Bad Day at Work, Good Day at Home

I am still sick, but I had to go into work anyway. At worked it sucked. I had an early meeting that I had to facilitate, but the others in the meeting did not seem to want to go where I was taking them. It was very frustrating and add that to the my not feeling well, it made for a really shitty day.

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Today, in our little town, we had our Thanksgiving parade. It is a really big deal in town and practically the whole town turns out to see it. My 2 youngest kids were on a float and they had a real good time.

After that we went home. I was beat. Just drained to my core at the end of the day.

K's parents are doing pretty well, if fact, better then I expected. Today the kids were in school and K and her parents talked a little about our situation. They did not talk too much, but I expected them to be in denial about the whole thing and they are not. They are worried about K, the kids and even me. I think that it was good for K to know that they really do care.

K was really worried about me too. We talked about my day at work and then when she went downstairs she told me that she needed a bottle of wine and a good fucking. She looked at me, and walked away. I was not sure if she was talking about me. It made me a little nervous which made be feel funny. Only a gay guy would have this kind of stress at the prospect of having sex with his wife. (Yet another clue that I am just a gay as I think I am.)

One more day of work and then 4 days off.

Bracing For What is to Come

I am sick (probably just a cold) so I am working from home today.

K's parents arrive tonight for the Thanksgiving holiday. They will be here until Saturday. Even K thinks they are crazy.

God, give me strength.

Epiphany

An epiphany is a sudden awakening to the essential nature or meaning of things. The day you realised that babies aren't delivered by storks: that was an epiphany. The day you recognised that men and women are not the same: that was an epiphany. The day you realised that your web site is your business and your software can't handle your traffic - that was an epiphany. It's a different kind of world, you need a different kind of software.

IBM advertisement - "Epiphany" - Avery Brooks

The day you realize you are different from other boys, that was an epiphany. The day you realized you were gay, that was an epiphany. The day you realized that you can no longer pretend to be something you are not, THAT was an epiphany.

Snoring Together

I saw T last night. We spent a few hours together. We spent almost all of the time just lying together . He works on Saturday so he was a little tired. He fell asleep in my arms. Lightly snoring with this head on my chest. It has been a long time since anyone has slept in my arms. I did not sleep, but laid there listening to him breathe and stroking his hair. I remember thinking how comfortable I felt with him. I there is a part of me that wished I had that every night.

While I have always loved K, many times when we were together, I felt awkward, often unsure if I was doing the right things. I suppose that should have been a clue years ago. Damn.

Of course, we could not spend the whole night together and I had to go home. Part of me was filled and happy, while another part was sad I had to leave him. And there will always be part of me that feels guilty for having someone to love me like that, while K is struggling.

Good Days and Bad Days

So there are good days and bad days. Today is a good day. K and I have been getting along pretty well.

Yesterday she had her second meeting with her therapist with a gay ex-husband. She told me about it and she seemed like she was making progress in her won head. Today she spent most of the day with a girl-friend and had fun. I think she really needed that. She needed to get out of the house, away from the kids and me and really have some quality "me" time. In her case is was both "me" time and girl time. I will talk to about it later, but when I got home from works she seemed in a good mood.

I am trying not to let this lull me into a false sense of security, but if I can have more of these good days and fewer of the bad days, that's a great thing.

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Tomorrow I am going to see T. I am very excited about it. I have no idea what we will do, but I also don't really care. As long as I can spend some time with him close to me, I will be a happy homo.

Having Cards on the Table

With all the shit going on in my life (can I say "shit" in a blog?) there is one part that is good. For the most part, I have all my cards on the table and there is an amazing freedom in that. A relief.

I am not out to everyone in the real world, but I am in a place where I am ready for everyone to know. The people who really matter in my life know who I am. Gone are the days where I had to worry about what they will think if they find out. They know who I am and love me anyway. What a relief.

While I worry how my kids will react, it really is more about the crap they will get from others and the pain involved with the divorce. I think, in the end, the kids will accept me as I am.

I am not living the life I am supposed to, but I am on the way there. I have made a lot of progress over the past year. A lot more since I started this blog. I don't know if it is the act of sitting down to write most every day, those commends and messages I have received or some combination of the two that has propelled me forward.

When I started this I resolved to post about every other day, not so anyone will have something to read, but so I will force myself to organize at least one thought every time. I know that sometimes I write about the same thing, usually from a slightly different perspective, but it's the act of writing it out helps a lot. That fact that there a couple of people who ready what I right is icing on the cake. I'm really glad there are some who follow me and I am grateful for the support they have shown me.

