The Personal and the Political...

So I'm home sick today, for once having caught something from someone other than one of the little Ebola monkeys at work. Just a stupid cold. When I called in sick my boss got all snooty with me and accused me of "just being hung over", which got me both pissed off and worried. Worried cause I still suffer from the fear of being fired for being sick.

Being home sick on this alternately sunny and snowy (wtf!?!?!?) Reykjavik Monday has left me way too much time to think, ponder, and soul-search. Not even the complete third season of Millennium seems to distract me.

The thing most on my mind is my strange reaction to flirting with the handsome gentleman Saturday night. It was fun and flattering and utterly right while it was happening, but the rest of the night, and the day after, it led to a feeling of panic I just couldn't shake.

Thing is, I've been out as Bi for a while now, especially here in Iceland.

And its OK.

People (aside from drunks) tend not to judge, at least not publicly.

It doesn't effect my professional life, if you can even consider my work-life "professional", and as I have a plethora of friends who are either gay, bi, or have family that is, it hardly makes a ripple in my social life.

That being said, my sexuality is often a source of anxiety for me. It has very little to do with where I'm at now. It has everything to do with where I come from.

Every time I'm involved with a guy, I wind up having this fear, fear of being "found out", fear of repercussions, loosing my job, loosing the support if not the love of family and friends, fear of violence.

I come from a place where "faggot" is the worst insult you can hurl, where there is no such thing as "homosexuals" or "lesbians" only "fags" and "dykes". Towns where the numerous churches thunder with denunciations of "sodomites" and "perverts". The sort of place where one of the most talented teachers I ever met was fired for being a lesbian. Even though she commuted 70 miles from where she lived, even though she never talked about her personal life. Someone found out she lived with another woman, someone else complained about how "liberal" she was, some of the students decided that any woman with short hair and a lack of make-up was obviously a pervert. So she was reviled and fired and driven out.

Imagine if she had lived there, and been open about it?

I remember when I started to realize I was attracted to men. It started early 11 or 12 years old. I remember the horrible fear that realization brought me. I remember how hard I schooled myself to not show any indications, not to keep anything "gay" around, not to speak out when they shouted "faggot" at others, even though I seethed at the injustice of it all.

Habits like that are hard to break.

So now, when I dance with a guy, or flirt, or anything, I have to fight against that instilled fear, that discipline of deception. I have to try to channel the anger.

And there's a lot of anger. Witness my previous post.

It makes me angry, hell, outraged that one of the most personal aspects of my existence, my sexuality, has become a political issue. And I hate it. I hate that something as fun and good and joyous as sex has become a battle ground.

But you know what I hate more?

I hate that there are millions of kids, all over the world growing up with the same fear and self-loathing I did. I hate that there are even more people out there who everyday, consciously or unconsciously feed that atmosphere of hate and fear.

As much as I freak out, here on this liberal island, I can remember how much worse it was back then.

It even freaks me out to write this. To talk openly about being Bi on a page that my family can read, that old friends and schoolmates can read, that the same loud-mouthed bigots I hid from all through school can read.

I fear that my family will suffer repercussions for it. That my mother's political career, a career that's doing a lot of good for my home town and hopefully my home state, will be torpedoed as soon as some right-wing Bible-bashing-bigot starts making political hay out of who I sleep with.

That my sister's will have to hear people trashing their brother, or worse suffer discrimination just for being my sisters.

I know these fears are exaggerated, I know that I'm automatically looking at the darkside.

But that's just how it is.

Hell, I'm 30 years old, thousands of miles from that place.

And I'm still afraid someone's gonna find out I kissed a guy.