He saw my heart; I was staring at his crotch

The Goodwill store is crazy busy—there’s a storewide half-off sale today. The checkout lines stretch from here to next Sunday. My husband Dave saunters over. I signal I’m ready to go.

Dave gestures behind him. “See that man way over there, next to the guy in the red coat?”

I scan the crowd.

“He’s in the far checkout lane, towards the back.”

“White shirt and bow tie? College age?”

“That’s him. I was walking past and he stopped me. Said, ‘You spoke in my social work class last semester. I want to thank you. You changed my life.’”

“Really?” I take another look. “How cool. Great. I’m glad he said something to you.”

“That’s for you, too. For both of us. We both would have spoken to that class.”

Dave’s right. We’re often asked to address social work and psychology classes at area colleges and universities. We go as the featured couple or as co-participants in panel discussions. We tell our coming out stories. We talk about what it is for us to be gay in this time and place. We answer questions. Any more, students are generally receptive.

“I wonder which class it was,” I say. “I don’t recognize him. I wonder what he heard that made such an impact. I think you should go over and ask him to elaborate.”

To my surprise, Dave agrees. He’s bolder than I and more socially adept. I tag along. He taps the young man on the shoulder. “We were wondering: could you say a little more about your story?”

Joe College obliges, and as he starts talking I’m able to place him: The Man With the Crotch. Drop-dead gorgeous, dark eyes, Adonis face, olive shirt unzipped to offer a tantalizing glimpse of his chest, tight red jeans, stylish leather shoes. Devastatingly handsome. I wanted to spend the entire period looking—no, gawking—at him. I restrained myself. Whenever I addressed the class I avoided looking his way for fear I’d babble. Not easy to do. He sat directly in front of me, legs spread wide. When I wasn’t talking, I looked down. At his crotch.

After class, Dave and I compared notes.

“He’s so cute.” (We both knew who I was talking about.)

“Adorable. I just wanted to stare at him.”

“Me, too. In fact, I did stare. At his crotch.”

“Do you think he’s gay?”

We thought we’d never really know, but here we are, getting it straight from the source.

Not that it’s been easy for him. He grew up in foster care, was told to hide his sexual orientation—“otherwise you’ll never be adopted.”

Indeed, his family of origin severed all ties with him when they learned he’s gay, booted him back into the foster care system. Eventually the couple he calls his grandparents adopted him.

“And they’re fine with my being gay. They love me, as do my amazing friends.” He turns and points to a motley crew of students behind him. They look our way and grin. They’re a diverse lot—race, gender, body type. All friendly.

Good. He surrounds himself with supportive people.

He says what meant so much to him when we spoke in class was the obvious love Dave and I share. “I was right there with you, crying when you cried, listening to every word, seeing two men who really love each other. You guys changed my life.”

My mind flashes to Bob and Bruce, Larry and Larry. Early in our coming out Dave and I saw seperately in these two couples proof positive that long-term gay relationships do exist and can be richly rewarding. Knowing this gave us something to shoot for, confidence we could.

I hope that’s where Joe College is now—buoyed by hope, poised to call into being then will into reality a love-filled life.

“Can I hug you guys?” he asks.

Zowie.

Sootprints in fnow

We live so much of our lives without telling anyone. But not when we walk through a snowy landscape. Several inches of new snow fell last night and I’m taking advantage of the afternoon light to traipse amongst the trees. I can see by the deer’s cloven hoof prints the place it leaped the fence. There’s the rabbit’s dash-dash-dot and the raccoon’s little paw print. Here a mouse scrimshandered a thin line atop the snow, then tunneled down under. (Such a little creature to face the great winter.) The squirrel’s bounding trail of double dots connects one tree to another, then explodes in a mess of dirt and torn-up earth where it retrieved a buried nut from the frozen ground. Great galumphing footprints behind me testify to my own passage through this little piece of the world.

Kevin Payravi, Wikimedia Commons

Traces of my presence—and yours—are not always so visible as footprints in snow, though they may linger after we’ve passed.

