Auto-Gratification: 2006

Sunday, December 31, 2006

[+/-]

A Flattering Way to End the Year

Wednesday, December 20, 2006

[+/-]

No Big Surprise

Sunday, December 10, 2006

[+/-]

My Coming-Out Story, Part Five

Note: If you have not already done so, be sure to read Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4 of my coming-out story so this part will make sense a bit more.

My Coming-Out Story, Part Five: Not Exactly as Planned (Conclusion)

I had a plan. Perhaps it wasn't perfect, but it certainly seemed workable.I had a plan. Perhaps it wasn't perfect, but it certainly seemed workable. I was returning to the city of my childhood--Los Angeles, California. My cousin was to be married, and I was the piano player for the wedding. So, my parents (who had recently moved to Kentucky) and I would have the opportunity on the Monday after the wedding to sit down and talk. I knew they wouldn't be happy about my coming out, and I was prepared for the questions and emotion that would come, or so I thought. At the very least, I anticipated that we would have a profitable discussion, where I could explain to them that I wasn't going to start dressing in drag and having public sex, but rather I was just going to be honest about who I am.

We all gathered in southern California around mid-week. Friday night was the wedding rehearsal and Saturday the wedding. My parents and brother joined me on Thursday for a day at Universal Studios, and we had a great time together. According to my plan, we would have the wedding events on Friday and Saturday, a nice day to relax on Sunday, then on Monday I would have "the talk" with my parents. Then, even if it was difficult, I would fly back to Illinois on Tuesday morning, and life would be good.

But it was not to be so. Friday evening, we had the wedding rehearsal and dinner. Our entire extended family on my dad's side gathered in the church building to walk through the events of the next day. I sat up on the stage playing the romantic piano melodies I had prepared, trying not to be too obvious as I looked at the hot friend of the groom who was in the wedding party. Eventually, they came to the point where they were going to discuss the vows and charge to the couple, and all the other non-musical items of the service. So, I decided to step off the stage for a bit and sit next to my mother, who was just watching off to the side.

As we sat there and chatted a bit, my mom asked how things were going at church. Now, if you have read the previous sections of this story, you know that church is a big deal to my family. My parents' primary reason for moving to the place they now live was the church they attend. And they had visited my church in Illinois on a couple occasions and loved it. However, they had no idea that I had been kicked out of the church for being gay and that the pastor had treated me shamefully. So, it was not an unusual question for my mom to ask, but it certainly was undesirable timing.

I tried to delay the answer at first, telling her that that was something I was planning to talk to my dad and her about after the wedding events were completed, and that it was a discussion that would take too long to begin right then. Rather than calming her, though, she became concerned and started pressing me further. So I said that I would explain everything on Monday, but I wasn't planning to attend that church any longer, and I planned to move to Chicago the next month. But I said I didn't think that my cousin's wedding rehearsal was the best time to discuss this.

Now, what happened next is the strongest example I have ever seen of a mother's intuition. Keep in mind that my parents, to this point, did not know of my strong attraction to guys. Even when I was forced to return from Europe (see part 3 of this story), they thought it was because I had violated the missionary agency's pornography policy. But sitting there in that church, my mother turned to me and said, "Are you gay?"

If there is one thing I cannot do well, and which I hate to do in the first place, it is to lie to my mother. When I was in elementary school, I lied to my mother once and said I ate the apple she gave me at lunch when I had actually thrown it away. It bothered me so much that I couldn't sleep that night, and I woke her up in the middle of the night to confess and apologize. I have said many times that, if it were not for her opposition to my sexual orientation, I would have the perfect mother.

So, I said, "Yes, I am gay."

Oops.

I knew that coming out would likely be an emotional experience. I anticipated my parents being upset, but I envisioned it happening in a hotel room where we would have privacy and a discussion about it. I planned on both parents being there, because they do a good job of keeping each other calm in strained situations. But I never planned for this.

For a moment, my mother went silent. Her jaw was very tight, a look I had seen before when she was very upset. Her eyes started to appear moist. Then, attracting a lot of attention from our entire family standing around the church sanctuary, she stood up quickly and left the room. Hoping to calm her down, I followed her outside and tried to talk to her.

What happened next was a couple hours of pure emotion coming from my mother. She was crying almost the whole time, trying to convince me I wasn't gay, that I shouldn't move to Chicago, that I was going to ruin my life. She was so upset that, within a few minutes of each other, she made both of the following statements:

"You will die of AIDS before you are 30."
"You will grow up to be a lonely old man."

The two of us missed the remainder of the wedding rehearsal and the entire dinner. And even worse, we were in the corridor between the church building and the dining hall where the dinner was held, so all of our family members walked past us seeing my mother crying and our intense discussion.

The following couple months were pretty rough between me and my parents. I moved to Chicgao in October, by which time I was often not answering their calls because I couldn't handle the crying (of both parents) and pressure all the time. Finally, in the early part of November, my mom asked me if I was going to be with them for Thanksgiving. I told her that, if the trip was just going to be four days of them trying to convince me not to be gay, I could not handle that. A couple days later, my dad called, and I saw the first very small step my parents took toward calming down. My dad told me that he knew they had made it very clear what they thought about my sexuality, and their opinion had not changed. However, he said that, more importantly, I am their son whom they love, and they would not bring up the subject again.