Tuesday Update

Lately I have take some of the advice I have been given lately. I am letting K be mad and hurt. I can't really do anything about it, so I am letting it happen. It's breaking my heart and it's wearing her down. I don't like to see her this way. She is not the same person. She rarely smiles or laughs anymore and I really like to hear her laugh.

On another note, we are preparing for her parents to come visit from Thanksgiving. They are crazy. It's not just me that thinks so. K thinks so too. Their nuttiness makes our situation worse, since they are not really supportive of her. As her parent they should be sopping over with support, but since they suck, they are not. It's really to bad.

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For myself, I am doing well. I am plugging away at work and at home. There is freedom in the finality of being gay. I am gay and cannot change it no matter how much I want to. I cannot pretend I am straight even thought I know it will make it easier for everyone else. I have not come bursting out of my semi-closet, but I know I will never be able to go back in like I was. Taking that off the table is liberating, one less variable to think about.

Alone in a Crowd

Sometimes I feel alone even with other people, lots of other people around.

I was at church this morning with K and the kids. After the service there was a BBQ lunch. There must have been a hundred people, most of them families. Kids, parents, grandparents al together. Even though I was there with K and my kids I felt alone. I was also jealous of all the straight people, secure in who they are and fully accepted by those around them. It never occurred to any of these people to pretend to be something other that exactly what they are.

Yes, I know that everyone has a part of themselves that they do not share, but this is different. Hiding the basics of who you are from everyone, even yourself is a lonely road. Even denying the core of who you are. None of these happy church people know anything about that. They can't even start to understand it.

It's not their fault, of course. They naturally are exactly what everyone expects them to be. They did not struggle. They have always felt what those around them have felt, just as it was meant to be.

sigh.

I talked to my therapist last week about how I chose not to be gay. Thinking it was all about behavior (sex with other guys) i just figured I could choose not to do it, like any other behavior. I chose not to smoke. That decision is one that I still subscribe to and it has worked out great. I chose not to be gay. That did not work out as well. I could not turn off the yearning in my heart to love and be loved by a man.

Kids today are not as likely to do that as I was 20 years ago. There was no internet then, no blogs, no gay community centers. Just teachers telling you that men who have sex with other men get AIDS (which was new then) and since there is no cure, they die from it. Yikes!!!

If I had access to the information I have today, I know I would have made a different choice. I would not have married a straight woman. I may not have come out in high school, but probably in college. I would have looked for a gay man that I could love. But...

If that had happened, I would be out some stuff too. I would be out one best friend (K), 4 kids, and man who does truly love me (T).

K tells me all the time that everything happens for a reason. Maybe all this was part of God's plan from the beginning.

sigh

Good Day, Bad Day, Looking for the rainbow.

There are good days and there are bad day.

Maybe it is all my perception. Maybe she is angry all the time and I don't always see it. Maybe when she hides is, I assume progress is being made. Maybe I am stupid.

Maybe I am so desperate for everything to work out OK, that I am blind to the idea that it may not work out OK. It is very hard for me to think that way, but I am making some progress.

Not long ago, when K would display her anger and hurt, I would go over in my mind that maybe, just maybe I could go back into the closet and once again refuse to be gay. I don't feel that way anymore. I am gay, I will keep being gay and no matter how much I love her and want her to be happy, I cannot change who I am. I cannot stop being gay.

I have to accept that there will be ups and downs on this journey as I look for the rainbow.

Breaking Dawn?

Things might be looking up.

K talked to the pastor of the church and his attitude was to be supportive. He said we would have to find our own way and we should not be worried about what others think. She also received assurances that she was not going to be fired because I am gay.

Of particular interest to me was the way she told me she described our relationship to the pastor. We don't fight. We are best friends. That really made me feel good.

At the same time, it made me feel sad. It is another reminder that my life is marching forward to a state of permanent change. Soon it will all be different.

Steps. Forward? Backward?

So there are steps being taken, but it is not where I expected I would be.

I am not moving out. At least not right away. K and I are talking about stuff we have not talked about much before. I'm not going into much of it, but suffice it to say we are talking about the sources and effects of her pain and anger. On my side, I am talking about why I have done the things I have done over the years and how I felt about her and other things over the years.

I have been telling her about how I feel alone and out of place all the time and I have since I was a kid. I suspect a lot of gay men can identify with me on this.

I do not have a lot of friends. I have some, but most of them don't really know me. I am afraid to make new friends because I know I have to be careful of what I say, who I am looking at and feelings I express. I feel out of place. K works at a church and she like it when we all go to service on Sunday morning. I don't mind going. The people there are nice to me, but they don't know I am keeping, what in their eyes, is a terrible secret. I'm gay.

