Home…

When my mom was alive, she constantly invited me and my friends over to her house, wanting us to watch scary movies, play games and eat a home cooked meal. Rarely, if ever, did we take her up on her offer. Weekly I would go over and visit, sitting for long hours in her living room, having “dangling conversation”, over strong coffee to the backdrop of Bob Dylan or Neil Young. Typically our conversations would range from the art of tea in oriental literature to the importance of a woman in the Supreme Court or our differences and similarities in our opinions about addiction and recovery. Usually only two times a year would my friends and I go over and hang out, eating food and listening to music; her “Come As You Aren’t” party on Halloween and the night of The Academy Awards, where she would wear a silver, sweater set and black jeans with a name tag that said “Sharon Stone”. But we never played games. And we never watched scary movies. And during the almost 15 years that she lived there, I never stayed over night and had a slumber party. Not once. And while I’m not someone who believes much in regrets, because I prefer to look at missed opportunities as learning experiences, I still wish I had indulged her wishes…at least once.

Alex and I recently started a new tradition. We live a pretty social life, both having busy careers as well as running a social blog, but Sundays are Free Dinner night at our house. Every week we cook a different meal, complete with breads and deserts for our friends who show up, and the night is never complete without hours of playing the Wii as well as all of us sitting around on the floor, candles and fireplace burning, watching our television shows. Last week we made a huge pot of chili, garlic bread, corn muffins and cookies. This week we made home made pizzas, breadsticks and apple and blueberry muffins. Alex and his friends drank beer and I made a pot of coffee and had apple cider, because it’s fall. Earlier, when Alex and I were at the grocery store, planning the dinner, he placed the groceries in paper instead of plastic bags. “Paper bags always remind me of the fall.” He said smiling at me. Awwww…October love!

And while I was cleaning the house today, the same house my mom lived in for almost 15 years, mulled spices roasting on the stove, candles lighting every corner, fire blazing, windows open wide whistling autumn wisdom into our hearts, the puppies chasing each other across the floor, falling over their new found paws, I was reminded of those calls I used to receive. “Hey Pete. Do you want to have some of your friends over tonight and we could watch a movie and play a game and maybe I’ll make chili and raw apple muffins.” But I always had better things to do, because of course…there was always so much time left. On my mom’s last birthday, she was upset because she didn’t get a birthday cake. I remember acting irritated and explaining that it was just a cake and that she would have many more birthdays. She didn’t. And we don’t really have all that much time, do we?

It’s in the hours…the minutes…the seconds. And even as I write this, as Alex and our friends Demi and Nneka are rolling in laughter while playing Mario Party on Wii, I’m again reminded of those calls and that these Free Dinner Sundays have somehow turned into a tribute for my mother. Or at least, a reminder to build a home, a nest, where our bed of white, crisp sheets is tightly made, three pillows deep, and candles always burn, and food is bountiful, and pups chase and love laughs on the scent, on the sound on the sighs, of our friends, our family and Alex and I. Together. Home.

And memories are powerful business. They are the foundation for what we want in our life, whether we realize it or not. Tonight, I was mixing the batter for the blueberry muffins and Demi, whose mother recently died of breast cancer, our stories being almost eerily similar, told me that it reminded him of being little when his mother would make him blueberry muffins. So maybe in the batter there is more than just eggs, milk and flour…but also a few Saturday morning a long time ago when Demi was under three feet and his mom was still alive. And I get it. Because I lost the recipe for my mom’s raw apple muffins. But I haven’t forgotten. And I’ll try my new recipe. Because life is about blending the old and the new, and remembering that for every lost opportunity, there is a new memory waiting to happen. And it’s time…

Because we’re on borrowed time as it is!

Translation…

Alex was born in Venezeula. I was born in Chicago. When I am around his family, not being fluent in Spanish, a lot is lost in translation. Often, I will ask his mother to repeat a word to me several times before I get the pronunciation or understanding correct. But there are some things that cross all boundaries. On the day that I planned my marriage proposal to Alex, I wrote a story titled, “Translation”, which explained the history of two boys, born across the world from each other, met and fell in love. At the end of the story, I had written quieres casarte conmigo? Will you marry me?, which I had childishly adopted the translation from google.

Earlier in the day, I had called my father and explained to him my plans of proposing to Alex on his birthday. My father, an intellectual and a man of science, always having believed that being gay was no different or less dominant, than the deep blue of my eyes, told me that he and my stepmother both adored Alex and believed he would be a wonderful addition to our family. After speaking to him, I went to my mother’s grave, sat down on the grass, and cried while explaining, out loud, my plans and how I wished she could still be alive to be a part of my joy, having never been alive to meet Alex.