Thanksgiving was very tense and uncomfortable, but they kept their word. Then Christmas was slightly better, and each visit afterward has improved. Three years later, I have seen my parents make amazing steps that I never would have imagined. They still hold to their belief that gay sex is sinful, but they are much less dogmatic about so many other things. They no longer believe I "chose" to be gay or that I am gay because they were bad parents. They realize that I'm not out on the weekends participating in S&M drag gangbang orgies. They don't make my "sin" to be somehow a big sin worse than all others. They have met a number of my gay friends and are thoughtful in their comments about issues that we discuss. And they have kept their word and have not gotten on my case about it ever since.

After moving to Chicago, I did not attend church for nearly a year, but then I found a church that seemed to have a good balance. As time has progressed, I have found it to be a very welcoming church and actually look forward to services there. I know I'm in the minority when it comes to gay guys and religion, and I must say I find it very hard to be critical of gay guys who want nothing to do with religion, because it seems most religions don't want anything to do with us. But for myself, I have found it to be a source of encouragement and stability, and hopefully people can see in me someone who is working on a balance in faith and sexuality, someone who takes my faith seriously but doesn't take myself too seriously. And most of all, that I will be a person of faith but never of judgment. I think that church should be a place where people go because we realize we are not perfect, not because we think we are. My attending church is a statement that I know I have things to improve on, not a statement that others are worse than me. Perhaps if more church people understood that, we would have less antipathy between the gay and religious communities.

As for me, I'm probably still a little messed up in the head. My friends could vouch for that. But coming out was the first of many important steps that I have taken to be real and who I need to be. It's still a process, for sure, but I am at a point where I can honestly say I hold no anger toward those who have wronged me in the past, nor do their opinions and judgments hold me back from being myself. Hopefully, I will continue to live in a way that will show the critics that stereotypes are distortions of reality, and a gay man can indeed be someone who is kind, self-disciplined, and someone worth calling a friend.

Saturday, December 09, 2006

[+/-]

Harry Potter Experiment

This has been around for a long time, but I ran across it today and was humored by it once again (not original with me):

Purely in the interests of science, I have replaced the word "wand" with "wang" in the first Harry Potter Book

Let's see the results...

"Why aren't you supposed to do magic?" asked Harry.
"Oh, well -- I was at Hogwarts meself but I -- er -- got expelled, ter tell yeh the truth. In me third year. They snapped me wang in half an' everything

A magic wang... this was what Harry had been really looking forward to.

"Yes, yes. I thought I'd be seeing you soon. Harry Potter." It wasn't a question. "You have your mother's eyes. It seems only yesterday she was in here herself, buying her first wang. Ten and a quarter inches long, swishy, made of willow. Nice wang for charm work."
"Your father, on the other hand, favored a mahogany wang. Eleven inches. "

Harry took the wang. He felt a sudden warmth in his fingers. He raised the wang above his head, brought it swishing down through the dusty air and a stream of red and gold sparks shot from the end like a firework, throwing dancing spots of light on to the walls

"Oh, move over," Hermione snarled. She grabbed Harry's wang, tapped the lock, and whispered, 'Alohomora!"

The troll couldn't feel Harry hanging there, but even a troll will notice if you stick a long bit of wood up its nose, and Harry's wang had still been in his hand when he'd jumped - it had gone straight up one of the troll's nostrils.

He bent down and pulled his wang out of the troll's nose. It was covered in what looked like lumpy gray glue.

He ran onto the field as you fell, waved his wang, and you sort of slowed down before you hit the ground. Then he whirled his wang at the dementors. Shot silver stuff at them.

"Yes," Harry said, gripping his wang very tightly, and moving into the middle of the deserted classroom. He tried to keep his mind on flying, but something else kept intruding.... Any second now, he might hear his mother again... but he shouldn't think that, or he would hear her again, and he didn't want to... or did he?

Something silver-white, something enormous, erupted from the end of his wang.

Then, with a sigh, he raised his wang and prodded the silvery substance with its tip.

'Get - off - me!' Harry gasped. For a few seconds they struggled, Harry pulling at his uncles sausage-like fingers with his left hand, his right maintaining a firm grip on his raised wang.

Friday, December 01, 2006

[+/-]

World AIDS Day

Today is World AIDS Day, and many others have spoken or will speak of it far more eloquently than I ever could. I do think it is wonderful that, each year, the tragedy that this disease has caused worldwide becomes more and more understood and responded to. Slowly, we see foolish assumptions and myths about HIV/AIDS fading away, as politicians, physicians, and the general public are realizing the importance of addressing the issue with compassion and honesty. I love how celebrities like Bono are choosing to leverage their popularity to accomplish great things in this realm. And a day like today is excellent for helping to increase public awareness, education, and compassion for those who live with HIV/AIDS.

But I also think today is important for a reason that those of us in the gay community are probably aware of more than most; that is, for those of us who are HIV-negative to remind our friends and family members who are living with HIV/AIDS of our love and support and total acceptance of them. I have known many people in my life with HIV/AIDS, having lived in West Africa where it was very prevalent, as well as knowing numerous HIV-positive friends and acquaintances here in the States. But it hit home more directly than ever this year, when within three months of each other, two people very close to me tested positive. Suddenly, it wasn't just acquaintances that I would see occasionally at a club or party; it was people who I would interact with regularly, people who I loved and looked to for help when I faced difficulties in life.

