So today is National Coming Out Day, and it’s got me thinking about coming out stories. Mine is not even worth telling, the responses I got were along the lines of a mild shrug. It was so underwhelming, in fact, that I forgot to come out to my step-father. One day in the car I made a passing reference, which led to an exchange something like this:
Him: “You’re bi?”
Me: “You knew that.”
Him: “No I didn’t, you never told me.”
Me: “Yes I did.”
Him: “No you didn’t.”
Me: “I’m sure I did, I must have…didn’t I?”
Him: “you definitely did not.”
Me: “Huh…well, I’m bi.”
Needless to say I didn’t have the kind of parents you worry too much about. Plus, of course, there was the fact that my sister was already out to them. My friends weren’t an issue, since my best friend was gay and I hung out with a bunch of lefty freaks. No, my coming out story was decidedly uninteresting.
My friends, on the other hand, not so much.
My best friend in high-school came out with a bang. In a small town of 6,500 he decided to save time by making a shirt that said, “Here stands a queer” AND writing “fag” on the ass of his jean shorts. Did I mention it was 1990? To this day I still don’t know how he escaped being full-on bashed. That’s not to say things were easy for him. When he came out to his guidance counselor he was advised to drop-out of school, not long after he did just that.
One year, and several live-in boyfriends later, we were sharing an apartment in St. C_ with his boyfriend. We went for a visit to the old stomping grounds and went to a dance where we boldly slow danced in same-sex pairs, the entire dance floor cleared as people stared at us in stunned silence. The rest of the night was spent rounding up a cadre of mullet headed bouncers to escort us safely from the dance.
When we got back to his mom’s house and he excitedly said to her, “Mom, you won’t believe it we danced!” she replied hopefully, “Wow that’s great, you danced with a girl?”
His face dropped and he said, “No with each other, me and my boyfriend.”
“Oh” she said, “I thought you meant with a girl.”
It was heartbreaking. For a split second we thought that finally she’d come around, finally he’d be able to share his life and his joys with her. To see his eyes light up when she first sounded so happy, and then to see them go so dark when she showed her disappointment, heartbreaking.
I’ve had friends kicked out of the house, beaten up by their fathers, and made to feel invisible. Some dropped out of school, some turned to prostitution, some spent too much time in emotionally, and sometimes physically, abusive relationships.
All because people assumed that they were something that they weren’t.
All because people didn’t give them the freedom and space to beand know who they were without fear.
All because people were threatened by the truth of who they really were.
Coming out shouldn’t be hard, it shouldn’t be dangerous, it shouldn’t be necessary.
In celebration of National Coming Out Day, I invite you to raise your kids so that they never have to come out, because they have the freedom to know and be who they are from the beginning. And because they know in their hearts and their minds that you will always love all of who they are.
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