The Boy On The Bus (Originally Written July 2009)

 I recently had a really vivid memory of something that happened one autumn when I was around twelve years old.

People in the gay community are always asking one another "When is it that you *knew* you were gay?"

For me there wasn't ever a specific calandar date to point back to & reference when I'd attempt to answer this. I had brief & fleeting memories of moments over my childhood where I knew I was different from the other boys my age but not really sure what to call it.

For instance I remember being very young & singing in the kids' choir at church & being aware of how much I loved being there and how oddly those feelings seemed to contrast with those of the other boys. I remember they all acted as though they couldn't wait for it to end & I felt like I would want to stay there all afternoon.

I remember, silly as it sounds, loving the way He-Man acted when walking among other residents of Eternia as Prince Adam... lol.

...all of the 'tell tale signs' got progressively more obvious as I got a little older but I never could remember a time prior to coming out as a twenty four year old where I knew what to call it & recognised it for what it was.

Until the other day, that is...

I was going through some old stuff ( & I mean OLD stuff ) from my junior high & high school days & found the remnants of a weekend so long ago I had almost forgotten I had ever lived through it.

I used to save everything as a teenager. My bedroom was a shrine to all things pop culture that I enjoyed... TV Guide covers coupled with pictures of me & the girls I hung out with in junior high & high school covered my bedroom walls to the point that the walls beneath weren't even visible.

When I moved out I took several things off the walls & threw them into a cheap WalMart scrapbook.

There's my backstage pass to the Amy Grant "House of Love" tour that I won from a local Christian radio station in Wichita... US Weekly clippings of celebrity pairings like Teri Hatcher & Dean Cain, Helen Hunt & Paul Reiser... about a jillion POGS (why were those things *ever* cool???)...

...and there's also a wallet sized picture of a boy named Joe.

Joe was a tall, tan soccer playing freshman I met when I went to a Promise Keepers conference with my Dad & church group as a seventh grader.

Lol - I know it sounds so cheesy but looking at that school picture of him balancing that soccer ball on his knee I knew that that weekend I met him was probably the weekend I also first began to accept myself as gay.

Joe & his dad had come on a church bus (just like my Dad & I) to Denver to the Promise Keepers convention at Mile High Stadium.

Joe was from Nebraska & we sat right next to one another in a stadium full of crying men for three whole days - neither of us sure what to make of what was happening around us. There was music & preaching & intermissions & while we knew it was visibly very inspirational to the older men in our midst, as kids we weren't all that moved by what was happening around us...

Luckily Joe had a game boy that we were able to sneak off and play Mario Brothers on for hours...

Other than tons of forty something men hugging & sobbing that weekend Joe is all I remember...

I remember feeling very close to him & dreading the end of the weekend when I'd board a bus back to Kansas & he'd board one back to Nebraska.

I don't know if my Dad was aware that weekend of the fact that I was feeling for Joe what I was but when Joe's church group had to make an unexpected exit from the last night of the conference he was the one responsible for making sure I didn't lose touch with my new friend...

Joe & I had parted ways to go have dinner with our individual church groups the final night of the conference. We were intent on meeting afterwards for one last game of Mario to be conducted during the final presentation Sunday night.

I remember I was wearing a denim jacket & jeans as our church group filed back into the stadium to reclaim our seats...

...all the seats to my right where Joe & his dad & their group had been sitting were oddly vacant. I didn't think too much of it until an older man seated in the row of stadium seats behind us tapped me on my shoulder & asked "Did you get to say goodbye to your friend?"

I remember feeling very panicked in that moment... Goodbye? We still had a few hours before I was planning on saying that... I had wanted to get Joe's address & maybe even give him a hug... ask him if he wanted to be pen pals so we could share video game codes after I got a GameBoy of my own...

"He left?" I asked the man behind us.

"Yeah, guess they got word of some unexpected emergency back home & all had to get out of here just as fast as they could."

"Lord I Lift Your Name On High" began to play announcing the beginning of the final workshop of the conference. The sky over the stadium was purple as the sun set & the air became ever chillier... 👂

...and I remember that as I sat there & began to shiver a tear made it's way down my cheek. I don't know if at that point I even knew why I was crying. But as a twenty eight year old looking back on it now? I know it was because I felt like I'd lost my first love.

My Dad noticed my tears & stooped down to ask me what was wrong...

I don't know why he had the response he did... maybe because I was a twelve year old boy who'd never had a male friend my whole life & because he thought helping me find Joe would be the first step towards securing a friendship with a person not named Jennifer, Natasha, or Mary Beth - lol.

Dad took my hand & we made a beeline for stadium parking...

"You're sure this kid was from Nebraska?" he asked me. I sniffled & responded "Yes."

We made our way through the parking lot, weaving in and out of rows upon rows of giant church buses looking for one on which Joe might be a passenger.