And, as my loved ones have progressed on their journies through this new challenge, I have been so happy to see them both moving from a very low place to paths of hope and happiness--anticipation of lives that will be full and satisfying, perhaps even more so than before, since they have faced a challenge that gives them an appreciation for life and health and love. And, I think that is a wonderful message for World AIDS Day... HIV/AIDS does not have the power to crush the human spirit or to fracture hope or to restrain love. It cannot suffocate laughter or silence creativity or shatter true friendship or stifle compassion.

Have you ever had a really bad day? One in which you just feel like your are overwhlemed by your circumstances? Where you are on the verge of tears or just want to hit a wall or scream into your pillow? But then, a friend or loved one comes into the room and, with a clever comment or well-timed joke totally diffuses the tension. I don't mean a careless joke that indicates your problems are not real nor important. But a gentle humor that communicates they love you and that they know you are going to make it through this trial. When this happens, at first you don't want to laugh, or even smile, because in a perverse way, we sometimes jealously hold on to anger or frustration. But when the laughter overcomes us, and we are forced to release the anger (since anger will not co-exist with laughter), we physically and emotionally feel that knot in our stomach begin to loosen and the load on our heart to lighten. It doesn't eliminate the problems we are facing, but it gives us the perspective to know we can make it through the valleys in life because we are loved.

Today's Holidays:

World AIDS Day
Day Without Art Day
Bifocals at the Monitor Liberation Day (I don't know what it is, either)

Monday, November 27, 2006

[+/-]

My Coming-Out Story, Part Four

Note: If you have not already done so, be sure to read Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 of my coming-out story so this part will make sense a bit more.

My Coming-Out Story, Part Four: Personal Exposure

When I returned to the States from my abbreviated time in Europe (see earlier posts for context), I bounced around aimlessly for a bit before finally landing in northwestern Illinois in May 2003. It was that month when I would finally begin to make choices that would help me to move in a new direction away from the cycle of frustration I had been in for so many years. I would indeed begin a new life. But, as with any new life, there is inevitably some birthing pain.

When I moved into my new Midwestern apartment, I did two things almost immediately. First, I found a new church to attend. Call it force of habit or whatever you will, but I had attended church my entire life, and the thought still had not occurred to me that not attending church could ever be an option. Instead of being an active participant in a pastoral role, however, I took much more of a spectator's position in the new church, not really wanting to attract any more attention to myself. And second, I decided I really needed to figure out this whole "gay thing" through some method other than by going to church people for advice or by just ignoring it and hoping it would go away.

The problem was, I had no idea how to meet gay people. I was two months away from my 28th birthday, and I was still one of the most sheltered people you would ever meet. I had never knowingly associated with another gay person. I had never entered a bar of any kind (much less a gay one) except once in Wisconsin to call for assistance when my car broke down in a blizzard. I had never danced. I had never tasted alcohol, smoked a cigarette, or done drugs. And yes, I was a virgin (to all sex, straight or gay-- I never even had a romantic kiss!).

Fortunately, technology was advancing quite nicely by this point, and I remembered something I had observed when checking my e-mail on Yahoo. I saw this fascinating site called Yahoo Personals, in which you could say whether you were a "Man seeking a Woman" or a "Woman seeking a Man." But, amazingly enough, you could actually change the option to be "Man seeking a Man." Simultaneously terrified and aroused, I went to the site and, for the first time ever, saw personal ads for gay men.

I looked at the ads and pictures for a week or so, and finally, I worked up the courage to reply to one. Looking back, I am amazed at my good fortune in that first tentative contact. Any of us who have been on an online dating site know that, when you are contacted by someone with no picture posted (which was the case with me, as I was terrified someone I knew would find out I was on a gay site), more often than not, the person is ignored. But the guy that I e-mailed actually responded. He was a handsome college student, just a couple years younger than me, and he was at a university about 45 minutes from where I was living. And, to show you how blessed I was to meet this particular guy, a quick fast-forward to today, November 2006, finds that that same guy is one of my dearest friends and lives just a few doors down the street from me here in Chicago, nearly two hours from where I was living when I first e-mailed him!

When my friend responded to my e-mail greeting, I explained to him a bit of my situation, that I was completely new to all of this and absolutely terrified (I think I worded it as "kinda nervous"). He kindly corresponded back and forth with me several times, but it being May, he was just finishing school and was, in fact, graduating. So, in early June, he moved two hours away to Chicago, before we ever had the chance to meet in person. But, by that point, we decided we did want to meet, and so one day we arraned to have dessert in one of the Chicago suburbs about half the distance between us. I had a great time and was amazed to find a normal, attractive, masculine gay guy who I got along well with! I was thinking that he must be the only one of his kind, and I just got lucky!

That first meeting was followed up only a couple weeks later by the night that would change everything for me. June 27, 2003. Friday night. Pride weekend in Chicago. Exactly one month before my 28th birthday. My new friend invited me to drive into the city and stay at his place. He would then give me a tour of gay Chicago. I had to leave Saturday afternoon for a business trip to Dallas, but I agreed to hang out with him on Friday night and see what it was all about.

