A friend recently reminded me of a story from my childhood. Finding it powerful, he has been sharing it with others. Hearing it retold to me, I realized how one lesson learned late one night at a Christian camp may have shaped my entire life.
When I was a child, before becoming a Witness, I used to go a Mennonite summer camp called St. Andrews. We sang Christian songs, played sports, explored nature, met and learned about the Amish and each other. One night, while deep in sleep, my camp counselor woke our cabin with loud shouts, pushing back the protective night with bright light. We were all confused as he stormed at us asking if we were Christians. When he came at me, face flat and stern, I quickly shouted, “No! I’m not.” The moment I did, my heart sank and I knew that was the wrong answer. It came from that space within all of us that knows. It doesn’t have to think or ponder or guess. It knows. As he turned away to approach the next child, I yelled out, “Yes! Yes, I am.”
I am what I am. No more, no less. No matter the consequence. I must stand in my truth to be known.
I didn’t have this story in mind as a teenager struggling to find myself. By that time, I had lost touch with most of my inner guidance. Confused by life. I lied all the time about being gay. The number of people who were against my truth seemed innumerable. I could never guess who was safe. Who I could trust. In the end, I could only trust God, I hoped.
By meeting Vincent during my sophomore year, I could easily imagine being in love with a boy who loved me back. Once we finally met, we would explore the world and be on a lifelong adventure together. Taking risks, meeting strange characters on the fringes of life, and never being bored of one another. Never feeling alone. Always loving each other. Till death do us part.
That was the dream. But by junior year, I had become so hopeless, there was no choice but to fight for my life alone. Or rather, something within me began to fight. A part of me that still wanted to be known. My bitterness, once taken out on my dog, strategically turned towards my parents and the church. I began to withdraw from many of my duties as a Jehovah’s Witness and my mouth no longer understood censorship.
One day, my father came home as I was downstairs rinsing out the mop after cleaning the kitchen floor. I heard my father’s footsteps go up the stairs and straight into the kitchen.
“I just mopped the floor.” I shouted.
“It looks good.” He said.
“Don’t walk on it then.”
I heard his feet quickly moving down the stairs. He turned the corner and advanced. Without warning, the back of his hand met the side of my face and I was on the floor.
“Don’t you ever talk like that to me.”
I needed to get out. I didn’t want this life. This isn’t what I dreamed of. I didn’t equate the act of giving my life to God with giving my life to an organization or to parents who didn’t understand me. Who didn’t try to help me understand myself. They were not God and I vowed my life to him. No one else. I had to get out.
In the spring of 1997 Ellen Degeneres shocked TV audiences when she came out on her show, ELLEN. It was so amazing. I loved her character and always stood up for her when others called her gay. I knew they were really calling her sinful or bad. But she wasn’t. I wasn’t. The night Ellen came out, I quietly walked to the kitchen and called my sister who was away at school in New Jersey. Pulling the phone chord into a corner of the unlit dining room, I told her that I was gay with a quivering voice. She heard me out and told me not to tell mom and dad until she came home for summer break. She didn’t say why, but I agreed.
Summer break came, but I never got a chance to have a heart-to-heart conversation with my sister. When she arrived, my parents wanted to see her immediately. They escorted her down to the basement and closed the door. After a long time, they called me down to sit with them. As I entered the room, I saw my sister’s wet face and red eyes. My parents looked angry and unforgiving. Nothing new. It was they who told me her truth. She was gay. My father had overheard her on the phone with her girlfriend last summer and had been keeping it to himself until a talk at the Kingdom Hall convinced him to speak. She was to lose all financial assistance and could no longer call our home hers. She was now on her own. My mother then said, “This is a big shock to me, so if you’re gay, you should tell us now. I always assumed it would be you.” I looked at my sister as she carefully shook her head, no.
“No, I’m not,” I said. There was no sinking of the heart. No feeling of remorse. Only an emotionless tall wall between me and anyone who wished me harm. With that, they let me go. I had been spared but my sister had not.
I tried to find a way to live the life the Witnesses wanted for me. What God supposedly wanted for me. But deep down, I knew it was wrong. The deep feeling of death within told me it was wrong.
One day, an elder approached my family as we were about to leave the Kingdom Hall. He wanted to speak with us regarding my lack of activity within the fellowship. We stayed back and met in one of the conference rooms. They all wanted to know what was going on with me. Why I was withdrawing. I told them the truth. “I’m gay.” My head met my arms on the table and I cried into my too large polyester suit sleeves. So much weight and fear released with so few words. Right away my father assumed I had had sex with someone, which I hadn’t. “How do you know you’re gay, then?” he asked. “How did you know you were straight?” I replied.
The elder listened carefully and spoke. “Well, if you haven’t had sex, you’re safe. You haven’t broken any laws and you can still be a part of the congregation. You just have to never have sex.”
He basically told me I could never experience love. Yes, I know there are many kinds of love, but I was only interested in one. Romantic love. I longed for it so badly. It was to be my balm. The grace that would lift me up and make me okay in the world. Make me safe. I prayed that that meeting would set me free, but it only imprisoned me more. Even the truth could not set me free.
In my senior year, I was enrolled in AP Literature, which I surprisingly loved. I dove into the novels listed for us and enjoyed learning about various characters and how they maneuvered through their own trials and tribulations. It helped me take my mind off my own. It helped me to survive. Feeling like there were others out there who understood me. That year, I also discovered gay online chat rooms on yahoo and AOL. Every morning before the start of classes, I would go to the school library and chat online. I have no idea what we talked about. I do remember talking to one college kid whom I would meet the following year as we attended the same university. I also remember Neal.
Neal was a 49-year-old man from the Midwest who landed in DC due to a government job. He was divorced from his wife and had a couple of kids. I can vaguely remember a picture of him with his family next to his bed. A sort of Sears photography studio look. The three standing next to yet slightly behind him. He liked me. He called me his butterfly. He made me feel safe in the world. Safe enough to take risks.
