Notes From Gordon 250117: I Confess. I Have Always Been Gay

I Have Always Been Gay

It's true. I admit it. Every day of my life has been a gay day.

As a young boy I would run gaily through fields of spring flowers, gazing at the azure sky and feeling spiritually close to the boys around me.

Of course, I felt spiritually close to the girls around me, too.

As a young man I felt uplifted and empowered when in the company of strong and dashing young men.

But I felt this way when in the company of strong and attractive young women, too.

Then there was my design sense. I've always had a knack—dare I call it a flair?—for interior design.

I could transform a friend's apartment into an inviting living space with items found at yard sales.

I learned that certain other men had this ability too. These men were called "light in the loafers." But I always walked with a jaunty step so I thought little of this.

I met a terrific girl who told me that because she was gay we couldn't date. I was confused. I told her I was gay too, at least on most days, and that we could just be friends.

The next thing I knew we were rolling in the hay. Her father had a hay barn and we had fun laughing and rolling down huge mountains of hay together.

I remember a friend joking that if you drop your wallet in San Francisco, you'd better kick it to L.A. before bending over to pick it up.

I thought this was the dumbest thing I ever heard. Why scuff up a perfectly good leather wallet?

Some of the guys I met in college were called "queer." I thought that idea itself was pretty queer. They seemed perfectly nice and normal to me.

Another friend accused me of loving ‘fags.’ But I had stopped smoking cigarettes completely and no longer loved fags. As for other people loving fags, to each his own, right?

A couple of friends were professional dancers in a Boston ballet company. They were smart, worldly, fun to be around and I enjoyed spending time with them.

The reputation got around that I was a "homo" lover but I thought this was highly exaggerated. Yes, homo sapiens is the dominant species on this planet, but that's no reason to think we're any better than the rest of nature's creations.

I remember the first Gay Liberation parade that was held in Boston. Thousands of young men dressed in colorful and interesting clothing—some wearing almost no clothing at all!—carrying purple and rainbow colored banners and demanding equal rights from the rest of us.

This confused me tremendously. I remember thinking that I was having a particularly gay day myself and felt no need to march for my rights. But again, to each his own.

One night as a bandleader I was on a break at a nightclub when a debonair young man approached and offered to buy me a drink.

When we shook hands he wouldn't let go. Plus he was licking his lips, batting his eyelashes and smiling at me oddly.

I remember thinking that he might have Parkinson’s Disease?

I thanked him and told him I didn't drink. He looked disappointed and walked away with an odd sort of strut. I remember thinking that my diagnosis had probably been correct.

In my more mature years I came to realize that an entire segment of society that called themselves gay had commandeered one of my favorite words and essentially stolen it for their own.

This concerned me. I imagined the peril that might face some of my other favorite words. Which would be the next to go? Niggardly?

After all, writing is an important part of my life and words are like musical notes to a composer. Where would Jimi Hendrix have been without “E”? Or Mozart without C#?

Being without even a single word because someone else appropriated it to themselves would make me very sad.

And a sad person cannot be gay, can they?