Marks Birthday

One of my best friends... On his birthday... I thought it would be funny to regift some of the regifted gifts that he has given me over the years... with a couple real gifts thrown in...

Dont you just live for that happy present face!!!!

My misspent youth of folly; part 4

I never came out to my parents.

I know, hard to believe isn't it. I was outed at Denny's but I never had to tell my parents.

I hear all these horror stories about what it was like for people coming out. How some religious families abandoned and disowned their children and what some peoples parents put them through, like reversion therapy and re-birthing therapy, which is some pretty scary shit in reality.

I always feel a mix of pride at how forward thinking and mentally evolved my parents always were and how easy they made growing up gay a non-issue. After all, this is a kid whose favorite Christmas gift from childhood was the deluxe two story, bright pink, She-Ra Princess of Power Crystal Palace. Not to mention the rather large barbie collection I had amassed by the age of ten.

In my interactions with other people in the gay community the first universal bond that we shared was the experience of coming out. Upon hearing so many coming out stories I, for some unexplainable reason, seemed to feel just a smidgen of disappointment that I didn't have a DRAMATIC coming out story of my own. My coming out was almost inconsequential...

I was going to American Career College at the time, taking my medical classes, commuting with my mom on her way to work. She was taking a course at Landmark at the time and I was helping her on her memorization. She spoke out loud like an actress with a script. I had her folder on my lap and was keeping her place with my fingertip when suddenly the words I was reading were not the words she was saying, and I looked up and said "huh, what?"

"Oh well, your gay right? I mean that's what we always thought?"

I looked away from her as quickly as I could. Mothers can read their kids eyes... and when time has stopped and you are caught in the mother stare, there is no lie you can tell convincingly. She will see it. Instead I focused on the trees on the side of the street. The tires on the other cars. We were at the intersection of Barranca and Sand Canyon Boulevard.

"Um... yeah? Turn right here..."

"That's what I thought, just checking. Anyway, where was I? You still have your finger where I left off, where was I?"

And away she went... back to practicing her lines. As if this was normal everyday conversation... As if it had no more weight to it than what would you like for dinner. She turned right and drove on toward my school.

The only other time she broke from the IFLP script that morning was when she turned to me and said, "drive through McDonald's for breakfast this morning?"

Again, my response was less than stellar and witty: "uh, yeah, sure, ok."

I cant remember a thing they taught in school that day. I couldn't believe that I had just come out to my mom. I had been so terrified at the thought of coming out to them. I don't know why. I don't even know when I started to be afraid of being gay. I knew it was wrong in High School, but I also knew that people didn't really always care the way you thought they were going to.

My Dad, and my brother however... not too excited about their reaction. After all, I had always been mom's little boy... and Josh had always been Chucks buddy. I guess I always knew my mom would take it well... I just couldn't say I was as confident with how they would take it. Mom picked me up after school on her way home from work.

We drove home singing along to the radio, and she talked about her day. At some point she said that she had told Chuck, and for some reason I don't remember her saying anything else. I didn't notice the pressure in my chest until we turned onto my street and I started panicking.

We pulled into the driveway and mom turned to me. "Chuck doesn't have a problem with you being gay, you know. We have known since you were about four. One of your therapists told us that you might grow up gay without intervention. So we didn't intervene, and we waited. It was an eventuality that we were prepared for."

As we walked in the front door, mom called out hello to Chuck who was just finishing a set on his drums. He finished and put his sticks down and came into the living room.

"Hey Sweetie" he said to mom before turning to me and saying "So, big day for you, huh." And then, I shit you not, he sang to me... "coming out is haaard to-oo-oo do" followed by some unintelligible high-pitched whaling a'la Frankie Valley. When he was done, he looked at me with that twisted dopey smile and said "well you know, I always wanted a daughter!!"

Finally, for once, my wit did not fail me, and I turned to him and calmly replied "Chuck, I am NOT going dress shopping with you!!"

And that was it. We chuckled, and hung out in the living room and watched tv. That was my DRAMATIC coming out story. Even worse was when I decided to tell my brother. It was a rare day about a week after my parents found out. Josh was in a surprisingly chipper and friendly mood, and we thought it would be a lot of fun to go out on Mission Viejo lake in kayaks. On the walk over there I built up the courage again and right before we got to the lake house I finally blurted it out.