Recently my husband Dave and I watched the 1970 film “The Boys in the Band.” We’d heard of it but never seen it on stage or screen. The show opened Off-Broadway in 1968. Says playwright Tony Kushner of Angels in America fame, “…it certainly started a new era in American drama, and was an immense contribution in American literature because it’s so unapologetically gay.”

The action centers around nine men at a birthday party. It’s funny, sad and suspenseful all at the same time. The friends trade vicious cut-downs almost as a matter of course. This put me off on a first viewing. Why must they be so negative towards themselves and each other? I’ve watched it four more times, however, and come to appreciate its humor, heart and snapshot of pre-Stonewall gay life.

In one scene the embittered Michael confronts his college roommate about the latter’s reaction to a mutual friend’s coming out.

“You couldn’t take it, so you destroyed the friendship and your friend along with it,” Michael says. “To this day he remembers the treatment and scars he got from you.”

This line sticks with me. Even today, the coming out process for many LGBT people is fraught with peril and littered with former friendships. This was true of my experience. My life has been shaped by a society that had no place—no word, even—for someone like me. I carry the scars of my late parents’ eventual and tentative tolerance of me. They were unable to fully embrace me as their son once they learned I am gay.

Yet others trail healing in their wake. When I came out at 35 my grandmother was 90 years old and the one person in my family of origin who accepted me without reservation. My mind goes to this scene:  Dave and I sit with Grandma in the church she’s attended for nearly 60 years. The pews and paneling are of ash; the aisles carpeted in red with tiny flecks of black. Frosted glass windows discourage daydreaming. Today is Communion Sunday. Grandma learns Dave and I will not be offered the sacrament. Incensed, this little white-haired lady puts away her usual smile and marches up the center aisle, leading Dave and me out of the building.

This memory of my grandmother’s show of support nurtures and sustains me years after her death. As she well knew, people do not remember what you do or say, so much as they remember how you make them feel. Grandma made me feel like a million bucks. No, she made me feel loved.

Love. Such a little thing to arm ourselves with as we face the great cold. And best shared with another—person, animal, plant, planet. For no matter how many our footsteps upon the earth, our trail is soon ended. A few generations pass; the snow melts and all trace of us is gone.

3 months now my marriage is recognized and still I’m waiting for guests to arrive at the reception

Daddy’s Day at Charlie’s church-based preschool class. The man who plays the title role in our grandson’s life can’t get off work for the hour-long program. Dave and I shoulder grandfatherly duties and attend in his stead. Charlie’s mom ushers us to the classroom door, chats briefly with the teacher, then leaves. Charlie takes over from there.

“This is my Papa,” the four-year-old says, pointing to Dave. He turns to me. “And this is my Iso Papa.”

The teacher laughs. “Your evil papa?”

Charlie looks daggers at her. “EESO-Papa,” he says, and leads us over to a stack of wooden blocks.

Maybe the teacher spoke her truth in referring to me as Evil Papa. Later she makes an elaborate point of there being a “special friend” in the room. She uses her voice to draw quotes around the term.

“Children, you may ask your father or grandfather or ‘special friend’ to join you at the craft table.” “Boys and girls, I want you to sing your best for your father or grandfather or ‘special friend.’” “Students, you may now offer your father or grandfather or ‘special friend’ a half-doughnut and glass of juice.”

I seethe with anger. Does it matter that she and others locate me outside the family? Label gay people as wicked? Feign inclusivity? Broadcast such messages to four- and five-year-olds?

Sure, it does.

Even before they’re taught to use the potty, children receive training in societal prejudice, gender expectations and roles. I learned at a young age to despise a deep part of myself. I’m coming to realize a lifetime is too short for me and others to undo all those early lessons.

Not that we should quit trying.

Since July, Dave and I have frequented a local film club. We’re the young ones in a crowd of 15 or 20 who gather once a month to watch old-time Western movies. At the club’s 38th anniversary celebration this fall we learned they’ve cancelled meetings only twice—once for the blizzard of 1977 and again for the blizzard of 2014.

