still standing or standing still?

Does there actually come a point in life when you stop dreaming? Or when being ambitious goes from being encouraged and praised (as a young person) to something that is looked down upon and suspected? At what point should we be satisfied with what we have, and accept that what we have is our lot in life? Because the way that I am going, I am only becoming more impatient. Perhaps it is a subconscious race against time, trying to get as much as I can before the alarm clock rings and I have to sit down and stop trying. When is enough enough? For me, I don’t know if it ever will be, and is that a good or a bad thing?

I remember reading an interview with Janet Jackson (as good a source of life advice as any, considering she certainly has lived!) where she would advise young people to make sure that they appreciate their journey, rather than always striving, striving, striving for more. This makes sense to me, but I must admit that I am not very good at it. In the quest for seeking to do something that fulfils me but that also “matters”, I seem to repeatedly experience disillusionment once I realise that what I’m doing with my life isn’t quite what I intended. Pretty soon, I move onto the next in an attempt to climb the ladder, all the while hearing the clock inside my head ticking more loudly with each birthday that goes by.

Why is the clock so insistent? At this point, I am lucky enough to be able to say that I am happy with my life, that I have accomplished a lot in a relatively short time, and that I appreciate what I have and don’t take it for granted. So where does the nagging insistence that it’s not enough come from? I think it’s because I feel that I still have plenty of potential that I’m not utilising, because there are only so many hours in a day and because there is only so much money in the bank. Yet, if I had all the money in the world, I’d probably not quest and strive quite as hard, because a little bit of the struggle would be taken out of it. Don’t get me wrong, if I won the lottery tomorrow I certainly wouldn’t rip up my ticket or choose to donate all of the money to charity. I would take all of that money and use it to improve my life in the ways that money can.  But not only is money not everything, but money is only something; and when I say that I want it all, I am not referring to material possessions. I mean achievements, I mean developing my intelligence, awareness and having all the life experiences that I feel I want to have. I don’t know if I will ever be satisfied, or ever stop working. Does that make me greedy, immature, honest, ambitious or just restless?

last Christmas.

I remember when I started this blog that I would write quite lengthy, detailed posts about my personal life and about all of my feelings and experiences. This blog has been around for over 3 years and during that time my life has transformed in a lot of ways: I did a postgrad, started working in jobs I actually wanted, learned to drive and bought a car, entered a long-term relationship, moved to London and supported myself, moved in with my boyfriend… I made the decision not to talk about my relationship in too much detail because I feel that my private life is just for me and for Toby – but he informs everything I do now and is such a big part of me that every post on here, more or less, is influenced by him or concerns him to some degree.

Although I am certainly more mature and guarded about what I choose to post on the internet, sometimes I miss the honesty and openness with which I used to post. Sometimes, when I have dilemmas in my life, I find myself typing my question into Google in search of some advice. And sometimes I find some decent food for thought, whereas other times there’s just nothing sensible or nothing that quite touches the nature of what I am going through. But on those occasions where I do find something that can help me, through offering a kindred voice or shedding an alternative perspective on a situation, it’s really valuable. And so I have decided that in this post, I am going to be honest and talk about what is on my mind, in the hope that one day someone else might find my post and it might help them to know that they are not alone.

Yesterday I was speaking to my mother on the phone and apropos of nothing, she asked me that when I am in Bristol for Christmas, that I don’t voluntarily reveal the fact that I am gay and in a healthy, happy long-term relationship with my partner. The reason for this is that my uncle and aunt are coming up from Melbourne for the holiday to visit my grandmother. My cousin (my uncle and aunt’s daughter) has been living in Bristol with my grandmother for the past six months, and during this time she has demonstrated that she has grown up a lot from the irksome child and teenager that she was when I had previously met her. And yet the other day, my mother was having a conversation with her and my grandmother, and my cousin asks “how is Alan getting on with his flatmate?” Toby is my boyfriend, my lover, my partner with whom I share a flat – but he is so much more than my “flatmate” that I paused a little bit – because surely this is obvious, and my cousin (whose recent displays of emotional intelligence lead me to believe that she would have caught onto this) must know that Toby is my boyfriend. My mum then told me that my cousin has revealed in the past that my uncle (who has hitherto always been nice to me) “hates certain celebrity chefs because they are gay” apparently. And so, my mother has asked me not to volunteer any information about Toby to “keep the peace on Christmas Day” and to keep my grandmother happy, because otherwise relatives’ reactions “may cause a scene and my grandmother will get upset.”