I have a hard time getting friendly with any of them because I know they would not be so friendly if they knew. I am an outsider. They don't treat me that way, but it IS that way, because I am hiding who I am.

I don't know if K gets that or not. I know she tries. I am tired of hiding. I am tired of pretending. I am slowing dying inside and I need to break free.

I have said before that at some point in my late teens I simply refused to be gay. Convinced it would go away eventually if I only behaved straight. Find the right woman and everything would be just fine. (Fake it until you make it.) Of course that only worked for a while.

I love K very much and I thought she would be the one that would change me, thought did not think of exactly in those terms at the time. So I pulled her into my deception. I was fooling myself and now I was fooling her too. That worked for a while too. But did it?

We took a cruise for out honeymoon. It was a lot of fun. On the first day we met another couple our age that was getting married in St. Thomas, one of the islands where the ship was stopping. They were really nice and fun to hang around with. I have forgotten their names but the guy was SMOKING HOT. I could not get enough of being around him. I was on my freaking honeymoon, I had been married about 6 or 7 hours and I was already checking out the cute boys on the ship. While I acted straight on the trip and told myself over and over I was not gay, I could not take my eyes off this hunk sitting across the table.

Looking back, I guess acting straight does not make you straight.

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I am hopeful that tomorrow will bring some positive moves. I K is meeting with a therapist who has personal experience being a straight spouse with a gay husband. This may be the person K needs to talk to that will be able to understand her problems. I am hoping she will get some good advice that she can use.

She is also going to talk to the paster of the church in the morning. She is not sure how much of the story she is going to tell him, but at least he is going to know there is no joy in Muddville. K is a little worried that if the church finds out that she could get fired. I told he I hoped not, plus she is not the gay one, I am. It's probably me they won't want to see again.

Cross your fingers.

Stop wasting time with gay marriage

I am a political junkie. I read political stuff on the internet all the time. There are lot's of political blogs out there and I am not going to try to make this one of them but I have a bee in my bonnet about this today.

I am gay (I may have mentioned that before) and I strongly the right of people to marry the person of their choosing (assuming they are of legal age).

I also think all this push for gay marriage is doing more harm than good and we should cut it out and focus on civil unions at the state and federal level. Yes I know that would cast us as second class citizens, but just for a little while. I know there are many who will not accept second class status, but it may be necessary. Here's why:

• It is totally absurd for civil right issues to be put to a vote by the majority. It is the function of the courts to protect the minority from laws that discriminate against any minority. Unfortunately, however, the court have not seen fit to perform their function. Now in 31 out of 50 stated we have lost because we have been insisting on marriage. People do not seem to have the stomach for that and it's hurting us.
• In Washington State a very good civil union law did pass a popular vote. Gay people in Washington can have a comprehensive civil union will all the state benefits of "marriage" without giving heartburn to straight people. Gay people in Maine and California got nothing. Is it unfair? Yes, but it's what we have right now.
• In every poll, people are much more likely to support civil unions for gay people than they are to support marriage. Why not let "marriage" be a religious term and let "civil union" be what happens at city hall. If we can get people support civil unions, it's a whole lot better than what we have today. Nothing, in most states. Something is better than nothing, even if it's not exactly what you want. Once the idea of civil unions is established, then we can (if we need to) go for changing the word to marriage.

Personally I think "Marriage" should be a strictly religious ceremony, with no power in the outside world. The couple (gay or straight) would then be required to across the street to city hall to obtain a civil union from a city clerk or some other official. Religious "marriages" would be treated but the government like a baptism or a bar mitzvah. Only civil unions would be recognized by the state.

Since the courts will not do their job, we need to work for civil unions.

Stepping off soapbox.

Ahhh... with only a touch of sadness.

I got to see T tonight. Except for one short lunch I have not spent anytime with him in 3 months. Way to fucking long.

Being with him, even for just a few hours was wonderful. It was good to be with him, touch him and feel his warmth.

I left him tonight with a high feeling and only a touch of sadness.

When I got home, I got an e-mail from K. She sometimes does that because it is easier for her to organize her thoughts that way. it was not angry (at least not at me) but it was sad and hurt. I felt a little guilty about the great night I had.

K has had a lot of men she cares about leave her life. Some have died, other have simply lost touch with her for a variety of reasons. Now she feels like I am leaving her too. I guess in some ways I am, but in others ways, very real ways I will never leaver her. I will always be here to support her. I will always be her biggest fan and I will be there to catch her if she falls.

Rain or rainbow?

Sometimes I have trouble telling the difference between rain and rainbows.

I have gotten K and avenue of help. I have connected her with someone, a therapist, who's husband came out to her and they divorced. K called to make an appointment and I am very happy about it. I have I hope she gets the support she needs and can't get from me, or anyone else.