Last month we decided to ante up the annual dues, only $10 per person or couple. We approached the treasurer, an amiable white-haired man of short stature and warm smile, and told him we wanted to become official members.

“Do you have change for a twenty?” Dave asked.

“Um, it’s $10 per person.”

“Not $10 per couple?”

“Well, are you two brothers?”

“We’re married, actually,” Dave said.

A bystander chortled loudly, then flushed when neither Dave nor I laughed. He quickly retired to his seat.

The treasurer checked his wallet and waved us off. “I don’t have change.” He, too, beat a hasty retreat.

“That was a conversation stopper,” Dave whispered.

I nodded. “You sure know how to clear a room.”

We talked about it on the drive home, how Indiana’s marriage equality played a role in our actions. “I’m feeling bolder,” Dave said. “More ready to publicly claim you as my husband.”

“Me, too,” I said. “Most of the time. Not the other night at that new theatre. You dropped me off at the door. The usher wanted to seat me. I told the her I was waiting on another person. When you came in she asked, ‘Is this your friend?’ I didn’t correct her. I could have said, ‘He’s my husband.’ But I was in new territory, didn’t feel safe. I kept mum.”

Maybe this happens to others, too—the club treasurer, the preschool teacher, my evangelical pastor brother, my deceased mother, my children. Marriage equality is new territory for them, may feel unsafe, scary. I want them to get over it. Buck up, duck. If our conservative state legislators have to accord me the dignity of marriage, you should, too.

But it may a hard pill for them to swallow. Maybe instead of scorn I can offer a glass of water. While still holding them accountable to treat me with respect, I can offer grace instead of judgment. After all, I’m asking the same of them. For me and my special friend. For every last one of my grandchildren. And theirs.

A funny kind of love

His invitation to celebrate Thanksgiving pulls me up short. I read it again, then once more, then squint at it and read it aloud. “We would love to have anyone—everyone!” It’s from my one-year-younger brother. He posts it to the private Facebook group for members of our extended family.
But he doesn’t mean it, not the way it sounds. Anyone, everyone? He can’t mean it that way. He’s inviting my husband Dave and me to Thanksgiving dinner?
It’s been years since Judas (not his real name) and I spoke to each other. He leaves my occasional letters unanswered. Except for funerals, he boycotts family events to which I am invited. Not that there are many. I’m the black sheep of our family. The rest of the flock is afraid I shed. They don’t want dark ringlets of wool all over the davenport. They take their cues from our Bible-thumping brother. He preaches in the type of church we five siblings were raised in—one that excludes gay people from fellowship.
His invitation reads like the title of a children’s sermon: “Thumper Invites Black Sheep for Thanksgiving Dinner.” Has he lost his mind? Or has he changed it?
I’m guilty of pickling in formaldehyde people I haven’t seen for years. I expect high school friends to look just the way they did when last I left them, and to hold the same opinions and beliefs. I expect my favorite college professor to appear in a wrinkled green suit with a narrow black tie, rap his knuckles on the table as he talks to me. I’m surprised almost every time I reconnect. People have moved on in my absence, grown more wrinkled, wiser and dear.
What if Judas did have a change of heart, does indeed mean to invite me for Thanksgiving? Ooh, that will upset my applecart. I’ve convinced myself I am the bigger (and better) person because I reach out to him from time to time, am willing to overlook his offenses. But it’s easy to be noble in a party of one. Maybe he’s calling my bluff.
I could ask him if “anyone—everyone” includes me. Sure, I could. But do I want to? He testified against me at my child custody and divorce hearing. Do I want to open myself to outright rejection again? And what if he says “Yes, come on over.” Do I want to sit down to table with him?
But maybe we could build bridges, set an example for the wider family, recapture some of what we had as kids—those long talks when we were supposed to be asleep, when we were marooned in the wild cherry tree, closeted in the clubhouse in the garage’s rafters.
I email him privately, keep my tone neutral, my words few: “May Dave and I join you for Thanksgiving Day?” I leave it at that.
So does he.
A month passes. His silence rankles. What do I want? Not for him to change. There will be no miracles here. I want common courtesy, the decency of a reply.
My follow-up email elicits a direct response, a first in over 15 years. For this alone I am grateful. Judas writes to inform me that no, I am not welcome in his home; the invitation was not family-wide. He’s doing what he believes God wants from him. He’s sure I am doing what I feel is best. He signs off by twice saying he loves me.
A funny kind of love, this, wrapped in religion and dubious convictions.
But some of my own convictions are suspect: Chickens are the most intelligent life form on the planet; Horseradish is the secret to the good life; When in doubt, sing.
So my brother says he loves me. Well, well. I happen to think love is our only hope. I’d like to believe it is enough.

