The Greatest Abomination

Family

             Unfortunately, my middle school experiences hadn't given me enough courage to come out to my parents. My mom was always the religious type and I had no idea how she'd react. Occasionally I'd bring LGBT topics up, mostly asking for her opinions, and she'd say things like “I don't think gay people should be judged, but they shouldn't be supported. It's not normal, and it's a sin.” This was just the beginning of my everlasting battle with religion.

                As for my dad, I had no idea what he'd say. My dad was pretty absent for most of my life, not to make it sound like we're some broken type of family, we're not. My parents are still together, although it doesn't help that they've had some marriage issues in the past, if anything it creates a bigger rift. While they aren't divorced, they also aren't the type of couple to spend Friday night cuddling and watching movies. But whatever, what I mean by my dad being absent is that he always worked from seven in the morning to seven at seven at night, and watched his TV from seven to eleven, slept from eleven to seven just to repeat it again the next day. My dad had some type of messed up childhood, so I don't blame him for being distant. I know he cares about me, and his support means a lot to me. It's just, not knowing him, or his views on things, I don't feel comfortable telling him. I have a little sister, but at the time she was too young to know about any of this.

                As we grew up, our family became a little more distant. Again, not trying to make it sound like I live in some type of broken home or whatever. There were no problems, it's just days would go on and there would be nothing to talk about. Everyone had their schedule. My mom, who works two jobs trying to get us by, works from four in the morning until noon. Once she gets home, she cooks what she can for us, then takes a two/three hour nap and it's back to her second job from five to ten at night where she comes home to sleep and do it all again the next day. We don't have family dinners where we tell each other how our day went. Everyone eats when they get home. First my mom, around noon. There's me, who usually gets home at around three, that's when I eat. My sister, gets home around four, that's when she eats. Finally there's my dad who gets home the latest.

                Our routine was pretty cut out for us. That's not to say we never spoke, however. My mom's the one that's pretty involved in my sister and I's life. On the weekends we see her all day and we talk to her, fill her in with the gist of what's going on in our lives. She's the one that buys us our school supplies, our new clothes, the one that we ask to go to the mall to. The good thing that can be said about her is that despite the busy work schedule, she makes time for us and makes an effort to communicate with us. She wants that strong family bond. From a scale of one to ten, she's probably an eight on how involved she is in our lives. And that's only because sometimes she's sensitive to my sense of humor (she enjoys turning jokes into life lesson lectures) or because it's something gay. All in all, no family is perfect. And I wouldn't trade mine if I had the chance, but I just didn't feel comfortable coming out. I felt loved, no doubt, but still not reassured enough to tell them I'm gay.