I that rain or a rainbow? I'm not sure.

There is more I want to talk about, but I need to think about it more.

Stay tuned.

Shipwreked

So is this me?

Am I a shipwreck?

Maybe.

We all have choices to make, and there are consequences for each of them.

I did not choose to be gay. (Still the stupidest thing I have ever heard anyone say). I did not choose to fall in love with T, that just sort of happened.

I am choosing to move out of my house. Is that really a choice?

I suppose I can choose to go back in the closet and pretend I am not gay. I can try to forget about the love I feel for T and chooses to walk away from him. That will make everything better, right?

Probably not. K never forgets anything. She clearly remembers ever transgression I have ever committed in the 18 years I have known her.

I doubt she will forget I am gay. Even if I tried to pretend and she agreed to try again, I know that every time she saw me "aroused" she would wonder if it was her or the guy on the cover Men's Health making me that way. She's not stupid.

Storm Systems Converging

It is getting worse here.

I have been delusional, fooling myself. I am very good at that. Very practiced. I have been fooling myself for 30 years.

When I was 17 or 18 I refused to be gay. I refused to accept any scenario where I would not be with a woman.

Up until last night, I was doing it again. I simply refused to accept any scenario where K and I did not end up being good friends. Last night I came face to face with my delusion.

"How do you think that will work?" she asked. I hadn't really thought about it, but I had known in my gut it would.

I thought we would always be a family. Nope. K and kids would be a family. Me and the kids will be a family, but her and I will no longer be a family. I mean I knew that our status would change, but I assumed that we would always be close, that we would alway support each other. That we would parent the kids together.

She thinks that would be confusing for the kids. She thinks that every time they see her and I together that they will be hoping that we will get back together. When we don't she says that will be confusing and cruel. I don't think so. While they may not all understand "gay" they all have friends with divorced parents. They all know that is when the parents do not live together. I think that if the kids see that we still love them and we are still supportive of each other, they will be just fine, after the initial shock of daddy not living there anymore.

It was not a good night last night. We were both up late and it was very emotional.

All day at work I found it hard to concentrate on my work. It was difficult to do anything.

I hope this starts to get better soon. I am not like the lighthouse. I cannot take the forever pounding of the sea. I guess sooner or later the lighthouse will eventually surrender o the sea. I hope this gets better before I have to surrender.

Just a friend who wants to help

Several months ago T bought a new house for his family. He found it as a foreclosure that was in decent shape but needed work and he got it for a really low price. Since then he has been thinking that he can buy some cheap real estate, fix it up, rent it for a while and then sell it as retirement income. One of the differences between him and I is he makes a shit load more money than me. Except for his REALLY nice house, he does not show it. He drives a Toyota with well over 200,000 miles on it for example.

When he called me the other day he was thinking about me moving out of my house. He told me he was thinking about buying a house near where I live now, and I could rent it from him. When I told him I could not afford the rent on a whole house, he told me not to worry about it. How nice is that?

Yesterday, I asked him if he was serious. He told me he was and had been thinking about for a long time. I think this is a big deal and if it were anyone else, I would think he might have a ulterior motive. I might think he was using his money and my situation to offer me a really good opportunity that I could otherwise never afford. I worried that one day he will think of me as a leach. But he does not think that way. His family came to this county with nothing but the clothes on their backs. They had nothing. They all worked their asses off and now all but one of his 7 siblings have advanced professional degrees and high paying jobs.

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I looked at a house with a room for rent. It was OK, very close to the house I live in now (about 5 min away). The room was OK. It was a price I can afford (including all utilities). I would get a room and a full back. Before I went over there I told the guy I am gay and he said he didn't care. It was not fancy, it's a small house, but I don't need much.

Looking at the house made me sad. Looking at a new place, makes it more real that I am leaving my family. Being gay sucks.

Storm Front Growing

There was no school yesterday (Friday) and K was home with the kids all day. I could tell she was stressed out because she was baking when I got home from work. She was making a pumpkin cake and an apple pie. It's not good for my waist line, but she is a really good baker.

After the kids went to bed we talked a lot. She was very angry. She talked about how I was the one who has changed. How she planned to hold to her wedding vows and I was breaking them by leaving.

Another problem she has is her family. I'm not going to go into the details, but they have never been supportive of her. Her parents and her sister talk a good game about how "family" is important to them but they are unreliable. Sometimes they don't even call back when she calls. She has told a few of her close friends about our situation and they are not really much help to her. Its so far outside their experience they don't know how to help her aside from "why don't you through the bum out?"

