On Daddy

I first saw Markus years ago on the train from London. I was on my way to a week-long mens Tantra retreat. Markus was impossible to miss. A thirty year old Nordic god. Blond hair, light blue eyes. His body layered with slabs of muscle. As powerfully as he was built, he had the face of an angel, sweet and seemingly innocent. So obviously and impossibly handsome I actually looked past him at first.

When he got on the shuttle to the retreat center, my eyes continually wandered over the outlines of his jaw and across the broad spread of his shoulders. He was like the sun, too bright to look at directly. When he caught me, his eyes hooked into me. I half smiled. He turned fully to face me, his smile breaking open his face like the sun parting clouds.

I assumed he lived in an alternate reality. One that held him beyond my earthly reach. Within a few hours, I learned that I was wrong. Markus and I had a destiny together. We were to orbit one another for many years. He was to be my first boy and I was to become the Daddy that he needed.

There were 25 gay men together for the week in this quaint retreat center west of London. We passed Stonehenge on our way and the smell of farm animals hung in the air as we stepped off the bus. Looking around the opening circle I could feel myself being drawn toward some men more than others. And there in the middle was Markus, standing like a unicorn among stallions. He was so angelic, it was hard to believe he was real.

On that first day, I observed him. Markus was very open and engaging with all the men. When he spoke, he was controlled and intelligent. I innocently walked up to him to introduce myself and in an instant he was in my arms, his thick tongue in my mouth.

It felt like being hit with a really wonderful hammer. It also seemed that our connection went very deep very quickly. We stood and kissed in that spot for an impossibly long time. I remember the sun fully setting as our kiss carried us into the evening hours.

Later on, we sat down to dinner and he called me Daddy for the first time. Oh, I thought. Is that what this is about?

“Do you want me to be your Daddy,” I asked.

“Yes, Daddy. Please, Daddy.”

“Why do you need a Daddy?” I asked. The edges of my lips lifting into a curious smile.

“My father was very busy. I always had crushes on my friends fathers. It makes me very excited to have a Daddy.” His deep voice rumbled out through his clipped Scandinavian accent.

“Ok, I’ll be your Daddy,” I said without really considering exactly what I was agreeing to.

I laughed with the fun game I thought we were playing. Feeling my excitement that this beautiful man wanted to engage with me in this way. And in that instant, my journey as Markus’s Daddy began. It didn’t take long for me to realize that for Markus this was not a game. He wanted to be my boy in a way that reached to something deeper.

“I am your boy, Daddy.”

In the gay community, being called Daddy is mostly a joke. One that has a variety of meanings. Most obviously, being a Daddy conjures up an overly scripted pornographic movie where a top dad and a bottom boy get it on.

Being called Daddy is also sometimes a request for generosity. Daddy is expected to pay for drinks and sun-filled vacations while the boy pays with access to his smooth, young body.

But for many aging gay men, being called Daddy is unwelcome. Daddy can feel like being told that you are old and less attractive. The inference being that a Daddy is a man on the way out.

But since I met Markus, I have had to reclaim Daddy if only for myself. Like a once vital part of a city that has fallen into neglect, Daddy was in serious need of his Renaissance. I now believe that Daddy jokes are the unconscious desires for a rite of passage that has gone missing. One that calls out from the bodies, minds and spirits of every emerging generation. Daddy is an ancient call for sexual mentorship from a culture that has lost that tradition.

When I was a young man, I know that I myself wanted a Daddy. I only wanted to have sex with older men. I was attracted to their thick beards and hairy chests but more than that, I wanted these men to teach me. They knew things about my body that I did not. I could feel that knowledge in the way they moved and the relaxed confidence that they carried. I longed to be let into that adult sex club and I knew that my education was lacking.

As I pursued these older men, I tried to piece together the education that I needed from those interactions but often what I encountered were men who didn’t know how to help me. They themselves were more like older boys. I didn’t know that I needed something more.

Historically, ancient cultures understood the importance of this rite of passage. The Greeks most famously embodied the role of an elder taking a younger male student under his wing. But this societal initiation has existed within many other cultures throughout history.

Looked at with modern eyes, the idea of a sexual mentor is highly suspect. For younger men coming into their sexual adulthood in their teens, a relationship with an older man is seen solely as abuse. It has been outlawed, removed from modern life. As the generations pass without this cultural sharing, we have lost our ability to mentor because we have not been mentored ourselves.

