Misunderstood

I've been in touch with a lot of my old school friends, all thanks to Friends Reunited.

We've been asking each other what we really thought of one another back then.

I've heard:

"I didn't think you liked me."

"You were naughty."

"You were a snob."

"I was too shy to speak to you, although I wanted to be your friend."

"You were into poetry and politics. I didn't understand it and I thought you'd think I was stupid."

"You never wanted to go out after school. Why?"

So I hear these things, but I'm still not sure what people make of me. I guess they knew, early on, as I did, that I wasn't like other boys. Not just because I was gay, but because of everything that comes along with that. The aversion to football, the joy of cooking and prefering to hang out with girls.

I often hear people say, "There's more to me than my sexuality!" Sure, but if you went to the Freud school of thought, we're all sexual beings and everything about us stems from our sexuality. Being gay is what I am. I do gay things. I sleep with men. I don't like F1 racing cars. If that means straight men, who do like F1 racing cars and the only cooking they do is burning cheap sausages on the barbequeue don't understand me, what am I supposed to do? Try to make them understand me or just leave it by the wayside? Straight women and girls also, I think, didn't have a very firm grip on me or understood what I was all about. They couldn't relate to me, although I was more like them than the other boys, because I didn't display the usual straight characteristics they saw in other boys.

I think, though, even if I was straight, I'd still not be like all the other boys. I hate to be part of the herd, one of the crowd. I think, no matter what I was, I'd go through life being minunderstood.