Another Coming Out Story...
A couple of Friday nights ago while I was cocktailing, I met yet another twenty-one year old gay person. This twenty-one year old was a very handsome young man but he was troubled. His dark brooding eyes were made darker by his pensive attitude and his naturally rebellious locks were forced into calm ringlets by his depression. I bought him a drink - someone had to do it - and asked if I could get him anything else. "Yeah," he answered sarcastically, "how about a new set of parents."
“You’re not having fun with the old ones?” I shouted above the blare of the video.
“Kind of like that,” he replied. “See, I just came out, and I don’t think they’re going to take it well at all.”
“Do you have to tell them?” I asked. That is always my first question since I know over a third of my friends have never really taken that step.
“I feel I do,” he pouted. “I just think they are going to explode.”
“Well, “I said sympathetically, “I’m not the best in the advice department, but I do remember telling my parents, and I do remember strange situations from friends who haven’t told theirs, so maybe I can help.”
He downed his drink and laughed bitterly, “Sure, you can have me over for Christmas and Thanksgiving from now on – after I tell them.”
“What makes you think they’re going to disown you?”
“Well,” he said, “They’re pretty religious, and gay is not smiled upon by the higher being.”
I smiled at this guy, now he was in my territory and I did have a story to share with him. I lit a cigarette, and with this young man in tow, I began a journey down one of the foot-trails along memory lane…”let me tell you about LIFE WITHOUT SOCKS.”
I was eighteen when I first realized that perhaps I was following the beat of a different drummer so to speak. I didn’t look like I was headed that way. On the contrary, I looked the way I had been raised: very feminine, very straight, and very Mormon. My parents had raised me for the sole purpose of getting married and replenishing the earth. Hopefully I would at least sort of like the other half of my replenishing partnership, but I don’t think, given the possible alternatives, that this was their prime concern. I was in my first month of my first year of college and was taking a drama class, (“Draem-ah” as my mother always managed to pronounce it) when I came face to face with my unraveling. Her name was Lyn. I’ve always suspected the name Lyn, spelled L-Y-N meant something along the lines of ‘loss of control’ or ‘parents’ enemy’ or ‘your daughter is one’, something like that, something that warns you a great change is about to take place, one our parents didn’t foresee, one they didn’t tell you about when you were fourteen and sitting in the back row of health class located in the basement of the school gymnasium. My Lyn was in the form of a very beautiful, very androgynous woman just a shade older than myself. I found the shade to be intriguing - in truth, I found everything about her to be intriguing.
Intriguing? My, how subtle I’ve hoped to become in my older years. Actually, I wanted her in the worst way and if that was standing up in a hammock – so be it. Perhaps I wouldn’t have chased her so mercilessly if I hadn’t believed her to be a card carrying lesbian, but I was young then and didn’t realize that androgyny was not necessarily a prerequisite for lesbianism. No, in my mind she was a definite lesbian…and she wanted me.
I followed her everywhere she went, did everything she did and made subtle suggestions every chance I got. My friend “Mikey” suggested I hang a sign around my neck that said “Take Me.” He made some other suggestions, too, that don’t bear repeating. Finally it happened. Lyn invited me to her house for the weekend. That was all I needed. I, who had always been the responsible daughter and child, did not even remember to tell my parents that I had gone. I just went, and it was magic.
Perhaps I should have gone home after the weekend – after all, I was still living with mom and dad. Perhaps Lyn and I shouldn’t have walked all over campus arm in arm, hand in hand, heads bent. I’m sure I’d do it all different now, but back then all I knew was that something magical had happened, something I had secretly waited for since I had heard my first fairy tale.
They called me at Lyn’s on Tuesday night. I hadn’t been home since Friday. My mother had heard something from my best friend about my behavior on campus. Not her little girl!!! They asked me to come home for a family conference, she begged me to be “okay.” Sick with dread I took a bus to the east side where I lived, where they lived, where we once had lived together.
When I got inside the house, there was no one at home besides my brother.
“Baseball,” I said, “I think I love a woman.”
“Great!” he said and went back to sniffling glue. I saw the dog.
“Brut,” I said, “I think I love a woman.”
He looked at me, yawned, and went back to licking his penis. This was not helping me prepare for the mom and dad, not in the least. I told the fireplace, the rhododendron bush, the silver tea service and the new patchwork print couch and chair which clashed with the rest of the living room. Nothing moved, changed color or disintegrated – I knew it would be different when mom and dad got there.
At six forty-two they entered the house. “Are you a lesbian?” my dad asked shakily.
“What’s a lesbian?” I countered.
“A woman who loves women,” he replied.
“Well, then no,” I reasoned, “because I only love one woman.”
That’s when my mom ran out of the room screaming and called every relative she remembered. I could hear her in the back bedroom wailing Irish curses and announcing the news while my dad tried to reason with me. Finally, after Fall turned to Winter (or so it seemed) my mother came out of the bedroom. She leveled her gaze on me and with much composure said, “Barmaid, I just cannot accept this…this…’phase’ you are going through. Going through life without a man, is like going through life without socks. It’s just not dignified.”
I waited for more flash, more fireworks, but that was all. The conversation was finished. I moved out of the house that night and for the next year pondered many things. I missed my parents and was devastated that they didn’t understand, but at the same time I was proud of myself for being honest with them. We had always had honesty between us and at least that hadn’t changed.
That first Christmas was very hard, for them too I’m sure, but somehow I made it through and then, right before my birthday something wonderful happened…I received a letter in the mail – actually it was more like clippings with a note attached… the note read:
“As you can see from these clippings, I guess I may have been a bit hasty. It appears that going sock-less is now in fashion. I love you. Please come home to dinner for your birthday and bring your friend. Love, Mom.”
The pictures were of new spring fashions – short pants, Keds, and yes...no socks.
It’s been almost 10 years since then, and my parents have been two of my best friends. They don’t always understand, but I don’t always understand, either. “Life without socks” isn’t always easy.
“Great story,” the guy said as he stood up to leave; he walked toward the bathroom and it occurred to me that you probably had to be there. Later that night, however, after the bar had closed and only the employees were left, the janitor came out of the men’s bathroom looking ever so perplexed.
“What a weird night,” he said, “Look, some guy left these in the john.” While others crowded around to identify the pieces held by the dumbfounded janitor, I just stayed in my place and smiled. I knew what the janitor had found because I had seen the young man when he left the bar, and he was showing a well turned ankle.
Written by TalkofLondon
You absolutely make my day! Especially loved "The Almost Donner Party"! :)
Posted by: Fama | March 16, 2009 at 12:25 PM