Before Markus, I’d been called Daddy a couple of times over the years. At first, I also performed the role like a porn daddy and it certainly can have that aspect to it. But once I stepped into that space with Markus, I felt the responsibility immediately. Being Daddy is to have love and power entrusted to you. And if you don’t know how to navigate power, it can easily feel like a burden or be ripe for abuse.

I was lucky with the first man I had sex. Kent was a beautiful, masculine man with thick, dark curly hair, a full brush of a mustache, hairy chest. I didn’t call him Daddy but he took on the role of sexual mentor for me.

The first time I visited him at his place, we sat on his couch in the afternoon sun. He was 40. I was 18. I was extremely nervous. Really horny. Thankfully, Kent took control of the moment by asking me some key questions.

Do you want to have sex with me? Is this the first time you’ve had sex with a man? What have you done with your childhood friends? Have you had oral sex? Do you want to have oral sex? Have you explored your butt? Do you know about STDs? Are you looking for a boyfriend?

My answers to most of these questions were simple yes, no or I don’t know. I remember being somewhat slapped awake by the directness of his approach. I felt a little embarrassed, partly because I didn’t have more elaborate answers but also because Kent's questions brought me a step closer to the reality of the sex I was about to have.

Although Daddy/son relationships can express themselves in an infinite number of ways, Markus and I fell into our dom/sub, top/bottom roles quickly and naturally. I was a little self-conscious to be called Daddy so publicly so often. Being with a group of strangers made it somehow easier to take on this experiment. I would not have chosen to be Daddy on my own but it seemed that being Daddy was the lesson for this week.

Every time Markus called me Daddy, whether we were having dinner or having sex, it pushed something inside me. It asked me to be in a more evolved part of myself. To be a conscious, loving Daddy is not always easy. It is to hold many points of view simultaneously. It is to be a flawed human and yet maintain an erotic relationship with an imbalanced power structure, while at the same time remaining vulnerable within it.

Daddy and his boy are continually reinforcing the power imbalance. The separation of powers is the erotic playing field. Boy has surrendered his power to Daddy and Daddy’s pleasure is the boy’s command. Using these names frequently is to cast and recast the spell.

More than anything, a boy wants to please his Daddy. To be not just near, but naked, vulnerable and intimate. To inspire and deliver Daddy’s pleasure. To witness his Daddy as he surrenders to his erotic vulnerability and ecstasy. To be let into that innermost secret chamber, his Daddy’s orgasm.

The last night with Markus, we dove into the sex play we both knew was coming.

“Thank you for being my Daddy. Thank you for giving me your beautiful cock.”

“Where is my cock right now, boy?’ I ask.

“It’s deep inside my hole, Daddy. Inside your hole, Daddy.”

Markus’s eyes roll back and I feel his energy surge.

I roll him onto his back. He is solid muscle and moving him is not easy, especially when he tries to help. “Let go boy. Give over to me.” Markus relaxes and I roll on top of his glorious body. “Are you feeling good, boy?”

“I feel amazing. Thank you, Daddy.”

“Daddy is going to take his pleasure from you now. Just let me take you and ride inside you a little bit. Is that what you want boy?”

“Yes, Daddy, please. That is what I want. Take your pleasure from my body, Daddy.”

For the next minute or two, I stop care taking Markus as intently. I know he feels good and he is ready to go deeper. I go inside my own body to connect to my pleasure sensations and turn up the volume. I ride my boy, filling him again and again with my cock. I adjust my stroke for my maximum pleasure and as the heat and energy begins to rise, I trust that my boy can now hold me as I expand into my own vulnerability.

As I get close, Markus is also verging on his orgasm. My heart is pounding and before the moment gets out of control I say “Not yet, boy.” Markus lets go of his cock and breathes deeply. Again, his eyes roll back in his head as he lets out the sound of a wave of ecstasy. It breaks through his muscular torso.

Deep down, I knew as a boy just as Markus is experiencing now that the gift of surrendering to a Daddy would be ecstasy! To feel an overwhelming peak of pleasure while at the same time feeling loved and seen. When the erotic fire is fully lit between a boy and his Daddy, the sex delivers a glimpse of the nirvana that intuitively every boy knows is there. It is his birth rite. It lives within his body. It may not take a Daddy or a mentor to show him the way but once this physical, emotional, erotic peak is felt, it belongs to a boy forever.

