Hello, thanks for stopping by. I'm guessing that because you're on a page entitled 'about me, you'll want to know more about me.
I'm Jason, I enjoy red wine, aviation, cheesecake, watching the sea, travelling and oh so much more.
I was born in the summer of 1969 in a sleepy Surrey village, where I lived for almost all my childhood and adolescence
Over the years I've done so many jobs in a wide vareity of industries that has seen me dress up as a koala and a tiger, dance on stage, sell holidays, look after rich people, put words in order in print for cash, clean windows, flog over-priced coffee, book flights, answer problems, investigate, broadcast and a wee bit more besides.
Now, that's pretty much the basics over and done with, so let's take a little breather before we delve into the dim and dark corners of my mind to recall some of my past! You sure you're not bored yet?
I was born and bred in Surrey, yes, honestly, born, not hatched or created in some lab or other. I kinda like Surrey, it's sort of green, rather pleasant, and apparently it's got a fringe on top, though I've never seen that! Oh what? That's a carriage, I hear you say, as if I didn't know that already! It was a simple play on words and the only cultural mention of Surrey that I could think of at the time!
It may come as a surprise, but I rather liked school, even though I was bullied a little. Well, a swotty, ugly kid with glasses and a briefcase is just asking for trouble! But hey, as they say, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger!
As a youngerster, my eyesight was a bit of a problem; I had a lazy eye and an even lazier one. I'd often have to wear a patch for weeks at a time, which, when it was over the dodgy eyeball, wasn't much of an issue. However, when one of those thick material patches, secured with sticking plasters, was placed over my 'good' eye, I'd be looking at a blurry eye and bumping into almost anything and everything. The only positive I can recall from those days is the sympathy the patch elicited from strangers and teachers. The latter would turn a blind eye, if you pardon the expression, to my want for staring out the window and dreaming, mostly because I couldn't see the blackboard.
My father had been an officer in the Royal Navy, and at times, he still thought he was; failure to comply with orders in the required time would result in punishment, usually of the physical kind. Indeed, there was some question about exactly how I broke my arm as a nine-year-old; it might have been at school, trying to clear a hurdle that had been turned the wrong way around, or it could have been some fatherly punishment that sent me flying across the kitchen a few days before my sister's wedding. It didn't matter to me which it was back then, nor does it carry any importance these days! My broken nose, now that's a different story altogether, and maybe one day I'll commit that to print.
I had a problem with reading and writing. I loved doing it, but I just wasn't very good at it; those darn letters kept on jumping about and swapping places. These days, they'd understand it was dyslexia, but back then, things were not quite so enlightened. I was considered a bit, well, thick to be honest, plus I was always the youngest in the class, being a summer baby, I was almost a year ahead of my actual age.
I was always put in the last of the classes according to ability, which at first was a bit of a bind, and I truly cared about being thought of as a dunce. Yet, I didn't need to work too hard in order to achieve the required standard, at least for the remedial classes. I accepted my fate and continued on my merry way!
Not all the teachers thought I was a lost cause; there were one or two that I can remember with fondness now. Indeed, they have had an impact on my life. George Ford inspired my love of geography and travel, whilst Ben Youngs lit a flame for writing and literature that still burns bright today.
I knew I was different from the age of about 12 or 13. It was most odd, but I had a kinda crush on Louis, my best friend's boyfriend. He was a dream boy, exotic, foreign, dark, mysterious eyes, clear skin, thin red lips and brown hair styled in a modern European fashion. I wasn't exactly sure why I wanted to be around him all the time or why I wanted to please him. Nor did I fully comprehend my desire to make the most of our time together. At the time, I just assumed it was because, as a French foreign exchange student, this 17-year-old would soon be going back across la Manche.
Long after he'd gone back to France, I thought of him, of having his arms around me, giving me a hug. Oh goodness me, I can close my eyes now, all these years later and still see him, standing in the old sports ground in Redhill, wearing a green and white striped jumper, dark jeans, floppy hair and a smile that could make even the hardest heart sing.
Yes, I knew I was different, that I was not like the other boys were in my class, although at the time I didn't fully know that the difference was, I didn't fully acknowledge that I was a big old nelly!
