“The only place to begin is where I am, and whether by desire or disaster, I am here. My being here is not dependent on my recognition of the fact. I am here anyway. But it might help if I could learn to look around.”
―Pádraig Ó Tuama, In the Shelter: Finding a Home in the World
third grade. i remember spending—or wanting to spend—every recess talking. standing on the edge of the playground, while the other kids played on the playground, i was looking for conversation. for connection.
replaying the scene in my mind, i see her turn, eyes on her friends chasing one another on the playground. i see now that she just wanted to play. which is what she told me, eventually.
it took me a long time to realize i was longing most for connection. it always was about connection.
+ + +
“why do you think things didn’t work out between you two?” the senior pastor asked from a coffee shop one afternoon—the same pastor who would later shout at me in his office, telling me how selfish i was, asking if i knew how hard all of this was on him.
“my wife and i talked about it,” he told me before i could respond. “we think it’s because you’re curious. she’s not.”
curious.
in another conversation, around the same time, he would tell me that he could understand why some people would have an affair.
was he looking, i wonder now, for a confession?
+ + +
“i just thought you were gay,” my brother tells me, matter of factly, the only way he knows how. “yeah. i told my counselor. told mom. aunt laurie.”
he says it all with a smile, a hint of pride on his face.
it was a relief at the time, in a way. he saw something was off, deeply, even if his diagnosis was, well, his own.
an older friend and i are watching hudson shoot hoops in his garage on a saturday morning when he tells me about a friend who went through a divorce, and who later revealed to him, while golfing, that he was gay.
“i told him i still loved him,” this friend shared with me, catching a rebound and returning it to my son.
watching hudson pull back and release another jump shot, i nod my head.
+ + +
over lunch at a barbeque spot in the south, another older friend, a philosopher—and soon-to-be colleague—tells me about his oldest son being admitted to a psychiatric ward, to prevent him from hurting himself. he was in college at the time.
“when he was released, he came out to us,” my friend explained, taking a break from his plate of brisket.
“we knew, of course,” he shrugged. “but he had to come to it on his own. he had that knowledge locked up, so far down inside.”
“he’s married now,” his face lights up, “to a man who loves him, and he’s flourishing.”
+ + +
sixth grade. walking to my after-school sitter’s home with two friends, i’m pushed to the ground from behind. called “fag.”
my friends watch, quietly.
“come on,” i vaguely recall the older one of them saying, without moving. “leave him alone.”
it’s because of my shoes, i know. i had the same pair as his sister, he’d pointed out to me earlier in the week. blue denim sketchers, white sole. i insisted they were in the boys’ section.
it didn’t matter, of course. his young anger founds its way into me in the shape of fear.
eventually, i picked myself up. we walked to our sitter’s house in silence.
+ + +
high school. advanced algebra. an older student, justin, leans toward my desk.
“hey, do you know nick’s phone number?” he asks with a smirk.
i did, of course. nick was one of my closest friends. i spent many days after school at his home, playing tony hawk. eating quesadillas. we played football together, and basketball. and baseball. his mom was like a second mom to me.
justin’s girlfriend elbows his ribs.
“that’s mike’s cousin,” she says. “knock it off.”
years later, some time after college, i hear justin was suing his employer. some of his colleagues were harassing him. calling him gay.
+ + +
“i never saw you hold her hand,” my brother says. “never saw you kiss.”
he was right. i noticed it, too. and i wondered if our children did.
public affection was something i assumed was not available to me. seeing other couples embrace on the street, holding hands, exchanging kisses. it fascinated me.
i longed for that kind of love. not public, per se. but unrestrained. love as compulsion.
“that’s not something that’s available to you,” i told myself.
+ + +
“why do you always dress so formal?” my daughter asks me one night on the phone. “why can’t you wear athletic clothes, like mr. _______.”
i smile.
“mr. _______ is a pe teacher, sweetheart. it makes sense that he wears sweats and gym shorts. i’m an editor and a writer. i dress like one.”
+ + +
that t-shirt, still in my dresser. my old favorite shirt, the grey pocket-t with a pink and purple floral design.
“it looks gay,” my ex told me.
so i stopped wearing it, i’m embarrassed to say. but i’m dusting it off.
+ + +
“what’s ‘fruity’ mean, dad?” my son asks me, something he overheard his sister say.
“it’s how your dad dresses,” my brother says before i can respond. so i don’t.
“i just assumed you were gay,” his words still echo in my mind, years later.
gay, which is to say, queer. which is to say, different. which is to say, you don’t belong–here, with us.
+ + +
“someone on the bus called me gay, dad,” my son tells me, at the conclusion of 2023, more than 20 years after justin’s question in advanced algebra. some 25 years after being shoved to the ground and called “fag.”
“so they think you’re kind?” i respond, without missing a beat, without thinking. “all of my gay friends are some of the kindest people i know.”
he doesn’t say anything more about it.
a couple months later, on the phone one night, my son tells me, “i don’t think anyone in my class knows i’m sensitive.”
“no? why do you say that?”
“because they all think i’m so strong.”
“you don’t think you can be sensitive and strong?” i ask. he’s quiet. “your sensitivity is something we all of us need, buddy. in fact, i think your sensitivity is your superpower.”
+ + +
“you’re lucky,” my partner’s mom tells her after meeting me. “you’ve got a girl-guy.”
girl-guy. which i take as a compliment. girl-guy. which is to say, not entirely one of us, nor entirely one of them, but somewhere in-between.
+ + +
It seems you love this world very much.
“Yes,” I said. “This beautiful world.”
And you don’t mind the mind that keeps you
busy all the time with its dark and bright wonderings?
“No, I’m quite used to it. Busy, busy all the time.”
And you don’t mind living with those questions,
I mean the hard ones that no one can answer?
“Actually, they’re the most interesting.”
And you have a person in your life whose
hand that you like to hold?
“Yes, I do.”
It must surely, then, be very happy down there in your heart.
“Yes,” I said. “It is.”
—mary oliver, “felicity”
hands&feet 