Not long ago, I told my parents and one brother (and his wife) about my homoliciousness. Since then, we've spoken about it some, fairly openly, in fact. My older, married brother occasionally asks me questions. I had told them I don't want to talk incessantly about it but they were allowed two or three questions at a time. He's taken me up on that a few times, usually starting with something like, "OK, my first of my three allowed questions..." I thought I would share a small sampling of my brother's questions:
Question: Explain something to me: you've said you could see yourself making it work with a girl, even if it wouldn't be as fulfilling as it might be with a guy. But I can't even begin to think I could be with a guy romantically or sexually. It's just not in my comprehension. So how does that work?
Answer: Well, some people would probably argue everyone's meant to be heterosexual, so what I experience is a deviation from the norm and I therefore have remnants of normality. But I'd also argue that you'd definitely be able to imagine being with a guy if you grew up in a culture where homosexuality was the norm, and you spent most of your life looking forward to someday finding your partner but wondering why you just didn't seem to be as into guys as other guys and why girls caught your interest so much. Imagining being with a girl is certainly nothing new to me. I was raised to think that way.
Question: I think I have a pretty good gaydar, but you don't set off my gaydar, except knowing how little you've dated and how much opportunity you've had. Is it safe to assume there are a lot of people who are just not stereotypical who I just don't notice?
Answer: Yup. We're everywhere. At least a couple in every ward. Probably more in many wards. The guy who likes sports and seems almost comically homophobic might be. Male ward organists. A fair portion of the BYU Men's Chorus. Don't get me started on how I've heard of BYU Men's Chorus members making the rounds... Oh, and BYU Young Ambassadors (a ...flamboyant broadway-ish music/dance performing group)? Yeah, total red flag, even if they're not particularly femmy. Probably most of them are unusually fond of men. As for more stereotypical, that effeminate guy in the ward you've always thought would be gay if he weren't married: he's probably just gay AND married.
Question: That friend who picked you up at our house one time. Was he one of the two you mentioned as having been romantic?
Answer: Yeah, he was. But by then, we had already curbed the romantic side of things, but that may have been the first we'd seen each other since I moved away. So...yeah...there was probably some excitement to see each other again.
His Response:: Oh good! Our 'dars aren't totally broken. 'Cause I have to tell you, [Sister-in-law] and I both noticed something different there. When you left, I looked at her and asked, "Did they--"
She said, "Yup!"
"--seem like a couple to you?"
"Yup!"
Then we both shrugged it off.
My response: Yeah, I thought it was obvious. Good job on that one.
Question: How do you meet other guys who deal with this? Are you sitting in a PPI with your Elder's Quorum president, and just say, "Hey, you're neat..."?
Answer: Only once. ...No! Actually, it's mostly like, you meet one through some coincidence or an online group or something, and you just start meeting others. They come out of the woodwork. It's a big, homo snowball effect. In Utah, they're coming out of every nook and cranny. Seriously. They're everywhere. You have to watch where you step. Don't want homo on your shoe.
Question: OK, so look over here (points towards a very seductive-looking woman with long, reddish-brown hair and tight-fitting clothes on her trim, curvy figure which I'm sure should send me into a drooling stutter). Are you telling me that--(he points again emphatically)--that just doesn't do it for you?
Answer: I recognize she's a nice-looking woman, for sure. But see, here's the thing: when you asked me that, you distracted me from watching an attractive guy walk over that way.
His response: (hearty laughter)
Showing posts with label Telling My Family. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Telling My Family. Show all posts
27 February 2008
21 February 2008
Breast Preference
So I got together with the fam recently, and we were all sitting around the dinner table, my brother and his family, my parents, and myself. We were eating spaghetti with pieces of chicken cooked in the sauce. I took a smaller piece, not being very hungry. But it turned out to be darker meat, and I prefer light meat when it comes to poultry.
I commented that the piece I had taken was dark meat and offered it to the first taker. My mom said she'd take it (not just motherly self-sacrifice--she actually likes the stuff...weird) and said to look in the sauce for more. "There should be some breasts left. I made sure to put in plenty 'cause I know you prefer breasts."
My brother, grinning wryly, quickly quipped, "Apparently not, we've learned." And there was much laughter.
Later that evening, the subject of an old breast pump came up and the comedy of using such a contraption (I won't even go into that, but let's just say they were talking piston-driven suction), along with the necessity of using them when babies won't breastfeed. My mother commented that when I was a baby, she had to find ways to feed me because I wouldn't nurse. I always fell asleep.
...now, would you pass up this opportunity? I sure wouldn't. I said, "Wow. Bored from a really early age." And there was much laughter.
Breast jokes are fun.
I commented that the piece I had taken was dark meat and offered it to the first taker. My mom said she'd take it (not just motherly self-sacrifice--she actually likes the stuff...weird) and said to look in the sauce for more. "There should be some breasts left. I made sure to put in plenty 'cause I know you prefer breasts."
My brother, grinning wryly, quickly quipped, "Apparently not, we've learned." And there was much laughter.