My Big Fat Gay Marriage Issue, Resolved

The minister signed our marriage certificate with a flourish, then said, “One of you needs to sign here as ‘husband’ and and one over here as ‘wife.’” It was 2005. Dave and I were wed in Canada on our ninth anniversary as a couple, soon after Ontario legalized same-sex marriage—so soon that gender-neutral forms were not yet available.
When we returned to the U.S. our marital status lodged in the Twilight Zone. It’s still there. We believe we’re married. A whole vast country north of us believes we’re married. But what happens in Canada stays in Canada. According to those with saying power, Dave is married to nobody. Guess what that makes me.
Being nobody wears on a person. Researchers have long documented the negative effects of the stigma of homosexuality on gay people. Recent studies show that residing in a U.S. state that outlaws same-sex marriage has a direct adverse effect on the mental health of lesbians and gay men.
It makes me sick to live in Indiana in a marital state of perpetual confusion. Here’s my marital history: Not married, 23 years. Married, 14 years. Not married, seven years. Married, but not according to my state or federal government, nine years. Married and recognized as such by the state, 36 hours. Back to married-but-not-married, two months, followed by 10 days of being married. Then back to yes-but-no, then over to yes-but-not-really, not until the Supreme Court says it’s okay. (Did you follow that?)
In June a federal judge ruled Indiana’s same-sex marriage ban unconstitutional. As gay couples lined up to obtain marriage licenses, Dave and I marveled. We could sip coffee at our own kitchen table as a bona fide married couple. For all of three days. The court ruling was stayed, pending appeal. For us, it was back to life in limbo.
Our summer vacation offered a breath of fresh air. We spent 10 consecutive days touring several states and two provinces where marriage equality is the law of the land. “This is the longest we’ve been married since we got hitched,” Dave said.

Toward the end of our trip we visited Niagara Falls, took in the view from the Canadian side, along with a thousand or more other spectators. So much water rushing over the brink made me have to pee. When I returned from the rest room I soon spotted Dave among the crowd. It’s not all that difficult to recognize someone you care about.
At the same time it’s easy to dismiss those you refuse to see. Experience has taught me this. My three children have severed contact with me over my having come out gay. As has my brother. As have former friends and fellow church members. No place at the table for the likes of me.
Where am I welcome? Life keeps me guessing. This past weekend I attended a college class reunion. I almost didn’t show up. I often encounter judgement and rejection from people who knew me before I came out of the closet. I feared more of the same should my classmates learn I am gay. I tested the waters. The first time a fellow alumnus asked about my spouse, I mentioned Dave by name. I was peppered with questions, taken to task for believing homosexuality cannot be changed, and charged with a lack of religious faith. Sheesh. Thereafter I mostly dodged questions about marriage and family. I avoided some conversations altogether. I shut down, hung back, withdrew. I was present but not present—off in limbo land again. This is familiar territory; I check in there frequently to visit my marital status.
Not long ago the federal court of appeals ruled against Indiana’s gay marriage ban. The state has appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. But I’ve been thinking: Dave and I could settle the matter now. As our state government is so antsy about keeping marriage between a husband and wife, we should send the folks in Indianapolis a copy of our Canadian marriage license. It’s there in black and white: on March 12, 2005, Dave took me to be his lawfully wedded wife.