After that, I picked up our matching, engagement rings from Tiffany’s, excited to finally have a reason to purchase something wrapped in their beautiful baby blue. I went home, hid the box under Alex’s side of the bed and waited to pick him up from work.

When we arrived home, Alex was excited about his birthday plans for the evening and his four days of birthday celebration to follow, not having passed into that age where birthdays were limited to a one hour birthday dinner at your favorite restaurant. I explained to him that I had been quite accomplished that day in writing and wanted to read some of what I had completed. He fell onto his side of the bed and told me to begin.

Reaching my trembling hand into my pocket, I pulled out the story and began reading it…”In 1972, there was a little guy born in Chicago, Illinois. His parents named him Peter, but they both called him “poco loco”, or, “a little crazy” in Spanish. A foreshadowing he wouldn’t understand until years later. During this time, a little brown freck was born in Venezuela, far, far away.” And I continued to read the story about how the boys moved closer and closer together, and eventually fell in love. “And so months passed, and they fell in love. One fast and one slow, but both headed in the same direction. They should have realized that nothing would be easy. They should have realized that great passion and great conflict go hand and hand. It is the definition of bittersweet. No love so great can be so easy. And many times, they often thought about separating and moving in different directions, because things appeared to be too difficult.” And at this point, I began to cry. “But how could they? No matter how they translated the differences, the feelings were always the same. And so one day, the American boy asked the Venezuelan boy to marry him and the Venezuelan boy said “Let’s do it!”

And there, written at the bottom of the page, were those Spanish words, which didn’t exactly translate correctly, but I tried…and he said yes.

And not in any of it, the proposal, the rings, the discussion with parents, not in any of it, did I for one second think about how we were gay, and this was really just a dream, a story, that couldn’t be lived out like The Smiths on Maple Street, who would be picking out bridesmaids and bouquets. We could do all of that, but somehow, it would seem like a fake. And it seemed like a fake.

Until Alex introduced me to one of his friends as his fiance. And then another. And then another, until I realized that we were creating our own reality. It was our responsibility to offer a translation of our relationship to theirs if we ever expected to meet on even ground. And tonight I saw a picture of a young lesbian holding a sign that said, “I didn’t ask her to civil union me!”, and I loved it. Because she was translating the similarities of gay marriage to straight marriage.

And we will continue to correct people, until they get it right. And one day they will. But until then, we’ll continue to grocery shop using the same cart, and continue to take our dogs to the vet together…and continue to curl up around each other as we fall asleep, slowly breathing together. We don’t need a legal document for that…but it would be nice.

Ghosts of the Patio…

I sat outside, drinking some Pumpkin Spice coffee, talking to my friend Kathy on the phone, as a thunderstorm blew already burnt-orange leaves across my driveway. It’s hard to believe that somewhere in the last few weeks, summer has danced away into the night and “The Something Wicked This Way Comes” way of autumn has brought mums to the front porches of my neighbors and thoughts of Halloween into the eyes of the children waiting for their school buses. And in a way, I’m ready for fall. But with each passing day, I feel more and more that I’m really and truly, as my mother was fond of saying, on borrowed time.

Tonight, as I was editing a chapter of my book, I put “To Kill a Mockingbird” on in the background, a comforting ritual which plays like a scrapbook soundtrack to my childhood. As the movie begins, Scout announces that during that summer, the days were 24 hours long…but seemed longer. And that is exactly how I feel today. And yet…I still can’t fit everything I want to do into my long day. Between seeing clients, running a social blog with Alex, running this blog, writing my book, taking naps, reading a few books a week, spending time with friends and catering to our two new puppies…there just never seems like enough time and I always have more things I want to do. Like getting a new library card at the Nora Library branch where I used to go as a child. Or make a list of all of the things I want to do before I die. Or go see about five movies. Or write a letter to my kind 80, year old neighbor lady who rocks away her days on her back porch, watching the days slowly turn.

On the phone with my friend Kathy, who has recently been diagnosed with cancer and is undergoing chemotherapy, she told me that she feels like she needs to slow down. “So why don’t you?” I asked her. “I don’t want to.” She said, matter of factly. And in some sense, she probably feels that she is on borrowed time as well. But aren’t we all? Every day I read two meditation books and my “Words of Wisdom” book while drinking my morning coffee to keep me centered. I also throw in some pulp fiction of Dan Brown or John Grisham just to even it out! This morning in my wisdom book, one of the phrases shot waves across my skin; “Time is not for sale”. Ahhhh…how true. And just like Kathy, I don’t want to slow down either.