Later that evening, the subject of an old breast pump came up and the comedy of using such a contraption (I won't even go into that, but let's just say they were talking piston-driven suction), along with the necessity of using them when babies won't breastfeed. My mother commented that when I was a baby, she had to find ways to feed me because I wouldn't nurse. I always fell asleep.
...now, would you pass up this opportunity? I sure wouldn't. I said, "Wow. Bored from a really early age." And there was much laughter.
Breast jokes are fun.
08 January 2008
Integration
Had a good talk on the phone with my mom tonight. A lot of emotions came flooding back to me as we discussed my situation. I realized, tonight, what a dam I had built up.
Backing up a bit: I sent an e-mail to my parents and my brother and his wife last weekend explaining the fact that yes, I am attracted to members of the same gender, and yes, it's hard sometimes, and yes, I'm OK. It was a long e-mail. Maybe I'll post it here sometime. Their responses probably couldn't have been better. Short, sweet expressions of love and gratitude, followed by, "Now that that's out of the way, let's talk about our upcoming family ski trip..."
Tonight was the first time I've talked with any of them since the e-mail. I've played some phone tag with my bro and his wife, but my mom was the first I've talked to. She's been on a bit of an emotional roller coaster and just wanted to hear my voice. Normally, I would assure her I'm fine and send her on her way to rest easy and go to sleep. I didn't. I did say I'm fine, or OK. I didn't want to go into the nitty gritty with her right away. I don't want to overwhelm her with details or the tougher nuances of what I'm going through.
But something in her tone told me she has been worrying about those nuances for years already, and she confirmed that's true. The news had come as no huge shock to any of them. They've all suspected, of course. I mean, I'm on my way to 30, totally single, disinterested in girls, and hey, I'm not totally hideous or bankrupt personalitywise, so why else would I be so very clinically single? OK, so there are lots of reasons to suspect me.
Anyway, as our conversation unfolded, I surprised myself. Apparently, I have some desire to share myself and my life with my parents, after all. I didn't know I had it in me. I have felt so disconnected in some ways for so long that I thought we had just sort of drifted apart. But as I expounded on my struggles and my perspectives on the whole wretched mess, and as I also tried to assure her that I feel like I'm in a pretty good place, emotionally, right now, I found myself daring to expose myself in a vulnerable way and risked saying things that might upset her a little but trusted in her ability to deal with it. As I told her how Dad's advice about just choosing someone to commit to regardless of shortcomings but based on mutual love and bringing out the best in each other finally made sense to me when directed towards a male friend I felt romantic feelings for over a year ago, I broke down. I couldn't talk for a minute. The sorrow around feeling disallowed from putting my dad's advice to use proved greater than I thought.
She was patient and strong and told me I didn't have to talk about it if I didn't want to but that if I did, she was listening. I gathered my strength and told her how hard it has been to finally realize what that kind of emotional connection feels like only to force it away and how foolish I felt, sometimes, for not having been through this 15 years ago like a "normal" person and how I felt kind of stupid over a recent infatuation that reminded me how little those feelings can really mean but how much I want to experience them together with--or allow them to build to--real, genuine trust and respect and love. I shared my realization that there are deeper aspects to relationships and that I recognize the transience of "chemistry" and infatuation and that a real relationship is built on much more. I shared that recent experiences have helped me remember the importance of tried and tested friendships built on mutual respect, dedication, and selflessness in action. I shared my worries, my dilemas, my hopes, my sorrows... I shared with her without reservation for the first time in as long as I can remember. For once, she was really "Mom" again.
She told me how hard it was for her to see me withdraw as a young teenager, gradually and deeply. It pained her to watch her beautiful, "whole" boy become a withdrawn, fractured teenager. I told her about a recent realization I've been having. In my couple of friendships-turned-romantic, I have caught glimpses of an old me, a tender me, a sensitive and affectionate me I had thought was mostly lost or forgotten. And I've been realizing that as I am bringing the fractured parts of my life back together, the gay and the straight, the friends and the family, the tough and the vulnerable, into one integrated whole, I'm rediscovering myself in some ways. I'm learning that it's not necessarily just romance which brought out the more tender, beautiful parts in me I have shoved so deep. It's the intimacy, the vulnerability, the trust which I have trained myself to withhold so thoroughly unless unleashed by romantic attraction. It's time for some deliberate effort to bring those back and allow it all to meld back together. To not wait for fleeting romance to bring it out but to bring it out by my own choice. It's time to try, at least, to bring back more of the "whole" me.
This doesn't mean I'll be changing my demeanor with everyone. It doesn't mean there's a "new me" everyone will have access to. I don't really know what it means, to be honest, but I just feel something "real" in all of it. I feel like a dam burst, and I was truly vulnerable to my parents, with little to hide, for the first time in my adult life. I remembered that they've lived long lives, themselves, and they've been through the ups and downs, and a little hell, and they've experienced doubt and hope and fear and loneliness and infatuation and confusion and indecision... They don't know exactly what I'm going through, but they know me pretty well, even after all these years of careful compartmentalization. I now have far fewer details of my life to restrict from them. As she said to me, "I don't have all the answers. I can't tell you what to do with all of this. As your mother, I feel a bit helpless. But I believe you're doing the best you know how, and I trust the Lord to help you with it. You've been emotionally withdrawn from us for so long, leaving us to wonder. Now that's all out of the way. You don't have to do it anymore."