Now, try to picture this in your mind. As we left his apartment to head out to the gay clubs of Chicago, I was braced for the most extreme situations I could imagine. Because my exposure to gay people was essentially what I saw on the cover of Focus on the Family magazines, I naturally assumed that my friend and I would be the only two gay guys there who were not dressed in women's clothing, and I was certain that these "gay clubs" would be full of men having sex together. I had never been in any bar or club, so I didn't even have straight clubs to use as a reference point in my mind.

So, when we walked into Spin and Roscoe's and I saw these places full of handsome guys, some of whom even smiled at me, I was completely overwhelmed. I experienced a range of emotions that night that I have felt very seldom to that intensity. It was that same night that I tasted alcohol for the first time, that I was knowingly around more than one gay guy at a time, that I danced for the first time, and that I stayed the night at another gay guy's house for the first time.

It was at some point when I was with my friend on the dance floor at Roscoe's, awkwardly attempting to dance but having no idea how, that I experienced something that probably all of us who have come out have felt at some point. Bonnie Tyler was singing "Total Eclipse of the Heart", a song I had never heard before but knew I instantly loved. And it hit me. For the first time in my life, I was real. This was me. I wasn't suppressing what I knew I felt. I wasn't trying to be what everyone else expected of me just to keep them happy. I was just being who I was. And it was the most freeing, most satisfying, most relieving feeling I had ever had. For a moment, I just closed my eyes, and soaked in the sound and atmosphere, and I knew nothing would ever be the same for me. To this day, when I hear "Total Eclipse of the Heart", I feel a little bit better and smile a bit more.

That weekend began a summer of exploring this new world that had opened up to me. With perhaps only one or two exceptions, I would drive two hours to Chicago every Friday night and go out with my friend, then drive home Saturday evening. I could not have asked for a kinder, more easy-going, more patient friend than he. We got along famously, and he would let me go out and explore on my own, always keeping his door open to me anytime I needed a place to go.

Oh, and I won't kiss and tell and say with whom or when or where, but by the end of the summer, I wasn't a virgin anymore. And I found out I am a big fan of kissing.

Summer began to wind down, and near the end of August, I concluded that I needed to be honest about who I was with the people in my life. The very first person that I came out to was my roommate, a very hot straight guy. If all my other conversations went as well as that, I would have been the luckiest guy ever. My roommate could not have been more supportive. I think he knew the difficult times that were going to be on my path soon, because he went out of his way to make me comfortable and to let me know I could be real around him. He knew that I thought he was hot, and I think he loved the attention. The first time I met his girlfriend was when I arrived home to find the two of them making out on the couch in the living room. My roommate introduced me to his girlfriend and then told her, "Eukolos wishes it was he who was on the couch making out with me!" He would walk around the house after a shower wearing only his towel and say, "Eukolos, I bet you wish this towel would fall off, don't you?"

The next situation, however, did not go as well. I knew that, if I was going to be real and stop faking, I would have to change churches, because the church I was attending took a very clear stance against homosexuality. However, I naively hoped that I could leave quietly, explaining to the pastor that I appreciated his kindness to me, but that I needed to move on. Well, after writing a very kind, non-judgmental letter to the pastor, he completely freaked out, and as I mentioned in part 3 of this story, he told me he was going to pray that God would kill me, then he kicked me out of the church.

That was the breaking point for me. In a short time, I had seen unconditional acceptance and kindness from my gay friend in Chicago (and a growing number of other gay guys I was meeting there), but then I had seen flat-out mean-spirited and angry responses from church people. I figured that, since every church experience when I was real about my sexuality had been so bad, I no longer wanted anything to do with church. So in September 2003, for the first time in my 28 years of life, I stopped attending church. And I decided to move to Chicago.

By the end of August, I knew the inevitable could not be postponed much longer. I needed to tell my family. And it happened that our entire family would be gathering in Los Angeles in mid-September for my cousin's wedding. So, since it was only a couple weeks out and my parents and brother and I were going to stay a few days after the wedding, I thought that would be an ideal opportunity to explain things to them.

Well, once again I am a bit long-winded. If I have not built up enough anticipation for this next part of the story yet, I don't know what will. But to do this justice, I will have to extend the story a bit further into another post, which I will attempt to write quickly.

However, if your patience will indulge me a bit further today, let me conclude this post by sharing something that has been foundational in my life ever since 2003.

On September 10, 2004, I got my first tattoo. For many years I had been fascinated with tattoos, and in recent years that fascination had grown into an interest in getting one myself. However, after having observed many tattoos, I determined that, were I ever to get one, it would have to be very meaningful and significant to me, something that I won’t mind having on my body when I’m in my 70's. As cool as I might think it would be to have the Tazmanian Devil on my forearm in my mid-20's, I knew he wasn’t going to make the cut.

