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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13751
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In fact it is not Thanksgiving for anyone except the USA. BUT today it happens that Thanksgiving falls on the 59th birthday of the man who was once the boy I loved. And this is another year that this date is less and less important to me.
I used to give him birthday cards in school. He used to thank me. I never had a birthday, nor a christmas card form him, but I sent those, too. And I sent Valentines cards as well, not that I ever expected anything from those.
I have had, for the past couple of years, a letter that I had written not to send, but I decided that, this year, before he turns 60, I would send him a birthday card, would tell him of my new address, and would, after some substantial thought, send the letter. He can hardly accuse me of stalking him! I last tried to get through to him in about 2002, maybe 2003.
I gave a lot of thought to the words that he will choose to crumple up and bin. I sent them in a birthday card on a pair of printed sheets because a birthday card is hard to ignore. And, because a friend suggested that the card's arrival on the day might be upsetting for him, I have mailed it to arrive on the day after his birthday. I wonder if his wife opens the post! He will leave for work on Friday well before the postman arrives, and she gets home from work well before he does.
Well, I cant be answerable for that! Nor can I be answerable if he is having a party on Saturday and this annoys him. He's failed to reply now rather more than is polite.
Last time I wrote I even enclosed a stamped and self addressed envelope for him to reply with, as well as email, mobile phone, and landline numbers. This time I saved the stamp and envelope!
Some of you will tell me how foolish I am, and that I am getting my hopes up over something that will never happen. And I acknowledge freely that I am foolish. But that is limited again to believing that he is a gentleman, something I think is a foolish belief.
The thing that will not happen is a reply of any description. It's silly, really, because he's turning down a free and pretty decent dinner during which he is at perfect liberty to tell me to piss off. Me? I'd accept the invitation. But I suppose I'm open minded.
It's not as if he is attractive today. I've seen his picture online. He wears a brown suit and a brown tie and appears to dye his hair brown, too, to go with yellow teeth and a sad and wan smile that has seen better days. The boy I knew left that body a long time ago.
And all I want, something I am not going to get, is an acknowledgement of some sort that he understands that he was once important to me, and is sorry that he cannot be important to me in any real sense today. If, instead he leapt into my arms and declared undying and unrequited love I think I'd be shocked.
It's no good advising me not to post the card. It is sitting in the box awaiting collection at 5:30pm tomorrow. But I shall not wait for the email or letter in return, and I know for sue he will not phone, just as I am sure I will not phone him.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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I have a good deal of empathy for your situation, Timmy. The past is not always what we wish it to be and quite often the future doesn't serve to make it any better. You are doing what you feel is right and that is what matters.
Perhaps he will not reply when he should. For if nothing that mutual past is no threat to him today. You draw a picture of a rather sad man in his current state of affairs, you would at least offer him some joy in the recollection of a time when life was better.
I do not mean to sway the message you have posted, but I am also in a similar situation at present. A boy I once loved and possessed in bliss for several years has reappeared in my life, he just doesn't know of it.
K went off to college 3000 miles away and at the time I was in deep pain since I encouraged him to go and become the best he could be. Mail was infrequent, calls even more so. But he returned to see his family on occasion and the last time I saw him was to learn that he was HIV positive.
That was all approaching 30 years ago at a time when so many died and I was sure he would be counted among them. I ran across a bumper crop of photos, the places we had been and the people we knew. I thought certainly that if he had died there would be a memorial for him somewhere so I began looking at the lists posted on websites.
Finally I just searched for his name and found a business website that had an exact match to his name and career choices way back when. Imagine my surprise when I found a photo of the man, and at 45 he still looks quite healthy. It occurs that his family has a good deal of money, they could afford the medications and they must have accepted his status as a gay man, he lives.
He is still 3000 miles away and I could join the business site to send him a post...but I have not and I wonder at my hesitation. Quite frankly, I don't know what to say. "Glad you're alive" sounds insane. And since we are worlds apart now I don't want to screw up and be rejected. Sound familiar?
K has his own successful life, the company he works for is huge, an international conglomerate in the entertainment field. I am fifteen years older than him, semi-retired, comfortable...we have little in common except our youthful obsessions from 30 years ago. I ask myself should I bother? I desire to contact him, but I must prepare myself for rejection or at least an indifferent response.
Neither of us knows what thoughts these men think today. If they don't reply we shall both see it as a rejection of the past, but we have certainly grown up enough to handle that. You pine for what might have been, I pine for what once was, but we are both trying to embrace history. If nothing else we will always have the memories. I use those feelings and thoughts in my writing and I suppose in posting here.
Go on and do it, Timmy. You have nothing to lose, he can't take away the memories.
Age appears to be best in four things; old wood best to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust, and old authors to read. (Sir Francis Bacon 1561-1626)
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13751
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In your position I would write and say how happy you are that he has become, from all you can see, the best man he can be. Tell him that you think kindly of him from time to time, and suggest, 3,000 miles notwithstanding, a beer or a meal should your paths recross.
