In the lead up to my wedding, I'd started to realise there was a certain adolescence I was letting go of. What I didn't quite comprehended, until I thought that older gentleman's comment through, was that such an adolescence isn't something a lot of gay men want to let of go of.
Nor do they have to. Our culture permits - even encourages - an eternal Peter Pan syndrome whereby we can choose to remain young and free at heart. And we do the best we can to keep our physicality in such a state too.
I'm not the first to call this the "gaydolescence", but this isn't a common term. I can't speak for the rest of the LGBT spectrum, but for gay men, we're allowed a much longer lease on youth than our straight counterparts.
Until marriage equality came around, gay men were relieved of the pressures of having to couple up, move to a nice suburban neighbourhood, and spawn children to carry on the cycle.
For the most part, the gaydolescence comes from being denied a legitimate adolescence in our teenage years. Even gay teens who grow up in the most liberal of environments have a good few years of finding out who they are. For those that aren't so lucky, the years 13 through to 18, and often beyond, are riddled with confusion and isolation (past the appreciation of most heterosexual coming-of-age experiences).
The consequence of this is often young gay men don't partake - and actively distance themselves - from the adolescent experiences of teenage love, sex, even good friendships. Both implicitly via societal norms and explicitly by schoolyard bullies, gay teenagers are more likely to miss out almost entirely on the education of adolescence. They're perennially relegated to the sidelines as observers, shallow stereotypes, and outcasts.
While usually there are others to blame for this (like the aforementioned bullies), gay men only realise in later years that the onus was on them to have a proper adolescence, and we built up protective barriers of our own which prevented it. The fall out effect of this becomes apparent when we accept who we are, at 18, 22, or sometimes 30 or older, and then we become 16 year old boys all over again.
Sex drives ramp up. We join a party culture that doesn't stop for anything. We date around and finally get the sexual education we missed out on (and then some).
It's obvious that gaydolescence extends to some gay mens' physical appearance, too. Buffed up from the gym like the athletes we wanted to be in high school, we're finally able to enjoy the prime years of ultimate fitness and boysie banter we were once denied. We try to stop time in other ways as well; notably in our skincare and hair regimes, and our wardrobe choices. Only on gay men is it still acceptable to wear hi-tops and tank tops at 38.
For some guys, the gaydolescence never really ends. Others might drag it out until their mid-40s when they realise a the benefits of a prolonged adolescence are no longer outweighed by the effort it takes. But for the gay men coupling up and getting married early-ish in life (myself included) our gaydolescence isn't even going to last into our 30s.
My enduring gaydolescence may be over. But that's not to say I'm going to get fat. I'm not throwing out my tank tops, nor do I plan to stop having fun. I'm married, not dead, and there are some things I have now - things I never had as a teenager - that I'll never give up.