Don't forget, back in those days, there was no such thing as the internet, social media was listening to a transistor whilst hanging around the swings in the local park. Mobile communication was little more than toy walkie-talkies or two tin cans on a bit of string. Everything I needed to know about being different, I had to get from a book at the local library. It said it was just a phase that most boys go through during their childhood or adolescence.
As I travelled through my secondary school, the phase didn't seem to be coming to an end, I wasn't growing out of it, and perhaps I was one of those limp-wristed, lavender lovers, nancy boys that the daily newspapers kept on calling, queers, perverts, retrobates.
I had no clue about being gay, other than what was on TV, which was John Innman in Are You Being Served, Colin and Barry on Eastenders or the handsome Jesse Birdsall on some London gangster mini series. Decent role models, I had none, nor did I know any other boys like me.
After I left school, I spoke to one of my former teachers about my sexuality and my isolation. She seemed to understand and was keen to help me hire one of the classrooms one evening a fortnight to set up a social group for others like me. However, this was in the midst of Thatcher's Britain and Section 28 was unleashed and put an end to my social group long before it began.
Fast forward to college, which went well despite a rocky start. I was the life and soul of the group, always relied upon for a joke or to do something silly for a giggle. The life and soul of the party, you might say, until I did something unspeakable! I came out! The one single declaration saw the big group of people I'd called friends whittle down to just two. A shock and a blow for sure, but at least I was no longer living a lie, not to them, but also, far more importantly, not to myself.
After leaving college, I took a job as a travel agent in Croydon, which was kind of fun and closer to London than my sleepy Surrey village that I called home. I want to experience life, yet I knew very little about how to do that. My life was going through a bit of an unsettled phase. I knew I wasn't living the life I wanted, yet I didn't know how to move forward. Things came to a head when I went to a friend's bedsit for the weekend in Woking. He wasn't in, and I had to wait on the street corner for him to return. A lonely boy in a strange town, alone after dark, with nowhere to go and little money. Someone, a young man, came and chatted to me in the darkness. He seemed friendly and kind, he was chatty and invited me to go with him, somewhere warm and dry. Warm and dry turned out to be a derelict garage, and friendly and kind rapidly changed into hard and aggressive. It wasn't what I wanted to happen, it wasn't what I had planned, it wasn't a nice experience, yet I didn't know how to deal with it, not during and not immediately after. Things hurt, both internally and externally, and I retreated into myself.
I found myself at a travel event, held at a hired-out nightclub in London, in the run-up to Christmas. It turned out to be a pivotal moment in my young teenage life. Whilst consuming free booze, I noticed a poster on the wall which informed me that this nightclub had a different claim to fame that was somewhat interesting to me. It was London's premier gay venue - it was Heaven! Well, strike me pink and tickle me under the chin if that wasn't a literal and metaphorical sign, then I don't know what is. Almost every Friday and some Saturday nights for months and months after that evening, you'd have found me dancing in that dark, cavernous club with mirrored urinals!
I was barely legal to drink and certainly not old enough to do jiggery pokery, as the age of consent for gay men back then was 21, but that didn't stop me from enjoying myself to the fullest. There were a lot of guys who wanted to buy me drinks, after all, I was a young, sweet, slim boy with a cute arse and a wicked smile. Sure, I'd let them buy me beverages and so on, but hey, I needed the affection more than they needed the money. I wish I could say that I could recall their names, ages and occupations, but I can't. There are a few names that spring out of the darkness, just as I can remember a flight attendant, a political secretary and a hotel concierge. But mostly their details, just like their faces, merge and blur into a series of hedonistic lost weekends where my body was a plaything and my mind as absent as my morals!
Life kinda came to a crashing halt one night when I was leaving Heaven, with some shag for the night, when we were followed by a group of guys who had nefarious actions in mind. I could run fast, but the guy I was with could evidently run faster, and he got away, whilst I got a beating. I forget how many ribs were broken, more than two, less than six, together with black eyes and a few other bruises. Gay bashing was a thing back then, the police didn't really do anything about it, and whilst such events were commonplace, it really freaked me out for a while.