As the Lady From Joisey Said . . .

The Rape of Ganymede by Rubens

“We think we know everything. We don’t know shit.” The name of the play escapes me, as does the plot, but this line sticks with me, as does the image of the world-weary drag queen who delivers it.
Growing up, I thought I was in the know. My brand of church taught that we had the inside track on salvation, knew exactly what God wanted. It was up to us to point out to others how wrong they were.
My eyes opened when I came out gay in mid-life. I went from a desk job at a religious organization to biscuit maker at an interstate truck stop cafe on the early morning shift. One of my co-workers was a large imposing woman with a thick New Jersey accent. I loved her sense of humor and take on the world. I often told her so. “Aw, ain’t you sweet,” she’d say. “You want to know what I think? I think you’re full of shit.”
I didn’t want to believe her. These twenty years later I begin to think she was spot on.
Last month I wrote a short piece about the brevity of life, how everything changes and how quickly. How to manage in such a world, I wondered aloud, and concluded: “Live as fully alive and fully aware as possible. Choose love. And gratitude. Laugh often.”
This on a Wednesday.
Thursday morning, my employer called me into his office to tell me he’s decided to change my job description. I’m to identify prospective customers and sell them on our services. “I know this has been a revolving-door position,” he said, noting the average tenure of marketing personnel at our company is three months—people get fired when sales quotas are not met. “I’ve decided this is what I want you to do.”
Had my anxiety been rocket propellant, there’d be a big hole in his ceiling. I am no salesman. As a kid, I tried peddling magazine subscriptions, and in college, vitamins. I proved an abject failure on both counts. After college, armed with a communications degree and no job prospects, I went into telephone marketing. That career topped out at a week. My next position, also in sales, lasted four times as long: I sold popcorn and caramel apples out of a wagon at the Covered Bridge Festival in Parke County, Indiana. I haven’t looked back. Until now. My boss orders me to walk the plank.
What I wrote about living awake and aware, embracing what is? Ehhhnhh.
When change stares me in the face, I notice I sing a different tune. I go all queasy—and with good reason.
It has to do with the story I heard Saturday at graduation open house for a friend who just earned her Ph.D. in psychology. As we ate out on the deck, we heard the neighbors’ chickens. Erin told us they’re being picked off one by one. Coyote? Hawk? Conversation turned to a YouTube video she’s seen: a family sets their baby bunny free to live in the great outdoors.
As Dad videotapes its first steps toward freedom, a hawk swoops down and carries off the little rabbit squealing.
“Run, run, be free!” said Erin, gesturing wildly. “Then wham-o!” A bunch of us laughed.
“That’s not funny,” said her mother-in-law, who finished chemotherapy two weeks ago.
“I’m sure it wasn’t funny at the time,” Erin said. “But isn’t that life? It’s what happens.”
Indeed, life pulls no punches. A bald-headed woman. Bunny nuggets. Me a salesman. Everything changes in an instant and it’s not funny. It’s tragic—except that it’s also somehow comical.
We traipse through life thinking we know the score.
“We don’t know shit,” says the drag queen, kneeling at her friend’s grave. She carries her purse over one arm, in the other, a toilet seat lid.

Brief Matters

    1. “A walnut killed him,” a relative says at the family reunion this summer, speaking of my great uncle. “He had a lot of food allergies,” says a second cousin. Apparently, Uncle Louie was deathly allergic to walnuts and didn’t know it. I stare at a sepia photograph of a young married man with big ears and bigger plans. Live like you mean it, Louie. Hear me? Love like you’re gonna die at 31. ’Cause guess what—

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2. Blend the peel of an orange, a patch of velvet cloth and a gold doubloon with a Georgia peach and you’ll approximate the color of day lily my husband Dave has growing out back. Gorgeous blooms. But don’t blink. As their name implies, each blossom lasts but an afternoon.