I don't. I didn't think it was that big a deal. Now, I realize it was.
Backing up a bit: I sent an e-mail to my parents and my brother and his wife last weekend explaining the fact that yes, I am attracted to members of the same gender, and yes, it's hard sometimes, and yes, I'm OK. It was a long e-mail. Maybe I'll post it here sometime. Their responses probably couldn't have been better. Short, sweet expressions of love and gratitude, followed by, "Now that that's out of the way, let's talk about our upcoming family ski trip..."
Tonight was the first time I've talked with any of them since the e-mail. I've played some phone tag with my bro and his wife, but my mom was the first I've talked to. She's been on a bit of an emotional roller coaster and just wanted to hear my voice. Normally, I would assure her I'm fine and send her on her way to rest easy and go to sleep. I didn't. I did say I'm fine, or OK. I didn't want to go into the nitty gritty with her right away. I don't want to overwhelm her with details or the tougher nuances of what I'm going through.
But something in her tone told me she has been worrying about those nuances for years already, and she confirmed that's true. The news had come as no huge shock to any of them. They've all suspected, of course. I mean, I'm on my way to 30, totally single, disinterested in girls, and hey, I'm not totally hideous or bankrupt personalitywise, so why else would I be so very clinically single? OK, so there are lots of reasons to suspect me.
Anyway, as our conversation unfolded, I surprised myself. Apparently, I have some desire to share myself and my life with my parents, after all. I didn't know I had it in me. I have felt so disconnected in some ways for so long that I thought we had just sort of drifted apart. But as I expounded on my struggles and my perspectives on the whole wretched mess, and as I also tried to assure her that I feel like I'm in a pretty good place, emotionally, right now, I found myself daring to expose myself in a vulnerable way and risked saying things that might upset her a little but trusted in her ability to deal with it. As I told her how Dad's advice about just choosing someone to commit to regardless of shortcomings but based on mutual love and bringing out the best in each other finally made sense to me when directed towards a male friend I felt romantic feelings for over a year ago, I broke down. I couldn't talk for a minute. The sorrow around feeling disallowed from putting my dad's advice to use proved greater than I thought.
She was patient and strong and told me I didn't have to talk about it if I didn't want to but that if I did, she was listening. I gathered my strength and told her how hard it has been to finally realize what that kind of emotional connection feels like only to force it away and how foolish I felt, sometimes, for not having been through this 15 years ago like a "normal" person and how I felt kind of stupid over a recent infatuation that reminded me how little those feelings can really mean but how much I want to experience them together with--or allow them to build to--real, genuine trust and respect and love. I shared my realization that there are deeper aspects to relationships and that I recognize the transience of "chemistry" and infatuation and that a real relationship is built on much more. I shared that recent experiences have helped me remember the importance of tried and tested friendships built on mutual respect, dedication, and selflessness in action. I shared my worries, my dilemas, my hopes, my sorrows... I shared with her without reservation for the first time in as long as I can remember. For once, she was really "Mom" again.
She told me how hard it was for her to see me withdraw as a young teenager, gradually and deeply. It pained her to watch her beautiful, "whole" boy become a withdrawn, fractured teenager. I told her about a recent realization I've been having. In my couple of friendships-turned-romantic, I have caught glimpses of an old me, a tender me, a sensitive and affectionate me I had thought was mostly lost or forgotten. And I've been realizing that as I am bringing the fractured parts of my life back together, the gay and the straight, the friends and the family, the tough and the vulnerable, into one integrated whole, I'm rediscovering myself in some ways. I'm learning that it's not necessarily just romance which brought out the more tender, beautiful parts in me I have shoved so deep. It's the intimacy, the vulnerability, the trust which I have trained myself to withhold so thoroughly unless unleashed by romantic attraction. It's time for some deliberate effort to bring those back and allow it all to meld back together. To not wait for fleeting romance to bring it out but to bring it out by my own choice. It's time to try, at least, to bring back more of the "whole" me.
This doesn't mean I'll be changing my demeanor with everyone. It doesn't mean there's a "new me" everyone will have access to. I don't really know what it means, to be honest, but I just feel something "real" in all of it. I feel like a dam burst, and I was truly vulnerable to my parents, with little to hide, for the first time in my adult life. I remembered that they've lived long lives, themselves, and they've been through the ups and downs, and a little hell, and they've experienced doubt and hope and fear and loneliness and infatuation and confusion and indecision... They don't know exactly what I'm going through, but they know me pretty well, even after all these years of careful compartmentalization. I now have far fewer details of my life to restrict from them. As she said to me, "I don't have all the answers. I can't tell you what to do with all of this. As your mother, I feel a bit helpless. But I believe you're doing the best you know how, and I trust the Lord to help you with it. You've been emotionally withdrawn from us for so long, leaving us to wonder. Now that's all out of the way. You don't have to do it anymore."
I don't. I didn't think it was that big a deal. Now, I realize it was.
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