Scott | 21 | Costa Blanca, Spain | Hairdresser
I recently moved from England to Spain to try and see more of the world before it got too late! I now have my own successful business in a divine little village in the middle of nowhere which suits me just fine. I first knew I was gay when I was about four years old. Whenever I tell people this the majority of the time they refuse to believe me. But why would I lie about this? I have nothing to gain from saying that. It’s just the truth for me, as I’m sure it is for many others. I looked at men and saw beauty, not only something I wanted to become, but something else. Obviously there was no attraction, but something was growing at the age of four.
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When I was around five my parents divorced. My father moved away and later went on to marry again. They now live in Spain and have two children. My Mother went on to marry again also. When I was six I was asked what I wanted to be when I when I was older. My reply was that I wanted to be a hairdresser so, "I could play with women’s hair all day long." Pretty deep! I also wanted to move to Scotland so I could, “Wear a skirt like my sister does." At that point, my Aunt (a lesbian, so well versed in the ‘Gay Way’) apparently caught a glimpse of the person I would become. In Primary School I had a huge crush on a teacher, but that’s boring, so cliché! At 13 I went through a pretty rough patch. My Mother’s second marriage was to a compulsive liar and gambler. He got my family into some pretty serious debt. For me however, that wasn’t his biggest flaw; that was his homophobic attitude. Keep in mind that I knew by 13 exactly what I was, even if nobody else knew. "I remember clear as day watching television as a family and the Dolce & Gabbana gay advert for a watch coming on. His reaction was obvious, complete disgust." |
I said nothing, when I ought to have spoken my mind. He also made me miserable in different ways. I would say that was the only time in my life I’ve been depressed. I self harmed a bit (because I was young and needed some kind of outlet). Needless to say, life happened and the marriage ended. I was happy again.
At 14 I decided to come out to my close friends. It felt so liberating. I knew I could be myself around them. But then the High School rumour mill started. My best friends told their other best friends, who told someone they sat next to in another class, and that was it. I had people come up to me in the Cafeteria asking me if it was true and laughing at me or calling me names when I confirmed. But the most important thing to me then was that I couldn’t lie; not now that I’d been so happy knowing what it was like to be ‘out’.
At 14 I decided to come out to my close friends. It felt so liberating. I knew I could be myself around them. But then the High School rumour mill started. My best friends told their other best friends, who told someone they sat next to in another class, and that was it. I had people come up to me in the Cafeteria asking me if it was true and laughing at me or calling me names when I confirmed. But the most important thing to me then was that I couldn’t lie; not now that I’d been so happy knowing what it was like to be ‘out’.
"That night I told my elder sister. She confessed to having feelings for her best friend, a girl.
And for also having a crush on her Science teacher, also female."
She said that she wasn’t sure about herself and maybe she was a bisexual. I knew I was gay, and we talked about that for a while too. Within a few weeks we both agreed to tell our Mother. I’ll never forget that moment. As we told her, she just said “Oh. Is that it? I thought it was going to be something more important”. As we told our Grandparents, they had the same reaction. My lesbian Aunt just gloated, saying she knew this day would come.
Needless to say, we were both completely overjoyed. I went into full on bliss, and my MySpace page (an old Facebook equivalent if any of you are too young to remember it) was a bastion of rainbows and gay pride propaganda. Unfortunately, my Father found my profile. That’s the power of Google guys, and when people say “Don’t post on the internet what you wouldn’t happily shout down the street”, they’re right. It may have been a mix of finding out this way, or just generally not knowing how to react, but my Father did NOT take it well. He essentially disowned both my Sister and I, saying we were “denying him of Grandchildren”. We didn’t speak to him for a whole 15 months.
I didn’t let it get to me too much; I told myself “I’m gay, if he doesn’t like it, that’s his problem”. It worked fine for me. Yes, I still got the occasional bit of grief in school, but all in all I coped. I took exams, was in the highest classes, I took far too many languages on, but it was enough. I passed my GCSEs with high grades, and went on to a 6th Form College. I was very happy.
And then one day, I received a call out of the blue, saying my Father had suffered an attack of “Acute Angina”, which as I understand it, is a blockage to one of the main arteries which travels to the heart, causing a heart attack. I may be wrong. My initial reaction, and I’m not proud to admit it, was “Oh well”. I went to college, carried on my day as usual, and then in the afternoon it hit me. I ran home, called my Stepmother back, and she arranged for my Sister and me to get on the next flight to Spain.
"As we arrived in the hospital, I saw my Father for the first time, truly enlightened. He understood that life was too short to let his children’s sexuality affect his relationship with them."
He told us how he was proud of us for being who we were, even when he didn’t approve. He asked us to be patient with him as he learned about what it’s like to have gay children, and we still are being. He is learning more and more each day, and as are we. As I mentioned in my introduction, I now live in Spain, in the same village as my Father, Step Mum and Siblings, and it’s not a big deal. Everyone in this tiny village knows I’m gay. It’s irrelevant.
I’m hopeful for the future. I’ve never felt so secure in myself. I know I’ll continue to be happy in life, single or otherwise. And I’m hopeful for the coming generations of gay people. I understand its hard now. But would you rather not be true to yourself and be ostracised for it than live a lie and be accepted? One of them means being miserable in the short term and happy in the long term, the other simply means being miserable in the long term.
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