She feels like since she has no supportive friends and her family is not supportive (or at least not reliable) she will go through this whole thing alone. With no support. To make matters worse, my family is very supportive of me and I think they will be supportive of her too, but right now she wants something that's hers. All this together makes her feel very alone.

In the end, she came back to the idea that we cannot change the past and only move forward. That was a little progress.

The storm is intensifying, but seems to be moving out to sea.

I know that she is not in the right place yet, but I wish she could see me the way I see her. As her very best friend. I really want to be supportive to her, but the truth is I can't help her because she sees me as the husband who has rejected her. Not as the best friend that has finally found out who he really is. I think this is the major source of my guilt.

Right now, being gay sucks. If I thought there was a chance that any of that ex-gay crap was anything other than crap, I would try it. But all those programs do is teach you how to lie. Lie to yourself and lie to others like a potential spouse.

Thanks for the Blogosphere

Where was this 20 years ago?

I have written about my problems. I have read about many men, who are gay, some in my situation and some not. I have read the happy ending stories about men who have survived the break up of their marriages, found not only themselves, but found partners they love and who love them back. I have read about the men who are, like me, still struggling on their journey. I have read about men who are married, too scared to come out, and hiding their true selves from the people they love the most.

I think about how much worse off I would be if I did not have access to the stories of all these men. In some cases I have learned a lot. In other cases I have fantasized about what it would be like to be a well adjusted gay man who is happy with his life and situation. Sometimes I have read every word of a man who is in so much pain where his blog is his only outlet. I have felt the heartbreak these men feel, knowing that I have walked in their shoes at some point in my life.

Thank you to the bloggers who have told their stories so I could not feel so alone. I do not know most of these men, but because they have put their lives on display, I have come to know them. I like the feeling to closeness, even if it is only online.

I have been talking with "Emerging Identity". He lives far from me, but we have talked on the phone several times over the past month. Before we spoke, he had read my entire blog and I had read his (his is much longer) and even though we had never spoken before, I felt like I knew him. I was very comfortable the first time we spoke. I value his insight and perspective. He helps me see there is light at the end of my tunnel. It might be an illusion created by the internet, but it feels real to me.

While I write this blog for myself, but I have always hoped that my story might help another man, the way others have helped me. Maybe it's what paying forward is all about.

I'm Glad You Found Yourself

That's what K told me last night. She said she was glad I found myself, but she added that it had a very high cost and hoped it was worth it.

I am paying a high cost, but I have only made a small down payment so far. I know that the really high payments are coming. When I finally move out. When I have to look the kids in the eye and tell them that I can't live there anymore. They have no idea any of this is coming and they will be shocked and confused. Probably devastated.

Since K and I don't fight, there have been no warning signs for them. From their perspective, this will be out of the blue.

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I have to find a way to re-build K's trust in me. About 18 or 20 months ago when I first realized I was falling in love with T, K overheard me talking to him and telling him, "I love you." Later she asked me if I told T that I love him and I lied and said no. There have been a few other things that I have not been completely honest about either.

I am a horrible liar and she now knows everything, but there is still a violation of her trust. For reasons I am not going to go into, she has serious trust issues. I worked very hard in the early years (yes, years not days) to earn her trust. Even thought I lied to her for what I thought at the time was a good reason, to spare her feelings from being hurt, it was still a lie. A betrayal.

The truth is I have been lying about who I am for the whole time I have known her. I have been lying to her and everyone I have ever met for past 40 years. I was even lying to myself for most of that time. This is not a new story. The blogoshpere is full of queers who "refused" to be gay. Like a lot of them, I did pretended to be straight, thinking that since I was normal in every other way, if I just act straight, I will become straight, like normal people. Add on top of that, a belief that being gay is just about having sex with other men. I did not realize until I met T what it is to be in love with a man. To feel emotional attachment for another man. A much more powerful pull than mere sex, and much, MUCH harder to ignore or pretend it's not there.

Because of this, she is not even sure that she will be able to continue to be my best friend, like I am hoping. Like before I will work hard to earn her trust back. I am gay and our relationship will never be the same, but I need to have her close in my life.

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I came down with a cold over the weekend I stopped at Wally-World for some drugs at lunch time today. I send K a text asking if she needed me to pick anything up for her. She texted back she was in the store (register #17). How cool!! I was there in 30 seconds just in time to put my drugs on the counter and get her to pay for them. (YIPPIE!!!) After we paid I walked her to her car. Then we had lunch together. It was a nice lunch, we talked mostly about the kids and school.

