This Pride Week, 2016, I want to write about the PRIDE I have in those in this community that have always lived their truth.
When I look back on this fabulous gay life, and make no mistake, it is FABULOUS, I have many wonderful memories for which I am eternally grateful, but I also have many pointed, not so fabulous memories. Tent posts, if you will, of my understanding of who I am and what it meant to be GAY.
You see...The world told me I was GAY long before I knew what GAY was.
All I knew, in my youngest memories, was how happy I was when I heard music that I loved. So happy, in fact, that I would skip and sing and dance. At first, as a child, this skipping, singing and dancing seemed to make others smile, and that made me even happier. But eventually, that singing, skipping and dancing was called GAY, by strange older boys that didn't even know me. I didn't really know what they meant, but I could tell by their tone that they didn't mean it nicely. SO...
I decided, I won't do that around strangers.
At home, all I knew was how beautiful I thought Eartha Kitt was when she graced our 27'' inch color TV in her black shimmery cat suit with the tell tale purr of the deliciously wicked Cat Woman. Naturally, when it was time to play superheros and villains, with my brothers and older cousins, Cat Woman was the only villain worth ANYTHING to me. There was absolutely NO QUESTION. Again, the world, in the form of my brothers and cousins, told me..."That's gay!"
By now, I had come to the conclusion that GAY was "the wrong thing to be" and I didn't understand.
I was just being myself. How could it be bad? As I cried, my mother, and my Aunt Mary, the two greatest influences of my early childhood, told me that it was okay. They explained that I could play how ever I wanted and if the other kids didn't like it, I didn't have to play with them. "It's their loss."
WHAT A CONCEPT! It's THEIR LOSS!!
Wow, looking back, I wish I really understood the truth in those words. But, the big boys didn't want to play with me, and it hurt. Though, I couldn't play with the big boys, I very quickly found my salvation and new inspiration in MY COUSIN TINA!
She was cooler than anything and anyone I had ever known, as I entered my early elementary years.
I lived in a small town in North Carolina, and she was one of my cousins from the DC Area.
(When you're from a small town, there is nothing cooler than someone from the city!)
Multiply that by the fact that she popped her collar, bleached her hair and loved the colors pink and purple... she was basically EVERYTHING I EVER WANTED TO BE!!
When she came down to North Carolina to visit, I was able to be myself. I was clicking and popping and gossiping with her like one of the girls. She would let me brush her hair and she would dress me up "cool" and I was in heaven. When she left...life was far less colorful. I've already written before, how eventually, I tried my best to "Fit In" and chose to change how I presented myself in my community. Life got easier for me as I started acting "Less Gay."
Now, that said, let's face it, it didn't always work. More times than I can count, someone was calling me a faggot for some reason or another, BUT, each time that happened, I took it as a lesson, another mark for me to show how much more work I had ahead of me. The goal...not to be me.
I am proud to say that my story does have a happy ending.
I eventually learned to be myself, once again, if merely out of exhaustion, and live today the happy GAY life that I know I was meant to lead. This brings me, finally, to the point of this story.
THANK YOU, to all of those wonderful, fearless individuals that I saw throughout my life. The hair dresser in my home town, the line cook at my first job, the wonderful butch saxophone player in my high school band...
One at a time, in different towns, in different schools, at different jobs and in different ways...
YOU didn't change who you are. You beautiful, wonderful people that found a strength that I didn't have, to say, under the same circumstances and even worse, "IT'S YOUR LOSS."
Seeing you live your truth has helped me. 17 years ago, I decided to step forward and live my own truth. You and your strength inspire me every day.
Now, I am the living the GAY life that I started to live the second I was born, and this week, the week that we celebrate the Historical Status of Stonewall, the Home of the the Gay Rights Movement, I take enormous pride in this life and my community.
But today, I want to single out one group, and say, I am ESPECIALLY PROUD of those that have found the inner strength and chose NEVER TO HIDE. It is NOT an easy thing to do. Every day, you chose to block out those negative voices, now matter what the personal cost, and live your truth.
You are DAMN SPECIAL and more people should tell you.
Here's hoping that someday, very soon, no one will have to hide again!
HAPPY PRIDE 2016!!