I remember thinking we'd never find him... & being very sad about that & not knowing why.

The sky had turned all the way black when my Dad finally spoke & said, "That's gotta be it... go get this kid's contact information & then let's get back inside. I'm sure we've already missed most of the sermon."

I remember still feeling doubt as I walked up to the bus in line to exit the parking lot. This wasn't his bus... he wasn't on it...

I knocked on the doors to the bus & a obese man flung them open with the lever next to his driver's seat.

"Can I help you?" he asked rather rudely.

I pulled my denim jacket tighter around me and spoke up to him through the cold, "Is there a boy named Joe on this bus?"

The driver shouted something to the back of the vehicle & I was astonished when he motioned for me to step onto the bus.

I walked up the steps & peered down the center aisle.

...and there stood Joe.

"Hey, Nick!" he said, smiling, "What're you doing here?"

I stammered & stuttered & said "I wanted to find you and tell you goodbye."

Joe said, "Sorry we had to leave so soon. I'm glad you found me, though. I was gonna give you this!"

Joe reached in his pocket & pulled out the tiny GameBoy cartridge we'd been amusing ourselves with all weekend.

"For when you get your Gameboy."

"Thanks, Joe." I said.

...and the next thing I remember doing was leaning in & giving him the biggest hug I'd ever given another boy.

...and Joe hugged back. ...and it was the best feeling ever. 👂👂

So I guess, in retrospect, that's when I knew.

It's hard to believe I ever forgot! Something so monumental in one's life shouldn't be banished from the memory.

Joe gave me his address & I wrote him a letter on the bus ride home that I had my Mom mail the second I got back.

We wrote back & forth a few times but then lost touch... I have no idea what happened to him but I still have the wallet sized school picture he mailed me with one of his letters.

I feel like at twenty eight I'm still roaming through an endless sea of church buses looking for one boy in particular...

...and my Dad, God, is holding my hand helping me search reassuring me with words & insisting we can find him... we will find him.

Since taking my sleep tech exam I've had a little time to resume dating... I've gone out with a few guys here in San Antonio & there've been one or two who definitely have potential...

I'm eager to meet whoever may be out there who with one hug can replicate the emotions I remember feeling holding Joe in my arms.

Not caring what anyone thought around me...

...and being certain for the first time that God is love & that love was awesome.

Soundtrack For This Entry -

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Additional Media Related To This Blog -

Just So You Know - New Baby's Guide To Life Courtesy Of A Sarcastic Uncle (Written June 2009)

Dear Little Baby,

I suppose I should start with an introduction.

I’m your Uncle Nick.

Wow. That feels really weird to say. Right up there with the first time I ever offered someone my business card. Actually, even weirder than that! I mean, I’m your uncle.

I’m your uncle.

I’m your uncle!

It really is a trip, little baby. In fact I’ve been feeling like I live on an alternate plane of reality ever since yesterday when I first found out about you. None of us really even knew if you coming into existence was even a possibility. For one thing, your Mom had been told by a doctor that she might not ever even have children!

But now that we know you’re around it’s changed everything! So much for the opinion of professionals…

You have most definitely made an enormous difference in the quality of our everyday lives! I’ve been walking around in what I can only describe as a ecstatic stupor for the last 24 hours.

It was yesterday morning that your Dad called me to tell me that in about seven months you were scheduled to come into this world and make him a father… make our parents grandparents! ….make me an uncle!

“I hope that we have a good relationship, me and this kid.” I said on my cell phone to my old roommate David as I strolled the aisles of the SuperWalmart waiting for the TLE to get done changing the oil in my car. “I mean, I hope it’s more like the relationship between Uncle Jesse and Michelle then between Uncle Joey and Michelle.”

“Are you actually modeling your hopes for the future off of relationships between people on ‘Full House’, Nick? Are you really doing that right now? Really?” David asked as I threw an economy size bottle of apple juice into my cart.

“Absolutely. Michelle never respected Joey. He was this weird guy who was always talking in funny voices, putting on puppet shows, making dumb jokes. Michelle was annoyed with Uncle Joey. Uncle Jesse she loved. And who wouldn’t?” I postulated as I scanned the shelves before me for the Special K with Red Berries I’d seen advertised on sale in the weekly circular. “I mean if John Stamos was my uncle you couldn’t pay me to miss a family reunion.”

David laughed. “Your uncle, as I recall from your past descriptions, is no John Stamos.”

That’s for damn sure. I thought, switching out my selection of Special K for a box of Cocoa Puffs.

“What makes you so sure that this kid is going to be a girl, anyway?” David asked.

I paused. “I didn’t say I thought it was going to be a girl.” I said, trying to recall the previous fragments of our conversation.

“Not outright.. But it’s telling that you compared the baby to Michelle from ‘Full House’ as opposed to Jake from ‘Two & A Half Men’.”

