"Coming Out - A Call From A Friend..."

"A friend who is far away is sometimes much nearer than one who is at hand. Is not the mountain far more awe-inspiring and more clearly visible to one passing through the valley than to those who inhabit the mountain?"

- Kahlil Gibran

One Friday afternoon a few weeks ago, I got a call from an old friend.  This old friend of mine was a good and dear friend from my days in the Navy.  I met my friend Keith when we were in service school together at Great Lakes Naval Station nearly 25 years ago.  And interestingly, he is one of two close friends made in those days that I've kept in touch with over the years.  When we were attending Service School together, I was Keith's Class Leader, which made me his immediate superior in the chain of command while we were attending our rate training for our naval career specialty.  We were training to be Gunner's Mates.

I think back to those school days often, and I recall that it was a struggle at times to keep the two dozen or so men in the class I was responsible for in-line.  But I remember well, that Keith was never a problem sailor or student for that matter, and in-fact he was a unique ally for my leadership amonst the men.  And as we talked, I fondly remembered how as we neared graduation and departing to our first duty stations, Keith and I developed a friendship of mutual respect and admiration.  I was a bit older than many of the men in my charge (one of the reasons I was selected to be the class leader) and many of them looked up to me, assuming that the 5 or so years older that I was than many of them meant I was somehow wiser.  Keith always seemed to look up to me in that way and asked for advice many times in the course of our friendship then and through the years.  I remembered as we talked, how I took my responsibility to look out for him and the other men quite seriously.

Over the many years that have since passed, Keith and I had managed to keep in touch.  At first, the old fashioned way, through infrequent but lengthy hand written letters, and later through occasional phone calls.  So over the years, we'd kept up with each other's progress in life.  In my case, although I always counted him as a dear friend, during those dark years of my life when I lived in fear of allowing my heart to dictate my conscience, I was always careful not to let our conversations turn to why I was still alone in the world, even as I shared in the joy of his good news about women he'd met and events that were significant in his life.  And so it went for nearly 20 years after we'd met.  We kept in touch.  We'd shared the milestones of our lives, but there was always that part of mine that I had yet to acknowledge to myself and that kept me from sharing the truth of my heart with him.

In 2004, when my mother died and the realization of how incredibly alone I really was in the world finally forced me to look deep into my soul to reconcile my life with the reality of my same gender loving heart, the fear of my further rejection would profoundly affect my friendship with Keith and another Navy friend, Ray.  When I came out to myself and then to others that were important to me, I was rejected by some, even shunned and shamed by many... And I can remember hearing from Keith around that same time, at a very low point in my life.  I remember quite well, reasoning with myself that I needn't come out to Keith or Ray.  I convinced myself that I'd be needlessly risking their friendship which was and still is very dear to me.  I foolishly believed that since we were separated by so much time and distance, It would be okay to continue the false narrative of my life that was completely devoid of the truth of my heart.  

And so, in the calls that came in the year that I rediscovered and accepted the truth of my own heart, I decided to willfully omit (lie) the facts of my new freedom and my newly found hopes for life.  And of course, choosing to do so affected me in ways I still struggle to grasp.  It was as if in my mind, I wanted to freeze the status of my friendships with Keith and Ray, and I reasoned that I was doing it as much for me as for them.    But when those calls did come, what did I have to talk about with them?  I had decided that the most significant aspect of my life, and the decision that I had made about it, which had freed me from a self-imposed prison of fear and loneliness was a topic I could not risk sharing with the dearests and oldest friends I knew.  I eased my conscience by rationalizing that since I had openly and willfully lied about the truth of my heart from the earliest days of our friendships, it would be a hurtful thing for them to realize that I had never trusted them and trusted their friendship enough to tell them that I was gay.

But an interesting thing happened, because the truth of my heart was still a secret I kept from my two dear friends, my fear of that truth made it easy for me to shut down my communications with them... Since I didn't want to lie to anyone anymore, on some strange subconscious level, I had decided that if I couldn't tell them the truth, then I shouldn't tell them anything at all.  And although momentous life changing events were occurring in my world, I decided not to share them with my oldest friends.  And so it became easy for me to fondly read the letters and listen to the messages left on my answering machine and yet not respond.  And although I eventually came out to the world, came out to my family, came out at work, and came out on these pages and others... I was still afraid to be out to these two friends who are some of my oldest and best mates in the world.  And so, gradually I allowed us to fall out of touch... the un-returned calls stopped and the letters and cards I didn't reply to didn't come as often either.  In fact, even as I write this, a last letter from Ray languishes on my desk where it has been waiting for more than a year for my reply.

So when my friend Keith called, I thought as I listened to him say how happy he was to finally hear my voice after nearly 5 years of silence, I decided I would tell him the truth, despite my fears of perhaps being rejected and losing his friendship forever.  So in mid-sentence, I stopped him and said, "There's something I want to tell you Old Buddy... I'm gay and that's why you haven't heard from me in so long, I wasn't sure how you'd take it."  And after a moment of tense silence, and much to my surprise, he said, "I know...! I love you, Chris and as long as you're happy, that's all I care about."  And after a deep sigh of relief, I asked Keith, "How did you know...?" And he told me that a few years ago, when I had seemed to fall off the face of the Earth, he Googled me and his search brought him to these very pages of my blog.  He said he read my blog and then he understood the mysteries that had plagued our friendship over the years.  He said he understood why I hadn't kept in touch, he realized it was fear.  But he said that he never gave up on hearing from me and so he continued calling me from time to time, and had always kept me in his prayers because he wanted me to know that it didn't matter one bit to him... I was still his dear friend just the same as I'd always been.

As tears flooded my eyes, I shared with him some of the stories of the happenings in my life that I had thought I had to hide from him and as we talked and he listened, he told me he understood... And in that moment, I realized what a true friend he is and always was.  We talked for hours that afternoon and in the days afterwards too.  And now having shared my truth with Keith has given me the courage to tackle the final frontier of my coming out journey... sharing my truth with my friend Ray.  This Christmas, he will receive a reply to his last letter... and with that reply, my journey to truth will be that much closer to its end.

It is true... "Fear Eats the Soul."