What the fuck.

I am not at all angry at my mother for wanting a peaceful Christmas – it’s perfectly understandable. My mother’s side of the family is Italian (and therefore Catholic, although I wouldn’t describe them as religious with the exception of my grandmother who goes to church twice a week – but only since my grandfather passed away 5 years ago). But I have introduced Toby to my father (who has made crass comments about gay people in the past but has never been anything but welcoming of Toby and supportive of me in my relationship – I feel that his macho posturing isn’t really indicative of his views, which annoys me somewhat – why does he even need to act a certain way therefore? But I appreciate the fact that he is accepting of me) and everything has been fine – Toby has never felt uncomfortable or unwelcome in my parents’ home. My grandmother has met Toby a few times now and they get on ok too – neither is my grandmother stupid; she knows who he is to me, even if she doesn’t say it out loud. But here lies the crux of the problem – everybody knows, but nobody wants to talk about it. Everybody is actually fine with my sexuality, but everybody seems to think that they are the only “enlightened one” and that nobody else approves. So it remains a big open secret. Which to me is partly laughable, but also quite painful because I have absolutely no shame in having found a man that I love with all my heart, and having established a strong and secure relationship with him. Shouldn’t this be something that could be appreciated, if it’s too much to ask for it to be celebrated? Why do I have to keep quiet about the most positive (out of a range of very positive things in my life) part of who I am today?

I have always been the Beyoncé of the family, if you will. (Prepare for me to toot my own horn in the next couple of sentences.) Not only because I’m musically talented, but I am the only person on my mother’s side of the family to go to university, let alone to the University of Oxford and then on to achieve a postgraduate qualification afterwards. I am the only one who has successfully moved out of Bristol. I’m the slimmest and most fashionable out of me and my cousins. I have an interesting job which pays a decent wage (but more about that in another post, as I have an announcement to make!). I am 27 years old and I have done pretty well so far (with some wobbles along the way – but hey, that’s life right?). With all of this hard work (which was for myself, but it didn’t hurt that it pleased others also), it would appear that the fact that I am gay, that I happen to be attracted to men, and that I have now built a life for myself with another man whom I love deeply, resets everything. I will never be good enough, and no matter what I did or what I achieve in the future, I never had a chance at being “good enough” because of my sexuality, which is something I cannot control. I love being gay, I love Toby, I am very happy with my life and with myself (apart from the fact that I ought to quit smoking and that next year I am going to lose weight – but there’s a forthcoming post for that too because my musical goals and my aesthetic aims are going hand in hand in 2013).  And I can’t talk about any of it, because other people may react to it, and it may upset someone else. Well, it upsets me! What about that?

Back to the phone call. So my mother asked this favour of me. I fell silent, and I said that I didn’t know if I could do that – I certainly couldn’t promise anything. I know that she understands, and I know that she didn’t like asking, and I am not angry at her. But I am angry at my family because I am never going to be good enough, and I am not able to relax and completely be myself. I told my mother that I didn’t understand why I should compromise myself. It’s not natural for one to shout their gayness or their homosexual monogamous relationship upon entering a room – this is not my intention. But I am 27 years old, and I am not afraid of them anymore – I have built my own life, and at the end of the day, I don’t live in Bristol and I don’t need the validation of my family. It’s nice if I could feel comfortable with them – but if that’s not going to be a possibility, c’est la vie. I will choose Toby over them, if it has to come to it. I am sad that it might have to come to that – but maybe we can’t have everything. I have a lot, and that’s enough. But I refuse to be intimidated by small-minded, low-aspiring people. I don’t even really know if they are small-minded – this is all just rumour and myth. But after all – I’d better not say anything, just in case.