“That doesn’t mean anything…” I said, shrugging it off and putting the pink pacifier I’d been looking at back on it’s clipstrip. “That was just the first thing that came to mind. I don’t care what it is as long as it’s happy and healthy.”

“Well, right now,” David replied, “happiness is pretty easy to achieve. Whereas you and I struggle to find reasons to be happy everyday this kid is jubilant at being promoted from zygote to fetus.”

I laughed. “Happy Fetus. Sounds like it could be a movie about Penguin Ob-Gyn’s.” I laughed again. “How scary would that be, a penguin waddling toward you with a pair of forceps?”

“Ok, Nick.” David said, trying hard not to let his laughter betray his usually serious demeanor, “On that note, I’ve got to get back to work.”

The whole conversation, little baby, reminded me of when your Dad and I worked at Pizza Hut together for a summer. It was the summer, as I recall, that the Hut launched their Sicilian Lasagna Bread Pizza. That particular pizza was topped with little kidney bean shaped pieces of mushy, frozen ricotta cheese.

Your Dad, Neal, and I used to get through our shifts by being as goofy as we possibly could and I remember in particular marveling with him once that the little peanut shaped pieces of cheese were comparable in shape and size to a human fetus I’d seen in one of my college text books. For the rest of the summer anytime either of us were assigned to freezer duty we’d remind the other not to forget to set out the ‘cheese fetuses’ to thaw.

And that’s the kind of warped sense of humor you should get used to as fast as possible, little baby. Because it gets employed a LOT. Your Dad is basically the Christian evangelical version of Jim Carey. No one will ever make you laugh like he will. You’re going to grow up smiling - a LOT - and he’s to thank for that.

I’ll be to thank for spoiling you beyond what is reasonable.

Right now, as we speak, I’m prepping to take an exam that will certify me as a registered sleep technician. That’s right, your uncle is pursuing a career in the medical field… and since I’m likely to remain single for a good long while and because I myself live a very minimalist lifestyle in a one bedroom apartment with the cheapest rent anyone’s ever heard of I intend to spend mass amounts of money on you.

You will go to Disneyworld a ridiculous amount of times throughout your life and will likely get a PowerWheels upgrade every Christmas. Puppies, ponies, your college tuition… start making a list, kid, cuz, seriously, as happy as I’ve been since I found out about you I don’t think there’s a thing I could deny you.

Just get here safe and sound and we’ll have a nice long chat when you arrive… as quick as I can I’m going to be up at that hospital eager to meet you and hold you for the first time. There’s a lot we have to go over, after all. Probably more than what you’re going to be able to digest right away…

And that’s why I’m thinking it all through in advance, little baby… that’s why I’m putting pen to paper and trying to make sure that I invest some real time in passing on to you what little I have had a chance to observe and learn about life.

I doubt I’ll ever have a child of my own.

It’s just that fatherhood isn’t really compatible with the life I lead… and I’m not just talking about the “gay” thing. Don’t get me wrong, if I had to I’d make any sacrifice necessary and ammend my lifestyle to accommodate a child should God drop one in my lap one day… but for now I’m career oriented… passionate about social causes… and after doing a survey of my apartment last night I realized that the only place I was able to find that could accommodate an infant was the bread box. A baby deserves better than that.

But I promise you, I’ll be a kick ass uncle.

I’ll rival Uncle Jesse like you wouldn’t believe.

You and I are going to be tight - wait and see…

And, granted, while it might be years before your parents and Grandma and Grandpa let you anywhere close to these essays ( I do tend to use a little more adult language than is appropriate for the Sesame Street crowd ), I promise you right now I’m going to tell you the truth in all of them. I’m never going to lie to you about anything… ever! My views on things are my own and my love isn’t conditional on you agreeing with them.

You, just like all people, little baby, deserve the truth.

Without truth life is a constant disappointment. Some people think that the opposite is true… that if you withold the painful details that a smile is easier to maintain. But in your life, tiny one, I hope you see the wisdom in the philosophy that the truth isn’t intended to do us harm but, rather, to set us free.

And I guess that’s the main point I want to make before making any others.

You can trust me to be your friend… and to tell you the truth always… in addition to being your uncle.

And for now, the honest truth is this: I am so excited for you to arrive!

Just so you know...

Cherish Every Glimmer (Originally Authored May 2009)

 My Christian walk has taken on a very untraditional appearance these days.

God's alone with me in my apartment.

We watch movies together in the middle of the night in between study breaks.

Sometimes I think it might not be Him I'm keeping company with anymore... that when you live in a world where everyone else fellowships with God behind closed sanctuary doors that it must be some other entity next to you on your loveseat in your living room in the middle of the night as you channel surf.

But I know as well as anyone that God finds us in our solitary places.