But last night, Alex and I made a chili dinner, complete with garlic bread and corn muffins gone completely gone. Two of our closest friends came over and we watched tv and played video games late into the night. One of our friends, Stacy, sat at the computer while we were waiting on the corn bread and read this blog. Afterwards, she and I went out on the front porch to smoke a cigarette and she asked me how my mom died. For several minutes, I retold the story, crying as I always do when I explain how the last few minutes before my mother passed away were a tribute to years of strong spiritual faith. I looked up and saw tears in Stacy’s eyes. And knowing that she is truly one of the most genuine people I have met in a long time, I looked at her and said, “It would have made my mom so happy to have us all over here, making dinner, playing games and watching tv. She would have loved to have been part of that.”

But life moves fast, faster than I really like to admit these days. It seemed like one day I was wading in the creek behind our house long into the summer evenings, the next I was driving around with my friends in high school, thinking of new ways to sculpt our hair while listening to punk rock, then I was drunk, and then I was sober, and then I was motherless, and then I was in love…and now I’m 37. And I’m still here, dammit! But we all need a place to slow life down a little bit…

And that place for me is on my best friend Tonya’s patio. For years, she and I and several other friends would find ourselves sitting on her patio, rocking and laughing, drinking large fountain sodas, yelling after her redneck dogs, laughing, gossiping, crying, long into the night. And for me, no matter where I am, or who I’m with, there is a solace and a piece of mind I find on that patio. It is where I have made almost all of my most recent life decisions. It is my home and it is my sanctuary. On that patio, my feet up on the fire pit, a cigarette in my hand, chatting a mile a minute to my dearest friend, life…slows…down…

Earlier this summer, Tonya told me she was going to write a short story about all of the people who had visited the patio in the past few years, all of the times we had and all of the stories we had told. Essentially, I think she was saying, “where the hell did everyone go?” And I hadn’t been being a very good friend. I had been whisked away into social night life and as she always says, being “a man about town”. And I needed to slow down. So I found my way back to that patio. And really, it’s not the patio. It’s Tonya. She’s my heartstone. She’s my Emma in “Terms of Endearment”. And as long as she is still here, I’ll always have a patio.

So Kathy was right, it sucks to slow down, because you miss out on a lot, but Tonya was right too, you have to appreciate that which is most important to you. And I think there is a happy medium. I believe there is a patio for all of us, where time stops, laughter and tears fall like juice from a ripe peach and the stars are as bright as summer nights in the country. There must be and I hope I find it soon…because we’re on borrowed time as it is!

Teal Street Memories…

The day my mother died, I remember wanting to call only one person. Krissa. I’m not sure why or what I thought I might tell her, being that it had been so long since I had spoken to her, but some part of my being needed to reach out to the one person who truly understood my soul. I remembered three years before, when my mother’s best friend Diane died from cancer, my mother looked at me across her living room, tears pouring from her eyes, and said, “there’s no one left that understands me anymore.” And that is how I’ve always felt about Krissa.

Krissa and I met when I was 20, out at a bar in downtown Indianapolis. Because she got into a fight with her friend that brought her to the bar, she came home with me and spent the night. We stayed up late, drinking and listening to music and were instant best friends. Soul siblings! (For years we would tell people that we were brother and sister and we were related to John Gotti.) The next day, I took her to her car, an old white supra that barely started and she drove off to work, swearing to call me at the end of her work day.

The end of her work day ended almost an hour later, when the family she was a nanny, fired her, telling her it didn’t appear her heart was in the job anymore. And so began our journey together. For the next year, Krissa and I lived in a one bedroom apartment, sharing a bed, sharing our jokes, our tears, our stories, our lives…best friends bound by our souls. Even after I became involved with my first real boyfriend, the three of us moved into a two bedroom apartment on Teal Street and even though I was in a relationship, it was Krissa and I who would go to the library, stay up late and watch movies and run to the gas station for chips and salsa and orange slice candy…”you have to have something salty with something sweet.” She would say, and thus defined our friendship.

Krissa and I partied together, and she was there when I got sober. To this day, she is the only one who I know of who stood up to my father, yet he slammed the phone down on her when she demanded that he bring me cigarettes to treatment. Awww…well, she meant well. And she stayed loyal to my sobriety and always respected it as well…

She was and will always be…my dearest friend, even though not many people understood our friendship. And that doesn’t really matter, because it’s ours and no one else needs to understand it. But today, on a day when I’ve been listening to old music and thinking a lot about the past, I received an email from her out of the blue. “tell me the name of the weird vampire chick we used to know way back when-the one who called 911 on us at Scandia.(oh God, memories)” And that’s what we have, wonderful memories and maybe some not so wonderful ones too…but she will be forever, tightened around my heart, even though miles and oceans separate us now.

