One Way Track

Have you heard the joke about the guy who named his dog, "Stay".  Then when he was training his dog to come when called, he was heard saying, "Come here, Stay.  Come here, Stay."


That is what K said I was doing to her in the two years that a waffled back and forth.  In the time that I was "working on my marriage."  In the time that I was trying to so the responsible & selfless thing and honor my marriage vows and hold my family together.


The result?  Confusion.  Hope.  False hope.  Pain.  Sadness.  Fear.  There were times when I felt good, when we made a new resolution to work together, but it never lasted.  


For all the years I was in the closet in my own head, I was able to successfully pretend that I was straight.  Well, I think the definition of "successful" depends on your point of view.  What is important is, that once I came out to myself, I was out.  Once I acknowledged to myself, I was gay, there was no way I could go back to pretending I was straight.  When I tried the despair only grew.  It grew faster than I could find ways to relieve it.


While I suppose there are some people who are able to make a marriage between a straight woman and a gay man (or the other way around) work, I just don't see how.  How is it that any self respecting straight woman will want to devote her love to a man who is not capable of returning the same kind of love?  Clearly we love our wives, God knows that I have always loved K and I will continue to love her.  But I do not love her in the way that she loves me.  More importantly, I was never in love her in the same way I now am in love with T.  At the end of the day, there was no way that she would accept that for herself.  She deserved that kind of love.  She needed that kind of love.

There is no going back into the closet.  Even K would take me back, I would not go.  I am a gay man.  I have tasted the love of a man.  I have fallen asleep in his embrace.  I have had him fall asleep on my chest.  We have made love in an emotionally intimate way that K and I never did.  I could never go back.


What's more, she could never go back.  In the same way that I have fallen in love with T, she has with AJ.  For the first time in almost 20 years, she feels what it is like for a man to not just love her, but be IN LOVE with her.  She deserves that.  She needs that, and while it was painful place for us to get to, I am glad she does have it.  Just as I am glad I have it.


I cannot go back into the closet and I doubt there are many others who could.