I LIED

     I have lied about so much in my life.  It would take forever to recall all of it.  I just have not been very authentic at times.  I think had I admitted to myself at an early age that I was a homosexual, I would have saved myself and others alot of pain.  Even if I stayed in the closet, that would have been more "real" than the way I was behaving.  "Chris, are you gay?"  I heard that from some people.  "NO!", I would say emphatically.  When I lived with a family in Maryland, they kept trying to set me up with men.  They thought I had issues because of my disability.  "Chris, YOU have a problem dealing with the fact that you wear braces on your legs.  And you have a problem accepting the fact that you use a catheter.  And you have a sexual problem.  You have hardly been with any men."  I was 29.  She was right about the sexual problem, but I sure wasn't going to tell her what it was.
    When I was in my first acting class in college, I did a scene from Lillian Hellman's, "The Children's Hour".  I couldn't pull it off.  In this scene, I had to confess that I was in love with another woman.  The teacher ripped up my ever so bad performance.  He imitated how I walked and I sort of shuffled along.  This was before I had broken my back, so I had no disability.  He said, "I am sorry, but you need to wear a skirt the next time you do this."  Then one classmate commented on how butch I was.  I couldn't handle it and fell into a depression.  I began wearing more makeup.  I thought I was damaged in some way.  How could I possibly be an actress if I was butch?  That was spring and I was confused and angry and I came home for the summer.  I dated one man and didn't care for him, but my parents sort of pushed him onto me.  Sometimes when my father was supposed to pick me up from work, this young man would be there instead.  He must have gone to my parents, told them he would get me, and they would let him.  After that summer, I went back to school and never heard from him again.  When I was 31, I dated a man that my friends introduced me to.  I tried to get into it, but I was bored shitless.  When I told my friend, she said, "Chris, I get bored with my husband sometimes, that's just how it goes."  "On the first date?!  On all the ones after that?"  After 3 months I bailed.  I felt like I was released from prison.  I didn't realize how gay I was until I met Susan.  I just fell in love.  I was about 45 years old.  We have since split, but it was the real thing.  It was so freeing once when the car salesman who knew my family asked me why I never got married and I said, "Because I'm gay."