Acceptance
Ever since I can remember, “gay” has been a bad word. Both my mother and father insisted that I never intentionally call another person by such a slur. Being young, inexperienced, and naive, I believed them. Even during family gatherings, some of my more rambunctious cousins would grow bold and let the word slip into their diction, only to be reprimanded by their own parents, a few sharp words and a quick slap, moments later. In some instances, I can distinctly remember fully ascribing to the idea that people who dared to like the same sex were wrong and repugnant. I had been conditioned to hate something I never had the chance to fully understand.
And then, I developed a crush on a girl.
Of course, I was only in kindergarten and completely oblivious to what my feelings meant. All I knew was that I wanted to be around this girl who I thought was pretty and I wanted to be the one that made her laugh at whatever a five year old finds funny and I wanted to be the one who gave her chocolate on valentine's and I wanted to be the one who held her hand at the playground. My ultimate mistake was telling my mother of these feelings. She reprimanded me, told me that the feelings I had couldn't really be what I was describing and that she hoped I was exaggerating from the excitement of having a new friend. For the rest of the day my chest burned with shame and I vowed to never disappoint my parents in such a way again.
For a while, my unspoken promise seemed to be effective. I never spoke of the incident again and I had nearly forgotten it occurred at all. However, my second crush would also be another girl. I was in middle school, just about the right age when girls begin to go “boy-crazy”. I could never relate to them of course, at most I would awkwardly agree or half heartedly declare who deserved to be titled the cutest boy. When I finally met my soon-to-be second crush, everything clicked. The way other girls would squeal about the butterflies in their stomach, the nervousness, the excitement of simply being in the same room as their crush, all of it. I finally understood all of it.
That very night I cried harder than I have ever cried in my entire life. I had never believed much in God before, in fact I had denounced his existence by the time I was nine (much to my parents’ chagrin), but that night I prayed as hard as I had ever prayed, even before I had completely given up the idea of God. I prayed that I wouldn't be gay, I couldn't. Not so much for my well-being, but for my parents. The idea of disappointing them in such a way, the idea of hearing my mother’s same derisive tone over something I could never control, terrified me to my core. I prayed through my tears every night after, but of course my feelings never subsided.
It wasn't until about a year later when I would come out to the first of many. At the time, he was my best friend and I was desperate for someone to know. I knew that I was lucky to even be able to consider telling someone of my preferences - that, had I been born just a generation before, such a thought could possibly lead to a criminal conviction - but it never felt as if I was. It was long after I stopped crying every night, yet I still felt paranoid, and trapped. I felt as if there was a glass wall between everyone else and myself. No one else could tell it was there. And everyday I would look through the glass and beg for someone to notice my separation, to acknowledge me for everything that I was, and to accept me. As the feeling of isolation grew, so did my comprehension that no one would come to my aid if I never asked. So when I finally told someone, someone who didn't reject me or ridicule me, and simply carried on as if I hadn't just shared my deepest secret, as if I was still the same person they were best friend with, I cried.
And this time, they were tears of joy.