I remember another mentor. Although I didn’t call him Daddy, it wasn’t until I was near 30 when a very kind man gently opened me up to the pleasures of anal sex. Until that time, I was scared of the discomfort and disease. That patient tutorial healed and returned that important part of my sexuality to me.

Turning Markus on his side, I place one hand on the back of his leg and the other on the base of his neck, I rock his entire body back and forth on my cock. With each stroke, I fine tune the thrust for my maximum pleasure.

“Feeling safe, feeling good? I don’t want to hurt you, boy.”

Markus is somewhat overwhelmed with pleasure.

“Oh my God, thank you, Daddy! I feel safe. I feel incredible.” Each word comes out a gasp. He can barely breathe.

He is on his edge and I know that I cannot hold him here much longer.

When men call me Daddy now, what I hear is a shy request to visit this place of vulnerability and freedom.

Hey Daddy, will you transform me with your wisdom of ecstasy? I need to be vulnerable. I need to trust and be held safely in order to transform. Will you do that for me, Daddy.

“Look at me, boy.” I say. Markus rolls onto his back and I tell him to kneel on the floor.

“I love you, Daddy,” Markus is looking up at me. His chest is heaving, his blue eyes piercing my own. I’ve told him to kneel so I can simply look at him for a moment. He is a man at the height of his youthful beauty and the sight of him makes me catch at my breath. His rock hard cock is pointing up at me from between his powerful thighs. As this is the first time he says these words to me, it feels like an important moment to pause.

“Do you really believe that you love me or do you love the missing Daddy piece in you that I’m touching?” I ask. He takes a moment to consider and I smile because I know it’s his own healing that he loves. As people, we are strangers to each other. But it is also true that I am loving Markus. Not as a partner or father stand-in but as a lover offering a special gift. A singular flawed model of what it means to be a man, to be loving, to be present, to allow my boy to suspend his adult responsibilities for a moment in order to bring him into the power of surrender as only another adult man can.

“Come here. boy” I say and I pull him back onto the bed and back on top of me. “I want you to put my cock back inside you. When you do, I want you to say thank you, Daddy. I love you Daddy. I hope you can feel my love for you, boy. I am here for you. You are so beautiful. You are giving me so much pleasure.”

As he rises above me, I look him deep in his eyes. I ask him quietly, “Do you love your Daddy?”

“Yes, Daddy.” As he takes me inside, his deep voice rumbles out me. “Thank you, Daddy. I love you, Daddy.”

As Markus rides me, he works his cock because he knows what is coming. He can barely breathe, barely speak as I ask each rapid fire question. The answer to each question takes Markus into an ecstasy. One that exists only in the expanding place he was reaching to the first time he called me Daddy.

“Who is your Daddy boy?”

“You are my Daddy, thank you, Daddy.”

“Is this what you want, boy.”

“Yes….yes, Daddy. this…is…exactly what I want…you are what I need, Daddy.”

“Are you my boy?”

“I am your boy, Daddy. I love you.”

“I love you too, boy.”

“Cum for me...now.”

In that instant, Markus’s cock erupts and a long pearly string flies across my chest. Looking up into his sculpted sweating torso, Markus is looking at me intently, searching my face for the signs of my pleasure. Our eyes are locked, bound together in this ritual of transformation.

Here we are the very heart. Daddy has opened his boy up so slowly, lovingly and confidently that all his boy feels is the deepest, most intimate pleasure. Daddy is there inside him, looking him in his eye. Telling his boy that he is beautiful. Telling his boy that he loves him. Combined with his orgasm, this is the peak moment that changes everything.

I’ve stopped just pretending to be Daddy. Now, I see Daddy as a higher call. Over the years since I first met Markus, I have had many boys. From age 20 to 70, boyhood has no expiration date. I’ve returned again and again to face this role with respect and love. To show up with clear boundaries, empowered communication and a healthy dose of ethics. To elevate the healing power of this role by becoming the highest expression of Daddy that I can be. One who delivers the erotic rite of passage that is lost. It is not just about coming into sexual adulthood. It is also about the joy of surrender and a deeper vulnerability that can only happen when one man completely surrenders to another in love and in trust.

“Are you my boy?”

“Yes, I am your boy, Daddy.Thank you for being my Daddy.”

“Thank you, boy, for making me a better man.”