As I explained in this post, major life experiences culminated in September 2003, resulting in my moving to Chicago, Illinois, and beginning a new chapter in my life. During the following year, a number of lessons started to gel in my head that would become guiding principles for me in the days to come. At their core, these lessons were about kindness. Beginning early in 2002 and continuing through the fall of 2003, as I grew in my determination to resolve the issues concerning my sexuality and my faith, I saw extremes both of kindness and unkindness. Sadly, much of the unkindness came from those with whom I often aligned in my faith, but gladly, I saw amazing kindness from those with whom I found common ground in my sexuality. While my pastor (whom I had previously considered to be a close friend) called around to “out” me to people he did not even know and told me he would pray for God to kill me, some of my new gay friends surrounded me with kindness and showed me unconditional acceptance at a time when I desperately needed friends. In particular, two or three of my friends in Chicago, all of whom are Asian incidentally (perhaps signs of an incipient rice queen tendency?), helped me make it through that very difficult time in my life.

So, in September of 2004, I decided to get a tattoo to represent and remind me of the lessons I had been learning and the principles to which I would hopefully adhere as I continued on my journey.

I wanted every aspect of the tattoo “experience” to be significant. First, the timing of getting the tattoo was almost exactly one year to the day from when I had come out to my immediate family. I selected a tattoo that included Chinese characters as a tribute to my Asian friends who had been such an amazing help to me. The characters are the word “kindness” which, translated literally (assuming I have been told correctly), is “good at heart.” In 2004, this became the goal to which I determined to be most dedicated--to be a kind person, someone who indeed strove to be good at heart. The tattoo was both a reminder to me of the hurt that can be caused by unkindness and of the help and hope that can be infused by a kind word or action.

In addition to the characters, I included a small rabbit. This was partially a continued tribute to my Asian friends, as I was born in the Chinese year of the rabbit. But also, the rabbit is a symbol of kindness in some Asian cultures, so it seemed to fit with the theme of the tattoo. The location of the tattoo is over my heart, to illustrate to others (and to remind myself) that kindness is something that I endeavor to keep close to my heart.

More than two years later now, I can say that the tattoo has accomplished a good purpose in my own life. Because of its location, I see it every day as I get dressed, and although it may not always be a conscious thought, it is at least a subconscious reminder to me that I should strive to be a kind person. And, although I know I fail more often than I care to admit, I have been encouraged to see that, many times, my natural reaction to a difficult situation (one in which many would tell me to react in anger or to write someone off), is an almost-instinctive urge to show kindness. I say this fully aware that I have far to go before I could consider myself to be a wholly-kind person. But I hope that someday, as I continue this journey, people will be able to look back at my life and see acts of kindness scattered along the way.

Well, stay tuned shortly for what will hopefully be the last part in this story that is beginning to make Tolstoy jealous for length.

Today's Holiday:

Travelers with Disabilities Week (Nov 26 - Dec 3)

Saturday, November 18, 2006

[+/-]

National Survivors of Suicide Day

Tuesday, November 14, 2006

[+/-]

Presidential Trivia Answers

On Sunday, I presented at random quiz on trivia about US Presidents. In case you missed that post, here is the quiz reprinted:

Easy:
1. Who is the shortest US president?
2. Which presidential child has a candy bar named after him/her?
3. Who is the only US president also to serve on the US Supreme Court?
4. Which US president vomited on the lap of the Japanese prime minister during a state dinner?
5. Who is the last US president to have facial hair while in office?

Tougher:
6. Who are the only 2 US presidents to hold all of the five following offices: state governor, US congressman, US senator, Vice-President, and President?
7. Which 3 US presidents won Nobel Peace Prizes?
8. Who is the only US president whose wife was not born in the United States?
9. Which is the longest-married presidential couple?
10. Who is the only person buried directly between two US presidents?

Painfully Difficult:
11. What common English word very likely originated with President Martin Van Buren?
12. Who are the only two police officers to become president?
13. What is the only book ever written by one ex-president about another one?
14. Which president is buried at the top of a staircase in which the number of stairs is equal to the number of that president in a chronological listing of presidents? (i.e. - if it were George W. Bush, which it obviously is not, it would be a staircase with 43 stairs since he is the 43rd president.)
15. Who is the only US president to be elected on his birthday?

Scroll down for answers.

Answers:

1. James Madison, at 5 feet, 4 inches tall.
2. Ruth Cleveland, daughter of President Grover Cleveland. She was the first presidential child to be born in the White House, and she caused quite a sensation in Washington. And, in her honor, a new candy bar of the time was designated the "Baby Ruth" candy bar.
3. Former President William Howard Taft was appointed to be and served as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.
4. George H.W. Bush.
5. Willia Howard Taft (had a moustache).

6. John Tyler and Andrew Johnson
7. Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and Jimmy Carter.
8. John Quincy Adams. His wife Louisa was born in England.
9. George H.W. and Barbara Bush (January 6, 2007, will be their 62nd wedding anniversary).
10. Abigail Adams. She is buried in the crypt beneath the United First Parish Church of Quincy, Massachusetts between President John Adams (her husband) and President John Quincy Adams (her son).

11. "Okay". Van Buren was from Kinderhook, New York, and he obtained the nickname "Old Kinderhook." During his campaign for presidnet, "Old Kinderhook Clubs" were established and known as "O.K. Clubs." As time progressed, the abbreviation came to mean "all right" and eventually nearly everyone forgot the word's origin.
12. Theodore Roosevelt and Grover Cleveland
13. Herbert Hoover's book The Ordeal of Woodrow Wilson.
14. Theodore Roosevelt (buried in Young's Memorial Cemetery in Oyster Bay, New York, at the top of a 26-step staircase).
15. Warren Harding, on his 55th birthday, November 2, 1920.