Last summer, an old friend of mine and I were talking about Krissa and he asked where she was and I said I thought she was in Berlin but I hadn’t talked to her in awhile. We started laughing about some of the trouble the two of us had gotten into and what a good friend she had been to me. We talked about how she had made decisions on her own and hadn’t allowed society, her family or her friends dictate what was or wasn’t important to her. “She lived a life. She definitely has lived a life.” He said, a we both laughed, thinking of what a wonderfully, kindred spirit she is. And I think, I’m just so much luckier for having had her in my life.

And hearing from her today has made me want to reach back into my back pocket a little bit and remember some of the people who have been so vital to my own growth. My dear friend Clara, for whom I wouldn’t be sober today if it hadn’t been for her. My friend Peggy who told me, when I was in the heat of my addiction, that the only way she could help me and be my friend, was by not being my friend. (This, important piece of wisdom I have shared with hundreds upon hundreds of people in treatment, therapy and recovery through the years. It is, by far, the number one thing that changed my outlook on my addiction, even is she doesn’t know it.) My adopted aunts, Vicki and Susie who gave me wondrous childhoods filled with politics, Pi Phi stories and pieces of Mockingbird summers. And to my cousin Caroline and my Aunt Kathy, who, well…have been my only family. A family so rich, that when I looked at my aunt, wearing her sunglasses as she walked behind my mother’s coffin into the church, took my hand and said, “come on, it’s time.” And they have all been there for me, and all share small hallways in the hotel of my heart.

And maybe, just maybe, all of us, should make such a list, although I’m sure I’m leaving many out…and remember, that it’s really the people, who save our souls and walk the walk, side by side…each step of the way…and really, really remember…because…

We’re on borrowed time as it is!

18 Degrees of Insanity…

Years ago, when I read James Frey’s “A Million Little Pieces”, I was infuriated. Angry because as soon as I was twenty pages into the book, as an alcoholic and addict in recovery, I knew he had fictionalized his experience. And maybe it doesn’t matter. I’ve spoken to several addicts and alcoholics who feel that even if he helped one person, then his intentions were honorable. And well, it was a great piece of literature. So maybe, in reality, he’s just a great storyteller. But I still felt cheated, because I felt that I had earned my journey. I felt that I had earned my misery, as well as my sobriety. It was mine. The one thing no one could take away from me. And then I realized, it just didn’t matter. We all fictionalize pieces of our lives to help others. Or to even get attention, right?

For years, people have asked me about my story, and I’ve kept it close to my heart, except in the rooms of my cohorts where I find solace and serenity. But now, I think, it’s time. Because maybe, just maybe, I can help one person out of the madness. The madness, which for me ended on December 16th, 1994.

I always considered myself, “The Pretty Drinker”. It was a term I had used to describe my mother in her drinking days, hair combed back, adorned in a cute suit, nice piece of jewelry around her neck, with a beer or martini in hand. And even as a small child, I yearned to be that “pretty drinker”. But there was nothing pretty about December 16th. And to this day, I wonder what it was about that morning, or afternoon as I was accustomed to not getting up until after three at that point, that made it any different. I remember walking into the kitchen and cracking open a Colt 45, having moved onto malt liquor as a starting point every morning, because quite frankly it was cheaper and more potent. In the bathroom, I examined my face. I looked closely at the stubble around my chin, powerful grey clouds foreshadowing a storm under my eyes, and the always constant perspiration. By that point in my addiction, I could no longer smell myself. But I had learned that others could, and quickly. I cracked open a bottle of Vicodin, swallowed two with the malt liquor, and started the shower. Back then and even now, I always start my day with a shower. A small piece of wisdom my mother allowed upon me when she would roust me up in the morning and get me started, long before high school, when her days began late after mine. She had told me it was always important to get up, get dressed and start your day. The motto of a pretty drinker.

I remember standing in the shower, holding myself up against the wall, the Colt 45 accompanying me under the water, as I soaped myself up, cleaned myself up and became beautiful. At least to me…

After my shower, I walked around in a robe, fixing my hair, smoking several cigarettes, smoking a joint, and just lazing in front of the tv. Typically, I had one movie in the VCR that I would just have on in the background, over and over again, and at that point, I believe it was “Out of Africa”. I tended to always lean to the beautiful and the desolate. By this time, it was six or seven and I needed to begin getting ready for the evening. Somehow though, I found myself down at my friend’s apartment, drinking and getting ready for the evening. It was Friday and that typically meant we were on day two or three of the weekend. Looking back, I realize it took me three or four hours of drinking, pills and weed to get to the point that when walked through my friend’s door, they always thought I was stone sober. And then the real party would begin.

