If I Had Spoken Out, or Korean Moms and Dah Gays, or Never Able to Say "I Love You"

"Remember when I was little and you thought I was a lesbian?"

There are two qualities that are arguably the most important when it comes to being able to communicate with others: tact and a willingness to openly explore previously uncharted nebulae of thoughts and feelings.

Unfortunately, due to reasons that have yet to be decided by the nature vs. nurture debate, and as evidenced by the poorly masked aims of the aforementioned question, I happen to lack both.

Throughout the past 19 years there have been a number of situations in which I have found myself where I have desperately wished that my role models for self-expression were not the tight-mouthed, fly-swatter-armed Korean mother and the self-fashioned macho, army officer father; the clenching of the stomach, the uncomfortable awareness of the awkward placements and erratic motions of my limbs, and the sudden disconnect that occurs between my mind and clumsy tongue are all too familiar feelings when it comes to telling someone about something slightly less superficial than typical, arbitrary banter.

So when my mother and I were walking through the woods behind our house, and our usual, meager attempts at conversation were out-paced by very pregnant pauses, I had no choice but to finally acknowledge both my inherent and/or learned flaws as a communicator and a voice that had somehow managed to survive the sporadic, subconscious purges of unwanted and unwarranted thoughts and feelings.

Just tell her now, it said, There's no point in waiting. It's not like the clouds'll open up when it's finally time to talk about it. This kind of secret isn't the kind that gets easier to tell over time. Don't think too much. Just blurt it out.

I had just enough time to heave an anxious sigh before hurrying to catch up to my mom's step and suddenly spout, "Mommy-remember-when-I-was-little-and-you-thought-I-was-a-lesbian?"

A slight pause before the reply.

"Mhm," she said, "Because you wah such a tomboy. But I knew you would grow out ob it, because yoh granmuddah was dah same way befoh she grew out ob it, too."

Crap.

"Right. Well..." I wasn't sure how to finish, "I don't think I...grew...out of it."

Another pause.

Crap. Too vague. You'll probably have to explain it now. Crap. Why did you have to go and say something anyhow?

"What do you mean?" she said slowly.

"Well...I mean...I don't think I grew out of it."

Another unbearable pause as her face folded into an indiscernible expression. There was definitely a small curl in her lip. Was it a bemused curl? Amused? Surprised? Suspicious?

"You mean you, heh, attracted to, heh, women?"

All four. And then some.

Wait, is this a trick question?

"Well...yeah. I mean, yes. I am."

The longest, quietest half hour of my life followed.

"Well," she resumed, finally, "I guess you at that age where ees okay to experiment."

Oh, God.

My tongue now catnip, and my guts, or what remained of them, now thrown unceremoniously into my vault of unmentionable and buried feelings, I let those be the last words of the discussion. Well, the last words before the random and less-than-comforting, "What would you like foh dinnah?"

For the next several days I was led to believe that discussion pertaining to my sexuality was either complete or unimportant - neither of which was at all reassuring.

On the third day or so following my brief, albeit traumatizing coming out, my mother put those insecurities to rest.

She caught me in the hallway, just as I was about to go to bed.

"Beekie," she said, in a soft voice - the likes of which I hadn't heard since I was very little - "Sit. Le's talk. I'b had a lot on my mind dah past couple of days, so I couldn't really registah what you...said to me...dat day. So, le's talk."

I slowly turned and caught myself against the wall. With utmost focus, I managed to bend one leg, and then the other; lower myself to the ground, put one leg over the other; place my arms at my sides in a sort of practiced pose of what was to be perceived as "casual." It was hardly comfortable, and I was suddenly too aware of the strange placement of my fingers, elbows, head, feet. Everything seemed to get in the way.

She sat down, too, on the opposite wall, considering me with the kind of wary eyes that usually preceded a trying line of questioning.

Several moments passed. Finally, she sighed wearily and began asking me the most relentless and prying questions I'd ever been posed.

The first few were straightforward, mainly about when, where, and how "this" happened. The next had a lot to do with previous boyfriends and conversations we'd had that had led her to believe wholeheartedly in my straightness and put her worries about my being gay to rest. She then asked questions that had a lot more to do with her own limited understanding of gayness in general than to my own identity.

"So what you gonna do when you hab uh job? You can't tell dah uh-duh people in your oh-piss about it, right? So you can't date when you grow up because colleague might find out?"

What year does she think we're living in?

"I think times are changing, Mommy. And even if my coworkers aren't tolerant, I think I can defend myself if I have to."

A deep sigh.

As the interrogation carried on, it was obvious to me that every word my mother managed to form, and every question she managed to craft, all resulted from probably one of the greatest internal struggles of her life.

It was exhausting sitting there, listening to and answering her questions. But more draining was having to witness her battle with the problem I had thrown at her feet.

Growing up, my mother was never one to display anything other than strength and power. Any sign of tears or sadness was quickly masked with bouts of screaming and anger, and if we cried we were instructed to stop. The only time I could remember her breaking down, however brief, was when her father died. I was four.