I want everyone to have a lovely Christmas day. I want Toby to feel welcome when he comes to Bristol, and the fact that he does perplexes me even more in light of this request. I don’t want my grandmother to be upset, and I don’t want anybody to cause a scene. But it’s not my fault if they cause a scene because of their own prejudice, surely? I don’t understand why I have to conceal, compromise and sacrifice my identity in the presence of people whom I see only occasionally, and who are my frickin’ family, so as not to rock a phantom boat. Am I being unreasonable? Because perhaps it’s not such a big thing to ask, for one day. But then, to me, it’s not really about one family day – it’s about me being denied the ability to openly be myself, to celebrate all of the things I have achieved and the precious gift of Toby’s presence in my life. He is wonderful, and I don’t see why I have to downplay this. I’m not going to shout it from the rooftops (though sometimes I want to! 🙂 ) because that would be unnatural, but neither am I going to lie about it because that is no more natural either.

This is bringing me to the sad conclusion that, whether or not a scene occurs, I feel like this will be my last Christmas in Bristol with my family, for at least a while. I don’t want to hurt my family by not celebrating with them, but at the same time I am an adult now, with the right to live my own life. (I can’t lie – it will be nice to actually not do a big travelling jaunt for one year.) I’m old enough to make my own decisions and to choose to stand my ground and enjoy my life in my own home. I have proven my worth time and again, and I now have the flat, the job, the relationship – the evidence to show for it. It’s not my fault that my family members may be insecure or jealous, and I don’t see why I should compromise myself to appease any inadequacies they may or may not feel. It’s not my problem. If I cannot be myself on Christmas day, then maybe next year it has finally come to the point where I’ve got to start making my own traditions, and if it means being by myself then hey – I’ll do it. I would never begrudge Toby going to spend time with his family, and maybe I would be able to join them instead. I don’t know – this whole situation has thrown me into a realm of “I don’t know”. What I do know is that I won’t lie, I won’t hide, and I won’t be ashamed. I am strong enough and secure enough to stand alone – I’d rather not have to, but if that’s the way it has to be then so be it. A part of me hopes I’ll be pleasantly surprised this Christmas and all these worries and postulations will count for nothing. I really don’t know what will happen – I am confident that I feel the right way about the situation, but I hope that I will have the grace and the presence of mind to react correctly and in a dignified manner to whatever situation arises.

I’ll let you know.

dreams do come true!

I passed my driving test!!!!

At last. This has been hanging over me since I was 18 (I am now 25, so 7 years) and I’d got to the point, that although I was trying to let common sense prevail when I failed a couple of months ago and be rational about it (and I received some good advice from friends that ultimately turned out to be correct), I didn’t have faith in myself. I didn’t think this would happen for me – I just figured that everyone had something that they just couldn’t do no matter how they tried, and driving was that for me.

I am pleased to say that I was wrong! This morning, I didn’t want to face the day and I could barely get out of bed – I am never like that. Come lunchtime (my test was at 3:30 in the afternoon), I went back to bed and tried to pretend like the day wasn’t happening – I felt more mentally unstable than I did last time, and part of me felt like there was no point even trying to take the test. I was so sure I would fail. Driving has been the only thing I ever felt like that about, and I felt like a hypocrite when I was telling other people not to give up, because I sure felt like giving it up and throwing the towel in, especially today.

But now, with my success in my pocket (and my last aim for 2010 completed before the end of the year! – better late than never 😉 ) I can assure everyone all the more that you have to keep trying, and you should never give up on anything. I felt like I would love to not even go to the test centre, but I knew in my heart that I could not let the chance pass me by. And after 20 minutes of the test, with my questions, my reverse around the corner, and a couple of hill starts behind me, I peeked at the examiner’s sheet and he had barely written anything. Good sign. So I thought to myself “all the difficult stuff is behind me now, so if I haven’t fucked up by now, I should do ok, and I CAN DO THIS.” My self-esteem took a big leap back up. And sure enough, I proved that I could do it, and I did it. I am patting myself on the back right now, but I am also saying this because I want everyone to know that we can do anything we put our minds to.

I felt like a failure for 7 years. Driving is the only thing I had ever really failed, and it took me a long time but I have conquered that obstacle and there is no reason for me to be ashamed anymore. I had to be brave so many times (including today), and so many times I felt like I had been kicked in the teeth and had to start all over again. Hell, for 5 of those years, I didn’t have the money nor the strength to get in a car. But with my life starting to turn around once I had started the Careers Guidance course, made some terrific new friends, found a wonderful man to stand by my side and realise that I could get a decent job, I decided to step back in the car and give it another shot. And it has now paid off.

