We Only Get One Shot at a First Kiss.

A bouncer herded us out the back door and down an alley. The bar was closing for the night.I couldn't believe it. 50 years old and I'd stayed awake long enough to close down the bar. Someone must have been spiking my Bailey's Irish Cream with Ensure.As we passed the obligatory trash bins, feral cats and grumbling homeless people, my friend stopped to light a cigarette."Do you know what all this reminds me of?" he asked.I know I should have kept my mouth shut, but I couldn't resist:"Your first time?" I retorted.The old timers around us laughed hysterically, but the 20-somethings? OMG: they'd thrown so much glare my way, I'd thought I'd suddenly stumbled into a mirror ball factory."Sad, sad, sad." one guy repeated to himself."What a pathetic way to live," opined another.How I'd wished that these youngsters had cut me a little slack. They obviously didn't get the point behind my gallows response: back in our day, it was extremely difficult to meet people, and even harder to find any privacy.I grew up in a rural town in the late 70's. I had no idea who was gay and who wasn't. The odds of meeting a random partner on the street were astronomical. You had to meet the right guy at the right time, at the right place, under the right circumstances and drop the right hints. (Yes, there was a pre-internet version of Craigslist available, but it involved deciphering enigmatic messages scratched into truck stop walls.)If I were lucky enough to meet someone, the next task was to figure out where to go for privacy. Venues back then were often chosen by necessity, and not by choice, so "date night" for me inevitably involved the back seats of cars, lonely country roads, cornfields, barns, and--in one instance--a very amused Highway Patrol Officer.I know, I know; your modern-day trysts don't always end on a high note either, but at least y'all get a 15 min warning before the battery in your webcam goes dead. Back in my day, cops didn't afford us such a courtesy: they liked to wait until the last minute before flipping on the klieg lights."Why not just go to a gay bar," you ask?I had no idea where the gay bars were. You couldn't just Google their location back then. I searched the highways and byways for years but with no luck.Then came the breakthough: during my Sophomore year in college, the local TV news reported that a shooting had taken place at a certain downtown drinking establishment. While my dorm mates mocked and lampooned the drag queens who were being interviewed, I quietly jotted down the bar's address.Five years after my 18th birthday, I'd finally stepped into my first gay bar.I'm so happy for the latest gay generation. Can't find the bar? Ask your smartphone for directions. Print up a Google Map. Call a married Republican Senator. Seriously: I could have used one of those services when I was 18, let me tell you!All I ask of you is this: cut our generation a little slack, especially when you overhear us laughing about the old days and ways. We were young too once, and we did the best we could given the often less than ideal circumstances.