Figuring out Queer

“Oh, you never want to go to a school like Vasser, or any of The Seven Sisters, because they’re all full of lesbians,” declared my best friend.  We were standing in the hallway of my high school sometime in 1984 and I remember a few other kids were there and even a guidance counselor, nodding his head in agreement.  It is my earliest memory of a consciousness of being gay, of actually identifying with that word:  Lesbian.  I remember thinking clearly: That’s where I MUST go, and, When I get to college, I can tell people, until then, I MUST keep it a secret. But college, college, college, I can finally be free in college.

I think about the thoughts that led up to this moment.  I have an early memory of being at Myrtle Beach, floating on a raft on my stomach with my head resting on my hands, looking at the people on the beach and thinking, I’m not like them, any of them, and I have to hide it, I have to keep myself a secret.  I was eight.   I remember in all my family’s travels across the country, when no one I knew was around, introducing myself to strangers as a boy.  I wanted so badly to be a boy.  First to have their freedom, next to have their girlfriends.   I remember watching soap operas and falling in love with Laura and thinking, I would be so much much better for her than Luke or Scotty.  I dreamed myself as the perfect boyfriend all through my childhood.  I remember how in all the childhood games, I insisted on being Chachi or Joe Hardy or Luke Skywalker.   All the sex education books told me having crushes on girls was entirely “normal” for the pre-teen and no indication of future aberrant behavior.  I don’t know at what point I realized I didn’t have to be a boy to have a girlfriend.  I could actually be a girl and have a girlfriend.

And how did I know “gay” even existed?  Again the early memories started with television.  The National Enquirer blowing up about Billie Jean King.  Rod Stewart having his stomach pumped.  A councilman shot in San Francisco.  My sister explaining the meaning of the lyrics of “Lola.”  The first time I heard the word “faggot” hurled at another kid was on the bus in fourth grade and my best friend had to explain all the words:  gay, faggot, dyke, lesbian, queer.  (My best friend did a lot of reading and had a way more worldly household.)  Martina Navratilova sent me to the tennis courts. Then Boy George appeared on MTV and when my father saw him, he muttered, What a fruit.  I looked at Culture Club and knew that was me; I didn’t have the hair or the make up and certainly not the style but I knew we were still the same.  

As I was entering my senior year, I was losing a different best friend to college. She left me with this parting advice:  Hey, there’s a girl I know from theater, you’ll probably meet her at the Thespian picnic, she’s had a really hard time because everyone is calling her a lesbian.  I don’t know if she actually IS a lesbian, well, yes, I do, she definitely is, but do you think you could try to be friends with her?   

Could I be friends with her?  Oh my god I was so excited to meet a real live lesbian who was actually my age.  This year I sent her a message on FB asking, I think you’re the first person I came out to, do you remember what I said?  She wrote back: You looked at me and told me that you were not gay and then you leaned over and kissed me. I don’t remember this, but I totally trust her version of events, especially since that sounds EXACTLY like something I would do.  

I regret  how after that kissing, I spiralled into a wave of self hatred which led me to reject my gay friends, hook up with a very sweet boy, and write suicide notes.  I was sure I was going to hell for being gay and the only thing that kept me from killing myself was that I also knew I would go to hell for killing myself.  

That time in my life completely informs my spirituality today:  

How we NEVER know how things are going to turn out. We know nothing.  I was seventeen and I was sure, absolutely certain, I was going to hell. A mere four years later, I was dancing with a hundred thousand queers in front of City Hall in San Francisco, thinking THANK GOD I AM GAY.  I imagine someone whispering to that 17 year old girl curled up, miserable on her bedroom floor:  You are perfect and soon you are going to be sooooo happy. If I find myself stuck in some kind of despair, I think of these mere four years and the distance traveled to get to such a place of acceptance and it doesn’t take four years anymore, thank goodness.