Door #3 Was Locked

I’ve had a lot of responses to my last couple of posts. I appreciate them all, but I have to admit I’m not sure what I was hoping for. Part of me wants to hear that I’m right, I can’t do this, you can’t be gay, so get over it. The other side of me wanted to hear that I can’t deny this any longer. I’ve tried for a good part of my life and I can’t do it any longer. I pretty much got both of those type of responses and I’m not sure which type I was hoping for.

This is not the first time I’ve done this since I’ve come out to Anginae. Sometimes I just wanna put my head in the sand and make this go away. I really meant what I said in my last post, but as I am prone to do at times, it was a bit of a reaction to what Anginae had to say. I don’t like doing it, and when I do it I honestly feel that I am doing the right thing. Anginae has informed me she cannot forget about this. She cannot pretend it has not happened. I hate to admit I cannot either. No matter how bad I want to, no matter how hard I try I cannot make myself straight and I cannot deny that I am gay.

I think door #3 for me what a little like my option #1, which means that I’m not gay at all.  Actually, option #3 was basically forcing me to make option #1 as true as possible.  When I wrote my last post I was mainly tired of dealing with this, but tough shit I guess. I don’t like the idea of not being able control this and make it go away. Maybe some day we will figure it out, I will just have to give it a bit of time.

I’m not gonna go away.  I’ll try and keep blogging, as long as you keep reading.  I’m sorry to disappoint the few of you that hoped I had finally chosen the path that I wish I could make myself take.  I’m ashamed that I can’t.  Many things that lie in the path ahead of us scare the hell out of me.  Burying my head in the sand and pretending I’m something I’m not won’t fix anything.

Door #3

You may recall my previous post in which I basically laid out the three options I feel I have to deal with this whole mess. I’m sure there are other options possible, I just can’t figure out what they are. My first choice would to be perfectly straight, and be completely turned off by men (hasn’t happened yet), second was to just be gay, have a boyfriend, but still have Anginae in my everyday life and be a good father, and third was to just try and go back as best as possible to the way things were before October 14, 2007.

I think I’m gonna go with option #3. It’s the only choice I have really. Plus it’s the easiest.  I can’t undo all that I have done over the last 15 plus years of my life for the hell of it. I also can’t undo what has happened over the last six months, but I can at least try and move on from them. Anginae knows my secret. I have shared something important with her and that is a good thing. That does not mean I need to do anything about it.

I can’t let a selfish desire destroy the lives of those I care most about. I can think of countless negatives and bad things that would happen if I choose to live my life gay. I can’t think of one good or positive thing that would happen if I choose to live my life as a gay man. Option 3 means I just have to get over it. Big damn deal really. There are people who have to deal with much more difficult shit in their lives that that.

I’m a husband and a father. I’m a relatively successful professional and a active member of our church. I’m a son and son-in-law. I am a normal hetero guy in all of these parts of my life. If I’m gay, I really can’t be any of these things anymore. I don’t have the right to change all of this. I made the choice to be straight a long time ago. I can’t change my mind now.

I’m tired of dealing with all this shit. I’m ready to move on. I’m tired of talking about how I can live being gay. I can’t and so I just need to get over it and move on. I know it sounds like I’m gonna try and just shove myself back in the closet, but that’s not how I look at it. I’m gonna try and come out of the closet, but shut and lock the gay part inside and leave it there. It will be hard at times, but so is any other option that I have.

This way, I can keep the other people in my life happy and take care of them. I can be there for Anginae and no have her worry about me leaving her or running away. Being able to make them happy will make me happy.  It’s my responsibility to take care of my family.  Being gay would betray that.

I know it may sound that I am hastily coming to this decision, especially since I just blogged about my options a few days ago.  But these are basically the options I’ve that I have running through my head over and over again since I came out to Anginae.  I’m ready to move on, and stop discussing this all the time.  I’m gay, so what.  It’s something I’ll just have to deal with one day at a time.  Being gay is not the life I chose so I just gotta live with it.

Options

I’ve been working on this post for a while.  I’ve had a hard time writing it for some reason.  It’s something I’ve had on my mind for a little while and wanted to blog about, but every time I have a chance to sit down and work on it, I’m not in the mood.  So if it seems kinda broken up and hard to follow, that’s why.

So the new job has started, and other than getting my mind wrapped around all that I have to learn in a relatively short amount of time, that should be all that I’m worried about right? Well I guess not. Anginae was recently commenting herself how busy everything has been lately, what with her new job and now my new job, but the gay thing seems to be bugging us both. A recently we got to go out alone and have a nice Sunday brunch at one of our favorite restaurants. We did that and did a little shopping; it was nice to get out and have some time together alone. But part of the conversation was a bit emotional talking about it. I think she just wishes I could give her a clear answer as to what I want. I wish I could give her one, but what I seem to want is very conflicting.

