De Facto Ostracism

I hope for him being wrong because I don’t think I could ever give up hope and consign myself to being alone. This Christmas, I’ll be sitting amongst family as the only one not in a relationship. It makes sense that my grandparents, my parents, and my aunt and uncle look at each other lovingly—they deserve to be happy and it makes me happy that they are together. Then I will look over at both of my cousins, who bring their significant others to dinner. I enjoy the company of these new additions to my family, but I somehow only see myself as very alone and very gay.

Being single in a group of people doesn’t always bring about such sharp feelings of loneliness, but being the only gay person and the only single person just smacks of de facto ostracism. My imagination can’t help but fast forward twenty years. My parents and aunt and uncle are enjoying their old age with each other, my cousins have begun their own families, and I’m the gay uncle who comes and goes to family events by himself. The weight of my sexuality overburdens the feelings of loneliness. At a certain point, I wonder if it would be easier to couple up with a woman; all the straight people in my family seem to have found someone.

Perhaps I resent my cowardly friend for his forwardness. The psychological game he plays with himself that allows him to enter into a win/win situation seems so tempting sometimes. If I put up a front of accepting defeat before I actually lose, then I, too, can have a sense of comfort if I lose at my own losing bet. For me, this game lacks viability. I cannot trap myself in mental fake outs to perhaps wind up winning. Hope comes from within to sustain the believer in the goal. I hold onto that hope, even if its validation comes from the bring that tells me I have a text. My birthday present sends me a message, “Please know that if I didn’t have to work, I’d be there, holding you and looking into your eyes. And of course cracking jokes and tickling you.” The corners of my mouth turn up, the tears of frustrating welling up in my eyes evaporate, hope is restored.