Please NEVER GIVE UP ON YOUR DREAMS. I am unfortunately going to be milking this story as a triumph over adversity (and I know that there are very many people who experience much more adversity than learning to drive – I’m not trying to be insensitive or naïve, but this has been the thorn in my side), so get used to it 😉 But I want to support everyone who reads this to keep trying, no matter how pessimistic you feel, no matter how the odds are stacked against you. Because when you least expect it, success might just be around the corner. 🙂

retaliate?

On Monday night I spent the evening with Mike and Caroline and their adorable 3 year old son Billy, and we had Dominos pizzas, played with Claire’s cat (they were house-sitting for her while she was on holiday for her boyfriend’s birthday) and watched TV.  Between the friendly insults between Mike and myself, the yummy food and the cute trots around the garden with Billy, we ended up having an interesting conversation / I watched an incipient argument between Mike and Caroline about whether it is right to teach your child to hit back when they are hit.

A bit more background to the story: Billy goes to nursery on afternoons during the week, and is in a class with various other kids who are the same age.  His initial reluctance to go to nursery has more or less faded now, and he seems to enjoy himself there and plays well with most of the other kids (as well as trying to sneak home toys in his socks!).  However, there are two little girls called Paris and Jayla who have behavioural issues in the group, and because of these girls’ issues with the rest of the group, they are currently under watch from the head of the nursery.  Now, I don’t really know too much of the details beyond the fact that these girls act mean towards the rest of the children, and Caroline said that she has observed Jayla (the girl in question) acting menacingly towards all of the children and trying to bully them into giving her their toys, or pushing them around.

On Monday, Caroline mentioned that she had asked Billy how he had got on with Jayla that day, and he said that she tried to take a toy away from him and snatch it out of his hands, but he held on to it; in addition, when they were lining up after playtime, she tried to push him out of the line several times but he just stood back in it.  Caroline was proud of this, as it meant that Billy had stood his ground without making a scene or responding directly to Jayla’s behaviour; at no point did Caroline suggest that the girl was personally targeting Billy; rather, it’s a case of her trying to dominate whoever is around in a childish display of power.  Nevertheless Billy has been one of the victims of her behaviour, and although he’s handled it well, who knows if it will escalate or how much it affects or upsets him below his happy-go-lucky demeanour?

Caroline and Mike were discussing this during the evening and it became clear that they had different viewpoints on how to handle this problem.  On the one hand, Caroline was pleased with Billy for turning the other cheek, but she was worried that Jayla might not stop harassing her son and that it might end up really upsetting Billy and ruining his time at nursery.  Mike was worried about the same, but his solution for dealing with Jayla once and for all was for Billy to push her back when she pushed him or tried to take his stuff. Caroline didn’t like this (for what precise reason I don’t know, though I think it has less to do with ramifications from teachers or Jayla’s mother – Caroline can stand her ground and apparently Jayla’s mother is your average young chav woman – and more to do with the ethics of teaching a child to counter violence with violence) and refused to tell Billy this course of action; Mike said that that was fine and that he would tell Billy himself, but it became clear that Caroline didn’t want him to do this either.

Mike could tell that Caroline was getting agitated, and said that responding in a more direct manner might nip the problem in the bud; he was adamant that Billy should not and would not remain unhappy at nursery, and pushing this girl back in retaliation was the best way to get her to leave him alone once and for all. He supported this with a story from his own childhood which resulted in him triumphing over bullies who had made his school life miserable in a similar way; however, in Mike’s anecdote he was 11; Billy is 3.  How young is too young to advocate violence? Is one child pushing another in retaliation considered “violence”?  Does it mean that Billy is lowering himself to Jayla’s level by responding to her intimidation in kind? What might happen if Jayla decides to step her threatening behaviour up a notch?