Part of me wonders why this is bothering us now of all times. I think it is on both our minds because I finally may have a resolution to my dad and work. I have been thinking for the last few months that I’ve gotta get my dad & work situation taken care of before I can really think about the gay thing. Well that’s done so maybe a mental block has been removed and now it’s in the forefront of my thoughts again. Its kinda like that now that all that other shit is pretty much out of the way, this is still there on the table. It’s not something we avoid talking about really. We both try to keep a good sense of humor about it all, but it is a very serious thing, and it can be difficult to talk about what the serious ramifications of all this could mean. I’m sure that’s mostly in part that pretty much all that I’ve done so are is tell that that I’m gay. I’ve never really said what that is I want (besides the obvious).

It really is hard to know exactly what I want. When I think of that question, it is hard for me to separate, what I want if I could choose what I want versus what I want from the realistic options that may be available to me.

Ideally, I would say I’m not gay, I’m not going to be gay, I don’t desire a relationship with a man and never will, forget the last few months ever happened and live the rest of our lives together as we have the last 12 years. That would honestly be my ideal #1 choice if I could pick anything. I wish more than anything that I could be who I am with what I have, minus being gay. That would be great. But I don’t think that’s gonna happen. To be 100% straight that is. I’ve tried for almost 20 years but to no avail. I don’t know what could possible happen from here on out that could possibly change that.

Well since I can’t make myself not gay, I guess option #1 is out. So what would option #2 be? That’s not as easy as #1, but I guess it would have to be that I live my life as gay, have a relationship with a man that cares for me and my family, still have my wife as my best friend, and be the same dad to my kids that I am today. Again, this option is a bit too pie in the sky for me. It’s the “have my cake and eat it too option”. I don’t know if this one could really happen. I just can’t help but feel that were this to really happen, that it would be impossible for Anginae not to harbor anger and resentment towards me (which she would have every right to). I’m not sure I can really handle that.

Option #3 I guess would be to pretty much do nothing. Keeps things the status quo as much as possible. To try and forget the last 6 months or so and try to forget about being gay as much as possible. I don’t quite know how I feel about this option. It’s offers both the easiest and the hardest options all in one. This one presents the least amount of problems for everybody else in my life. Nothing really has to change except for me. I just have to try and forget about something, but I don’t know if I can do that. Like I’ve said before, I don’t quite know how to be married and gay. Of course I’ve been married all this time and been gay, but that was when it was just my secret. Now that Anginae knows, it all of a sudden seems different. I have to put something back in the closet after I’ve let it out. I haven’t figured out how to do that yet or even if it can be done (or if I really want to do that). When I told Anginae, I finally had some relief that I could finally be honest with who I am, despite how painful it may be. But that was quickly followed by the realization that there was a lot more to it than just telling her. Telling her that I’m gay is a hell of a lot easier than living my life as a gay man. Don’t confuse the difficulty in taking this option because it means that I have to spend the rest of my life married to Anginae. I know it’s hard to understand, but me telling her had nothing to do with something being wrong her. It had to do with not feeling I could hide who I was anymore. Right now, I feel like for option 3 to be successful, I have to give up being gay. I wish I could figure out why the idea of giving up something i’ve never really had is so hard, but that is really to tough part about it. I don’t really know what I would be giving up. And I also don’t know how to make the desire to be with a man go away.

I can’t really come up with anything beyond those three options. I guess, simply put I want a be gay. Ive spent the better part of my life fighting it and trying to deny it and I’m tired of doing that.  I want to finally see if that is what I want. But I don’t want to lose Anginae. I don’t want to hurt her. I don’t want to hurt the things that are most important to me in life. I also don’t know if I can change who I am. I don’t want to commit to being something again and break that commitment years down the road. These are all questions I’ve run through in my head countless times. Maybe I will eventually come up with an answer.

Excuse Me

Well I know everyone who reads my blog waits for my next post with bated breath.  Well with the new job, it’s hard to find time to sit down and mess with it as often as I might like.  So if you mark you calendars each day to check my blog, I will try my best not to disappoint.

Work is good, just busy.  With the commute and all, I get home about 45 min to 1 hr later than I used to.  That makes the nights really busy for us.  I only have about 1-2 hours to get home, have dinner and get the kids in bed.  My boss is on vacation all week, so I will probably get outta work each day around 5 since he won’t be there to keep me late working on stuff.  I like my boss a lot, I’m I kinda glad I have a week to slow things down and try and think about and study all that I’ve gone over in the last week.  I’m not complaining, just trying to get used to things.  I feel a lot better about having a job that I’ve earned on merit, and also not being under the thumb of my dad.

