My Name Is…

What the hell were my parents thinking when deciding to name me? Were they drunk? Was it a joke? Or perhaps they were pissed off because my appearance on the scene upset their enjoyable time as a couple without any children up to that point. Or maybe with our double entendre surname, my parents thought it better to expose the bare facts of a humorous last name by bestowing an

equally hilarious one for my first name. To my younger brothers and sisters, they were kinder. There was no funny stuff bequeathing knee-slapping first names. Unlike me, my seven siblings were not the butt of jokes at school due to their first and last names.

My name is Harry Bottom. And despite the name, I am a proud gay man.

To add insult to injury, I am not a ‘bottom’ but a ‘top.’ I know you’re smirking as you read my ‘great reveal’ and that you think I am lying. My surname is Bottom, but I am a top, honest! Okay, okay. Maybe not always. Years ago, when I was in university and lived with my girlfriend (I mean before I admitted to myself and the world that I was gay), she used to like being on top.

It was fine with me, too, because it was more relaxing. I barely broke a sweat. But I digress.

My girlfriend and I were from two different worlds anyway. I was a farm boy, and she was from a white-collar family; they were city people. Well, if you could call Woodstock a city back then— I certainly did—it had a population of over 25,000 people at the time. Our family farm was on a dirt side road in southwestern Ontario, not far from a hamlet curiously named Plenty, population – 69. My girlfriend took me home for the first time on a weekend away from university to meet her parents and siblings. They had a formal home and seemed so worldly. I mean, her parents smoked filter cigarettes; they did not roll their own, unlike my parents. Their family home had a dining room, a fireplace, and two bathrooms! Out on the farm, we were still sometimes forced to use the smelly, spider-infested outhouse when one of the family members took an inordinate amount of time in the bathroom due to a particularly contentious crap.

My girlfriend and I were studying at Ryerson University in Toronto. Due to political correctness, the university’s name would be changed years later. My girlfriend and I met when I was in my first year of university and she was in her second. Mutual friends were having a fondue party after a protest about the Vietnam War, or maybe it had been a demonstration supporting free love; anyway, they invited the two of us, and of course, they were matchmaking. They thought she and I would hit it off, and we did. From the start, those friends often called us Sonny and Cher – as a nod to that singing sensation duo – and we appeared at a party dressed as that cool couple on our first Halloween together. Are you smirking again? Yes, I was shorter than my girlfriend! A lot shorter. But I wore elevator shoes that evened things up. When I wore them and was dancing at a disco club with my girlfriend, my eyes were just about level with her boobs. I mean, what more can a guy ask for? Who would want to be tall under those bossomy circumstances, for crying out loud?

By our second year together, we lived in an apartment on the top floor of an old brick house on Gloucester Street, near the corner of Church. It was in the ‘gay village’ and an exciting place at all hours of the day and night. The disco clubs were packed every night of the week, and the baths were booming. Sometimes, after going to a club with my girlfriend, she decided to go home and leave me alone. That is how I ended up at the baths one night after being alone at a disco. But for the record, I started going to the baths because I have dehydrated skin, and the moisture was good for it. Jeez, Louise, are you smirking again? Not everyone went to the baths for sex! I think it was my third time at the baths that the penny dropped, and I became aware there were only gay men there. I thought it was like a hamam. On that particular occasion, when at the baths, I was sitting on a high stool at the bar in the lounge, nursing a vodka martini. A big bear of a guy sat down beside me, clad in a towel. Between noisy slurps of his beer, the guy started to chat me up. I replied in monosyllables. I was not interested. Finally, he asked, “Are you looking for a hard top?” I pulled my towel tighter around me and responded: “For your information, I am a top.” With as much macho-ness as I could muster, I pushed back from the bar and climbed off the barstool with a drop to the ground. As I turned to walk away, the hairy guy called after me, with a guffaw, “Can I push in your stool?” The nerve!

Eventually, my girlfriend and I did not often go out to bars and restaurants together. Over time, my girlfriend and I grew apart. We started to sleep in separate rooms. Our relationship ended, not with a bang (no pun intended) but with a proverbial whimper. My girlfriend wanted to explore life as a single woman with a new career. Being a year older than me, she graduated from university first. I’m no dummy; I mean, most of the time, I’m not. I smelled a rat. I knew it was because of my last name. And because of her first name. I don’t blame Belle for not wanting to marry me. If she had, her name would have been Belle Bottom. This was in the 70s when everyone was wearing bell-bottom jeans. That mod couple, Sonny and Cher, popularized them.

Belle and I had matching flower-power bell bottoms that we always wore. We were hip! We were cool! We were a young, with-it white couple on our black brothers’ and sisters’ Soul Train! Sadly, regarding our relationship, the train had departed the station.

We still lived together, but we were like roommates. Belle graduated from university with a top- up degree in Innovative Accounting, and the very next day, at a job fair, she landed a great job with a company. She had to relocate from Toronto to Chicago. Belle, the bleeding-heart liberal, eventually married an up-and-coming Republican, who is now a mover and a shaker in the Senate. I left university, worked a few years, and then finally returned to complete my Nursing degree. A few years ago, I decided to retire – at least from my nursing job. I decided to leave Toronto and return to my roots in the country. With my life savings, I bought the local watering hole in Plenty, The Barn Boot, and after renovating it, I rechristened it Harry Bottom’s Bar. It has been quite successful with customers: the younger set, seniors, and those in between. People come from as far away as Stratford and London.

After being single for most of my adult life when living in Toronto, I ended up in a relationship when I moved back to Plenty. Bruce Flowers and I were in high school together in Cornersville, a short drive from Plenty. Little did I know that he was hot for me even way back then. He had heard from classmates that I was hung like the proverbial horse, which I can modestly admit is true. The proof was in the pudding when we ended up in the same PE class: Bruce saw the big guy when we were showering after running around the track for 40 laps. Little did Bruce know then that he would be the proud recipient of my crowning glory decades later!

Bruce is a florist, which comes in handy when a friend has a birthday or, worse yet, departs Dodge for greener pastures. Years ago, I thought of changing my last name to something better, something more butch. I toyed with a few possible new surnames: something militaristic – Naval; something historical – Gandhi; something literary – Shakespeare; something musical – Hendrix; or even something Hollywood – Spielberg!

I eventually decided against changing my last name. Although my surname has remained Bottom, I am still a top. Bruce likes to rib me about my name, and anything else he thinks will ruffle my feathers, especially during our daily martini hours. “But you shave your ass!” he likes to exclaim, slurping on his martini. “What self-respecting top shaves his flipping ass?”

My answer to Bruce is always the same: “Shaving my ass does not mean I am a bottom!” Then, pausing for effect and continuing, “I would swear on a stack of bottoms! Er, bibles, I mean.”

Another martini, please, Bruce!