Today's Holidays:

Loosen Up, Lighten Up Day
National American Teddy Bear Day
National Young Readers Day

Sunday, November 12, 2006

[+/-]

Gerald Ford Becomes Longest-Living US President

For 175 years, John Adams, the second US President, held the distinction of being the longest-living US President (he lived 90 years, 247 days). Then, just five years ago, Ronald Reagan broke the long-standing record and, by the time of his death in 2004, had established a new benchmark of 93 years, 120 days.

However, Gerald Ford, the only US president not elected as president or vice-president, was born just two years after Reagan, and today, November 12, 2006, he passed Reagan's record, now having lived for 93 years, 121 days (and counting). Ford is one of the most athletic presidents ever to serve, having been a football star at the University of Michigan while in office. No doubt his good habits and active lifestyle have contributed to his longevity. The four other living US Presidents have a long way to go to reach Ford's record, as Presidents George H.W. Bush and Jimmy Carter are both 82 years old, and Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush are both 60 years old.

Gerald Ford is also the only surviving member of the Warren Commission, the 7-member panel that investigated the assassination of US President John F. Kennedy.

I'm a huge fan of US Presidential history, so just for the heck of it, here's a little presidential trivia quiz for you. I will post the answers on Tuesday.

Easy:
1. Who is the shortest US president?
2. Which presidential child has a candy bar named after him/her?
3. Who is the only US president also to serve on the US Supreme Court?
4. Which US president vomited on the lap of the Japanese prime minister during a state dinner?
5. Who is the last US president to have facial hair while in office?

Tougher:
6. Who are the only 2 US presidents to hold all of the five following offices: state governor, US congressman, US senator, Vice-President, and President?
7. Which 3 US presidents won Nobel Peace Prizes?
8. Who is the only US president whose wife was not born in the United States?
9. Which is the longest-married presidential couple?
10. Who is the only person buried directly between two US presidents?

Painfully Difficult:
11. What common English word very likely originated with President Martin Van Buren?
12. Who are the only two police officers to become president?
13. What is the only book ever written by one ex-president about another one?
14. Which president is buried at the top of a staircase in which the number of stairs is equal to the number of that president in a chronological listing of presidents? (i.e. - if it were George W. Bush, which it obviously is not, it would be a staircase with 43 stairs since he is the 43rd president.)
15. Who is the only US president to be elected on his birthday?

Today's Holiday:

I Need a Patch For That Day

Thursday, November 09, 2006

[+/-]

My Coming-Out Story, Part Three

Note: If you have not already done so, be sure to read Part 1 and Part 2 of my coming-out story so this part will make sense a bit more.

My Coming-Out Story, Part Three: The 28-Year-Old Virgin

The fall of 1993 found me at a ~~compound~~ college campus in northern Wisconsin, about 30 minutes from Iron Mountain, Michigan (which had the closest McDonald's). I make the "compound" reference in good humor, because it was what many thought of the college I attended. What else would explain this large campus in the north woods in a town of about 1,000 people? You may wonder why I ended up at this school, so I shall give a bit of background.

My parents both attended Bob Jones University in Greenville, South Carolina. For those who may not be familiar with that school, it is the place where George W. Bush spoke during the 2000 election campaign which caused great controversy because of their policy prohibiting interracial dating (and what about someone who is from a multi-ethnic heritage? they had to state their preference for which ethnicity they wished to date upon arrival and stick with it through their schooling). It is also a campus that does not allow gay people to enter (with the exception of visiting their sacred art gallery, which is admittedly quite impressive).

When it came time for me to choose a college, my parents wanted me to attend BJU. I knew that there was no way I would attend that school, so I begged them for another option (since they were threatening to give me no support whatsoever if I went somewhere they did not approve). After much cajoling, I convinced them to allow me to attend the Baptist Bible College in northern Wisconsin. The president of the college and much of the faculty were Bob Jones graduates, but they seemed to have left some of the goofier extremes behind (i.e. - no interracial dating prohibition). Still, it was very very conservative and definitely not a place where a gay person would feel welcome.

This was not a problem for me, I thought. Because, as an idealistic college freshman, I was convinced that I would now be able to put these gay feelings behind me and live as the heterosexual I was supposed to be. With these grand intentions, I began to unpack my bags in my new room in the all-male dormitory with community showers.

Yes, it took about 2 minutes for me to realize this gay monster had followed me to college. I mean, you can say a lot about the Baptists, but they have some hot guys! Very quickly, I fell into the cycle of jerking off to thoughts of my dorm-mates and then feeling extremely guilty about it. By the time I reached my sophomore year, I was an emotional mess. Here I was with these intense emotions but terrified to tell anyone about them and convinced I was a horrible person for having them.