So please forgive me for being a bad blogger.  Not that I was a great one to begin with.  I really hope you all enjoy reading and I also really appreciate all the feedback I get from everyone.  Keep reading!

First Week Over

Well week one of my new job is over.   So far its been pretty good.  It’s been extremely busy to say the least.  It’s been a 50+ hour workweek so far, which isn’t really too far by many standards, but when I tack on my commute, it’s been pretty long.  I got home at 6 pm on Tuesday, and my boss let me go home about an hour early because I had a 12+ hour day the night before and on Friday he know I would be there a bit longer.  It was a 10+ hour day today so I’m glad for the weekend.  It’s been a bit crazy because my boss is going on vacation next week and so he wanted to try and get as much crammed into me as possible so I will have plenty to do next week.

I really like my boss, but he is an intense guy to say the least.  He knows his business very well and cares a great deal about his company.  He can go about a 100 mph so it’s hard to keep up.  He expects a lot out of his employees, but no more than he puts in himself.  I have a feeling I will get ripped up and down more than one time, but I will have to learn not to take it personally, because that’s how he is.  I’m making him sound bad, but he’s not.  He’s really nice, just very intense at times and can get easily wound up about stuff.  It’s a relatively small company, but there are a lot of people I really don’t know yet.  I really like all of the people I work with so far though.

It’s just going to take a little time for Anginae and I work out our new schedule.  We are both a lot busier now what with both of our new jobs.  It’s gonna take both of us a little while to adjust to my commute,  I don’t mind the driving, it’s just dealing with how much time it takes.  But I’m much happier where I am now and they are paying me pretty well to start off, so I know if I perform well, that will only get better.

BTW, I haven’t really heard a whole lot from anybody at my old job.  My dad certainly hasn’t called me for anything.  I’ve talked to my cousin a time or two and I think it will take a little time for things to settle into a routine there.  After talking to her, I’m still baffled by how unprepared my dad seems about me not being there.  I wish them all the best and think in time we will be better off not working together.

Last Day

Well Nate said I had to blog about my last day at work so here goes. It’s been an interesting week to say the least and today was about the busiest day I’ve had in some time. I tried to go in late Thursday night, but when i pulled up to the office at about 9:30, my Dad was there working. He’s been gone on a skiing trip all week (which had made my last week kinda nice) so I guess he was there getting caught up after being back. The idea of working late at night with just me and my dad around so I turned around and headed home. I got up at 5am and went in early. I really didn’t want to sit around cleaning out my office with everybody around, so I got that and some other shit taken care of before everybody got there. I’ve kept my leaving pretty well under wraps. I of course gave my dad two weeks notice, and pretty much the only people who knew were the family that worked there. I imagined that before he left for his trip (with my step-bro-in-law who is the assistant manager) that they would let some other necessary people know. Well I get back from my 4-day weekend, and they have told no one. So I guess it was up to me to pretty much let everybody know, which by Thursday I have pretty much done. So that gave me one day, Friday, to try and get anybody that needed to know up to speed and how to try and do my job. It was a very busy day to say the least. And I top of everything else, I had more than my fair share of phone calls and ended my day as the last one there trying to solve a unusual crisis that I will have to make sure gets resolved this weekend. So I’m done but I still have work to try and finish up this weekend. I really can’t believe how unprepared my dad seemed to be for me leaving. I just think he couldn’t believe I was really gonna be gone. I don’t think is was something he could handle, and I don’t quite know how to feel about it. I really can’t figure him out at all. At the end of the day he says he didn’t really want me to leave, he just wanted to see the kids. After the last few months, he still just doesn’t get it. With the was he been acting towards me the last few months, what else did he want me to do. When he says that if we can’t figure out how to get along then he doesn’t see how we can work together, what choice did I have. The reaction of most of my coworkers made feel pretty good. The gave me a little party and some of the people I work with gave me a little goodbye gift. I get along with everybody there and most people couldn’t believe I was leaving. Also, many people were not looking forward to have to figure out and do everything that I do around there. So even though I knew, it’s nice to hear that you are really wanted. The only time I got emotional was when my grandpa (our company chairman) come up to give me a hug and, in tears, told me he would miss me and wished me well.