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3. The pain is intense, and it isn’t as if I haven’t been warned. Dave pointed to the hornets’ nest being built above our barn’s double doors, said he planned to kill its inhabitants. I made a case for living and letting live. They’ll interfere with our painting the barn this summer, he said, and will probably sting us when we go in and out. Not if we don’t bother them, I said. I’m reminded how physical pain rivets my attention, even as I mutter, “this, too, shall pass.”

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4. After our long cold winter, the attack of the mayflies didn’t happen at my workplace this year. There are usually one or two days the entrance to the building is heaped with mayflies that have expired beneath its bright security light. These creatures spend most of their life as nymphs in the nearby Missinewa River. Come spring, they transform en masse, unfold new wings, fly, mate and die—all within a few hours.
5. Love me, love my cock. My hens, too. Our barnyard chickens are more pets than livestock. I was stricken last fall when a dog maimed my favorite hen. Three weeks ago she went broody, determined to hatch a clutch of eggs. My heart swelled to think of this scrappy survivor bringing life into the world. Yesterday she responded in soothing tones to the peep-peeps of her lone new arrival. Today her nest is empty. No sign of her chick anywhere; only a broken eggshell to prove she is a mother.

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6. My oldest son is seven years old when I come out to myself and others. I lose my court gambit for joint custody, then see my visitation hours cut and cut again until finally a judge issues an order barring me from seeing my children altogether.

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7. Pride Day in Indianapolis offers a flash of rainbow warmth and dazzle. Then it’s over. Back to life as usual. Yet for one brief Camelot moment, a shared sense of acceptance and freedom.

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8. Life itself might well be an orgasm, fast as it shoots by. I’m at the age now where years collapse into months, months into hours. My elders assure me the pace only quickens from here on out.

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9. In the wake of a recent federal judge’s ruling same-sex couples here in Indiana are allowed to marry. No having to travel out of state or out of country (as Dave and I did when we wed in Canada in 2005). For three days I revel in the notion my state finally has to accord Dave and me this measure of dignity, humanity and equality. Then the 7th Circuit Court stays the order. Now, a colleague bustles over to tell me what she heard on the radio: same-sex couples who wed here are to return their marriage licenses and collect a refund of fees paid.

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10. All things change. All things change. My crib notes for living in such a world: (a) Live as fully alive and fully aware as possible. (b) Choose love. And gratitude. (c) Laugh often. (d) Avoid nuts.

I found Captain America where I’d least expect him

My husband Dave and I arrive late for a poetry reading—open mic, read your own work or somebody else’s—and watch the Midwestern version of Captain America approach the podium: trim well-formed body clad in blue jeans and a cardinal-red dress shirt, top button opened to reveal a white undershirt. Black cowboy boots match a thick black leather belt with shining silver buckle. Bright blue eyes, unapologetic nose, strong stubbled chin. Dark brown hair close-cropped up the sides, growing out of a crew cut on top his head. Captivating smile, a mixture of confidence and self-consciousness with a dash of eager-to-please stirred in. His introduction is promising: “I really like this poem and I love the man it’s about.”
Woof.
He launches into the reading and my ardor cools. Flip-flops into foreboding, actually. Captain America narrates with pietistic fervor a piece of religious propaganda about the life of Christ. What starts as a sexy male daring to read a poem about the man he loves turns into a quasi-militaristic call to sacrifice lives for God and country.
I find myself thinking, Don’t trust this man. He will hurt you. This man hates you and your kind. He doesn’t believe you’re human. He thinks you deserve everything you get. A man like him fatally stabbed your friend Carl. Remember Andy and his partner? Clubbed to death by a man like this. And Dick’s suicide? Brought on by people with this sort of religious fervor. Their thoughts, words, theology and way of life willed his death. No, this man is not safe. Keep your distance.
I plan to. Eying Captain America, I now see him as a red, white and blue coral snake. Beautiful, but deadly. He symbolizes the irrational knee-jerk prejudice and homophobia I fear most. I’ll be careful not to out myself with him around. I wouldn’t want to meet him alone on the sidewalk afterwards or have him drive slowly by our house fingering his shotgun.
He reaches the final line at last, slithers back to his seat. I do not join the general applause.
Later that day, at another venue, Captain America takes to the podium again. He reads his own work this time, a revealing look at his childhood. Abusive home, alcoholic father, raised in squalor, often scrounging for food and affection. His words are heartfelt and moving. Life has not been easy for him. It’s a wonder he’s standing before us, looking as sane and sensational as he does. I clap as loudly as anyone.
Why must life be so complicated? I want to go back to hating him in peace. Instead, I must do the hard work of reconciling this conflicting information, the paradox that most human beings are, the mix of good and evil, of positive and not so nice. But really, the work to be done is in myself. Deep inside.