Then she pulled out furniture brochures. Apparently she had been doing some shopping during the morning. She had been looking at bedroom sets. It seems her intention is to give me the set we have now and she would buy a new set for herself. This is the first time she has talked about logistics of my moving. She did not seem angry, but was emphatic that she was not keeping our current furniture. I suppose from her perspective we bought that furniture for us (together) and if she was going to have to be on her own, this would be a fresh start. Or at least a symbol of one.

I guess I don't blame her.

A little sad

I was talking to a friend last night and talking to him makes me hopeful and scared at the same time.

He has walked the path that I am walking now. He has survived and nothing really bad happened to him. When I talk to him I see the light at the end of the tunnel. I see a view of what my life could be. His life is not perfect, but he knows what he wants and where he is going. I envy him in that regard. But life is not perfect for him either. I'm not going in that that here (you can read his blog for that) but it is also a lesson that once I starting living as a gay man, everything will not be perfect.

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Today I am feeling a little sad.

I don't know how exactly to describe my sadness or what is causing it, but I just feel it. I'm feeling lonely too. I suppose sad and lonely are related.

Sleepy and ...

"No one likes gays who pretend to be straight."

That was the last thing that K said to me before we went to sleep last night. I was too tired last night to ask her about it, but I think I know what she meant.

I have been thinking a lot about living (and loving) with integrity. I have been worried about how my leaving K would effect her. The pain and suffering that we will experience when I leave. The pain of shattered dreams and the loss of a life planned.

But now I am starting to see the pain is here and there is nothing I can do to stop it anyway. While she knows that I love her deeply, I do not love her in the was that a husband should love his wife. She knows that. If I stay here and pretend to be straight, I will be doing just that, pretending and she will know it. Stay or go, the pain is still there.

No one likes gays who pretend to be straight.

Especially straight spouses.

Snow Day

I love snow. Growing up in New England it snowed a lot in the winter. I remember as a kid being so excited when a snow storm was coming and there was a chance that school might be canceled.

I love in the south now and, no, it did not snow here, but I took a snow day from work anyway. (I took this picture just outside Charlotte last year.) K and I were home together most of the day and we did not have a bad day.

I did do work, but I was able to do it from home.

I really needed a break and I feel pretty good about it. Back to work tomorrow.

Flashes of anger and guilt

While things are going OK for now, I got a reminder that all is not as good as I would like. I try to remember that this is a process and I need to have faith that, in the end, it will all work out the way it should.

One of my kids had a behavior problem that required his teacher to call me this morning. #3 son is in second grade and an exceptionally a good student. Usually he has regular 7 year old boy problems at this school but this one was more serious. The teacher called me and I told her we would address it at home.

I knew she was working so I sent K a text message about it and then I went to lunch with some people from work. I did not hear my phone when she called (it was on the in-the-office-quiet setting). I also did not hear the 3 text messages she sent looking for more info. By the time I reached her, about an hour later, she was pretty pissed.

The part that matters here is she mentioned how things for the kids are going to get worse when they start getting teased at school because their daddy is a faggot. I thanked her for adding to my guilt (grrrr) and we finished our call. By the time I got home she was much calmer and we talked to #3 son in a rational way.

It is not uncommon for her to get very angry about something and lash out with something hurtful. The anger never lasts long and once she gets it out, it passes. That is just who she it. I have gotten used to that over the years. This time she picked something that was really concerning to me.

I do worry, a lot about the impact to my kids of having a gay parent. My younger kids are not old enough to really understand, older kids are. Living in this Bible-belt state, I know it is only a matter of time before someone tells them their daddy is going to hell. Being singled out for teasing (beyond what is normal) is another very real possibility. They might not immediately understand that Daddy was born this way, or why I had to live with integrity. All they will know is there is something different about their daddy and it's causing them grief. They will want it to stop, and they will probably resent me for it.

Yes, my kids will survive. They will not die, but will they thrive? Will they be happy? Is the extra pain they will experience so I can live honestly really be worth it? Will they think so?

I hope so.

Thinking about love

I had a good weekend and I have having a pretty good start to my week.

Today is is K's birthday. Last Mother's day I bought her a membership at a local spa so she can get a massage once a month. Her last one was today, so I renewed the membership for her birthday for the next 6 months. She really likes it and is a rare thing that she does for herself. She deserves it.

We have talked superficially about me starting to look for my own place. (The stuff in my price range is not luxury accommodations, to be sure.) We talked some about the kids and about how she will make me take our king sized bed because she hates it and wants a new one.

All in all we have had a good couple of days with my best friend and I feel pretty good.

I have also been thinking about T. This picture hangs in his office. He painted it himself. He painted it when he was dating someone else, but it makes me think of him and I.