So that was pretty much it. It was a pretty busy and eventful day, but nothing terribly dramatic. It hasn’t really sunk in yet that I’m gone. I think thats in part because it is not a completely clean break. I’ll still be taking some phone call and emails trying to help some of the people there with some questions. That’s really fine with me. I care a lot about the company and the people there and want to help them where I can. I’ll be away from there for good soon enough. I’m sure it will get better once this weekend is over and I start my new job.

What Now?

So I resigned my my job. I gave my dad written notice on Monday. I start my new job on April 14th. I’m pretty excited and nervous at the same time about it. I think I will really like it there but I’m gonna have to bust my ass to get up the speed like they want. It will be nice to work for someone though where I can feel I know where I stand simply on my job performance and not an anything else.

But my Dad’s reaction and the subsequent days that have followed have made things a bit more muddled in my head. Have I really done the right thing. My head says hell yeah, but my guy or heart or whatever it is just is not so sure at the moment. I guess it should have been expected, but for some reason I did not anticipate feeling this way.

I’m left wonder what will happen between us after I’m gone. For the last 6 years, I’ve had nearly daily contact with him. We weren’t really close, but I was in his life. Before I started working there, I would call him at least once a week to see how things were going and just to keep in touch. We would see each other sometimes, but not a lot. But when I leave, I don’t think I’ll be doing that. At least not for a long time anyway. And since I’m not really interested in keeping in contact, I don’t know when or if things will ever get resolved. I don’t know how they will. If it were just a disagreement between he and I it might be different. But a lot of this issue is with my step mother, and I don’t see her changing anytime soon. Plus, with what they have said about Anginae, it makes it much worse. For me, it’s not so much what they said about her, but why they said it. It’s how they came to that conclusion. It’s how that can come out and say something like that about her when she has done nothing purposely against them. It’s how they can come to judge a person like that they never really know. I don’t know if or how we can ever regain their trust.

I think I’m basically just tired of fighting it right now. I’m done with trying to figure out and working on my relationship with him. I’m done feeling like I need to be a certain way and act a certain way to make them happy. I guess that’s been the story of my life over the last few months. After coming out to Anginae, I’ve given up on some big battles I’ve waged within myself all my life. I’ve decided to quit fighting being gay, decided that quit fighting the fact that I don’t believe in God and never really have been able to, and finally I’ve quit fighting trying to fit into a family that I have never really felt I belong. Fighting yourself is hard and tiring.

I don’t know what giving up on all these fights will mean in the end. Maybe they are fights that I’m supposed to fight. Those fights are part of life that all people must endure and I’m wrong for giving up on them. Maybe I’m weak. Maybe I’m lazy. I just don’t know.

I Got the Job

Well as you may know, Ive been job hunting. With the situation between my dad and how it affects work, I really felt I had no choice. I got a call from a company I submitted my resume to on Monster.com. My first interview with this company was at night exactly two weeks ago and lasted about 3 hours and went pretty well. I got a called back two days later to meet with a couple of other people with the company. I met with them for about two hours. I got called back for my third interview last Friday and met with two other managers. Overall I felt pretty good about my chances, but of course one can never be for sure about these things, so I tried to keep my feelings in check about the hole thing. Well this morning in my email was a written offer from this copany. All in all I’m pretty happy with the offer. The company I work for now pays me fairly well, but I have excellent benfits (I don’t pay a dime for what has to be one of the best health insurance plans ther is). I’ll get about a 10% raise with this job, but the benefits aren’t quite as nice and I’m gonna have to start paying a contribution for my health insurance. I’m also gonna have to start commuting again but they are gonna give me a company gas card and pay all my turnpike tolls which I thought was really nice. It is fairly small company, but about hte same size of where I am now.

It’s a very bittersweet feeling. The company where I am now means a great deal to me. I’m the 4th generation in the business. My father and grandfather have spent their lives making this company what it is today. When I started here about 6 years ago, I thought it was going to be for life. I thought I was on the road to come back into my father and step mother’s lives like they wanted almost 25 years ago. But after 6 years, I now know why I did not live here to begin with. It’s been a difficult lesson, but I hope that me leaving my job can some how lead us both to finding peace with our relationship.

I’m a Wuss

I mean that quite literally.  I’m not talking about not standing up for myself or letting people get away with treating me badly (although I don’t have the best record when it comes to that either).  I’m talking about the fact that I’m a really out of shape wuss of a guy.  I always have been pretty much.  I’m not athletic or coordinated.  I’ve never really played sports growing up, except for being a really crappy soccer player for two years in high school.  In 7th grade, we were required to P.E.  Since in didn’t play basketball, I had to take weight lifting with most of 7th, 8th & 9th  grade football team.  I was the weakest kid by far.  I got a lovely nickname of “Cardboard 55″ by a couple of girls once it got out that I maxed out at 55 lbs on bench press (I doubt I could do much better than double that now).  That was the last year I had P.E. in school thankfully and I’ve worried about other people realizing exactly how big of a wuss I am.  Going to the gym and trying to work out has always been a bit of a catch-22 for me.  I’ve always had the desire to get in better shape, but I’ve always been too embarrassed to work out in front of other people because big of a weenie I am.