 

 

It’s not Captain America whom I fear and mistrust, so much as it is that part of me that still is quick to judge others, that believes I’m right, that divides the world into us and them. I’m right to mistrust this energy, but it’s this energy in me I need to be aware of and wary of first of all. Psychologists call this a negative projection, not recognizing an annoying quality in myself and attacking another person for it. A positive projection can be something I admire in another person (Captain America’s beauty) but unconsciously devalue in my own life (my own degree of handsomeness). Whenever I refuse to accept something as a part of myself I project that something onto others.
It takes energy to shoot out these projection missiles, but it takes work to withdraw them, too. It takes me waking up to the idea that I can’t blame others for my own failings, nor look to them as superheroes who may save me from myself.
The adage rings true, “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.” Time to don my mask, take up my shield, get ready to roll.

Party Ever After

It wouldn’t be practical, let alone possible, but I’d love to take ’em all home with me, the LGBTQ+ folks who show up to Pride Day in our capitol city each year. Where do they all come from? Do we bus them in from neighboring states? Run special charter trains from the coasts? Are they posers, straight people pretending to be gay for a day, and has my gaydar grown so rusty I can’t tell the difference? Whatever the truth, their sheer numbers amaze me. I didn’t think our sleepy Midwestern state could cough up so many people ready to party.

 

Is that why they’re there, to party? Some look eager enough to celebrate—some as if they were a bit over-eager—but every year I pass many folks who look zoned out. Bored, even. Were they hoping for something more, something different? What did they expect?

My reasons for attending Pride are varied. One, I go to ogle. We live in the boondocks, Dave and me, and hordes of sexy men don’t exactly beat a path to our door. I go looking for them at Pride. I pray for sunshine so shirts will come off. I feast my eyes and my imagination. Last year my attention riveted on a shirtless man in skimpy red shorts. With his long curly hair and olive complexion, he looked the spittin’ image of my first-ever lover. Suddenly I was 30 years and a thousand miles away, reliving a magical summer spent as a camp counselor in England.

Am I the only one who does this? The images of attractive men I collect on Pride Day will nurture and sustain me throughout the year.

Too, they’ll remind me I am not alone. This is how crazy I am: I live with a man, sleep beside him every night, yet sometimes believe I’m the only gay man in a hundred miles, two hundred. Recalling Pride Day’s extravaganza reassures me, reminds me, wakes me up to reality.

This is not altogether pleasant. Living where and as we do, Dave and I do not often feel safe expressing mutual affection in public. I treasure our time at Pride Day, revel in being able to hold hands, kiss whenever we want to. For these several hours I let down my guard, walk about in public without looking over my shoulder, wondering if we’re safe.