"Josh, you know... I'm gay..."

"Um, does the word DUH mean anything to you? You have been in what I like to call a glass closet. You think your hiding it, but shit, everybody knows!!"

That day he tipped my kayak over three times before I got back to the lake house... bastard. When we got back to the house he told me he had a surprise for me. We got dressed and got into his beat up, dirt caked behemoth of a powder blue tank and drove down to the Laguna Nigel theatre.

He got out and said he had been trying to find someone to see this movie with him, and since I was a big ol MO now, I should enjoy it. That is how I ended up in a deserted dark theater in christian republican Orange County laughing hysterically along with my straight brother to The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert.

Again, robbed of all dramatic tension, my life seems to constantly play out as a grand comedy. All that's left for me to do is laugh along and enjoy it.

My misspent youth of folly; part 3

After high school I became best friends with the twin sister of my only girlfriend. Stacey and Stephanie Bernhardt, Best friend; former girl friend. Stacey and I were both kind of counter culture kids stuck behind the Orange Curtain. Although I never came out to her, she figured I was gay. So there were were; the goth and the gay, and weren't we a pair!

We really bonded when Steph got surprise married to some guy, even though she was still telling her parents that we were "going steady"... yeah, right out of high school... all of us 18. So Stacey was the one that called me and told me, and then accompanied me to the wedding. From then on we were inseparable. Stacey and I did everything together. Eventually we build our own cool group. Stacey, Halla, April and I...

We would hang in my garage, or at one of their boyfriends houses... or that one night at Staceys' when her parents were out of town... We all decided to hang out there and drink... in the enclosed spa. A couple shots in and we're all pretty happy... a couple more shots and I'm walkin Stacey out into the back yard for some air... I sit her down on the kids card table and I sit across from her on the plastic slide. For some reason she thinks it is the perfect time to pull the Sharon Stone leg cross and winds up falling right through the table, legs straight up... I cant stop laughing and pointing long enough to catch my breath and end up screech-vomiting while laughing through tears... well... you get the drift... pretty average teenagers.

Well, one night when I got off from my shift working the counter at Ross, Stacey, Halla and April were all waiting for me in the parking lot...

"What's goin on?" I asked.

"We're going to try out the Denny's on El Toro tonight... I hear it's less crowded and better atmosphere than the Alicia Denny's... that place has been taken over by the high school kids... bleh..." said Halla in her French Lebanese way...

So we all piled into her dodge colt hatchback with the tinted windows and drove the seven or eight blocks to the Dennys. Now when they say the place had better ambiance what they really meant was that instead of the horrid wallpaper of most dennys, this one actually had some nice aged wood paneling instead. Still... it was Dennys.

"What can I get you kids" Jan asked as if bracing for yet another smart ass kids comment.

"An All American Slam for me Jan" I responded... and then coyly whispered "up against a hard wall" to my friends...

As we waited for and then ate our food, the girls decided that it would be a fun game to go around the table and tell our deepest darkest secrets... Hehehe... wont that be fun... they all asked with some sort of evil knowing in their eyes. I cant remember what Aprils was, but we giggled and then moved on to Stacey... and she described some sordid affair that barely skirted the law in her youth...

Halla however, burned her darkest secret deep into my cornea insuring that I shall think of that ill placed cucumber and carrot always as tools of depravity!! Which, by the way, turns out to be a fantastic excuse as to why you wont eat those things... Give just enough information like I just did, and trust me, they wont want you to continue!! Halla... Shocka!!!

And then there was I.

They all turned to me with anticipation...

"I was locked up in a mental hospital for 8 months once..."

"Yeah, we already knew that one... has to be deeper... something you have never told anyone..." Halla said, pressing me in the direction she wanted me to go.

"Well shoot, I was raised by hippies and had a pretty cool and weird life... wait, I was in special ed from 1st grade to 10th... did you all..."

"Yes, we went to high school with you... duh..." said April... I left out the part about her being my reluctant senior homecoming date didn't I... Yes, she asked me if I was going to ask her to dance... yes I said not to this music... yes she went and danced alone. I was an awkward gay teenager... leave me alone!!

Anyway...

"Well, I guess I had a pretty good childhood. I don't really have any secrets like that..."

"Alright, come off it, we found your video tape Shane. Jason found it in your VCR when he was hangin out in the garage." Halla blurted out, bringing all conversation to a stunned silent stop.