And honestly…that’s about the extent of the party that I remember. That first drink, which at that point in my drinking was always a Jack and Coke, well, actually, a double. And then out…like a power outage at midnight, with the freaks still running the streets in my mind. I don’t remember much else. I remember being at a club and standing at a bar. I remember someone buying me drinks all night long. But I don’t remember that someone. I remember going out into the alley behind the club with someone else, a girl maybe, and smoking rock, something I had begun doing towards the end, but had literally been too ashamed to admit to myself or any of my friends. I remember showing up at my friend Jack’s house and he took my keys and told me I could leave. I remember waiting for him to go to sleep, sneaking into his room, stealing back my keys, plus about six beers and several cassette tapes and heading back to my apartment up north. I inherited one quality from my mother…always wanting to be at home after the party. Home was safe. At home, nothing could happen, and I didn’t like being out of my element.

So I headed up north from downtown Indianapolis. And that is where I vanish into the night…into the black, only to remember one memory until the next day. I’m driving home, and I remember sitting back in the driver’s seat, not touching the wheel, looking over at the passenger’s side and talking to someone…who isn’t there. I rarely share this with anyone, because for me, looking back, it was somewhat mystical, or hallucinatory, but I believe something happened in that car that night. I don’t think I was supposed to make it. But I did…

And the rest, I rely on my father to fill in the blanks. He apparently received a middle of the night phone call and came out to rescue me, stepmother in toe. When they arrived, they found me, pacing in the driveway next to the White Castle, mumbling, not making much sense, in a tee shirt and jeans, in 18 degree weather. Just today when I called him he told me that it was bitter cold that year and he couldn’t believe I was walking around in nothing but a tee shirt. I do vaguely remember walking to the grocery store before my father came, and buying cigarettes with every cent I owned because I knew I was going to jail. I had driven my car almost into the kitchen of Perkin’s restaurant and had landed, nose down, in the ditch. The car was littered with alcohol and most probably other substances. When my father arrived, he looked me over once and stated, “Jail or treatment. It’s your decision, but I’m done.” I guess I decided, as any good alcoholic and addict does, that treatment sounded pretty good, because I jumped in his car and my stepmother drove me to the closest treatment center, leaving my father, a prominent plastic surgeon and board member of his hospital, to say he had been driving my car. The consummate enabler.

I don’t remember walking into treatment. I don’t remember the .37 I blew on a blood alcohol level, which should indicate death. I don’t remember the urine drug screen I gave which tested positive for alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, opiates, benzodiazepines and barbiturates. I was a walking pharmacy of the sick…sick of mind.

I must have slept much of the next day, because when I woke, it was early evening and I was craving a cigarette, at that point, being a three pack a day smoker. I turned over in my bed and looked at an at least 7 foot, black giant next to me, snoring and moaning in his sleep, tossing back and forth and pulling at his sheets. I quickly pulled myself together, ready to sign myself out. I ran into the hall and walked up to the nurses station, only to be met by eyes I had known almost my entire life. She smiled and took my hand from across the counter. “You didn’t know I worked here, did you?” she said. And I stared back at my childhood neighbor and the mother of my childhood friend. Which should have been comforting…

It was so, fucking embarrassing. To say the least. She explained to me that I was on the detox unit and that it was a locked unit, stating that I would be given medication every several hours to help me detox my system. She also explained that I would have my vitals taken to make sure my body was safe. I laughed and she looked across the counter at me. “It’s not funny. You’re in really bad shape.” She handed me a pack of my cigarettes and told me to go to the lounge and have some juice. I walked down the hallway, in a pair of oversized scrub pants, no shirt, a long hospital robe and footies. As I walked past a full, length mirror, I realized one thing. I was glamorous. This was the life I had hoped and dreamed for all of my years.

