Senior Speech / Valentine's Day

Today's the day I've dreaded for five years. Today, the summation of my high school years comes together for one final, despicable high school graduation requirement: the senior speech.

People have warned me for years not "to make a decision I will regret" regarding my senior speech content. Obviously, they refer to my sexuality. Granted, even though I never had any intention of writing about my sexuality or God forbid COME OUT in my senior speech, it kinda irks me. It almost gives me the impression that the best I've done in my high school experience is had an alternative, predetermined lifestyle. I don't think that's what my high school experiences amount to. I do, however, think that my sexuality has made a good portion of who I am today and that I need not pretend that it isn't important. Clearly it's important. But is it necessary to stand up in front of a room of six hundred people and declare my attraction to the same-sex? Is it even necessary to remind me it's unnecessary? I suppose contextually, it would simply be a poor decision. I go to an all-male, Catholic, military academy with obvious conservative leanings, both politically and socially. On the other hand, my graduating class of 2010 couldn't care less that I'm gay; they either know and don't care or simply haven't picked up on it. That, to me, is the best way I could have it. I mean, sure, I would probably be safe in assuming that all of my classmates are heterosexual. But even if one of them weren't, is it really my business to know either way? No, it's not. Similarly, it's not really anybody else's business to know my sexuality.

But there is and always has been the question- what if I were to simply hint at my sexuality? What if I were to build up the suspense of possibly coming out only to reveal something else? My father hated this idea. In fact, he begged me to reconsider this. I thought this reason enough to go through with it. Making people uncomfortable isn't foreign to me. Making people uncomfortable with pressing social ideas and concepts is almost talking my language. Therein lies another question- if indeed I were to do this, how would I go about fulfilling the time length requirement? I can't just dance around revealing something for three minutes straight- that would drive me and the audience up a wall. Clearly, I need to talk about something else and segue into my "big announcement."

That's why I'm writing this blog, for the most part. Carleton's SWP program taught me that if I write about anything- anything- before what I actually need to write that I will find it much easier. In that sense, general writing I guess is like working out before a game. That's what I'm doing right now; I'm preparing to show that hypothetical pen (in this case, my keyboard) who's boss.

On a completely different note, I am absolutely hungover. Yes, I drank half a bottle of wine last night. Oops. Chandra invited me over and made me dinner (which was fantastic) and we watched Van Wilder Freshman Year, 17 Again, and Good Luck Chuck. Good Luck Chuck was pretty heinous. I didn't get home until around 2AM and didn't wake up until about ten hours later, which is actually a lot of sleep for me. And now here I am, hungover and trying to cram all of my classwork into my day off. God I am an idiot sometimes.

I have the rest of the weekend to blog about too, but I'll save that for later when my brain isn't screaming.

another year

it's been a really long time since i've blogged. i feel like i should be doing this a lot more often. a lot's happened since i last had an entry, much less about something besides "Abnormally Attracted to Sin." more than any other, so much shit has gone down this week. jon and i broke up (mutually and on good terms). i've been having horrible cigarette cravings for over a month every single day. school has been fun, but my quietness regarding my sexuality is starting to destroy me. i started exercising. i'm seeing someone about my sexuality/school issues now at the request of jon and an instructor. but most of all, i find myself with a really strong support group. and i am stronger than i have ever been. this week so far has been very hard. it's crucial that i not only survive it but also vanquish it.

i'm learning a lot. and i'm finding that people are much more open to helping me and getting through this than i would have imagined. and it means more to me than i can express. especially because i'm in a very bad place right now. i'm stronger than ever, but i'm not sure if i can go another week without coming out. even if it's just being open through facebook. i don't know if i can do it. and that scares the shit out of me.

more than anybody else though, jon is really helping me through this. and it's amazing- our relationship as friends is so much stronger than it was when we were together. we're in such different places in our lives. it would have been hard to stay together for much longer. i'm not sure either of us thought we'd even be together as long as we were. and it was an unbelievably healthy and successful relationship. but it had a deadline. and we both knew it. it made it a lot harder for us, jon especially, to give to each other emotionally. i'm on my way to college. he's on his way out. i need him as a big brother and a friend a lot more than i need him in bed though. and already i feel like this is a good change for both of us. that makes me very happy.

the other day i tried nicarette gum in hopes that it'd reduce my cigarette cravings. i was totally wrong of course- i didn't know any better though. that was the most foul thing i've ever put it my mouth. needless to say, i'm pretty convinced that i'm just really stressed and craving cigarettes because of it. thus, pack of cigarettes for the week. then i'm done.

and here i am, watching jasmine dragon pearls grow in lemon myrtle water with libby, jon, and taylor. can you say pathetic? oh yeah.

ps: my father and i have decided that i need to wait another year. he'll bring the smokes, i'll bring the beer.

it'll be the best year ever. i promise.

