KarMel
Scholarship 2008
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Honorable
Mention: Best Coming Out “Personal Story” By Gregory
Chin - MA |
Desciption of Submission: “A personal essay exploring two contrasting halves of
an identity, between humor and solemnity, between retrospect and optimism, and
between ethnic background and sexual orientation.” - Gregory
Why Karen and Melody Liked It: We loved how
he took a stand to come out to his Asian parents. We liked how his story
inspires others that in order to get what you truly want in life, you have to
take that first step to tell your parents who you are.
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My heart was racing, but I hadn’t move an
inch. My mouth was dry, but I couldn’t
stop swallowing in an attempt to suppress the overwhelming nausea. My whole body was burning, but I was ninety
percent sure that I wasn’t a fifty-year old menopausal woman (although in
retrospect I probably had experienced the closest thing to a hot flash that a
seventeen-year old boy could experience). “I’m …gay?” my ovice
cracked. “… What?” my mother
asked, turning to stab me with a sharp, surprised glance. “I’m…gay,” I told her
resolutely. “Oh..
Wait.. How do you know? How do you
know?” When I first told my
mom that I was gay, I could instantly feel a heaviness descend in the
room. Then again, that may have just
been the giant rainbow-colored elephant that I had just welcomed into the
kitchen. Needless to say, my
mother was caught off-guard. She had
no idea how to react to this intensely awkward and fragile situation, even
with all of her life experiences and hours of watching Oprah. For a split second I thought she went to
reach into her purse for a rape whistle or a cell phone to dial 9-1-1, but in
reality she was just latching onto the kitchen counter to stabilize herself. Who knew gay children could cause
earthquakers? Of course, no parent
imagines their son or daughter to be gay; to do so would be a wish for a
social handicap. This fact is even
more evident in Chinese culture, where homosexuality, and indeed sexuality
itself, is more or less a taboo. Even
to my American-born parents, homosexuality is a distant and far removed
topic. Chinse sons are supposed to
obey their parents’ wishes. Chinese
sons are supposed to be devoted to their families. Chinese sons are supposed to find a nice
Chinese girl to marry, produce beautiful Chinese grandchildren, and pass on
the family name. All of those ideals,
however, were quickly discarded by my parents. Or rather, they were crushed into a fine
powder, mixed with water, and molded into a giant statue memorializing their
lost son (and more importantly, their lost grandchildren). It was the biggest insult I could have
thrown at them. I had fialed them as a
son, and even worse, they had failed as parents to raise me properly. Even though I was
supposed to feel a sense of shame in what I had just told my mother, in what
I was doing to her, I realized that I felt better than ever before. My previous symptoms of nausea and weakness
were gone; such were the usual motions that accompanied the “coming out
talk.” I knew those symptoms wel,
though. I had felt them countless
times before, with both friends and family. However, there was no
explanation for their arrival or for their persistence. I mean, I felt no shame in being gay. Homosexuality is a part of me, an
inseparable patch in the fabric of my being.
And yet, somehow being gay had this temporarily adverse affect on
me. Comin gout of the closet had
released me into the lion’s den. And
from my body’s reactions, those lions weren’t the nice, noble, bug-eating
kind like those from a certain deceptively cheerful Disney movie. Hakuna Matata my ass. Nevertheless, it had
to be done. Coming out was, and to
this day still is, a necessary evil for me.
Even though it is a giant weight off my shoulders and the pros
certainly outweigh the cons, the physcial reactions that I get just before
coming out are excruciating. Telling
people about my sexual identity makes me feel like Harry Whittington right
before he was shot in the face by Dick Cheny: terror-stricken. Telling people about my sexual identity
makes me feel like a choir boy alone after rehearsal: vulnerable. Telling people about my sexual identify
makes me feel like Nicole Richie’s stomach: empty. IN the split second before I say “I’m gay,”
I feel everything and nothing all at the same time. My body shuts down but I feel tense and
aware. My mind feels numb but I am
articularate and focused. The disconnect and harmony between my mind and body is,
for a split-second, an oxymoron and a paradox. And yet I subject myself
to this torture all the time. Sometimes I ask
myself why I do it. “Why bother if
you’re just going to make yourself sick and waste the four dollars you spent
on that sandich?” At times this
questioning makes sense, and the temptation of taking the easy route
overcomes me. But when I move past my
subconscious, past my need for instant gratification, I am able to look
towards the future. In the future, I see
myself meeting my boyfriend, holding another man’s hand for th efirst time,
having my first gay kiss. In the
future I see myself falling in love with another man, marrying and devoting
my life to him, and starting a family with him. Thanks to his diligence and strong work
ethic, we’ll have a comfortable standard of living. Thanks to my genes, we’ll have drop-dead
gorgeous offspring. Most impoortantly,
though, I see the support of my family in my future. I want my parents’ approval, and as much as
teens don’t like to admit it, I need my parent’s help, guidance, and
respect. However, in order to truly
gain those ideals, they have to know me for who I am first. One day, my parents
will understand me. One day, there
won’t be such a schism between race and sexual orientation. One day, culture will not be at odds with
sexual identity, and those of Asian descent will not feel like two
contrasting halves. One day I will be
whole. But one day will not come if I
do not take the first step. And so I tell them. |