My family of origin was a hybrid between Blondie and Sleeping Beauty—a marriage of a passive but caring father and a resentful, frustrated mother. I, as the only child, quickly learned that the combination meant that I could have a great deal of freedom to do as I pleased but that the consequences would be severe should I ever be caught crossing “the line”. It taught me to be out-of-sight so as to be out-of-mind, how to be a “people-pleaser”, and, later, how to hide my sexual identity.
My father was the oldest of four brothers growing up on a farm in south-central Kansas. I never knew either of his parents as I came along when he was thirty-five and both had passed away. How he came to be such a gentle, quiet man I can only guess. It may have been that he very early learned how to hide his pain as he quietly watched unseen his mom and pop hold each other and cry as they said “Goodbye” to the farm that was to be their legacy but lost during the Depression. It may have been the polio that he contracted as a senior basketball player in high school. For whatever the reason, he was, as a father, ill-equipped to coach a bright but shy son through the trials and tribulations of growing up gay in mid-20th Century America with a mother who was plainly—in retrospect—unable or unwilling to empathize.
© 5 September 2016
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