By Uncle Abdul

So many parties are available to the community these days that you're almost forced to use a Palm Pilot to keep track of them. Janus just holds about 3 or 4 per year, but there are several other organizations that do theirs almost monthly. How could we ever have done with anything less? Well, gentle reader (and of course the cruel, sadistic ones too), there was once a time when we did have to do with much less.

When I started in Janus, the club didn't have any parties. I joined at the tail end of what I call the "100 friend" phase of Janus, i.e., the Janus membership was pretty stable at about 100 people who knew each other pretty well. The constituency was primarily gay men, but there was a smattering of hets and lesbians thrown in. Janus was seen as the educational club that was also sociable rather than a social club that does education. Pre-program time had the aura of a cocktail party, except there was no alcohol served.

The social events available to members of Janus then were the many and varied Gay Bath Houses, Bars, Fisting Clubs such as the Catacombs, and various private venues. And in those days the hets and lesbians joined into the Gay party scene to a large extent. Janus almost didn't need parties then.

Working almost antithetically to the old maxim, "...if it ain't broke, don't fix it...", someone suggested at a business meeting that Janus should hold a party. Apparently one had been allegedly unsuccessfully tried before in the dim prehistory of the club, but this reincarnation got approved. Don Miesen suggested that there should actually be two separate parties on the same day--one for the tops and one for the bottoms. This too passed.

Well, comes the day of the party. Me being a top, I went to ... of course... the Tops' Party (daahh). It was at Don's old place, down in his basement where the orientations were usually held.

Talk about a dull party, this was it! Half-hearted attempts were made to maintain conversation. There were actual pauses when the only things to be heard in that room were the chugging of the beers and the munching of the cheese and crackers. Don was expounding eloquently in hopes of livening things up, but it was like the Six-Million Dollar Man in need of a lube job. Finally he suggested that, "...Hey! We shouldn't be the only ones having fun. Let's crash the Bottoms' Party." In silent relief the sound of murmured consent was heard throughout the room. We piled into our cars and made our way to the other party.

Low and behold, what sight greeted us dom-ie Doms when we entered the Bottoms' Party? Was it the same vacuous conversation lulls suffered by us? Hell no!

The bottoms were having a gay old time. There was music. There was dancing. There was someone tied to a rope hanging from the ceiling. They were having a wonderful time. How dare they!

Moving in to "...save the day..." (and thereby violating the aforementioned maxim again) the Doms moved in and began to mingle. That only lasted for about a half-hour. It seemed some sort of karma followed us--like the cloud over Joe *$%@#^%, the doleful guy in the Lil'Abner comics. (It really wasn't us, however. Naaaaa!)

Well, the hour was getting late, and everyone seemed to have better things to do--like cleaning the lint traps in our dryers. (But I digress.)

It wasn't for another couple of years the Janus finally tried a party again. This time it was done in the manner familiar to and well loved by all. The rest ...as they say... is history. But I still look back with some fondness to that first Janus party I attended--probably more out of nostalgia than a sense of "...that's the way things should be done..."

Chao-4-Now

Unc'