Jumping ahead a long while here, mainly because I can't remember the details, which is perhaps just as well, as I'm not sure there was much pride there. But I decided I wanted more than just a casual fuck for the weekend. I wanted that elusive notion or emotion called love. I had so much of that to give and nobody to give it to, and I was pretty sure I wasn't going to find that four-letter word whilst up to my tits in Red Stripe, shaking my tight lil arse on the dancefloor!
I'll be honest here, I put 'a lonely heart' ad in the back of Sky Magazine, which was a trendy lifestyle mag back in the day. Those printed words brought a long, tall, handsome stranger into my life. Now, when I say tall, I really do mean TALL. He was over six feet six, whilst I was five feet six short. Yes, an odd couple we did make, but hey, none of that matters in the glow of first love!
I keep fast-forwarding in this little biography to save your eyes, and I just want to get on with another glass of wine! After a while, I came out to my parents, first my mother, who said she already knew, apparently mothers always know such things before sons do. Then, a few months later, I came out to my father, who said he understood. Yet, for about a year, he avoided being in the same room as me. We didn't really talk, other than just the most rudimentary pleasantries, for another decade or so. Did it bother me? Nope, not really.
Life moves on, and for a bit I shared a house with two other air hosties, Jilly and Jacquie from the same airline and an accountant called Eric. Some of those parties we held were pretty wild, especially the one that involved burnt cork or me dressing up in Jilly's uniform. I loved local radio, and somehow managed to bag a job at a local radio station, just at the weekends, but that love of radio, of communication, burnt deep into my soul.
The airline went bust, and the three of us in that house of fun were all out of work, so I did what any other normal person does in that situation. I jumped up and down, moved to the coast and became a redcoat, before moving on to be an entertainer at a holiday centre in the West Country. It's not a job you do for the money, indeed, I worked on average a 96-hour week and took home £81, but hey, it was fun, it was a laugh, I got to sing and dance on stage and generally be a fool and get paid for it. During the closed or winter season, I went off and worked for a magic company, selling tricks and illusions and that sort of thing, which proved to be harder work than it was worth! Magic is no fun when you know how it's done!
For a while I did promotion work, freelance stuff, auditioned for a few shows, I thought I'd get a break in the business they call show, but with no formal training, in fact no training of any kind, that break never really happened, unless you count bit parts and 'extra' stuff as a break, which I didn't and don't, still it was fun while it lasted, but deep inside, I knew I'd have to grow up sooner or later!
The boss at the radio station called and, by some piece of good fortune, gave me a job, first in the music library, then researching, then producing, then presenting, then doing anything. It was a great experience, I learnt a lot, broadcasting is a lovely industry to be in, especially if you are a little crazy and a tad egotistical. I loved all aspects of it, even doing the overnight show; it was a thrill, a job that I will always look back on fondly.
Life was pretty good at that time. I even had a couple of stalkers, yes, it's true, I had two, one serious and one not so serious. I'd get odd notes left at home for me, or put through my door just after I'd gotten in. Phone calls started soon after the notes, and some would come in the middle of the night, some would just be silent, some would detail the time I'd arrived home, what I was wearing and where I'd been that day! Yep, it was just a tad scary, probably made me a bit of a challenge to work with, always looking over my shoulder, but hey, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger, at least that's what they say.The radio station went through some changes, not least in ownership and well, costs needed to be cut, and I guess, I was one of those costs, and I was cut. Now they say, whoever 'they' are, that when one door closes, another one opens, and for me, that was somewhat true. I became a freelance writer. I had an advice/agony uncle column in a weekly gay newspaper, and I also created features and other stories for that paper along with other magazines. I produced and presented video travel brochures and the odd voice-over and radio show. But, I kinda liked the freelance lifestyle rather than the actual working bit. Mind you, I had one hell of a sun tan in those days! It's amazing how a whole section of life, perhaps two years or more, fits into a neat little paragraph. Anyway, it does, and life moves on at a pace. Ed was the man of the moment, who talked me back into full-time employment back in the real world
Since then, Ive done so many jobs, working for a holiday company, checking out hotels, I've been a government employee, and I've worked a permanent night shift for a major American company looking after really rich people. I've had a bike accident where I broke my back, damaged a kidney and split my coccyx. I also broke my right leg whilst dancing on a cruise ship, which was so bad it needed a metal plate and half a dozen screws to fix!