But now, fifteen years later, here she was; the unwavering symbol of strength and self-control in my life, with quiet tears in her eyes and subtle cracks in her voice, displaying anything but strength and self-control.

"What ah we going to do?" she sobbed, "What ah we going to do?"

"I don't know," I returned, "I don't know. What...what do you mean?"

I was so sure that she was going to fulfill every fear that had kept me locked in that closet for so long.

She'll probably oust me now. Just tell me to leave, get out, not come back until I'm happily married to a doctor who has it all, including a penis, and have popped out five kids.

"You - you wanna staht looking like uh man now?"

Wait...

"No, Mommy..." I didn't know if it was okay to laugh, "I'm not transgendered, I don't think...I'm...gay."

She sighed again. Was it relief?

I wasn't sure if this was the point in the conversation where she would suddenly spring up and embrace me, letting me know it'll all be okay and that she was just testing me.

If that's her biggest worry, I thought, I'm in pretty good shape.

Unfortunately, my fashion sense was not the depths of my mother's concern. After another long silence, we returned to far more personal questions, one of which continues to trouble me even months afterward.

"So what was it like?" she asked, "How did it feel, how much did it hurt, to have feelings for someone and know that you could never tell them you loved them? That they, she, could never know?"

Up until this point, I had managed to maintain my composure when faced with even the most ignorant and troublesome questions. Not a tear was shed on my part and, apart from the occasional hand and feet fidgets, I had managed to keep the obviousness of my discomfort and internal conflict to a bare minimum.

But when she asked this question, I could feel the wall I had so carefully built around myself begin to crumble. I didn't answer right away - I took a moment to try to regain my composure before opening my mouth. But when I did manage to open my mouth to speak, no words came out. Instead, the air around me was suddenly filled with loud, strained sobs - the likes of which had never been heard before.

The tears fell, a little at first, but eventually I felt like I could drown in them. I couldn't stop shaking, or crying, or sobbing. It just kept coming out, tearing its way out of me like a poorly tamed and contained bird. It couldn't be stopped, and I wasn't sure if I wanted it to stop.

Here it was - the unnamed, faceless monster that had haunted me my entire life. The thing that had caused me so much anguish and fear. The source, and in some ways consequence, of my self-hatred. The one thing that turned the key in that closet door.

There it was, the ghost I had lacked the sense, or desire, to fully acknowledge and come to terms with, so simply identified and so plainly worded that the lock encasing all of my previously restrained emotions was shattered and I was left with no choice but to let them come ripping out.

I went on sobbing for several minutes, while my mother watched. She didn't say a word, nor did she make any attempt to come comfort me. I could feel her eyes on me, scrutinizing my every move, and try as I might to control myself just enough to continue the conversation, I couldn't help but keep going.

Finally, my breathing began to even out, and the tear-flow stagnated. I wasn't sure of what I was feeling. I was lighter somehow, awakened to a new sense of myself. My body was slumped, either by exhaustion or release. I couldn't look at my mother. I didn't want to know what she thought of my spasmodic emotional spell.

When I chanced a glance upward, though, it wasn't disgust I saw in her eyes, or hatred; it was pity - a glint of compassion I didn't know those eyes were capable of. Did she know what I was feeling?

"It hurt, a lot. But...I'm growing," was all I managed to say. Anymore and I was sure I'd start sobbing again. She might start sobbing again.

The conversation ended not too long afterward with a somewhat stiff and embarrassed, "Good night."

The truth is, unrequited love isn't a foreign concept to me, nor is it something from which I think I, or anyone, can ever truly recover.

But love, even the unrequited kind, isn't something that's meant to be caged or tucked away. It isn't bestial, or wrong, or labeled. It isn't slight, or meant to be slighted.

It sets us apart from every other creature on the planet. It forms the foundations of the most basic needs and wants in life. It's why we have faith, and why we wake up in the morning. It exists in all of us, driving us forward, moving us through each day, guiding us through every obstacle.

It's meant to inspire good in everyone and to unite us against the common enemies of ignorance, intolerance, and hatred.

It can't be divided by labels, or contained by fear. It's too big and too loud, and doing so can be too painful and destructive for any one person to experience alone.

Having lived with that pain, the kind that comes with loving someone and knowing, deep down, that she can never know about it, I know that no one should ever have to feel that way. That to go against the very thing that makes us human is not only unnatural, but also perhaps the most exhausting, pointless path anyone can take.

So when society tries to tell me that my love is wrong and that I should control it, repress it, or be ashamed of it, or that it's a different, unnatural kind of love, I know deep down that they are wrong and driven by the hatred that stems from ignorance and fear.


And, someday, when I die and have to face the judgment of God for my sins, I take comfort in knowing that my biggest potential flaw will be loving someone, rather than blindly spreading hatred throughout the world.

There's only one kind of love.