He's just as likely to send a raven to the river to feed you as He is to curl up next to you at three a.m. while you pop in your most recently received NetFlix selection.

He's always been here with me & I know He never intends to leave.

I said going into this year that I expected it to be a year of change & growth... rebounding from a lot of hurt that occurred in the year that preceded it. ...and to a large extent it really has been! Life *looks* promising.

I'm just so reluctant to take risks... to let people close...

I know this is a truly abstract blog entry... I know that it's not typical of Nick to come to the table without an intended message.

I guess I just want to officially be able to have this in print - a written record that for a little while on this hot steamy night in Texas I knew enough to know I still believe in God... in good... in renewal... in potential.

Even in me.

Someone who isn't sure why the hurt ever came or why it's hurt for so long but who is trying with everything in him to believe it's subsiding in the here & now... so slowly but so surely.

Before God & I watched our movie tonight I woke up from this dream about this person I've held genuine contempt for for about a year & a half... someone who I literally would love to punch in the face. lol.

In this dream I was eating out at this restaurant I love with friends & family. I don't know what we were all celebrating... maybe that I'd past my RPSGT exam! ...and it didn't matter why we were there - it's been so long since I've been out with friends I honestly didn't care! ...all that mattered was that there was music & laughing & love & the biggest frikin' platter of nachos I'd ever seen in front of me.

...anyway at the height of the celebration I caught a glimpse of this person out of the corner of my eye sitting at a table nearby.

He was surrounded by people I counted as friends in yesteryear and they were all engaged in a rowdy & raucous evening of their own celebratory processions.

...and the minute I saw him my entire countenance changed.

I stopped being happy & instead became angry.

...angry that of all the eateries in all the world he had to be at this one! That of all the people he could be out with that he was there with the ones whose absence from my life I still mourn... angry that in my life where I have to work so hard for happiness that he had it without even batting an eye lash...

I tried to turn back to my own table & forget about him & all who were with him but as I sat there trying to forget about it I felt like I could almost feel him boring a hole in the back of my head & telepathically asaulting me with his taunts.

"Get a clue, loser! I'm happy & you are miserable. Can't you see the way to get what you want in life is just to take it from someone else? Waiting on God for it means waiting too long! You don't even have any guarantee that what you want & what He wants are even the same freaking thing! Let's face it - if He were in the business of intervening in people's lives I wouldn't still be enjoying all I took away from you here a full year later... go on & finish your little party. Tomorrow after it's all over you'll just be your sad sack self again & I'll still have all this..."

I woke up from that dream angry that I hadn't acted on my anger. Done to him there in that world what I want to do in this one... set him straight - & employ my fists if necessary.

That's what led to my late night movie with God... and to the conversation we had afterwards about how lonely I am & how badly I miss being a part of a church. ... how sad I am that the ones I've visited haven't felt like He's anywhere on the premises... how jacked up it is that I used to be able to find him in buildings with altars in the presence of friends & how now all that seems like it was just an illusion all along.

...and as I try to dislodge a popcorn kernel from one of my back teeth with my tongue I'm simultaneously begging Him to just let something good happen to me... let me pass my test... meet a friend... or, if He isn't interested in blessing me, at least prove He's still alive, active, & well by reacting to the ones in my life who have no remorse for wounds inflicted on me.

I used to hate people who posted "woe is me" posts.

...used to want to send 'em a PM and tell 'em to stop their crying.

But that person is me now... and the reason I can't stop my crying is because I don't feel like I'm winning anymore... I don't see the champion underneath the surface the way I used to.

It's just me, God, & Netflix in the middle of the night.

...and I cherish every glimmer of hope that finds its way here to me.

How funny is it that as I was penning this blog in the overnight hours tonight I get a text from a friend in Cali as lonesome as I am?...

He says he hates sleeping alone.

I pause and am able to relate... I text him back that "I know the feeling" & wish him a goodnight anyway.

...and then unexpectedly he sends another reply.

It reads...

"...you won't be by yourself forever, Nick. You're young enough to be able to get through it & forget your loneliness when it's over".

I hope so... I think before looking with anticipation to the empty side of the couch.

I sit back, close my eyes, and go back to the party...

My Mom & Dad are there, of course.

My brother & his wife - pregnant as can be & reminding me I'm going to be an uncle for the first time by year's end.

My loony co workers...

...various friends from GCN...

...and, yeah, that jerk on the other side of the dining room is still back there.

But I have the option to be happy and forget about him... to enjoy what I do have & not dwell on what's been taken or how unfair it is that he got away with it...

...and I own my humanness so I realize I might not make it to dessert without going back there and slugging him...

But I'm going to try...
Yep, I'm going to try...

Because even if the whole thing is a mirage and it's just me at a table for one...

God's at home waiting for me on the couch...

...and He might not be all I want but He's certainly all I need.