So a few months ago I decided to try and finally get in shape.  Anginae wanted to buy a tread mill a little over a year ago.  It didn’t get used much but last November I got up the motivation to start using it.  After about two weeks, my knee started to give me a lot of trouble.  After x-rays and and MRI, the doctor said it’s nothing really wrong, just a break down of some in the cartilage in  my knee (aka my knee is gettig old).  They can’t really do anything about is so the treadmill was out.  We got rid of it and replaced it with a recumbent bike about a month ago.  I don’t like it as much, but it doesn’t bother my knee.  I’m been doing some push-up, sit-ups and lifting a little weights now for about a month.  I haven’t noticed a big difference yet, but I’m not doing anything really tough.  I have lost about 5lbs which is good.  I’m now a little less than 10 lbs from where I want to be (175 lbs).   Once summer starts and I begin working outside a lot more, I think I should get there.  I just hope I can stay there.

Anginae is suspicious of the timing of all this.  I started this up after I came out to her.  I think she thinks I’m trying to get myself ready to be “on the market” or something.  That’s not really the case.  I think its a way of just having a bit of control over something in my life when other things are a bit crazy.  It may also be I’ve always hated my body and I’m tired of it.  I’m sure there are a number of reasons behind it, and finally coming out is one of them.  The desire to get is shape is nothing new for me, but the motivation is.

Work Sucks

You can probably recall that I work for my dad. And if you know that than you are probably aware just how rosy our relationship is at the moment. My dad is the president and general manager at this company. It is a relatively small family owned business (about 25 employees) and has been in my family for several generations. My grandfather started the company as it is know today in 1954, and he took it over from his father who started running it in the 1930’s. My grandfather is still chairman of the board, although he is not involved in day-to-day operations. There are quite a number of other family members who work there as well. My dad’s brother is the vice president. My step brother-in-law is the assistant general manager. My step sister-in-law is the marketing director. My cousin is the lead customer service rep. My step brother was highly involved before he left to go to law school, but is still on the board of directors. My step mother is also the secretary of the board of directors. So as you can see, it is definitely a family operation.

There has always been a split between my dad and his side of the family. He does not get along well with his father, brother and his sister. After he got married, he had a falling out with my grandparents over work and personal issues, and I think he and my uncle tolerate each other for work purposes. As I step back and look around, it is amazing to me how all the relationships he has on his side of the family are in tatters. I wonder at what point he can look around and figure out that maybe it’s not everybody else that’s the problem but him and my step mother. Anyway, as you can see lots of family are at my work. My step-brother-in-law and step-sister-in-law are pretty firmly on my dad’s side of thing (whether by choice or not), but they are both pretty nice people and acknowledge me around the office. My dad on the other hand, could not ignore me or avoid me any more than he possibly could. The few times he does speak to me, he can be kind of hostile. I can’t really go speak to him about anything regarding work. I am pretty much completely shut out of anything and everything going on. I am limited to what duties I have on a daily basis, and the few projects that were already on my plate to finish. Once that work is done I don’t know what I’ll do. So pretty much everyday I go to work and just hope there is nothing that I have to do that makes me deal with my father. I communicate mostly with my step-brother-in-law law, who pretty much acts as a proxy for my dad. Our conversations are strictly work, which is fine with me, but there is definitely tension present.

So because of all this, I’m looking for a new job. I’ve been on the market since mid January. I’ve put in resume to about a dozen places or so. Things were pretty quite until last week when I got a couple of callbacks. Once is with a company who’s VP is a guy worked with at my previous job. He called me after he saw my resume and recognized my name. I have an interview with that company tomorrow. The one that I’m really hopeful for called last week. I had two interviews that lasted about 5 1/2 hours total. It went pretty well. I really want this job. I can’t tell you how badly I want this job. There are so many things about it I like, plus I’m desperate to get out of my current situation as soon as possible. The president of the company he’s ready to hire pretty soon, so I’m hopeful to hear back anytime now. I just want to know so I can move on. I think I have a good shot, but I just want to know so I can move on.

So everyone keep you fingers crossed that I get this job. If I don’t, say a little prayer for Anginae and my kids, because I’m going to be a real pain in the ass for a little while if I don’t get it.