I used to love the holidays. I used to wait all year for Thanksgiving and Christmas. Everyone would gather up in my parent’s house to head out for ice-skating together. We used to laugh, saying that people who didn’t grow up in our neighborhood must have thought we were some kind of gang: no one had ever seen such a huge group go to the pond to ice-skate!
Yes, that’s how I remember it: hot cocoa, ice-skating, Secret Santa and unending love.
This year, when I was home from college for some good old turkey, I got so much attention it was like being a hometown celebrity. But not for the reasons I would have wanted.
Nothing could have prepared me for what was coming when I told them I was dating another boy.
I’ve always felt attraction to the same-sex, but never really acted on it. My family said California turned me this way.
“Everyone there is fruits and nuts,” my dad said, trying to make a joke to cut the tension.
Slowly, over the last few weeks of the semester, they started avoiding my calls. My little brother slipped and told me mom thinks I might “rub off on him.” Like being gay is contagious. They act like I wanted to be this way, like I would choose to go through all of this!
My mom finally said that I’m not the same person anymore, not the son they had raised. From what I remember, they raised me to treat everyone equally – or had they only meant that to be about straight people?
Daron, my boyfriend, was my safety net. He’s Daron convinced me to experience Christmas his way. It was the most I could do, since he had warned me not to tell my parents. All I had wanted was a normal Christmas; filled with the same love and caring I had had all my life. Normal should have included bringing my partner home without worrying if his gender would get me disowned or not.
Anyway, Daron said the LGBT Center on campus hosts traditions that my family would normally host back home – but I found the idea to be like wearing knock-off shoes: sure, they cover your feet, and you’re still walking, but it feels off and you know it.
The festivities started a couple of days before from Christmas. When other college-students were leaving for home, I was spending the holidays getting to know a bunch of strangers.
The first day, Daron and I went to and initial group counseling. The counselor, Christine, was a bright-eyed redheaded lesbian, which qualifies her to be able to counsel us because she’s “been there”.
She told us about how suicide rates in the LGBT community tend to increase around the holidays and that being able to express ourselves is a crucial factor in combating depression.
I squeezed Daron’s hand through the whole session, but was glad we went. I ended up finding out that those strangers weren’t as foreign as I’d thought. They had experienced situations exactly like mine, where a seemingly accepting and open family suddenly closed its doors when no longer fit the projected perfect child image.
Some “in the closet” couples split up, went home as if they were straight, and returned as if everything was cool. But others chose not to go home at all, seeing no point in spending the holidays with their family if they couldn’t be who they truly were.
Counseling was like the icebreaker before we hit the ice. The next day we went down to the mall skating rink. Daron and I held hands as we glided over the man-made frozen pond.
I couldn’t help noticing a few people looking at us, but I acted like I didn’t see them. They weren’t going to ruin my holidays. I had plenty of other things that could do that without them.
I’d been struggling with my religion a lot this holiday. Everybody knows that my Church is against alternate sexualities. It’s hard to deal with that because I still feel a connection to God. I’d like to believe that He doesn’t discriminate. I mean, doesn’t the Bible teach to love one another? How can I be damned to Hell for loving someone? It just doesn’t make sense! I refuse to feel badly, but sometimes… it happens anyway.
Connecting with other LGBT college students has opened a new doorway, though.
When I was telling the counselor about how I would still like to include religion in my holidays, she said there are such things as LGBT churches and even religions that are queer friendly! Christine actually goes to one, and invited me to come along the Sunday before Christmas.
It was just like my regular service, but without the judgment back home where my church criticized for everything. Skirt one inch above your knee? Pants are a little baggy? Make-up a little overdone? I always heard the old hens snickering and tittering away, finding something to complain about, especially with the younger parishioners.
It was nice not have someone judging me all the time.
The Center movie party is fun, too. Jamal, one of the faces I recognized in the counseling session, hosts it. He says he needed the company since he and his partner broke up last month. He didn’t have a family to go home to.
We watch a few classics, like The Muppet Christmas Carol and Home Alone. Everyone is drinking hot cocoa, laughing as Daron tells how he once tried out the pranks Macaulay had pulled on the villains in Home Alone, and then my world freezes.
My throat constricts. I’m having a panic attack. I feel like I’m living someone else’s life… This can’t be right. Shouldn’t I be home right now?
I excuse myself to the bathroom. No one notices how hard I am trying to maintain my composure. How could they? These people don’t know me. They aren’t like my mom, who can tell on instinct alone when I am having trouble. In fact, she could feel it when we were apart. Why then, I wonder, isn’t she blowing up my cell like she used to?
I know I have to come to terms with my situation. This is as good as it is going to get.
A few minutes and a couple of splashes of hot water to the face later, I leave the bathroom a new person.
Daron pulls me into the kitchen to make sure everything is okay. I don’t want to stress him more than is necessary, so I keep it to myself.
If I had kept everything to myself in the first place then I wouldn’t be going through this.
I take a deep breath, hug Daron, and remind myself that this is my family now. The faces may have changed but our background is the same.
I head back to my dorm that night and leave my past behind me.
The night before Christmas arrives, and I live it up! The Center throws an unforgettable dance party. I rock out to all my favorite club songs, hoot and holler at the hilarious comedy of the drag performers from the group, and don’t head back to the dorms until after midnight.
I sit with Daron on one couch in the common room as a group of us exchange gifts. He’s bought me a gift card to Hollister–my go to store for all my polo’s. He knows me too well!
I wanted to get him something really special, to show him how much he means to me, so I created a piece of art myself. I had put the final touches on the drawing over the last week.
It resembles the world but broken up into puzzle pieces. In the furthest corners, in black and white, I sketched out our families. As the lines neared the center, color comes into play along with the people who have bigger roles in our lives now, like Jamal and Christine and others from the group.
In the center, I have drawn Daron and I.
Our relationship is the most important thing in the world—real or drawn. If that means having to leaving my family stuck in their ways then so be it. I can’t live anyone else’s life but mine.
Daron plants the biggest kiss on my lips and, I admit it, I blush like crazy. I look over and everyone is “Aww-ing” at us. I know it sounds cheesy, but I love every moment.
Jamal grins, saying, “See, this is what we need more of!”
And I totally agree.
There needs to be more people willing to stand up for themselves and what they believe in. So many relationships are broken because of other people’s actions, when really the decision to end a relationship should be made by the two people actually in the thing.
Looking back at this whole mess, from Thanksgiving until now, there were times where it would have been easier to breakup with Daron. Good thing I didn’t though! It may have made my family happy, but it would have killed me–and the secret was already out so it would have been for nothing.
You can’t go throughout life trying to please everyone. It just doesn’t work.
Am I mad at my parents? Not one bit. It’s hard to be able to see from another person’s point of view. I just pray that I may be able to open their eyes someday.
I realize that I may not be spending this Christmas with my family but I am spending it with people who love me for who I am. That unending love is the part of the holidays that no one should do without!