And I went through five years of college developing friendships and emotional bonds that began to confuse me. I started to wonder why I had the type of closeness to male figures that seemed a little too close. I developed jealousies that I couldn’t control because I was experiencing crushes on these other male figures that held me in a shame and ultimately shaped me into pretending to be someone I thought I was. And what really triggered this inner conflict I started to have was the way I had to force those same feelings to the opposite gender. There were girls I had much in common with until it came to any hint of physical contact which resulted in an instant injection of discomfort. The confusion turned into a curiosity which started to turn into real feelings and I couldn’t fight any longer. It was time to pay attention to what my heart was telling me.

One weekend afternoon I decided to go home for the day. I took a bus to Northampton and waited for a connecting bus that would take me to the next town before getting back home. I always felt awkward there and with this strong feelings swirling around within me, I felt like I was in a place that was going to expose me to the world. There were more people parading around town than usual. Rainbow flags hung in the front of storefronts and people lined the street. I wasn’t quite sure as to what was going on but I remember telling myself not to make eye contact. There was an extra laugher in the air as smiles shined and a sense of love seemed to orbit around everyone within the organized crowds. And then as I sat at the bus stop I started to hear the music and the crowd cheer. Hands were waving and more rainbow flags were gently massaging the air. People were hanging out of high rise apartment windows and a symphony of voices collided with echoes of “happy pride”. Back then I didn’t know what it was all about but I knew it was a filled with homosexuality and I watched without trying to be interested. But I was and they didn’t all seem so strange anymore as it became obvious to me that I took a wrong turn into something right. It was all about pride and at that moment I knew I could no longer hide.
© 2010

Tarringo T. Vaughan

I felt trapped inside the walls of societal expectations, inside my family’s vision and inside my own hope to be normal. I didn’t want to be the one slurred at and pointed at as different. I didn’t want to be called a sissy or queer for being me but as reality set in; my inner feelings had to learn to accept this life. And as I watch them almost every weekend in a local bar I understand them because I see through them what I life could’ve been if I remained hidden. Like them I could’ve been married with kids on the outside but on the inside living on the down low, lying to manufactured life hurting those who think they know me all the while betraying the honesty of myself. I sometimes wonder where their wives think they are when they are out exploring their temptation and when they are out having drinks with their only companion known as the truth. As I notice them, they seem to be enjoying this only time where they can be themselves. I pay attention because I could’ve been them if I didn’t embrace myself just in time.

One is an older gentleman who hides his eyes just enough to reveal his stare. He stands in corners, gives false names and knows how to play the game. Sometimes he is just a whisper but other times his voice is heard when he finds his comfort; married with four kids, a city worker, taking a chance just by being there. Taking a chance by exposing himself in a world he knows he belongs by risking the years he built to be who he felt he had to be to become his identity. Every time I see him I think about the life his wife thinks she has lived and how her own health is a risk every time he allows a stranger in his car. But this is the road where closed mindedness and the fear of non-acceptance have led him. A destination where he can only be who he is on a weekend night, on a bar stool rubbing the thigh of a man he can only meet once.
And the other is slightly younger, more vocal and doesn’t mind exposing his life. He says he has a great sexual relationship with his wife but he desires that closeness with other men for those moments during his few hours out. He doesn’t openly hide because he’s a people’s person and enjoys the company of those he feels he connects with. But he also lives a lie that disconnects him from the great relationship he claims he has. And perhaps he does but that fear of revealing himself to her demonstrates knowledge within himself that he is not fully happy with the path he has chosen. He is an undercover man lover stuck in a world he believed in. He followed a road that told him the only definition of a man was being with a woman. A destination that has him running to his car at 11:59 pm to get home five minutes before his wife so she thinks he’s been home all night.

They are two of many living a separate life because of that fear of non-acceptance and they are two of many living this reality. These are not just tales, this is real life. These are husbands, boyfriends, priests, politicians, celebrities on the down low because they are afraid for people to know. And any one of them could’ve easily been me if I didn’t recognize the path my life was taking by hiding.

© 2010
Tarringo T. Vaughan
Diary Of A Gay Black Man: Hiding to be seen

I’m not going to sit here and expose my wishes to be straight because if I had those wishes I wouldn’t be happy with the man I am today. But I do wonder what if I was what society wanted me to me? I would have a wife and kids, maybe be homophobic towards someone like me. Maybe I would be against gay marriage and have the same attitudes towards homosexuality defined by the bible. Would I still have this heart? Would the same passion be behind my writing? Would I even smile or love the same? I guess we will never know that because being straight is not who I am. Being simply me is who I am.

Society still has me trippin because people who don’t know a damn about me are giving a damn about what I do behind closed doors or who my heart can’t help but love. “It’s wrong” they say, but they are who cheat, do drugs, lie, steal and commit other sins defined by that same book that to them justifies their right to disapprove of someone who is making a difference and just living the life every individual has the right to live. You know what? Straight does define me in the way that I give it to you straight and how I’m straight to the point and that I’m straight up happy with who I have grown into. But for those who want my direction to go straight, I say…

I’d rather go gayley forward!

but for that moment, I wasn’t supposed to be anywhere else. We didn’t have much in common except we were men, unattached and seeking companionship. He talked nonsense and I nodded my head as if I actually had interest. But we were there, sharing time because either one of us had anywhere else to be. We sat at the bar of a local restaurant studying the loud crowd around us as we wondered if the atmosphere was interpreting our body language as our linguistics was of two men just introduced as strangers barely even making eye contact. I thought I was over weird moments like that; I thought I was at a new place in life where I could turn awkward moments into an easy laugh. It wasn’t that he was not easy on the eyes; perhaps he was even interesting if I took the chance to pay attention but it became apparent to me that I wasn’t ready to meet anyone new. My heart was still in that nowhere zone hearts go when healing from the wicked ways of love.

“So, tell me more about yourself”, he said.

“Well…” I responded as he anticipated. The thoughts in my mind during that long pause were of disbelief that I was in this situation again. What do I tell a man who I already decided I was never going to see again? But then I thought how cruel I was being and I was being like other gay men I’ve encountered who pretend and go through the motions. Well I thought I was being nice so I told him the easy answers and that’s where we found a connection.

There was something in the way I hesitated to tell too much about me and something in the way my eyes looked every which way but at his interest that felt familiar to him. He was a taller man with mixed Irish-Italian features just moving to the area from Florida. He was seeking a new beginning and that is what attracted me to his profile on an online dating service. It was a risk for us both as we were both just out there with our hearts shattered just seeking that something that would make our belief in love beat again. So we decided to listen to each other because we were there, with nowhere else to be. Two strangers sharing a similar disappointment just seeking a common place in a moment called nowhere. That night I learned that I would feel again because I discovered how to communicate my pain and I wasn’t alone. And I didn’t belong there but I was meant to be there. Because it was there, on the other side of nowhere that I knew my heart had someplace to be.

When we heal, we teach.

© 2010

Tarringo T. Vaughan