While my situation today requires that I focus my attention on myself, my kids, K and work; I think once I am out on my own I will be ready to really explore a relationship with a man. That makes me think of T. I continue to have strong feelings for him. I love him very much. What's more, he has loved me in return. A big part of me thinks that I am stupid for letting him slip away.

Once I have a clear direction in my life and I know what I am doing, I feel like I want to try again with him. If he is willing and available (he's damn cute and lovable). It would not be perfect, there would be challenges, but maybe for love it's worth it. Maybe, just maybe.

Masks

I have said before that K works with youth at a local church. In preparing for her program for tonight she was talking masks. It's duel topic, both for the upcoming Halloween season and they talk about that God can always see who they really are even if they pretend to be someone else.

Apparently the "be yourself" topic is one she covers a lot from different angles with the kids. It struck a cord with me since I have been pretending to be someone else.

I do not pray often. Today I did. I asked for a clear mind. I asked for an open heart. I need to clear my mind and move in the right direction. Maybe moving in any direction will be a good thing.

As K was telling me about the plans for her program tonight, I could not help but think about my prayers this morning. That I need to be myself. That I need to stop pretending to be someone I am not. I need to be a gay man. I need to find a man that will love me and I can love. One that will also understand what it means to have a family (K & kids, kids mostly) that need me to take care of them.

I wonder if that is the clarity I need? Was that the sign that God sent me? Maybe I need to open my heart to the idea that it is.

I see straight people. They are everywhere.

I went with K and the kids to church this morning. After we all went to lunch and then to a local mall. While K was shopping for kids clothes, I waited outside the store and I could not help notice how many hand holding couples passed right in front of me. It was almost like they were teasing me.

I took these pictures about 2 min appart. I took several others too, but I think these 2 make my point. These people are normal and it's so easy for them to be normal. They get up each day and they look into their lover's eyes and they see there exactly what they want to see and what they expect to see.

Their love is normal. Everyone around them expects them to hold hands at the mall. Maybe even sneak a quick smooch. Everyone who sees them, including me, thinks it nice that 2 people are in love. It made me want to be normal too.

Busy and Fun.

This will be a busy weekend, but I think it will be good.

Tomorrow evening K and I will go to the race. She will have a good time and maybe for a little while we can be best friends and forget we are having all our other problems.

Break up in slow motion

So T and I are no longer boyfriends. The truth is that I have been running flat out that there is nothing left for me to give to him. He understands that we can not see each other as much as either of us would like, but I have a hard time finding the time (or motivation) to call him. I just don't have the energy. And it's not just him. Sometimes K and I sit at the same table, each with our own laptop, and we do not speak to each other. It's not that we are mad, we just don't have anything to say.

He was starting to feel resentful that I it was hard for me to find the time to even call. We will remain friends, but not more. I still love him very much, but I can't string him along any more. Who knows, one day when I situation with K is resolved and I am on my own, maybe T and I can try again.

Alone is sometimes good

I frequently go to lunch alone. Not because I have no one to go with, but sometimes I enjoy the quite time to be in my own thoughts. In my previous job I used to travel for business a fair amount. Almost every time I travel alone. Of course I would be working with people while I was there, but at the end of the day they would go home to their families and I would go to my hotel alone. I never minded.

I don't think I would like to be alone all the time. But because it's so crazy at my house (with the kids and all) the quiet time was welcome.

I think when I have to come to an empty home everyday I will not like being alone as much.

Some breaking dawn

I was having a productive day at work. I was thinking about the talk K and I had this weekend. I was feeling sad about it.

K and I exchanged a few texts and when she asked me what was wrong, I told her "It turns out I'm gay and that is hurting my family. That makes me sad."

She replied that she could not change who I am. She also said as irritated as she is I could not "come clean" to her or myself 16+ years ago, we can't change that either. We can only move on from here.

I really love her. I feel like she is letting me off the hook. I know that she will not let go just like that, but for today anyway, she understands who I am.

Swirl

Today has been a good day. Work was manageable and I got a lot of stuff done.

I have been grateful for the comments and e-mail of support I have received lately. They have helped me to feel a little less alone.

Sometimes I am frustrated that the process seems to me moving slowly, but I suppose there are some things that cannot be rushed. I doubt I could move faster if I tried.

So for now I swirl. I swirl and swirl. It's probably getting boring to read. :-)

I have been looking at Craig's List for cheap apartments and rooms for rent. I think the kind os apartment I could afford would be pretty crappy. I could get a nicer place in a roommate situation, but do I really want to share a house with someone I don't know? I have not had to do that since college, and when I had to share one room.

