The Unseen in The Stuff That's Not Interesting But Is The Most Interesting Stuff I'll Write

I’m sorry I’ve been MIA recently, I’ve been battling to get my health under control, which has been more of a struggle than I’m really used to. Apparently while I was absent, Prosebox was ending… and then now it’s not. So I’m glad I missed that drama.

Things with Jonah ended on an amazingly awful level to the point where I’m completely okay with him hating my guts. That’s completely within his rights. But that isn’t really what this is about, it’s not even about my health… well, not at first.

It’s about a chance encounter I had earlier this week that was unsettling on so many levels that I’m not really sure I want to dwell on it… or write about it, but if I don’t write about it, I’ll dwell on it… and I guess I’m just choosing the lesser of two evils.

Now to understand this situation, we’re going to have to go back… and when I say “back”, I mean to when I was barely in my 20s. Some of you who have read me for a long time might even remember who I’m going to describe to you. I had always found it rather remarkable that I was going to a church that never really made a big deal about the fact that I was gay. I mean, they weren’t thrilled about it, but the pastor always said that since he only ever understood the subject of homosexuality as a matter of abstract ideas, he wasn’t going to ever force his thoughts on those of us that actually experience it.

That lead to the conflict between myself and another member at the church who was a few years older than I was. He was very close friends with my best friend at the time, but he was in the midst of his therapy… he even went so far as to refer to himself as “ex-gay”. Now, I knew enough, having been raised in the church, that we all have to deal with this in our own ways. However, as time passed us by, we became much more critical of each other’s choices.

He didn’t believe that moving to Los Angeles was the best environment for me. Whatever, we know how that turned out. On the other hand, I was quite concerned about the fact that he had decided to get married. I remember, nearly 10 years ago, sitting across from him in a restaurant begging him to think very hard about what he was about to do. I told him that it’s one thing to “struggle” with your sexuality on your own, but it’s quite another thing to bring a wife and eventually children into your struggles.

I remember being very unkind to him, I remarked, “The only reason she’s marrying you is because she is deaf and can’t hear how high-pitched and effeminate your voice is.” Not my proudest moment.

Well, I didn’t see him too often after that, mainly because I moved back to LA, then to Paris and then back to LA. I knew that he had gotten involved in local politics, but I didn’t really pay attention to him. I even deleted him on Facebook because his black & white, selfishness was really getting on my nerves.

So there I was the other night going from the club where I was running karaoke to the bar next door that serves pitchers of beer, and I see two guys making out at the bar. The one with his back to me turns toward me, I recognize him, he recognizes me… he even does the hand over the side of his face thing, which I now know is perhaps the most conspicuous thing you can do in a bar.

He came over and greeted me, and I could tell that he was trying to quell the rising panic within. I simply said to him that he doesn’t have to worry about me and that he would remain unseen.

But that’s not true.

In fact, it made me think about the way we used to verbally spar with one another. I mean, he was always so self-righteous about his self-denial and how he’d never even had any type of physical contact with a man (he only struggled with pornography). And I was such a bad person for not denying my desires.

That was when we were in our twenties.

But now we’re in our thirties. I indulged myself and am now more restrained than I was. He was responsible and got married, and then had two children… but now he’s a prominent politician making out with a man in a bar in a burst of self-indulgence.

As far as I’m concerned, it will remain unseen, but it won’t remain unknown.