I’ve always loved writing and marveled at how thoughts, ideas, and words move from one’s brain to the printed page. So often I have worked to journal, but not had the discipline to keep it up. However, as I have worked to handle the mish-mash of emotion that has welled up from me since my wife’s pronouncement of “Divorce!” I’ve found that writing has helped me to identify feelings and come to terms with a plethora of issues that seemed to have lurked just below the surface of my day-to-day existence.
I’m Frank. I’m 47 years old. I have been married for 24 years. I am the father of three children: twin daughters who will be 22 shortly and a son who just turned 20. I own a house…or should I say, I co-own my house with my bank. I currently own three vehicles and a dog.
I am also gay.
There…I’ve said it! I’ve committed it to paper. It’s on the same page as my name and where all my major worldly possessions are listed.
It wasn’t so long ago that I couldn’t say those four words. I AM ALSO GAY. As I reread those four words it’s curious how they appear on this page…. It sounds as if I have said it as an afterthought….or as if I almost forgot to tell you this important fact that “I am also gay.”
Those of you who may thump your Bibles periodically may think evil of me. You may think it evil that I chose to be gay or that I molest children or make small furry creatures do strange things to me…
I did not choose to be gay.
I do not molest children.
I do not make small furry creatures do strange things to me.
I am just a middle aged man who is desperately trying to sort out my life from the debris at hand….24 years of marital debris……47 years of personal debris….and nine months of pain…..nine months of heartbreak…..nine months of profound sadness…….nine months of resentment……nine months of adjusting…..
You see on June 9, 2005 at bedtime my wife announced that she was in pain -- not physical, but emotional pain.
“Raw,” she said. “I am raw inside. I am no longer happy. I no longer love you. I no longer want to be married to you. I want a divorce!”
It hurt me to hear those words….all 28 of them.
All I could do was to nod and say “Okay.”
After 24 years of marriage to “Lovey” and after 23 years of her knowing about my being gay and after my 47 years of being gay I knew about these words. They didn’t surprise me. But, when they are said through so much pain and after so much time the only energy left for me is to say, “Okay.”
Was it really December 12, 1981 that I married this woman? Oh the dreams we had! The excitement of building a new life together was so strong anyone who knew Lovey and I could piggyback onto it.