It was during my sophomore year that I began a journey that was incredibly difficult but, considering my background and years of mixed-up thinking, a very necessary journey. I will summarize this briefly, lest I make this far too long. On four separate occasions during my second through fourth years of college, I worked up the courage to ask someone for help with my "problem." Remember I was still thinking that I had done something wrong to have this attraction to other guys. I went to the Student Body Vice-President, my dormitory hall leader, the Dean of Men, and the Vice-President for Student Affairs, asking each of them for help. In each case, I was disappointed. The first one prayed a prayer for me and never spoke of it again. The second freaked out and told my boss, causing me to lose a campus job I loved. The third was kind but didn't really want to deal with it, so he quickly pronounced me "cured" and moved on. The last became so uncomfortable around me that he never spoke to me again my entire time at the school.

Now, perhaps here is where you will start to get irritated with me, and perhaps I should have caught on, but I graduated from college still trying to figure out what was wrong with me. In desperation, I decided to go to graduate school, and I earned a masters degree in theology. This was followed by my being ordained as a Baptist preacher and working as a missionary in Africa and Europe for nearly 3 years. I kept thinking that, if I did all the good things I could do, this one bad thing would eventually go away.

So I found myself working as a pastor in Europe, nine years after graduating from high school, never having touched a guy the entire time, but having these overwhelming urges and thoughts constantly. Finally, I hit bottom, or so I thought. I felt that, if I did not get this thing figured out, I could not go on any further. So, going to the head pastor of our church, I told him of my dark secret, hoping that perhaps he would show kindness where others had not. Instead, I was reported to the missionary agency through which I was working, fired that day, and told I would receive nothing further from them. So I was stuck in Europe with no job and no way to get home. With help from family, I finally made it home, where I was publicly rebuked in front of my entire home church. I moved to a new town and attended a new church, but when the pastor there found out I was attracted to men, he told me he would pray that God would kill me and had me kicked out of that church as well.

You might be surprised, after hearing all this, that I am not a church-hating, anti-religious gay man. At some point, I will write about my reasons why I do not hold a grudge against those who treated me wrongly and why I still consider myself to be a person of faith. But I will admit, by the point I was kicked out of that church, I had arrived at a place where I wanted nothing to do with church or anyone related to it.

However, during this turbulent time, something else was happening that turned out to be beautiful and life-saving for me. That, as well as my recounting of coming out to my family, will be in the next part of my ever-expanding, yet always-intriguing coming-out story.

Side Note of Interest: Baptists believe that it is God who ordains someone as a preacher (a calling that is for life) while the church merely recognizes that calling. Thus, I am technically still an ordained Baptist preacher, since, if they are consistent in their theology, those churches would have to admit they have no authority to revoke the ordination. So I can still perform marriage ceremonies and the like. Somehow I don't think I will be invited as a guest speaker at my college's chapel services anytime soon, though.

Today's Holidays:

World Kindness Week (Nov 7-13)
National Animal Shelter Appreciation Week (Nov 7-13, US)
Pursuit of Happiness Week (Nov 8-14)
Kristallnacht Memorial (9-10)
Vietnam Veterans Memorial Day (US)
Return Day

Monday, November 06, 2006

[+/-]

Enhancing my Geek Credentials

Friday, November 03, 2006

[+/-]

A Plea for Patience

Thursday, November 02, 2006

[+/-]

Shifting Gears

[+/-]

My Coming-Out Story, Part Two

My Coming-Out Story, Part Two: Sorta Like a Lesbian Pollyanna

Note: If you have not yet read Part One of my coming out story, I would highly suggest you do so (by clicking here) before continuing. Otherwise, this part will make even less sense than it will for those who have read the first part.

A quick reiteration from the first part of this story.... Lest I appear to have an over-inflated view of the significance of my own coming-out story (since I am dividing it up over the course of four posts and going into extensive background information), allow me to restate that this is the first time I have ever written out my story in a disciplined manner, so I am doing this for my own posterity and will include this in my personal journal. I do hope that you will find it to be entertaining, though, as I share some unique experiences I had.

Part one ended with my ultra-conservative Baptist Republican parents determining that Los Angeles was the Gomorrah to San Francisco's Sodom and deciding to pluck my brother and me from the fire (they didn't notice we were already flaming) and move us to the wholesome, values-driven Midwest.

The way they went about telling us brothers that we were moving from everyone and everything we had known since birth and going to a place where snow fell from the sky was classic. During spring break in 1988, we flew to Chicago to visit some friends who had moved to the northwest suburbs the year before. At least this was the cover story. One day, while my brother and I thought our parents were driving us to lunch, we instead pulled up to a newly-completed house. This, our parents said, was our new home. I kid you not. That was the first inkling we had that we were leaving California. Within a week of our return to California after our "vacation," my dad had flown to Chicago to start a new job, and when school was done a couple months later, the rest of us joined him.

My parents said that the move was to protect us boys from the bad influences of California. Ironically, about a month after we moved to the suburbs of Chicago, I saw a pornographic magazine for the first time. It was a Playgirl magazine, and someone had put it behind the MAD Magazine that I had intended to read. Now, by this time I was in high school and was self-aware enough to realize I felt emotional connections to guys and attraction toward them, but I had never really seen guys naked before. If this sounds unbelievable, remember the first part of my story, that my entire life was centered around the church. The church school I attended frowned upon guys seeing each other unclothed, even in locker rooms, so the few times I saw another guy naked were so fleeting that it didn't register. So, looking at that Playgirl, something clicked in my head that finally made sense. The feelings I felt around guys were physical. And if the mental connection wasn't enough, my body made it very clear, requiring me to quickly hide the porn and buy the MAD Magazine to use as a shield in front of my pants.

