The Natural Stages of Life of a Gay Man

The other day my friend asked me when the right time was to transition from a twink into a twunk. You see, there comes a point when gay men like me realize our youthful charm won’t last forever, and, at some point, we’ll have to build up muscle. But how do you know when the time is right? To help him and all the other gay men in the world, I decided to compile this handy guide for the life cycle of every gay man.

0: Birth
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I've said it once and I'll say it again: You don’t choose to be gay. It’s something that happens to you in the womb if, and only if, your pregnant mother is cursed by a witch. One of gay men’s favorite past-times is telling each other how our parents got on the bad side of the local sorceress or warlock. I know, for me at least, that my parents trespassed into a sacred glen with a bubbling creek where the village crone gathered her scrying-water. Boom! Zap! The crone cursed my mother. Three months later, I was born with a caul on my face and holding a miniature picture of Colton Haynes. In the words of Lady Gaga: “Baby, I was born that way!”

0-8: Development

Once the gay is born, there is usually a long period where he appears just like a normal kid. During these first eight years, little gaylets will suck as many nutrients as he can manage from the roots of shrubs and maple trees. Gays in more tropical climates will feed on fresh fruits that have fallen to the ground—hence the anti-gay slur, “fruitcakes.” Many gay men reminisce about times in their youth when they wore the clothes of their sister or their mother. But this practice is not just an early sign of curiosity with gender expression or an innate comfort with femininity. No: gay men play dress-up to prepare for their pupal stage.

8-13: Gestation

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Around his eighth birthday, or whenever he discovers the discography of Nicki Minaj, the gay will begin to secrete a viscous substance from his mouth. This becomes a cocoon, in which his body will become a soup of proteins and minerals essential to life. This is also when he learns how to vogue. Gradually his body takes shape, and at 16, he emerges as a fully-fledged twink, complete with a new Andrew Christian jockstrap.

13-26: Twink

The new twink will seek out others of his kind to form a shoal or a school of other gay men. When threatened by a predator, such as mandatory P.E. or Boy Scout summer camp, the gays of this shoal will cluster together to give the illusion that they are not actually hundreds of individual gays, but rather, a single giant gay. Like this, they manage to survive in a heteronormative world.

26-38: Twunk

Around his mid-twenties, the twink is ready to make his way into the real world. To transition into a twunk, the twink will have to work out constantly and eat more than five times his body weight every day in mosquitos, small rodents, and whey protein powder. Once the transition is complete, the twunk must fight other twunks in hand-to-hand combat to earn a studio apartment in a gentrifying neighborhood. This is also when the gay man develops antlers.

38-50: Bear

Once the twunk has passed his peak breeding season, he begins his life as a bear. In this stage, he will hibernate for six to eight months a year, and will develop a taste for opera. But life isn’t all smoked salmon and Maria Callas for these gays: In certain parts of Alaska, native gay bears have been hunted almost to extinction.

50-??: Death and Rebirth

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This is the stage that my straight friends have the most trouble understanding. The thing about gay men is that we never truly die. Yes, on the eve of our 50th birthdays, the witch’s curse returns, and we ‘die.’ But before our bodies can hit the ground, we turn into a swarm of blue butterflies. Then these butterflies ride the western wind and disappear into the sunset. And somewhere, another gay baby is born, and the gay's life has come full circle.