This year it’s our turn to host the family reunion for my great-grandparents’ clan. A couple months back, I mailed out letters to folks I don’t even know, encouraging them to attend. The reasons I offered are valid for Pride Day, too. After all, what is Pride, but a big ol’ Family reunion? Here’s what I said:

  Come for the people. Come connect with folks you don’t see often enough. Or ever.
Come for the stories. Come tell a few of your own. Funny ones. Sad ones. Stories about how we get through. How we are.
Come for the food. Not such a bad idea.
Come connect with real people, in person.
Come because you’re getting older or wiser or both, and you’ve begun to realize that family means more than you knew; that in connecting with your relations, you connect with yourself in ways you can’t quite understand but feel somewhere deep down inside.

Of course, Pride Day isn’t all happy, happy. My eyes get glued to the beautiful people and my internal critic takes over: “Gee, aren’t we old. And fat, and out of shape. And about as pretty as a mud hut.” A crowd of people can be the loneliest place in the world. Every year I see a man off by himself sobbing as if his heart is broken. Probably it is. We’ve all known the feeling of heartbreak.

Here’s what I’d like to do: gather him up, hold him close, remind him that being self-aware, being out to himself and others is reason enough to celebrate.

I’d like to invite him—and you, and all the rest—over to our place the day after. ’Be right proud to have you.

I Did.

I Did.

 

Did I grow up hearing the word “gay” mostly on Saturday mornings while watching cartoons as in,

            When you’re with the Flintstones

            Have a yabba-dabba-doo time

            A dabba-doo time

            You’ll have a gay old time

and notice that a gay old time week in and week out involved a grown man getting locked out of his own house and hammering at the door to be let back in?

I did.

Did I make my way through the world compliant and quiet, the middle child, a people-pleaser who valued appearances because they helped keep the peace and make folks happy?

I did.

Did I embrace the Bible thumping tenets of my family with a fervor all my own, label my same-sex attraction sinful temptation fanned by the flames of hell, plead with God to remove from me the stubborn desire to lust after other boys, promise to read my Bible two hours every day, never backtalk my mother and become a missionary when I grew up, if only I could be cured?

I did.

Did I hear whispered that homosexuals are monsters, child molesters with horns and red eyes who lisp and can’t hit a baseball, and know for a fact I wasn’t one of those even though the part about the baseball fit?

I did.

Did I lean on my reputation as the shy studious type to avoid dating women in high school and college as much as possible?

I did.

Did I learn to live in my body as in a house divided, keep at arm’s length the despicable part of me that lusted after men, assure myself this wasn’t the real me, and succeed so well that as a college senior I could find excuses to bathe whenever our floor’s resident Greek god padded his way down the hall to the group showers wrapped only in a towel, and envy the towel, yet banish from consciousness the idea I might be gay?

I did.

Did I marry a hard-headed woman in the sincere belief I was doing what was right, honorable and holy, and in the hope she would save me from myself only to learn she did not have the power to change me?

I did.

Did I become father to three sons, change diapers, read stories, play Robin Hood, sing songs, make funny voices and discover that parenthood, while demanding, did not lessen my attraction to men nor its accompanying self-hatred?

I did.

Did I finally devise a way to kill myself and test it on several small animals to make sure it worked?

I did.

I did all this and more. And although I peered into the void, I did not follow through with my planned suicide. After I composed my final farewell, I made a small choice for life, postponed my death for an hour, then a day, a week. (At such times grace may be measured in minutes.)

Even as I believed hope was gone and all was finished, a whole new world was waiting to be born—a world I had never dared imagine, never heard described in positive terms, never believed would receive, bless and nurture the likes of me. A world in which I am acceptable as I am, loved without having to change, remake or undo myself. Nowadays I often see it reflected in my gay friends and chosen family, in our shared laughter, warm embraces, genuine regard.

Here’s the thing: this world had been there all along. It had been and was and is within me. Within each one of us. The path is uncharted, the way perilous, the door hidden, the night dark. Yet life endures, cloaks itself even in catastrophe, calls to us ever and anon, in tones loud and soft. May we with courage listen, respond, reach deep, take hold the key, unlock and pry open the door, step into All that awaits us there.

 

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This piece appears in Flying Island Journal, May 2014

Ilustration: Spooky Dad at flickr