After all…I was 22 and I was a pretty drinker…

Kitchen Magnets…

I have a magnet on my refrigerator that was left behind by my mother. It is the only one of her magnets that I haven’t taken down. It simply states, “I support the Matthew Shepard Foundation.” It took a long time to get up there and hopefully, it will never come down.
I came out to my parents when I was 18, in 1990. At that time, gay men and lesbians were still hiding, they weren’t seen on television and in movies and they definitely weren’t made judges, like Ellen Degeneres, on American Idol. If we were seen in movies, we were cast as AIDS patients or effeminate guys prancing around. While those stereotypes might have been true of some, they weren’t true of everyone. My dad and stepmother were easy to come out to, being that my father is a surgeon, a man of medicine, who believed that sexual orientation was decided at birth. I thought my mother would be just as easy to comfort, but that wasn’t the case.
Some background on my mother is important. She was extremely liberal, always voted Democrat, and believed in the underdog. She lived in Chicago during the late sixties and worked at Northwestern Library and as a teacher at an orthodox Hebrew school. At that school, she was the only gentile employee and most of her students were first generation immigrants to the United States, whose parents still had concentration camp numbers imprinted on their arms. My mother and my aunt both went to inner city schools and graduated from Broad Ripple High School in Indianapolis. My mother would tell stories about spending her summers at the Rivera Country Club and remembered different bathrooms and water fountains for “white” and “colored” people. She would become extremely outraged by any mistreatment of humanity, yet she struggled with my being gay. “I’m just really worried about you Peter.” She said. “Don’t worry mom, I’m not stupid, I’ll be safe.” I replied, meaning practicing safer sex practices. To this day, I remember her sitting back in her chair, smirking, as if I could not grasp her simple meaning. “I’m not worried about you getting sick.” She said, “I’m worried about how society will treat you.” And there began our journey together.
For several years afterward, she would introduce my boyfriends as “friends” to people she knew, and even to some of her closest, “Christian” friends, she struggled when they asked her if I had a girlfriend or why I wasn’t married. Until, October 7th, 1998. I remember sitting at home that night and my mom calling me. “Are you watching this on the news?” she said. Of course I wasn’t. I rarely watched the news, unlike she and my father, who had always been news junkies and were always up to the minute on world events. “No, what’s going on mom.” She began sobbing on the other end of the phone. “There’s this boy from the University of Wyoming who was beaten and left for dead out in the middle of nowhere because he was gay. It’s just so horrible.” She was inconsolable. Finally after several minutes, she got off of the phone and told me she would call me the next day. Which she did, before my alarm even went off. “Ok, I’ve been on the phone with the hospital all night trying to contact his mother.” I had no idea what she was talking about, as my mind had drifted away from any misery in the night. “What the hell are you talking about?” I said. “Matthew Shepard.” She replied, “That boy from Wyoming. He’s at the hospital in Colorado and they’re not sure he will make it. I’ve been trying to contact his mother to let her know how bad I feel for her and how I relate, but they won’t put me through.” The hilarious point, if there is any, of this statement is that my mother always felt entitled to be part of any event. If there was a car accident, she would pull over and ask the police if they needed help. If a national official was in trouble, she would attempt to write a letter or educate others. Yet at times, she didn’t know when to pull back.
Five days later, Matthew Shepard died. My mother was silent for almost two days and then asked me to come over to her condo because she needed to talk to me. When I got to her house, she had made a pot of coffee and we sat down in the living room. “What is it?” I asked, not sure what the seriousness of the occasion would entail. “I want to know.” She said. “I want to know what it’s been like for you. Matthew Shepard died from hate and I want to know what it’s been like for you through the years because honestly, I wouldn’t even know you were gay if you hadn’t told me.”(and to this, I still give a little chuckle.)But I told her anyway…

I told her how in elementary school and junior high, kids would make fun of me for my lack of athletic ability. They would also point to the “homogenized milk” cartons at lunch, and laugh at me, saying I was like the milk. They would lisp, they would push, they would attack. And it didn’t get any better in high school. Every day, I dreaded going to school because I was afraid of what someone would write on my locker, spray on my car, or say as I walked through the hallways. I would constantly be called a faggot, pushed into lockers and made fun of by the kids around me. And worse still, even my friends wouldn’t stand up for me. When graduation closed in on me, I was afraid to walk across the stage because of my fear that someone might call me names as I walked across the stage and my parents would be privy to the private pain I wore every day.
A strange side note to this story is that I had one such nemesis in high school named Matt. Although he wasn’t aware of this, for years after high school, the things that he and his friends said and did to me lingered, making me shy in social situations and ashamed of being gay. Finally, my determination to challenge ignorance such as theirs helped me to become the strong, proud person I am today, capable of having healthy relationships and friendships. The strange part is that he befriended me on Facebook less than a year ago. He is now aware of how I felt in high school, has taken responsibility and I now consider him a friend. We all grow up. We all deserve a second chance. Even me. But high school was hell. And I have to believe in some way it contributed to my extreme substance abuse because as long as I was wasted, I didn’t really care what people said to or about me. But my mother did.
And she couldn’t contain her hurt that day we had our talk. She wanted to personally call the parents of every “child” that had been mean to me and make them aware of how their children had treated me. But I was almost thirty at that point, and life had moved on, and there wasn’t really any point anyway. But for her, things changed. She no longer called my boyfriends “friends”. In fact, my ex-boyfriend Shawn became a permanent part of our family and was probably one of the people closest to her in her life. She was not ashamed or protective of me anymore, and felt that it should be the other persons shame or burden to carry if they couldn’t handle the fact that her son was gay. When she died, I received a letter from the Matthew Shepard Foundation regarding my mother and found countless letters she had written Judy Shepard, Matthews mother, rough drafted in her many notebooks about how society was a cruel frontier and how mothers were the captains of their children’s ships. One of our closest friends, MaryAnn, contributed to this foundation, because she knew how much my mother cared about it’s cause and how her endearing love for me was also in her love for me as her gay son. And then the fight continued…or so I thought.
Because I met Alex. And he changed my perspective on everything. He wasn’t quite as out with his family as I had been, being that he is much younger and that culturally and religiously his mother is not necessarily at the same point my mother was by the time she was fifty. But I believe that will come with time. Because love endures and love translates what we do not understand, but feels it’s intensity nonetheless. And I love his mother because she has amazing energy and has allowed me to become part of their family. And Alex has challenged me on words like “fag” and “faggot”. He believes that these “words” only carry as much weight as we give them. And on a few occasions when someone has called him one of these names, he responds with something like, “thank you for noticing.” And maybe that’s the way to go about it. Because this Saturday, we’ll be heading to our engagement party that his coworkers are throwing us. And tonight we took his teenage brother to see a movie. And yesterday we went grocery shopping and took our new pups all over town. Because we’re just like everyone else and we don’t need to be separate. It’s important to bring the awareness to the gay community, but maybe it’s more important for us to lessen the tension, just a little bit. Why take ourselves so damn seriously.
But it does remind me of how we treat each other. And how words have lasting impressions like a burn from a curling iron on your forehead. Or how love is not pain, but endurance, compassion and understanding. Love does not hurt. And everyone deserves the chance to grow up. Everyone. But Matthew Shepard wasn’t given that chance. So for that reason, I think today I’ll forgive everyone that gave me a hard time in high school, and especially Matt, because he’s pretty cool these days and if we ever got together I think enough time has gone by that we might be able to be pretty good friends. But most importantly, because people are dying everyday, and quite frankly, it’s easier to love than to hate. And the saddest part of this story to me, is that my mother never got to meet Alex. And he was never able to meet her. And we just don’t know when are chances run will run out…because, we’re on borrowed time as it is…