Shortly after this, I asked one of my new Chicago friends (who I thought was quite cute) if he had seen guys naked. Turns out that Chicago church people haven't become quite as paranoid, because when I started attending my new church school that fall, I found what my friend told me to be true, that community showering was the norm after Phys Ed class. So there I am, not only just beginning to be aware that I am gay, but also never before having ever been around naked guys, when suddenly my entire class is naked in front of me after getting all hot and sweaty on the soccer field. I thought I would die (and didn't care where I would go). It took almost a month before I could walk into the shower room without a large washcloth strategically placed until I could stand under the coldest water I could tolerate.

Well, the conversation with my cute friend must have caught his attention, because not long later he brought up the subject again. I was so overwhelmed with what was happening, that I honestly do not remember exactly how things developed, but I do know that he and I ended up touching and groping until I came with a guy for the first time. That began ongoing encounters that lasted for nearly 4 years til I graduated from high school. Both of us were so sheltered that we did not know there was even anything to do beyond jerking each other off, but we knew we liked that a lot and did it at every opportunity.

This created a problem. Suddenly, I found myself on the express train to hell. Every time I sneaked away with my friend, I was certain I would drop dead within moments. After all, I was committing the worst possible sin, being gay. I knew there was something horribly wrong with me, but I didn't know what I had done to be this bad of a person. I would daily lie flat on my stomach with my arms outstretched begging for forgiveness and for God to fix me.

If it seems that the answer should have been obvious to me, that I wasn't a person whose evil character brought this judgment of homosexuality upon myself, keep in mind again how sheltered my life had been to that point. All of my life-forming influences had been from my church and parents. My TV-watching was strictly limited, consisting essentially of Little House on the Prairie and Captain Kangaroo. But I had never been confronted before with anything that would make me doubt those influences in my life. After all, the vast majority of what my church and parents taught me was essentially good stuff. It is a worldview that, while sadly blind in certain spots, is overall not a bad system. I was taught respect for others, kindness, honesty, playing fair, being willing to sacrifice my own comfort for the good of others--all things that I try to honor to this day. My parents demonstrated a love for each other that I hope to emulate in any relationship I have--a love that messed up on occasion but admitted fault, asked for forgiveness, and above all, stayed together. Obviously I see the glaring blind spots now, but as a high schooler, all I saw was that my life had been pretty decent compared to others I saw who didn't follow the rules and guidelines I was given.

So I thought the "gay" problem was with me. But, as I finished high school, I thought that going to a Christian college would help me figure out the problem. Surely, this was just a temporary thing, and now that I was going into college, I would find a nice girl who I would be attracted to, and we would have the same perfect life my parents seemed to have. I said goodbye to my jerk-off buddy on graduation day, and I never saw him again. The next fall, I left for school with a determination that I would never do such a thing with a guy again. And, for 10 years, I never did.

But that will be explained in Part Three of my coming-out story. Click here to read.

Today's Holidays:

National Traffic Directors' Day (USA)
Plan Your Epitaph Day
National Men Make Dinner Day (USA)

Wednesday, November 01, 2006

[+/-]

Fresh Sheets

I have thought about this blog considerably in recent days. Since I began my second blog early in August, this, my original blog, has sorta become the neglected stepsister. The great reception many kindly gave my other blog was good motivation for me to give it a lot of attention, to the detriment of Auto-Gratification.

But, my reason for blogging in the first place was not to build up my ego through the praise of strangers; rather, I wanted a forum in which I would be "forced" to discipline myself to be creative and to write on a regular basis. One of my major life goals is to become a published author, but the writing opportunities of my current marketing job (in which I work on the management side of the company rather than the creative side) consist primarily of responding to e-mails about problems with grocery store displays. Not particularly inspiring stuff.

Yet, as things have developed, this blog has become more of a photo collection than a space for me to write, and I find the pictures controlling the writing far too often. Additionally, it just is a very time-consuming process to come up with pictures to post regularly that are not over-used or copyrighted (the latter, of course, being almost impossible to know much of the time). Trying to do that with two blogs has stretched me far beyond the time resources I have available.

So, today I'm putting fresh sheets on this bed. From now on, I may include photos of hot guys when the occasion warrants; certainly, I will try to include something graphical each post to spice things up and keep it interesting. But the focus of this blog is going to return to its original intent: to give me a place to write and interact with others on ideas, to entertain if I am able, and hopefully to give you, my readers, a place to take a break in your day and find something worth reading.

My Asian blog fills a niche that is not found many places on the web; but pictures of guys of other ethnicities are found everywhere. If you're afraid you might miss my pictures, check out the blogs on my links list. I am hoping to update that soon, and I will try to keep it current with plenty of suggestions for you. But I hope you will find this blog to have actual content beyond the eye candy--content that, I trust, will be worth your while to read.

Come back tomorrow for the (far-too-long-delayed) second part of my already-started coming-out story! If you have not done so before, check out the first part for an example of what I hope this blog will contain on a regular basis (minus so many pictures).

Today's Holidays: