Make a beautiful mess and clean it up later.

The sort of public sex aspects of gay male sexuality did not appeal to me. And it wasn't just a matter of being afraid of them or being too nervous to try them. I did try them and they didn't work for me, they didn't feed me spiritually, they didn't leave me gratified.

I think what has been the ultimate challenge for me is being willing to be honest with myself about what works for me in terms of relationships and sexual relations. In that sense, I was pretty traditional and pretty buttoned down.

Honestly, in retrospect, I would wish for future generations to have the ability to have a coming out process that was less alcohol-soaked than mine was.

My experience of coming out was very much centered around the bar scene. And what happened for me is that when I turned 18 and was old enough to get into certain gay bars in the French Quarter, I became a regular customer.

I had seen the gay social chronicle done abundantly and done very well. And I didn't want to do any more of that myself, I wanted us to be included in the popular mainstream of entertainment fiction.

What's become more important to me over time is to not try to sell myself as someone that I'm not, and that begins with coming out of the closet and gradually it's a challenge to expand that into other areas of my life.