The other gay marriages

I've known three in my life, at least three that I was pretty sure about because I inadvertently witnessed something secret. There was a fourth, but I couldn't say with conviction he was the real deal like the other three. They all broke my heart. I wonder what ever happened to them.

Married men, family men. Attentive and sweet to their wives. Doting with the kids. They followed all the rules meticulously: mowing the lawn in baggy Bermudas on Saturday afternoon, attending galas in sharp tuxedos on Saturday night and coaching the little league team on Sunday morning. The office and briefcase rounded out the week. Their silk ties were always perfect.

Too perfect.

Ten years ago, twenty years ago, fifty years ago, no years ago. It doesn't matter. There is an entire army of gay men who shoved their homosexuality into the closet and locked it there. They bravely stepped into hetero life. They married and just ... what? Maybe they hoped their sexuality would go away or maybe they pushed it away with drugs and alcohol (one of the ones I knew was constantly popping Valium). Maybe they ended up stealing taboo pleasures in filthy bathroom stalls. Remember Larry Craig? A lot of people laughed at the conservative politician from Idaho. I didn't. There's nothing funny about denying something as human and innate as your sexuality.

The polls and headlines tell us attitudes towards homosexuality are changing with lightning speed. However fast it happens, it will never be fast enough for all those gay men who were so afraid of what they were that they cheated themselves out of an honest life and the simple joys of natural love. I'll leave the painful silence of their wives for another essay.

So then, dear readership, while politicians decried the downfall of a sacred institution and flamboyant celebrants waved rainbow colored flags in the wake of this week's SCOTUS rulings, the true victory was quietly marked. It bloomed within the men I knew all those years ago and countless others just like them as they mused on the day when no one will feel compelled to live the lie:

It's getting closer. 

*  *  *

Last notes on Craig

Much has been written about the Craig debacle over the past days and I was glad to add my essay on closeted gay conservatives to the fray. If you haven't read it, I welcome you to do so. It's a bit different than some of the angry political barbs flying back and forth. And the comment section is wonderful. The whole thing has given me pause, so here's a few notes in closing.

All Craig allegedly did was solicit consensual adult sex. No kids, no blood, no guns, no drugs. Didn't all us liberals hate the lynching Clinton withstood over a consensual blow job?

It is homophobia that forces gays into the closet (or bathroom).

Imagine being a 12-year-old boy with burgeoning feelings of homosexuality. Imagine being surrounded by homophobic adult males. In the worst case, they're talking about how that little queer got what he deserved. Or maybe their talking about how all the homos are going to burn in hell.

The fear and shame that would instill are unspeakable--something a heterosexual person cannot fully understand. And the fear is real. Homophobia cost Matthew Sheppard his life. Back in the 80s, a gay friend of mine was beat to an inch of his life by Cleveland mafioso street thugs. They did it just for kicks.

Is it any surprise that a young gay boy would do ANYTHING to convince those around him that he is not gay? That he would tell himself I've got to act like I hate gays too. And I better be convincing. I better cry out against it and politic against it and maybe if I shout loud enough, I'll even start to convince myself.

That sort of overcompensation makes perfect sense to me. And that's why I'm hesitant to use the word hypocrite.

Sure, one can say that, as an adult, Craig or others like him should come clean. But once you are ensconced in the lie, it gets harder and harder and harder to break out of it--there is more at stake, more people involved.

One note to those who are quick to say Craig or others like him are putting their wives' health at risk. I don't think its fair to assume he did not practice safe sex. Or that his wife did not know of his practices. We have no idea about these things. Would it be fair to make the same claim of any bisexual man? That his female partners are at risk and that he should be vilified for it?

Despite our perceived sophistication, homophobia still riddles our society. It seems worse for the men. In my experience, straight women happily embrace gay women as friends and feel no threat. But seeing gay and straight guys hanging out together isn't so common. Even the most liberal guys I know feel a need to occasionally announce that they are on the straight side of the fence. They have a way of conferring that they are secure in their manhood. They often wrap it around a joke or weave it casually into conversation.

Homosexuality is an elemental part of the human experience.

It should be considered by everyone as a personal and inalienable right. Craig's demise (or Foley's or Haggert's ) is really the liberal's opportunity to draw attention to this in an intelligent way.

Peace out--

Erin

Senator Craig redux

So you're born.

You're a kid. You're attracted to toys. You like crayons and dolls, but you're given trucks and soldiers. And downcast glances from the surrounding adults when you protest. You are told what is appropriate and what is not.

So you do what is appropriate because you want to be a good boy. You want the validation good boys get.

With every passing season, you have urges to do more and more inappropriate things. Sure, girls are pretty. But as you twirl around with them at the Freshman Snowball, it is the angular boys who make your eyes smoky.

You look away, you force yourself, telling yourself it is wrong and unnatural. You just have to try harder, be more conservative. Behave yourself and it will go away. It is silly and stupid. You will grow out of it.

(something deep inside of you says this is horribly wrong. But you have no choice, so you ignore this instinct)

You go to the conservative church with your parents. You embrace all things conservative. If you practice, practice, practice, the thing inside you will go away. You pray to God. If you are an enthusiastic member of His team, He will surely erase the wrong thing.

(shhhh. don't worry. no one will ever find out what you do with those other boys in secret places that feels so good)

Conservatives all around you all the time. Your family, telling you what is right and what to be. You find the more you act like them, the more approval they give you. Approval feels good. You go to a conservative college and keep talking loud and conservatively.

(you are very quiet during the stolen moments with the beautiful boys)

You marry a conservative woman, one who will match your burgeoning political career. You mount and impregnate her. These are simple motions. The children come.

The older you get, the more you realize that the urges inside of you are not going to go away. They are elemental. And The Other people would accept them. But they wear blue and ride donkeys. You wear red and are high on a lumbering elephant, which means money and power and adoration from all the conservatives. You speak their language and wish, wish, wish with all your heart that you could believe it. So you speak it louder in order to imbue the words with power. You denounce and denounce. Sometimes you even think it is working.

(all of this is very big, so you must keep the lovers very anonymous and secret. you may not even exchange names)

Years pass. You instill your children with the conservative values you want so desperately to believe because nothing could be worse than the hell you have lived. And every week you pray at church, searching for an answer, praying it could be different, hoping this thing is not genetic and that it is in one of your children.

(your desire does not wane. you want and want and want, something sexual and brilliant and dynamic, but this you may not have for such a thing would surely be discovered. life is not fair.)

The covert tricks and behaviors are easy enough to learn. Sometimes money changes hands, sometimes not. The acts are played out in filthy places. They are not the honest sex acts you crave

(the most dishonest sex acts are those with your wife you are sorry you are sorry sorry sorry sorr)

the simple human connection with another man,

(it hurts no one but you can't have it)

but they are all you may have, so you settle for the sordid couplings and all their banal satisfaction.

(sorry can't have it and help. who would ever know it's just the taptaptap of my foot just like Dorothy trying to get the hell out of Oz and I've got something that will put you over the rainbow big guy)

And in one instant inside a vile public bathroom stall, your entire life crumbles.