The Underground

This happened to me a couple of weeks ago. Well, while we trainin' it up outside, we had some downtime to just sit and have our minds wander. Well, some of the guys in my company were just jokin' and chatting like guys do. But one of the topics that the guys surprisingly talked about was how does one become gay? One of the what if question that started the topic was what would be worse to have: a gay son or a slut (eventually pregnant) daughter. Well, this conversation got my attention, but stopped myself from jumping in, and just casually observe and listen in, which we all were kinda sittin' in a semi arch. Anyways, One of the guys said that he had an awesome mentor/teacher that had the most amazing war stories being deployed but had a son that was gay. So they were talking about how this amazing guy just so happens to have a gay son and the guy telling about this situation said that he asked that amazing guy what he thought about it. He replied that it's weird sure at first, but it is what it is. He'll always be his son.

But the guys that listened were still trying to understand how someone can turn or be 'gay'. How does this happen? These guys were academy grads so they tended to be of the more traditional bunch, but I was thinkin' the same thing, how the hell does this happen? Who can choose this knowingly? I sure as hell didn't. But the guys were trying to argue that maybe it the psychology of a person or the history of a family or even maybe, just maybe, you can predict that that a person is gay on if the ring finger is higher than the index finger. And then they all tried to measure their hands and compare. I showed them mine and then I said, "Well, then I guess I'm gay according to that." Hahahaha. You have no idea the bitter-sweet irony I felt then and there at that moment. I had to take it in. .Ironic. Beautiful. Divine. Divine justice or injustice? One thing's for sure they all knew, DADT is inevitably going to be gone and THEN, everyone in the mil is all gonna have to deal with it, regardless. Better for them to talk about it now than later I guess.

Well, this is the play of my life. It feels like I'm in a play cause I'm playing a double act or a double agent of some sort. It really is like I'm some spy looking on the inside of a warrior society of loyalty, duty, and traditionalism. But you know, it's not hard to act 'straight'. I mean if you're conscious of your body language, voice, and mannerisms with professionalism on top, you pretty much got it. It's just hard to be fully human or real here. It's hard to have a social life and even harder for a dating relationship. Men trip not on mountains, but on mole holes, and its the simple-conservation-mole-holes that I have to watch out for in social situations everytime in mil company. But you know what's also hard, finding the 'others' like me on active duty or at least from the officer side of the fence. I feel just like a hetero too trying to speculate on whether a person is gay or not. You can have your opinions and perceptions but you can never really know....Unless you ask, which I can't do obviously. It's like finding an underground group I know I have to seek out and listen out for before I get the access to be the real me around these select people. So I've got to go deeper underground.