Finding Peace
Today I spent time giving serious thought to many things. One in particular was my mother’s recent death. She died January 3, 2021.
I could write a book about my mother, and maybe I will, one day. For now, the following will have to do.
We both desperately hoped the other would have made different choices. She could never come to terms with having a gay son because her fundamentalist faith would not allow it. I could not come to terms with a mother who every time she saw me, before I would leave, would hug me hard while convulsively crying and chanting, "God, remove this demon from my son." While caressing my face and still sobbing, she would say, "Look at me! Your family will be in heaven one day and you’ll be looking up from hell at us wishing you had made a different choice."
The last time the latter happened was spring of 1988 (33 years ago – that’s a long time). I was working at Hopkins (East Baltimore campus). My mother called me at work and invited me home to lunch. She always made my favorite foods. While she was cleaning in the kitchen, in her obsessive-compulsive way, we would chat while I ate. We never lacked for conversation. (As I look back, I realize how abnormal our conversations were because more often than not, we would spend most of our time judging people, especially family members. I guess you could say we were our own little clique. I can only imagine my friends’ faces when they read this because most will say, "Well, that explains a lot!")
Then, like so many times before, my stomach would turn into nervous knots because I knew what was coming, the hate speech about me burning in hell. Rest assured, it happened! After my mother’s speech, I hugged her hard, harder than I ever had before. I told her I loved her and then I left. I got in my orange Volvo (I miss that car!) and drove to the end of the street. I stopped the car, looked back and firmly said out loud, "I am never going back!" And I never did. I never answered her calls. Ultimately, I changed my number and finally, my address. These were not premeditated actions. I just simply had enough. For those who really know me, when I say I’ve had enough, I’ve had enough!
Life was mentally hard during those few years after divorcing, not just my mother, but my entire family. The pre/post of that period was strange. It’s fair to say, those were dark days.
I had two relationships that were affected by this ordeal, men who were kind, brilliant, solid, educated and family oriented. They were loyal to me. They gave me the world, and that’s not being dramatic. They really did! I was loved. I know that now, but I couldn’t feel it then because the only love I knew was that which was conditional.
The unsuccessfulness of those partnerships I blamed on them, but it was me, all me. It’s hard to have a relationship when 1 ½ adults are present. I see this all too often in gay relationships, and it is not necessarily because of family. (GAP and SWJ… When it comes to you, I live with my regrets every day, but my survival has taught me to concentrate on the many happy memories, and I do. Thank you.)
I feel like I’ve been running my whole life. I wasn’t sure what I was running from, but I know now. I’ve been running from the truth. I wanted my family to be something we never were, a "real" family.
This is not a "bash the mother now that she is dead" post. Quite the contrary. My mother loved her children the only way she knew how. She was strict, but very affectionate (not like her husband, I guess I am supposed to say, my Dad, who could be difficult and volatile ).
My mother was a good human being, she was just horribly misguided and ultimately, as no one wants to admit, suffered from mental health issues later in life, much of which had to do with her physical health, and the fear that comes with being fundamentalist.
My mother had the normal fears that come with having children. Her fears were compounded with one particular child because he was different – perhaps a bit too animated and expressive, but well adjusted enough. Of course, that child is me. She often told me when I grow up, I am going to get a good job, meet a nice girl, become a husband and a dad, and be happy (she never said that to her other boys, but I digress). Needless to say, she got that wrong! As for the happy part, that would take a very long time. All that energy you spent trying to convince me I wasn’t different you could have spent understanding me more by just talking to me, loving me unconditionally. But I forgive you, Mom.
When I was 10 years old and you invited church members to our home, which I thought was a prayer meeting, but the group stormed my bedroom, pinned me to my bed, throwing holy water on me and placing their hands on me to remove the demon that was supposedly possessing my body, that was a deal breaker. But I forgive you, Mom.
When I was 13 years old, I remember walking down the stairs from my bedroom in the afternoon. I heard my parents arguing. Just as I got to the bottom of the steps, my Dad said to my Mom, "Your son is a fag, Mary." "Paul is not!" my Mom quipped. They both looked at me. I ran up the stairs, through my parent’s bedroom, to the porch, jumped on a wall, then onto our garage roof and finally to the ground, only to run – far, far away. I ran for what felt like forever. It was bad enough I had to hear that word every day of my young life from kids in the neighborhood and at school, and sometimes from their parents. (Strangely enough, I really couldn’t comprehend what it meant, but I have known I was gay since I was five years old.) However, to hear it from a parent is beyond heartbreaking.