A Suicide Note…

Dear Suicide…I have a dear, dear friend, maybe a better friend than you can ask for at times, that was greatly affected by you, and didn’t even ask for you to be in her life. I have a dear friend, whose mother was taken by you, without questions answered, without any sign of your coming, without any ability to meet you at the door and escort you far, far away. My dear friend, Lis Crosby, is only 23, and because of you, she will never see her mother’s hair all turn white. She will never be able to hand over one of her children to it’s grandmother. She doesn’t understand you and neither do I. Why would you do such a thing. Because of you, there is so much that her mother will miss out on in Lis’ life and the life of her brother Jonathan. But why am I telling you this. You already know this by now as you take an adult life almost every 16 minutes in the United States and attempt to take one every minute. You are tricky and deceiving because you offer solutions with no reasonable answers. You are real. You are scary. And you are lurking in every corner. Not only have I lost my dear friend Lis’ mother, Nancy, but also several friends, and parents of friends. Not long ago, you met the father of a friend of mine. You hide in the minds of our children, our elderly and those in between. I am thankful I have never wanted to taste of your breath, but I can’t say so much for many, many people I have met. The only solution to getting rid of you is through education, and awareness and talking, comforting and compassion. So watch out. Because…we’re on a mission.
Nancy Crosby was born on December 7, 1963. She died on September 30th, 2006. I remember that day almost too well. I had just left work and got a call from my friend Tonya. “Uh honey.” I could tell she was crying on the other end of the phone. “They just found Lis’ mom.” And from there on, everything is a blur. I remember pulling up to her Granny’s house and seeing all of the cars, all of the people in AA surrounding Lis, only twenty at the time, and already, several years sober, comforting her as she and her brother screamed up into the trees. Why? Why? I had never experienced so much pain, angst and anger all mixed into one strange concoction. After talking to Lis, or talking at her in her fog and haze of confusion, Tonya and I went to her mother’s house to get Nancy’s dog Serenity. When we walked into the house, I was somewhat eerie, being that Nancy had only been found hours before, but somehow, the house was comforting. I didn’t experience any fear as I walked through the house and we got Serenity and put her in the car. Through those next several days, I saw a young girl shattered by the loss of her mom.
A year and a half later, Lis got to do the same for me. She was by my side the entire time my mother was sick, and eventually died from a rare disease. We laughed together, we cried together. And a 21 year old, LADY, walked me through how to deal with a funeral. Our mothers are even buried only five feet from each other. And we find comfort in that. What we don’t find comfort in is how both of their deaths could have been prevented. In the case of my mother, she had a rare disease that went undiagnosed for far too long, and probably could have prevented her death. And for Nancy? Well, much the same can be said for her disease. Because suicide and depression are diseases in this country that go far to unnoticed and dealt with appropriately.
This Saturday will mark the 2nd anniversary of Team Nancy marching in the Out of the Darkness Community Walk for suicide prevention. All money raised will go to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. Lis and her brother Jonathan will both be marching again, as will many people in more than 200 communities across the United States. I know many people read my blog who care alot about mental health and addiction issues. Please donate to help their cause as it is vital that more attention is brought to depression and suicide so it can be brought out of the darkness and into the light. On the main page of my blog, I have linked The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, Team Nancy for donations and more information about the walk in Indianapolis this Saturday, September 12th, 2009, and Gay/Lesbian/Bisexual/Transgender issues related to suicide.
The information is astonishing. And as I walk past my mother’s grave and visit Nancy, telling her every time, that I’m watching over Lis and taking care of her the best I can, I know somewhere she’s watching. But I have to believe that things got just too painful for her. Life became too overwhelming and somehow she ran out of options. But I don’t believe she would trade it all in if she had known other options. She was one damn fighter, we just didn’t know how to help her into the ring.
I remember when my mother got sick and we didn’t know what disease her symptoms were indicating, I asked her why she wasn’t fighting harder. “If I knew what I was fighting, I could fight.” And much can be said for depression and suicide as well. So reach out, learn and contribute. In these trying times, we should cherish the ones around us more and hug often and remember…we’re on borrowed time as it is!

