sexual attraction--but I liked the looks of the boys more than I liked the looks of the girls.

My first job, I started out as a dishwasher in a restaurant Downeast, but a man had never washed dishes before. That was a woman's job.