Raspberry Swirl

Jon goes home in two weeks. I know I've exhausted this bit of information, so forgive me. In good news I was accepted into Carleton's summer writing program, which makes me really happy. My father gave me a credit card today. Lolwut. My father is not only supportive of me dating Jon, but won't stop asking questions about him. Double lolwut. I came out to my mother. Triple lolwut. Oh and Kristoff Krane might be a new client, or rather, my first personal client. Not quadruple lolwut, but still noteworthy (the lolwuts had to die at some point). Maybe California didn't blow chunks. Quandruple lolwut (I lied). At any rate, I'm going to miss my sweetheart. I'm not going to miss high school. I will probably miss Minnesota, and then the US, and then St. Paul/Minneapolis, as I go on the G tour summer '09 (New York, Italy, Northfield). But most of all, I will probably miss Emily and the internet. Also- can somebody stop me from coming out to any more people? This shit is gonna get out of hand and spread like wildfire if I don't shut up. I mean, I'm all for triumphing over the heterosexist world, but not when and if it's not safe. But I am terribly sleepy. SO, I am going to go to sleep and dream about sleeping with my baby. <3

epiphany.

what i just witnessed will never be repeated. never in my life have i ever felt so inspired, and nothing i can say will ever be able to describe the incredibility of what just happened. today, lauren picked me up from the barnes and noble here in eagan to take me down to northfield and see this guy- kristoff krane perform. what i didn't know was that before the show we were going to see him do a writer's workshop. the workshop was truly inspiring and i feel so moved by what he taught us. while i'm totally not comfortable posting the random incoherent thoughts i ended up with on my sheet of paper, i will give you my last thoughts and reflections on the excerise and the writing i did. i decided to write about my struggles with coming out, and ended up with some garbage that sort of rambled and stole a bunch of lyrics from merman and riot poof. whatever. these were my final thoughts though:

sometimes i wonder if it's just better that i either come out now or not at all. if my car lands in an ocean, likewise, i have to make the decision whether or not to try and escape the car before i drown. hence, every day i have to make the decision of whether or not i want to come out of that car. the longer i wait, the harder it is and the more likely i'll drown. however, if i rush things i could likely find myself w/out a plan and die foolishly. therein lies the problem.

so you can see from this that from using my resources and a recent conflict that i took my struggle with sexual identity and coming out and used drowning as a metaphor. i drew this conclusion from an exercise he had us do. we were asked to write down "what's on my mind lately? / conflict" and explore those concepts. so i wrote down this list during that time:

heterosexism
fear
what defines a real person?
silence
homophobia
cannibalization of identity
security
identity -> uniformity crisis
self-acceptance
identity crisis
sexuality
sin
sensuality
self-loathing
ego

so from these concepts and ideas i noticed a lot of links and similiarities. all of these are related and essentially boil down to the way i've approached myself growing up gay in a very heterosexist society. we were then asked to make four boxes, and list things. since i can't draw boxes on this, i suppose i'll just write them down as lists in the order of what we did:

objects / images / associations:
parking ticket
tea
riot poof
car - escape
school - sta
cracker

reference / quote:
real men
riot poof
"go to bed the priests are dead so no one can call you bad"

memories:
morality class
8th grade - coming out
denial - freshman year
catholicism
travis

shape / colour / season / condition:
grey / green / blue
cold summer / winter

so as you can see from the lists/boxes that i sorta rambled and didn't have any real sense of direction with my thought process other than that i wanted to write about my sexuality. when i remembered the problems with coming out in 8th grade, i started to think more about my current situation. connecting that with the cold water/ocean, the parking ticket i had gotten and with that my car, which i use a lot of the time to escape (hence have to drive being so dear [err, deer] to me), and especially tori amos's song "merman," i began to draw the idea of myself drowning, trapped in my car. while i didn't get anything really written, i feel like i learned a lot from this writing exercise and hope to try it again on my own time.

the show though, words cannot describe it. i can say that kristoff krane is a wonderful guy and that his music really inspired me today though. i can say that i sat down on a couch and ate pizza with eyedea and totally connected to them and the other people around me. and i can say that i have never before seen such admiration and powerful looks from a crowd like that, as well as kristoff himself. please look the guy up, because had i had $10 there, I would have bought that cd twice over. and i will be buying that shit the instant i have money again. i am completely inspired and in awe of what happened and i wish that i was able to explain what just happened in more detail. thank you lauren for inviting me and experiencing this with me, and thank you kristoff for giving me something i will never experience again.