20101227.017 A DAY LATE AND A DOLLAR . . .
Hello everyone. Here it is December 27th. I had planned on putting up a BLOG on December 24th. It didn’t happen. I also planned on putting up a BLOG on December 25th. That didn’t happen either. A day later, two days late, and I am always a dollar short, hence the title to this BLOG. So now, I am aiming at putting up a compilation of sorts about lessons that I have learned this year. So let’s see how far this goes! If you end up reading it, then I have succeeded and actually got something posted.
I shall try to go through the year starting in January. Let’s see how well I do.
Lesson 1: “NO MATTER HOW MUCH YOU MAY PLAN, WHAT HAPPENS WILL ALWAYS INCLUDE UNPLANNED ITEMS” At the beginning of the year I had lots of plans. I was going to get health (again!) I was going to get organized (again!) In fact, you could probably put all sorts of items after “I WAS GOING TO . . .” and then add the word “AGAIN” to it because I had all sorts of plans for that - whatever it was. And no matter how much I planned, other things cropped up and got in the way. So, the logical assumption would be to not plan anything. However, the fact remains that we all need to plan something. Therefore, it requires the right amount of pallning to get through it all and survive!
Lesson 2: “EVEN IF YOU LOVE BIRTHDAYS, THERE IS A DOWN SIDE TO GETTING OLDER” I am 46 years old. And I am realizing more and more just how old and decrepit I am getting. It sucks! Unfortunately, in considering “LESSON 1," this is one of those things that cannot be planned and so you’ve just got to “roll with the punches.”
Lesson 3: “WHEN YOU CHANGE, GROW, MATURE, THERE IS ALWAYS GOING TO BE SOMEONE WHO DOESN’T LIKE IT” I am amazed how I have grown this year in ideas, thoughts and understanding. But I am also amazed at those people who I thought I could consider friends, ended up getting upset with my change. In fact, my daughter noted something interesting to me. She said, “Why have you gotten so serious all of a sudden?” When I questioned her further on that statement, I realized that it was because I had become more vocal against some things that have always upset me. So, even though, it wasn’t an area of change, it was how I portrayed myself in dealing with that issue.
Lesson 4: (Corollary to LESSON 3), “NO MATTER HOW MUCH YOU MAY TRY NOT TO TAKE THINGS PERSONAL, THERE WILL ALWAYS BE ONE STRAW THAT BREAKS THE CAMEL’S BACK AND YOU WILL TAKE IT PERSONAL.” This past year, when I took a stand on an issue, I was admonished “Not to center everything in my bed room.” The point was that I was “making everything into a GAY issue” Well, The end result was that It was a gay issue, and since I am gay, you better believe me that I took it personally. Especially since for so long I have been hiding in the closet, this year I finally decided to step out of that closet and take a stand. And if someone is attacking others in the gay community, you bet your bloomers that it becomes personal for me!
Lesson 5: (Corollary to LESSON 3 & LESSON 4): IF THERE IS A POSSIBILITY THAT SOMEONE WILL MISUNDERSTAND YOU, IT MOVES FROM BEING A POSSIBILITY TO A CERTAINTY! On the same note of “not centering everything in my bed room.” I am amazed how some people really don’t understand what it means to be gay. Just like “being straight” is a whole lot more than having sex with someone of the opposite gender, being “gay” is a whole lot more as well. Being gay is about how you feel, how you see the world, how you live out your life experiences, how you process information. I realize in our world we are always trying to find commonalities with others, but just like women think and act and feel differently then men, gays thinks, act, and feel differently than straights. The sooner we accept this, the sooner we will be able to allow the world to be a more rich diverse place.
Lesson 6: NO MATTER HOW MUCH YOU MAY PLEAD WITH GOD, GOD WILL BE GOD AND DO WHATEVER GOD WANTS TO DO IN SPITE OF YOUR PLEADINGS. During this year I have been pleading and begging God to speak to me! Now, I will be the first to admit that God can speak to us in various ways. But I am looking for something specific. It has happened once before and I have been asking God to respond ins some similar form again. God hasn’t done that, In fact, God hasn’t really done anything. And that is what is so very frustrating. Some of my friends have responded that I am still too angry at God and so I can’t hear God. But, if God is the great and powerful God that I believe in, then God can MAKE me listen. And that hasn’t happened as well. So I am at a loss. I will continue to beg and plead. And if nothing happens, then nothing happens. And God will continue to be God!
Lesson 7: WHEN YOU NAME AN “ISM” FOR WHAT IT IS, IT WILL GO INTO HIDING. As I mentioned earlier, I came out this year as a gay man. I had slowly been coming out but this time I came out to the church I was serving and also resigned. The few people who didn’t know that I was gay went to the Secretary and said, “So David is Gay, so what! He didn’t need to resign!” When in point of fact, I did need to resign! I needed to resign not JUST because I am gay, but that is a major point of it. Those few people had been chipping away at my confidence and I finally stood up for myself and said enough is enough. And their response proves to me that they didn’t want GENDERISM AND SEXISM to be brought out in the open. This is true of all other ISMs. Whether it be ageism, classism, racism, whatever, if you call it out, it will hide its ugly head and claim that it wasn’t really the reason for the anger, hatred, attacking, condemnation.
Lesson 8: WHEN YOU COME OUT OF THE CLOSET, YOU HAVE TO TRAVEL THAT JOURNEY ALONE. I have been very lucky in that my parents, my family, and many of my friends have all been very supportive of me living an honest open life as a gay man. But, ultimately, when I made the decision to come out of the closet and be honest about who I am and how I feel about the world around me, that decision had to be mine and only mine to make. Even more reason why it is so very important to be careful when it comes to OUTING another person - an issue that is always difficult for those of us in the GLBTQI community even AFTER we have come out.
Lesson 9: NO MATTER HOW HARD YOU MAY WORK ON SOMETHING, SOMEONE ELSE WILL FIND IT IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH. This lesson is partly connected to me resigning from ministry. At the church I was working as hard as I could, trying to get everything done, and it never was enough. I do the same thing here at home, and I never seem to make things work good enough for everyone around me. This lesson plagues me and does make life quite disconcerting. What is so mind boggling is that I am a very smart person and very capable of doing all sorts of things, but when ever I try to accomplish something I am a failure. This is not me having a pity party, this is me simply stating the results of everything around me. Mind you, knowing the lesson doesn’t mean I have learned the proper answer to it. I still don’t know what to do about this!
Lesson 10: NO MATTER WHAT HAPPENS, TOMORROW IS YET ANOTHER DAY. I think this one is pretty self-explanatory and it really isn’t a lesson that I have just learned. Rather it is a lesson that keeps coming to light. There are days that just seem horrible and one might want to crawl under a rock and die. However, the end result is that no matter what, I will go to bed and wake up the next morning. When I die, I will die, but it isn’t that time yet, so I will simple sleep and then wake up and trying working at the tasks at hand.
Mind you, these aren’t the only lessons that I have experienced this year. But they are the one s that come to mind. Hopefully, I will have3 learned from them and I will be able to put them to use in the days and years yet to come. Until then, I think I will go take a nap. Blessings all!
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