Award Ceremony…

Last week, I was meeting with a client who had been a patient of mine at the adolescent, residential treatment center where I worked for 13 years. “Do you remember the award ceremonies you guys had every Thursday?” She asked. How crazy that after only almost two years since my resignation, I had almost entirely forgotten about the award ceremonies. “Oh, yeah, I forgot about those.” I said, laughing to myself. “I used to love getting those awards.” She said. “You would always give me an award for being the happiest patient of the week or the most creative journal writer. It felt good to have someone notice something in me, even if it wasn’t even true.” But they were true. And instantly, I remembered back to every Thursday afternoon as I would sit in my office, blank sheets of white, copy paper and large markers in every color, and make awards like, “Patient with the Best Family Communication” or “Most Stylish Outfits for Treatment.” I also remembered in my last year, that I became extremely creative with journal assignments and gave extensive journal questions every night that my patients were asked to answer. Typically they were geared for one patient in my group to learn something from, but rarely were they aware, until we would process it in group and they would realize that a specific assignment had been meant to lean in their direction.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if in the real world we had Award Ceremony every week? Growing up, my mother and I would watch the Academy Awards every year and we would talk about how someday I would write a great screenplay, lavish with southern belles and alcoholic fathers, all very Tennessee Williams, with treacherous sarcasm slapped in the faces of the young actors, while my mother would dream about costuming these same actors with ornate gowns designed by none other than Edith Head herself. We would eat popcorn and lay on the floor and scream as each person came onto the screen and we would hold our crossed fingers up to the air before the television. Some years, there were great disappointments, and in others, like the years that Julia Roberts won for “Erin Brockovich” or Hilary Swank for “Boys Don’t Cry”, there were loud screams of excitement. And in other years, such as when Geraldine Paige won for “Trip to Bountiful”, we would practice our acceptance speeches with the same grace and humility. Ahhhhhh…But where else do we find that kind of honor. I thought I would find it when I left the treatment center where I worked. And maybe, because of a few poor choices on my part towards the end, I didn’t get the send off I expected. But it would have been nice, nonetheless. But I got what I deserved. It wasn’t in the small party they through for me, or the flowers or gift card. No, all of that was nice. But it was in one small gesture I received.
For almost the entire time I worked at that treatment center, I had worked with a woman named Cathy. She was a proud, humble, extraordinary individual, who made me feel special every day that I walked into those walls. She didn’t have to, she just did. For all thirteen years, we comforted each other, listened to each other and watched each other grow in our own direction. The last night I worked there, I stayed until 10pm, because it was family night. When I walked down the hallway, I took one last look down at all of the rooms that the many patients I had through the years had slept and had come and gone. And as I watched, Cathy wheeled her chair out in the middle of the hall and began whistling the theme song at the end of the Carol Burnett show, which is how the entire series had ended, as had every show. To us both, it was a true sign of gratitude and companionship. And who can ask for more.
Today alone, I had a client who deserved an award for “Writing a powerful letter to her mother”. A neighbor deserves one for “Always Waving to Me As I Drive Down the Street”. Maybe one for my friend’s Chad and Gracia for “Making Me Feel that My Relationship Is Normal” and one for my boyfriend for dealing with my constant challenges. Each week in treatment, one recipient would receive the coveted “Resident of the Week” for meeting all of the characteristics of a “almost perfect” resident. This week, that would have to go to my boyfriend Alex.
See how easy it is! But we forget. Every day, we forget to make people feel special and make them feel as if they deserve awards. So from here on out, I’m going to take a pad of post it notes with me every where I go and pass out little awards. I think it might can’t on. I think it just might. And who cares anyway if no one understands…We’re on borrowed time as it is!