no other choice

Not if I will be able to post this because the Internet in this airport is painfully slow, but I’m writing this anyway.

I am in San Antonio, soon to be boarding a flight to Dallas, and if all goes well, I’ll be in DC by the end of the night. This is the first leg of a multi-state/city/purpose journey I am taking, and it has gone well for the most part, busy of course and HOT because Texas is ridiculously hot, but all things considering, not bad. 

I’ve been busy, really busy, attending three-hour dinners with my colleagues who insist on grilling me about my relationship. I swear, if one more person asks me if we are planning on getting married, I think I’m going to puke. Because it’s like, yes, we’ve been together for almost four years, and no, we’re not making plans to get married. How do you say that in a way that doesn’t arouse suspicion or beg for a further explanation. So then I feel pressured to let it slip: "I want kids, he doesn’t." And then their eyes get big and they say, "Ohhhhh, wow, that’s huge." And then they give me twenty minutes of unsolicited advice about not compromising my beliefs and not settling and how relationships can’t work with fundamental differences like that, and I’m like, OK, you think I haven’t thought about all of this before? Do you think I really want to think about the inevitable break up with one of the people I love most in this world right now, while I’m sitting at a table with my boss and business clients? Do you think that because of what you’re telling me I’m going to go back to my hotel room, call Eric, and say, "I think we have to break up"? No. No, no, no. Please. What am I supposed to say?

Of course there is something else on my mind, something bigger and crazier and more intense than I think maybe I have ever been a part of? Which is all this stuff with the zine symposium. The organizer in question has begun the public shaming, posting on her blog about how all the other organizers are prejudiced against her because of her queer and poly identity (even though many of the organizers are queer/poly themselves). Funny how that was never an issue until I stood up to her and confronted her on her shit. Now all of a sudden it’s because she’s "different" and "not accepted" and we are "incapable of being sensitive" to her because of all of the "internalized microaggressions" that we’re getting from society. It is really sad and scary and it makes me feel like shit. I have been crying, crying, crying over it. I am constantly on the verge of tears. 

Eric is sick of it, already. I try not to talk to him about it too much but it’s on my mind constantly – I am constantly wondering if I’m doing the right thing, how I should be approaching it, am I crazy? And Eric is my main source of support. But he thinks the organizer is just crazy and I shouldn’t even be engaging with her. "You’re not going change her," he tells me. "It’s not worth it. This is killing you. I can see it killing you every day." He is not wrong about that, but I think he’s wrong about it being worth it. It has to be. So many people just pass her along because she’s hard to deal with. They don’t call her on her behavior because of the backlash they know is coming. They are afraid to stand up to her because they know they’ll be publicly shamed and villified and slandered. IT IS NOT FUN. IT IS REALLY HARD. I AM REALLY STRUGGLING. 

BUT I ALSO HAVE TO BE TRUE TO MY HEART. AND I HAVE TO STAND UP FOR WHAT I BELIEVE IN. And I have to do this, I have to. At this point, there is no turning back. I just wish I could make her see that what we’re doing ISN’T BECAUSE WE HATE HER OR LOOK DOWN ON HER OR are prejudiced against her—IT’S BECAUSE WE LOVE HER. And we want to work together and we want to be able to work through these issues. 

Kirsten says if anyone can do this, it is me, but I am not so sure. It feels really bad and awful and heavy. I can’t stop thinking about it, my thoughts just go in circles around my head every waking hour and through the night. I practice what to say to her, how to deconstruct her convoluted arguments and accusations. I STILL HAVE ANOTHER THREE WEEKS until I can even have an opportunity to talk to her. How much worse is this going to get? Is it ever going to feel better?

I want to write about Austin. I flew there before I got to San Antonio to visit my friend Paul, who is one of my very best friends from college. He, his partner Stephen, Chelsea, and Kirsten were/are my best friends from that period of my life. And I feel so incredibly connected to all four of them, it’s kind of insane. Paul is amazing and off the wall and has the most beautiful, emotionally deep mind of almost anyone I’ve ever met. We haven’t spoken or seen each other in years except for a few logistical planning conversations before my trip, but as soon as he picked me up from the airport, it was like no time had passed. We spent the night sitting outside his apartment in the sticky heat, him smoking cigarettes and talking with me about the past, relationships, our lives, the cities we live in. We talked about sex and love, tearing ourselves down and building ourselves back up. We talked about how we’ve changed. 

Over the few days I was there, we went all over Austin, visiting parks, eating Mexican food, catching up. Sunning ourselves and drinking wine, me slathering sunscreen all over my pale skin to thwart the inevitable sunburn. I talked to him about the zine stuff that’s been going on and his brows furrow as he listens to me. He tells me he believes in me, that I am doing the right thing. I tell him I am proud of him, that he is doing a good job. We talk about what we thought we’d do after college and how different it is from what we’re actually doing. We talk about not being productive enough, not writing enough, not indulging in our creativity. I tell him it’s OK, that we have to do the best with what we have. I still think he is going to make a movie that is going to rip out the hearts of everyone who watches. I mean, god, he tears my heart out every time we talk. 

Life is not easy, and I am trying to take care of myself, but it

is really hard. I am trying to stay centered and focused and follow my heart and my moral compass, and I think I am on course but the forces against me feel so huge. I am trying to separate myself from everyone else’s own shit that they’re dealing with, but it is hard for me to not take it on. But I have to. I have to. I have no other choice.