To say
that it’s been a while would be an understatement, given my usual level of
production here at the EH lair. My
apologies dear readers, but the children are wearing me out. Between in class sword fights, trying to
explain iambic pentameter, and the usual administrative flaming hoops to jump
through, my days have begun to blur one into the other with the soundtrack of
screaming teenagers and bellowing principals as the background of my dreamscape. With the addition of some unavoidable
personal life upheaval, things in EH land have been, if not always sunny,
certainly always interesting.
In honor
of this series of misadventures as well as an attempt to avoid writing about
children, I shall broach a subject that isn’t often taken up here but stands as
probably one of the most important in my short life, and that is the subject of
“teh gay,” specifically, my thoughts on coming out and “knowing.”
I think
that’s my favorite question – “how did you know?” It’s as if people assume that there is a
special gay knowledge that one must acquire before leaping headlong into the
boundaries of vajayjayville – but really such is not the case. Though there is a knowledge to be acquired,
it is one that we ALL acquire, but one that most straight people just kind of
shrug off as a byproduct of puberty/listening to too much angsty music in their
teens. This can simply be attributed to
the fact that straight folk don’t really ever “come out,” that is, at least
they don’t think about it. This
knowledge is an inherently sexual one, but whereas most straight will consider
their first kiss or the first time they touched a member of the opposite sex in
a way that made their drawers tingle, the gay’s knowledge acquisition usual
comes before the kiss, before the touch. Our knowledge is almost always located in the cerebral.
Which
makes, “when did you know,” almost appropriate. I say almost because the question usually bugs the shit out of me for
reasons beyond my comprehension, but really there’s something to be said for
the moment when one “knows” one is gay. I can, like any good little gay, pinpoint the moment at which I truly
KNEW I was a homo. Now it took almost 6
years for me to tell the world at large, but that moment is as deeply ingrained
in my psyche as one of the most pivotal in my existence.
I can
still remember the shirt she was wearing when I noticed that her lips were
painted a garish red, and that I wanted to kiss those lips. I also remember that she wearing doc martins
and a khaki skirt of the catholic school uniform issue variety. And while I did end up kissing her (not then,
but shortly thereafter), it was that moment of knowledge, that horror of
difference, that shattered my world view as I sat through English class stoned,
paranoid, and entirely wanted to claw my own skin off. Of course there were always signs, but they
seemed so insignificant before this one – crushes on baby sitters, feeling
differently about certain female friends, HORSE BACK RIDING CAMP – but this one
moment, the moment when she passed me the joint on the loading dock and smiled
in a way that showed the faint crack in her front tooth from when she fell down
the stairs…THAT was knowledge. It loads
a whole new ball and shot onto the phrase “knowing gaze.”
Last
night, during a rather fabulous gchat session with my new favorite gaysian, I
took it one step further into esoteric absurdity with the following comment:
Attraction
is strange indeed - I spent the last two years reading about the human body and
how human beings have viewed each other’s bodies throughout the centuries. I've spent so much time trying to make sense
of how we relate on a physical level and yet when it comes to me own
attractions I could no more explain them than I could do my taxes. I'm
an impulsive person by nature, I trust my first feeling and go with it. I love the question "when did you know”...because I
don't think I ever "knew," I just felt. And
in “doing” I affirmed that what I felt was valid and real and exquisite.
And here
I contradict myself – at first I said I KNEW, but then earlier I said I FELT
and DID – which leads me to the ultimate queer theory thesis – is there even a
difference?! I rather enjoyed her reply,
that attraction was “powerful and dangerous.” Of course there’s a dangerous edge to attraction, and I think that’s
what keeps me coming back for more. I
like the thrill, the danger of falling. Probably why I’ve fallen flat on a face a few times (oh, alliteration) –
but I seem to be fine.
Or
rather, to quote the deliciously sexy Fiona Apple, “better than fine.”
