Just another ordinary day in Keith's life. Not! But more of that later.

Last night, I met my host's twenty-four year old boyfriend, as he stopped over briefly for dinner before heading off for an optometrists' convention with a friend of his. A less likely looking optometrist you're unlikely to see. He looks kind of like a young hero from a British World War II fighter- pilot movie, albeit with a contemporary gym boy body. And, for the short time I saw him, I was impressed with him as a person too. From what my host has told me, he's had one hell of a hard life. I wish I could relate to you some of the stories he told me, not just about his boyfriend, but about their various unlikely relations, including the 65 year old condom-distributing aunt who lives on a ranch by herself in Oregon, driving a one-ton pickup.

But one of the problems about writing this journal is that I don't feel free to really describe the people I meet. Take my host and his boyfriend. There's a truly fascinating dynamic going on between them. But I don't feel comfortable writing honestly about them since they might eventually read this online. I could ask them if they minded if I wrote about them, but that would only make me even more self-conscious about my writing. So the safest thing, I've found, is just to touch upon things.

Last night after dinner, we all took a hot tub together. And it's positively the first time and the last time I'll be taking a hot tub with a bunch of optometrists (my host is a former optometrist).

Today was to be the main day for photography. It took forever for the day to get going, and, it was only well after lunch that we finally got round to taking photos. The weather showed signs of clearing up, so we drove over to Seabec, a scenic town overlooking the Sound with the snowy Olympics as a backdrop, to take a few photos. Yet another cute, young friend of my host came with us to hold the reflectors. A strong, and cold breeze was coming in off the Sound, however, which caused us problems. It wasn't so bad for me, although it was a cold day to be standing around in just jeans and a tanktop to be photographed. The main problem was with the wind catching the huge reflector screen that the young guy was trying to hold. So we bagged that idea, and headed home.

Puget Sound with the Olympics as a backdrop.

This is where the day started to take its strange, if not unexpected, turn. A long afternoon during which I frequently found myself saying "if only Mom could see me now." We eventually came to the point in the shoot where I had to not only get naked, but also get aroused. And my host's cute young friend was still with us, helping out with lights and so forth. I wasn't really at all embarrassed to be lying there nude in front of these two men, trying to get aroused. But what did embarrass me was that I could scarcely get aroused at all. But no matter what we did (and believe me, we tried a lot of different things), I couldn't get aroused.

So, at around five p.m., my host's friend departed, and I heard the trickle of rain against the roof becoming more insistant. Now that it was just me and my host, the photographer, I felt less inhibited, and I admitted to him the one thing that would probably turn me on.

So we finally got the shots we needed, and, more importantly, the confidence boost to set up the big series we were going to shoot in the garage. It was meant to be a kind of white-trash, at-home, guy-in-the-garage-with-his-power-tools kind of thing. The shoot, if it was successful, would be submitted to "Men Magazine".

Well, we took the first three rolls showing me dressed, then shirtless, then undressed. Then finally it was time to ... well ... shoot the rest. Strangely enough, I found myself completely getting into it. To be honest, it was one of those moments when you lose your inhibitions and completely surrender to the moment. Of course, whether all this excitement will translate into great photos is another matter entirely.