I am a little more in K's good graces for a while anyway. I got tickets to the NASCAR race this weekend. I really don't give a crap about the race, but she really likes it. I told her she did not have to take me but I was available if she wanted to. Looks like I am going. It will be nice to spend some time together. It's been a while.

Admiration and Respect

I love this guy. Not in a creepy stalker way, but in an admiring way. I wish I had his courage.

Meet Army 1st Lieutenant Dan Choi. I'm sure you have all heard his story. West Point graduate, Iraq war combat veteran, fluent in Arabic, and oh yea, he's queer. He is being kicked out of the Army. I don't know what the taxpayers paid to give this guy the education he has, but that investment is going down the drain. All because he was born gay.

One of the things I hear him say in an interview is that telling the truth is the most important thing. There is a conflict between the Don't Ask Don't Tell law and the Honor Code in the Army concerning telling the truth. There is no way for him to be on compliance on both policies. Gay men and women who just want to serve, have to lie about who they are. They have to sit quietly while their buddies develop "normal" relationships, start families. They are banned from living their lives.

Dan Choi said no more. He could no longer hide who he was from his friends at work. He could no longer deny himself a relationship of a man he fell in love with. He could no longer lie. He could no longer pretend to be something he is not. A gay American.

I admire his courage. His father is a baptist minister so I doubt he is receiving a lot of support from home (though I don't really know.) He is losing his job and a career he trained for and by all account loved and was good at. The US Army is losing a man who was an effective leader and an Arab language specialist. Certainly something we need right now. He did not commit a crime. He did not go AWOL. He did nothing other than tell the truth about who he is. That's it.

Why does that have to be so fucking hard?

I mean really. If things were not so fucked up, I would not be in the position I am in right now. I would not be breaking the heart of my best friend. When I realized I was different all those years ago, it would have been OK for be to think of myself as gay. It would have been OK.

I admire Dan Choi and all the other gay men and women who took a stand and said, "I will not lie about who I am. I will not hide in the closet. This is who I am." They did not have to wave a banner, march in parades, or appear on the TV to get my admiration. They just came out to themselves and did not live a lie.

For those of you who, like me, did lie to themselves, but have since come out to the world, I admire you too. As I am learning, it take a good deal more courage to come out late in life. When you are young your deception may be just to yourself, or to a small group of family and friends. When you are 40, or 50 , or older, you have a life time of people you have convinced that you are normal. You have emotional investments in a lot more people and from a lot more corners. In the eyes of others, young people come out as gay. Older people become gay, or they decide they are gay. It is perceived as a change so coming out means you have to admit that you have been lying to them for a much longer time. In some cases, a life time.

Thanks to Dan Choi and others like him. And my other blogger friends who are showing me there is life after coming out. It is an inspiration to me.

Not quite sorted out.

I built a campfire last night. We sent the kids upstairs to watch a movie and K and I sat outside. The night was cool, but not quite crisp and the fire felt good.

We talked about how we are going to get through this mess. And you thought we had it all worked out. Not quite I guess.

She said says she does not want to revisit the past and how it all happened, but she still feels fucked over. And I'm doing the fucking (and not in the way she wants me to). She does not doubt that I love her and that I have "tremendous feelings for" her, but I do not love her the way a husband should love his wife. I told her that was true.

Then she went on. "So either you never in love with me, or your feelings have shifted."

This is a problem question for me. I'm not sure what the answer is. On the one hand I dod not feel like my love for her has changed. I feel like the intensity of my feeling for her and just the same as the day we said "I do." On the other hand, while I have always had a physical desire for men, I have not always had the longing I have now for the love (physical and emotional) of a man. So have I always felt this way? Does it matter?

Yes. It matters because K feels that if I was never in love with her, it means (to her) that I have been lying to her all these years. For now she chooses to believe that there has been a shift.

She also brought up our wedding vows. This is a powerful tool for her. She knows I that I take my promises to her very seriously. I know for some people marriages are disposable. For all the talk of the sanctity of marriage straight people yabber about, there are a lot of divorces. If I was not gay, there is no doubt that K and I would be together until one of us died. We have been through a lot together, and if it was not for this, we could go through a lot more.

At this point I am almost beaten. Maybe my needs don't matter. Maybe the responsibilities I have and the commitments I have made (to both K and the kids) are more important than getting my needs met. I am pretty sure I can meet the needs of the kids. But what about K? Can I meet her needs? Of course the answer is, no. I have not been able to meet them for a long time.

At the end, I think we know we need to move on, but neither of us are very happy about it.

It just sucks.

Then last night I had a dream. My worst nightmare, actually. I don't remember everything, but K was no longer my friend. She was no longer talking to me. It was awful. If that happened in real life, I don't know what I would do.