[sebbie]

 
A Fondness for Speedos Part V

I was 21 years old, and leaving from my native state in the Midwest to do my PhD at Purdue—some 1,200 miles away. I was still going to be living in a college dorm, but this one was made for graduate students, and all the rooms were single. I saw this as an opportunity not a problem. I could get to do the things I always wanted to do while studying for my doctorate, And there were lots of things by then that I really enjoyed doing, but in private.

The Purdue campus is separated from the main retail spaces in town but there are a couple streets just off the campus that were there to cater to the needs of the students. Lots of fast food places--back then a Burger Chef and a place that predates Arby's but also featured roast beef sandwiches, So I would often take a short walk only a block or two from the grad house to pick up a cheap burger or maybe splurge on a roast beef sandwich as well.

In addition to the food places, there were a few stores that catered to the clothing needs of college students—shirts, jeans etc. Periodically these places would have street sales as a way to reduce the inventory of stuff that hadn’t sold. And, guess what? In the fall they would invariably have some heavily discounted swimwear as well, including swim briefs. What an opportunity for a guy who had wanted to own a Speedo for so long, but never quite dared doing anything about it for fear of being discovered and with that a long line of uncomfortable questions.

And there it was. A heavily marked down genuine Speedo in a patriotic pattern in an early Lycra/Nylon blend. I pulled that off the rack and made my purchase. My life as a graduate student was not going to be that dull and boring after all. On another trip I found a swim brief made by Janzen at a heavily discounted price and I bought that too. Now I didn’t really intend to go swimming, but I was merely looking to make my time in the dorm room more interesting. I was spending a lot of time studying, but every guy also needs some “recreation” if I could call it that.

Sadly, though the room was single the bathroom was across the hall. You know, ten each of toilets, showers and sinks all in a row. The problem was that I needed a private space to rinse out a cum-stained swim brief.

But, it was not long before I solved that problem too. I discovered there were a few rooms with private baths that rented for only a bit more than the private rooms with the bath across the hall. So I rented one of those and changed rooms.

I worked hard but had great fun in graduate school as well in a host of different ways. Purdue is a great place to study and learn. I learned a lot as well about a bunch of different subjects some not at all related to what I was studying for being able to do as an academic. You might be able to guess what some of the subjects are. Following this was a 40-year career as an academic. But I also developed a side hobby writing on male sexuality which is completely different from what I did as an academic during my career.

Retired now, I still enjoy doing a lot of the same stuff I always did while also having the free time to devote to my hobby writing. Every day is an adventure for me.

The Speedo I bought that day collapsed into almost nothing decades ago. Cum stains are tough on Lycra. But the Janzen brief I bought at about the same time is still with me, though its condition is not that great as you might imagine after all these years. Still, I have not had the heart to just toss it, given all the excellent memories of a time long gone by.