Saturday, July 28, 2012

Arise Chicken, Chicken Arise!

I fell into a tumblr
and kept on tumblring down
I stumbled and I tumbled
until I came back around.

So. Tumblr. True story, funny story: I left this blog for a boy.

 I just checked back through the archives of this blog and remembered two things. 1) I was very angry for quite a long time and 2) it was because I was gay, in the closet and hated myself for it. As it turns out, outward and inward harmony is not achieved by living lies contrary to my values. So, shortly after I had my afore-mentioned elbow surgery, I met a boy (well, 37) who had a tumblr, and so I tumblred with him, so to speak. At the time, I just thought dating men was something I needed to experiment with, and get out of my system, so I could end my internal speculation once and for all and then get back to a life of, hopefully, enthusiastic heterosexuality (contrary to all past experience). Believe it or not, it was kind of a surprise to realize I had had it backwards for my entire adult life. So I dated a boy. And soon enough, after the angel choir had faded, and the light from heaven blessing my sinful union was gone, I lay on my bed thinking: "Well shit. That clears a few things up."

 Of course, the stunning realization that the reason I had never felt comfortable with women in my bed was the "wo" at the beginning was life-alteringly amazing. I realized I could finally have a relationship that I found satisfying on a level I didn't know I had. Everything clicked and everything suddenly made sense, in ways it should have made sense long before. This was followed by the immediate knowledge that I was not going to be in the closet for one second longer than I possibly had to . . . which meant I was going to have to tell everyone I knew. So out I came. First on Tumblr, then to close friends, then to my parents, then to a select group on Facebook, representing the last group I really felt i needed to tell. I just didn't want people to wonder. I wanted them to know, and I didn't want to feel like I was hiding.

 Which isn't to say the transition was smooth. I went a wee bit crazy for a few months, while I tried to come to terms with who I now knew I was, and who I'd always thought I'd been, or at the very least thought I had tried to be for everyone else. Coming from a conservative fundamentalist background did not make it any easier. Of course, this is not the most amazing mindset to maintain a relationship with (I was not a great boyfriend at this time), and my boyfriend left me after four months, somewhere in the middle of my coming out process. That wasn't fun either. I had chemically bonded to him in a way I had never experience before, and it took me quite a while to pull myself back together again. But, of course, I did, if not gracefully. But I regret nothing. I learned an amazing amount from that relationship.

Where were we? Ah yes, Tumblr. Why Tumblr? For one thing, I wanted to "practice" coming out of the closet before I did it to everyone, and Tumblr seemed gay friendly. For the record: Tumblr? Gay ENTHUSIASTIC. And I liked making new gay friends, and gif culture, and whining about every damn thing and having it just float away in a sea of cat gifs. But after the relationship fragmented, and I had finished coming out of the closet, I started to need it less. I still enjoy tumblr (and in fact will be linking posts like this straight through to the tumblr blog indefinitely), but the coming out process has morphed nicely into an ongoing mid-life crisis, and I find tumblr is not really the place I want to explore that. So I return, at the turn of the tide, to my old Blogger home.

 Also, holy shit! Blogger is so much better than it used to be.

 Not that you really needed to know any of this, or didn't already know it, but here I am: Super gay and ready to blog. I have a new boyfriend, heights I aspire to, and a pathological fear of falling. Should be a good time.

 Soylent H (still people), Age 36