All motion seemed to slow down... the couple by the door that seemed to be moving this way, did his head just jolt in my direction... had they overheard? The waitress seemed to be pouring that water at the next table for an eternity... Why was everyone suddenly staring at me... Why was everyone in the restaurant suddenly staring at me??

"What video?"

"You know what video, your face just turned scarlet." Halla said... leaning slightly back as if she was in complete control and was only waiting for me to stumble before exposing and destroying me, right here... in Dennys.

"Its not mine... I was just holding on to it for someone..." Yes. I actually used that defense when they confronted me with porn. I know, I cant believe it either.

"Shane... If there is anything you want to tell us, you should. You are my best friend in the whole world, and there is nothing you can say right now that would change the way I feel about you." Said Stacey.

"uh... well... " as I glance around... no one is near... "i'm gay".

"Cool!" hailed Halla, "I love gay guys, they have always and will always be, a girls best friend."

Stacey leaned over and closely whispered "you know, I've known for years... I was just waiting for you to tell me."

So when I came out, every one of my friends and their boyfriends liked me, and liked having a gay guy around. Which seems weird to me, now as I think back on my time in Orange County. Somehow I managed to having a completely positive coming out experience in one of the most christian/republican intolerant locales in the United States.

But still... at a Dennys?? You ladies couldn't have taken me down to the Little Shrimp in Laguna Beach? I had to find that place all by myself!!!

The Curse of Incompleteness: part 1

My Uncle Marty asked an interesting question a while ago about why I titled my blog "The Curse of Incompleteness". I told him that I called it that both because Life is a journey of incompleteness and you don't become complete until you die. And secondly because I felt that there was a large amount of things that I had left unfinished, and people that I had ended relationships with while things remained incomplete.

While this statement is technically true, it seems that I skewed my view toward the negative in interpreting it that way. While browsing through my photo album tonight, I was reminiscing on all the moments that I have experienced. It seemed to me that part of living this journey of incompleteness is remembering the things I have seen along the way, the places I have been and sharing them more...

The following is the beginning of a list of things that I have completed in my life.

I have sung on the main stage of the Sydney Opera House.

I have sang on the fields of Soldier Field, Wrigley Field and Giants Stadium.

I have sang on the stage of San Francisco's Castro Theater.

I have stood at the foot of the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona.

I have sailed the Pacific, Indian, and Arctic Oceans.

I have been at sea in a hurricane.

I have participated in search and rescue operations.

I have driven a speedboat.

I have seen the sunrise over oceans, rivers, valleys, mountains and snowscapes.

I have traveled to Europe, Asia, Australia, Canada And Central America.

I have driven a Navy warship.

I have fired missles at another country, and I have feared for my life while fighter jets circled the boat.

I have been in love.

I have passed the equator and the international date line at the exact same moment, and I have become a Golden Shellback.

I have met two half siblings for the first time as adults.

I have walked the streets of Hong Kong, but preferred the streets of Kow Loon.

I have had a secluded beach all to myself in a foreign country.

I have seen a shipwreck.

I have seen the sunbeams poking through the highest peaks of the Austrian Alps.

I am a sharpshooter.

I have been to the top of the waterfall from the movie Predator.

I have entered the hidden stairwell behind the bookshelf that was the last home of Anne Frank.

I have held a best friends newborn in my arms.

I once worked for a Dr. Einstein.

I have seen the sun set over the Golden Gate Bridge.

I visited my first castle and it had a moat, an outer wall, high turrets, and a dungeon. Just like this crazy American wanted.

I have ridden horses, both in my youth and as an adult.

I have served my country.

I have had plastic surgery.

I have dressed up for Halloween, every year.

I have met and hung out with a couple "celebrities"

I have shaved my head because I couldn't find a good way to brush my hair.

I have been drunk. I have been high.

I have been to straight weddings. I have been to gay weddings.

I have swam from the boat to the shore.

I survived boot camp.

I have stood with twelve of my friends in the middle of a mighty redwood.

I have sang back up to both k.d. Lang, and B.D. Wong.

I have swung from a trapeze and been caught by my partner.

I have gone to summer camp, as a child and as an adult.

I have camped in the woods, and roughed it in the Diamond Member suites of the Hilton.

To be continued...

The Progression of me