I have heard numerous
stories and experiences told by queer folk about their coming out. Each of them
was unique, with both laughter and tears. One friend of mine was recently
disowned by his family when they found out he was gay. His father threw out his
mother as well, because “your son is a disgrace to this family’’. Suddenly, the father now refers to my friend
as his mother’s and that his ‘blood’ does not carry the gay gene, he must have
got the gene from the mother.
One can only begin to imagine what the boy is going through now. I
partly understand it, from my coming out experience. My coming out has been a
process, it still is and in my opinion, this process never ends, ever. If you
are not coming out to a family member today, or a friend, colleagues...etc, you
are tomorrow, and the next month, next year.....and it goes on and on.
When my sisters started teasing me years ago about how
"choosy" I was because I would dismiss every boy that tried to ask me
out, I so wished that I would just let them know that boys are not my thing.
When I would not bring any boys home, they tried to fix me with blind dates,
and when all that failed, they sat and watched so that they could figure out
what my deal was.
When I u-hauled with my first girlfriend, I heard them say that I have
made a good decision to move in with my good friend because then, we would
share expenses in the tougher economic situation. On other occasions, they
would tell me to stop behaving like the last born I am for wanting to always
have someone live with me, and just start living on own. I never offered them
an explanation that this was actually my partner, the person that I wanted to
share my life with.
Eventually, I was bursting to tell them not to hold their breath anymore
by waiting for me to bring a boy home. My big family is like a market place so
I was sure that if I talked to one of my sisters, the news would spread in an
instance. I was right! :-)!
Funny thing is, some of them said it was about time, and that the
pieces of the big puzzle about me had finally just fallen into place. My
brother, bless his soul, said he was happy for me and my sexuality did not
change his love for me at all. However, I knew there was trouble when my sister
Kui* started brewing trouble. Kui had always found a way of annoying me
somehow. I do love her, but sometimes I think she is and has always been miss goody-two-shoes. She always finds a way
of having her way...she talks too much and judges too much and is always complaining
about one thing or the other.
I get texts from her to date, telling me that God loves me....that am
beautiful and can do anything I want to do in life....that I can succeed in
whatever I do if I put my mind to it... Just subtle hints that I was erring in
the path I have chosen for my life,… or that I was putting a dent in the flowery
arrangement that she envisions as our perfect family. Usually, besides making
note of them, I ignore the texts.
But recently, she voiced the boldest and most forward disapproval of my
sexuality. She said that whatever I am, "is not fair to them (family) or
to the kids (my nieces and nephews) some of whom are already teenagers and may
start questioning why I am the only one in the family that has not introduced
an 'uncle nanii' to them".
That statement stung, and it
stung deep. I felt that it was as if she was removing me from the picture
completely by glaring my difference and using it as reason to justify her discomfort...and
the kids were excellent bait! I wondered if she stopped to think about me for a
minute, or cared about my happiness.
True that coming out is a task...it’s almost like having to introduce
yourself over and over because some people just do not let go. Like you have to
keep justifying yourself every time someone questions why you are what you are.
Maybe we could pull a Jodie Foster move and dictate time and dictate out time
and conditions under which we come out.
I wonder if you guys have
been in situations such as this. I usually do not give a shit about a total
stranger who doesn’t know me or anything about my life, but when
your family, the people who are closest to you, question and deny you, that is
beyond hurting. And worse, the heteronormative society that we are living in at the moment is unforgiving. Shall we ever get to that level that we are yearn for?