From the above questions, it might sound like I fall on Caroline’s side of the fence, but actually I don’t.  I am not a parent, and I have not met Jayla; nor is it my place to offer advice to Mike and Caroline.  However, the way that I see it is that Billy, to his credit, has already tried turning the other cheek (as do, from the sound of it, the other kids) and Jayla isn’t giving up. She is a nasty piece of work, and although I don’t think that Billy is a weak child, he is a nice boy and perhaps pushing Jayla back is a primal way of demonstrating that he has some grit to his character.  Moreover, in life you have to protect yourself by any means necessary; at this point Billy has already tried a non-violent approach which has been mature and classy, but it’s not working… now is the time, in my opinion, to send a short, sharp message loud and clear.  Like Caroline, I don’t believe in using violence to get your point across, but at the same time if someone hits me then I will hit them back and I believe that their attack gives me licence to do so.  In the context of retaliation, I don’t think there is anything wrong with Billy pushing Jayla – to sound schoolyard, she pushed him first. He’s tried the passive approach, now it’s time to send a clearer message using a different approach. Although I think that Mike is projecting somewhat when he talks about his own childhood and says that he doesn’t want Billy to be seen as weak (which I think is a little bit of over-psycho-analysis), the result is the same: the goal is to get this girl to piss off, and turnabout is fair play. Like Mike, I have a feeling that from the sound of her, Jayla can dish it out but she won’t be able to take it, and I’m in favour of Billy giving her a taste of her own medicine.

In my childhood, there was one instance in particular when I lifted a boy up by his shirt and ended up ripping all the buttons off it in the process; I was 6 years old.  However, although my mother and his mother (who, thankfully, were friends) did have to come and resolve the situation after class (and we had to sew the buttons back on his shirt!), I didn’t get in trouble because my teacher had seen that my action was a retaliation; the child who got his shirt ripped had yelled in my ear. The moral of this story is that teachers, good teachers know dynamics between their children, and I didn’t get in trouble for a simple act of retaliation. I think therefore that the teachers at the nursery know the score and they wouldn’t hold any retaliatory action from Billy against him; so although I would always go with Caroline’s non-violent, rise above it attitude first, if that fails then I agree with Mike and it is time to hit back.

3.

Look what I did today!

Okay, so this has been on the cards for a little while. But today was the day (and no, this is no April Fool’s – that is an actual picture of me, you can see my flab and the grubby inkstains around my body so I wouldn’t put this up for fun, and I don’t have a sense of humour anyway so April Fool’s Day is irrelevant to me) that I went to Dean & Lewis at Iron & Ink tattoo studio in Whitchurch, Bristol, and got this stained-glass patterned raven tattooed on me. It took 4 and a half hours and was, at times (particularly the outlining & infill of the wingtips near my hip) excruciating – luckily I was alone, because I don’t think my facial expressions would have been particularly pretty. I would say this tattoo was the most painful experience of my life (and Mike giving me a lift home was a godsend – he’s wicked jealous now and I’m waiting to see his next move!), but looking at it now, it was so, so worth it.  I feel great (well, great and sore) and proud to have this on my body.

For me, I originally just chose this design (which I found online, and then edited and redrew somewhat myself) because I thought it was beautiful.  But it also symbolises emancipation and strength for me.  Ironically, I am concealing it from my parents (though how long this is going to last is debatable – however, they don’t know about the other two! If I can get through the initial 2 weeks’ pain stage & the family-centric Easter weekend, I think I might be in with a shot 😉 ) which doesn’t really scream “freedom”, but I’m only doing that for an easy life.  After all, it’s not worth the questions, the inquisition, nor the horrified look on my mother (and possibly grandmother)’s face and declarations that I have ruined myself, that I will never get a job (because I am obviously going to be applying for jobs where I need to strip naked) and so on. It’s kinder to them to keep it under wraps for as long as possible.  And it’s kinder to me too.  I’m aware that the jig will soon be up, but if I can give myself a couple of weeks’ head start, I’d feel better about it.  The only other question is, what will I get next?  I would be lying if I said this was the last one, but I think that I’ll have a bit of a longer gap and think of something really personal to get.  Watch this space!

See tattoo number one HERE

See tattoo number two HERE

And here is the stencilled version before I started having it done:

Once again, I have to shout out Dean & Lewis at Iron & Ink Tattoo Studio, Whitchurch, Bristol, for the stellar job they’ve done, the hospitality they’ve shown me and my friends, and for the beautiful art they’ve created.  They are fantastic and if you’re thinking of getting a tattoo done, definitely go and see them for advice, a hygienic and comfortable atmosphere (Dean gave me a pillow when my shoulder was cramping today, and I was able to watch music videos on Viva to pass the time) and fantastic service. I couldn’t recommend them more.