And why not do it today and tell him you are giving thanks for knowing him, among so many other things.
[Updated on: Thu, 25 November 2010 17:39]
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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Done and done...I will await a reply. 
Age appears to be best in four things; old wood best to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust, and old authors to read. (Sir Francis Bacon 1561-1626)
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13751
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The worst that can happen is precisely nothing. But, in that event, he will simply know that you have not forgotten him and that you think kindly of him.
Who would not want to know that last thing?
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13751
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So, I sent it. I thought you might be amused by it, so I've anonymised it and put it here. I posted it on his birthday so it would arrive afterwards. It can;t be changed because it's been sent. Even so you can dissect it if you like:
Happy birthday. Yes, I mean it. I thought you might look more favourably on a note from me after quite a time had elapsed. We're both older and wiser. Well, I'm older. I doubt I'm much wiser. I've rewritten this note about ten times. I decided to time it to arrive the day after, at least, just in case hearing from me annoyed you on your birthday. I don't want to spoil that. It's special, and I would be intruding.
I was quite surprised when I did, some time ago, a Google search for your name and found your official mugshot. I hadn’t realised how successful you are. You’re at the top of your profession. Well, you know that already. It's not really a surprise; you were always determined and competitive.
I know what a stressful job it is from [g/f], my son’s girlfriend. Her mother’s head of [somewhere or other]. Small world or what? I imagine you've met her. Not [g/f], obviously, but [mama].
I don’t know about you, but I hate official pictures of me. You probably loathe yours, but it shows something very important about you apart from the fact that you carry your age well.
It shows that you are a kind man. You’ve never lost the kindness you had as a boy. There’s a joke in there struggling to get out and your eyes show compassion. If I’m any judge I think you must be a damned fine boss. You must be a pretty good dad, too. Your kids are lucky.
I looked at some of the other links in google, too. You’re highly respected and valued by your colleagues. Things like that have never happened to me in my career. I’ve just passed through jobs and never been missed.
All those years ago, when we spoke on the phone, you implied that you felt in some way a failure. You said that you were the first one in your family not to be a doctor, and you sounded as though it mattered. But you’re a success. I’m not. All I’ve had in my working life is total crap. I’m just a survivor. And some of that ability to survive is somehow because of you.
The thing I don’t understand is why you are so afraid of meeting. You can’t seriously think I expect you to leap into my arms, declare undying love for me and we skip happily off into the sunset, surely? Why would that ever happen? I’m the gay one, not you, and anyway I'm settled with my life; I'm married and I plan on staying that way. You are too. Maybe it upset you to know you were loved at school, maybe I disgusted, disgust you. I don't know.
I’ve just been hoping, stupidly as it turns out, that you would take pity on me one day, and let me drive to [home town or work town] and let me buy you dinner while I embarrass myself because I’ve been such a total fool. I'm sure you understand my need for closure, and I understand that a meeting might feel difficult for you. I also know the only thing we have in common today is some weird memories of a pretty poor school that failed us both. Maybe the meal would be awkward, maybe we'd just get along pretty much as we always should have done, maybe we could end it as we always ought to have, as quiet and distant friends. Or maybe we would just shake hands and part as, well, something different from friends. But I would like to see your face and shake your hand even if I get the punch on the nose I half expect.
Sometimes it still hurts, and hurts a lot. I was truly stupid over this at school and after school. I thought I was being sensible by trying to blank it all out. As it happens I have hurt myself badly by doing that. I wish I'd talked to you then, but I was so afraid of rejection, something that is ironic since that is all I have ever had. There are days when it hurts almost too badly to bear. I had one of those days recently. I wasted so much of my potential by moping over something that was never mine to have. Some days I catch myself moping again.
We've moved home from [old town] in December 2009, we're now in a tiny terraced cottage, built in 1865 or thereabouts, overlooking the harbour in [new town]. We've retired early because we're both pretty much burned out by the rat race. My mother's death, sad though it was, enabled our retirement.
You know, I hope, that I only wish you well. I have always wished you well. I can't ever be free from my childhood, and it's not possible to forget my first love. There is no 'what might have been' and there never would have been. I just failed to let myself grow up back then.
Today I've grown up enough to be 'out' to the world as who I am. I campaign for human rights, emphasising LGBT rights simply because I can't campaign for everything. I draw on my experience of growing up scared and gay, and I try to bring humanity and humility to my campaigning.
I came out to my entire family 15 months ago, almost all with a good result. I lost a cousin who is simply a bigot. No real loss there. I came out to the OE alumni magazine last year. Perhaps you saw that and passed it by. I'm not the sad old git I seem to be painting myself in this letter. I have a great life. I've tried very hard to find and apologise to everyone I hurt as I was growing up, but I can't find them all.
Since I'm starting to ramble, and since I'm pretty sure you haven't read even this far, I'll stop by wishing you a happy birthday, health, wealth and happiness.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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