Fag hags, fruit flies and queen bees. Just a few names one calls a girl that surrounds herself with gay men, a girl that falls in love (using the term love literally) with gay men and a girl that feeds off the drama in the gay world like a leech.
I really hate the name ‘fag hag’ because it is combining two words that encompass hate and dislike, but that is the name I have to use for now. ‘Fag hags’ usually form around falling in love with a man that later comes out, being an overweight (sad but true) girl in high school that never had friends but homosexuals were the only ones that befriended her or from being in one too many abusive relationships with previous or current boyfriends. They generally don’t date straight boys long term because nothing will compare to the companionship she can have with her gay friends. She is usually so insecure about herself that being around gays allows her to take advantage of the fact that they are outcasts as well, giving her the ‘right’ to bounce her insecurities off them; something she could never do with a straight guy she is dating.
I have many girlfriends…MANY! If you are my friend you are not a ‘fag hag’ because for one I cannot stand them. Once you jump into the cycle of one, there is no getting out. You become their accessory, their Marc Jacobs headband, Louis
Vuitton clutch or pocket vibrator. You are always there to please and make them look and feel good.
SIDENOTE: Tyra Banks refers to herself as a ‘fag enabler’ instead of ‘fag hag’. Girls take a beat and learn from
Tyra.
This whole world of ‘fag hags’, I knew nothing about; that was until I met Megan
Magelby.
I first met Megan when I started hanging out with hair stylist Jeff. She was the girl he was sworn to, the girl he was going to marry, or so he thought. While he and I would be talking he would tell me stories of him and her cuddling all night professing their undying love for one another. They would talk about the family they were going to have and the names they wanted to name their children. Picturing them together only made me dry heave because it would be like seeing Richard Simmons and Kathy Lee Gifford do the nasty. Which lets be honest, that would not be something fun to see.
Megan was a little taller than I, was skinny (unlike most ‘fag hags’) and was actually somewhat cute. Her and Jeff were attached at the hip, always holding hands or linking arms whenever we were all together. She took pity on me like a baby puppy when she found out I was on the verge of popping out of the closet and we became pretty good friends; she always had good advice for me on how to deal with my friends and family. Once Jeff and I were over, Megan stopped talking to him and attached herself to me. Though we never cuddled and talked about imaginary children running around we were pretty close. She introduced me to a handful of her gay friends and kind of helped me see there was a lot more out there in the world that was not here in Utah.
She came to that dreadful end of the year Ballroom concert bringing her girl friends and a few of her gays, one in which was named Joshua. She brought Joshua to the concert in hopes we would start dating; she was on a mission to set us up. His family lived in Utah but he was visiting from Seattle that weekend for Mother’s Day so the timing was perfect for a first introduction. Joshua was a year older than I, tall, blond and had a cute southern boy next-door look about him. We all went to a movie that night but he and I did not talk much. I was so shy, and besides, what was I supposed to say, ‘Hi I am totally messed up right now, everyone hates me and thinks I am completely psychotic”? Yeah right.
After that night he went back to Seattle to finish the year up at Seattle University and we kept in touch via text, phone and even snail mail.
* * * *
It was finally summer and I could not be more excited; Joshua was coming back to Utah to spend the summer with his family and my parents were taking a trip to Cancun so I knew/thought I was going to have all the time in the world with him. He flew in on a Tuesday and Megan and I met up with him that night to hang out. The night ended and Joshua kissed me. All I could think about was how could something like that be something so wrong?
I got home that night with my hormones raging; kissing was not enough I wanted more. Once my family was asleep, Joshua snuck over and spent the night.
The evening following, Megan and Joshua came to see me while my parents were out on a date. The three of us sat on the front porch talking when my parental unit pulled up into the garage. I knew this was not going to be good.
I heard the car doors shut and the sound of my Mom’s high heals slowly click around to where the three of us were sitting on the porch. She was holding David’s hand with this sickened look on her face.
“What’s up guys?” She asked blankly.
“This is Megan and Joshua.” I introduced them to the unit.
“Hello.”
There was an awkward silence for a minute or two, we all sat there wondering what to do next. My palms were sheets of sweat.
“Now boys, we don’t need any sneaking around!” She said sharply and she stared Joshua and I down. I could see anger behind her eyes. David said nothing.
* * * *
“You were holding hands on our front porch for all our neighbors to see Jordan!” My Mom yelled as she gave me my clean clothes the next morning.
“No we were not!”
“We pulled up to the house and you guys were all over each other. Not appropriate Jordan especially in front of the little kids.”
“WE
WEREN’T DOING ANYTHING!” I yelled. That was the truth, Josh and I we not even touching each other.
“And the sneaking out or the sneaking in or whatever the hell you were doing has got to stop. Do you think that when David and I are gone you are going to be able to do whatever you want? Well think again son. THINK AGAIN!”
I said nothing.
“If you live under this roof, you are going to follow the rules. If you choose to be gay do you think you are going to be able to stop going to church with the family?”
Up until then I had said nothing about not wanting to go to church.
“Yes! I don’t want to go to church anymore.” I had had it.
She went ape shit screaming things about how I am choosing to be this way. How I am choosing the path of the adversary and how I am giving into the power of the Satan. I vaguely remember her saying something like ‘you can’t be gay and live here.’ But the recollection of this conversation and its substance is a blur.
“And Jordan…” She paused, “If you don’t want to live by our rules than you can leave!” Her face was red and her veins were popping out left and right.
“Fine then I am out of here!”
She walked off almost as though she thought I was joking. I
wasn’t.
I packed up some of my clothes and called Megan to tell her what was happening. She said I was more than welcome to come stay with her for the summer but her family, like mine, was Mormon and I did not feel comfortable with that – I wanted nothing to do with the church at that point. Joshua stepped into the equation offering me to come stay with him and his family. Being quite a liberal family, Joshua’s parents were extremely kind and treated me like one of their own. Joshua cared for me, they knew I was important to him and they of course loved their son and wanted him to be happy; never once judging the fact that Joshua and I had just become boyfriends.
Megan came and picked me up and took me to Joshua’s house. I was happy to be free from the hell that was binding me down and happy to be living a life that I felt was right.
Living away from home allowed me to really explore myself to see who I wanted to become without any sort of influence. I admit, having a boyfriend who had been out of the closet a tad longer (Joshua came out the Christmas before that summer) than I and who was extremely educated in gay politics was an influence in and of its own but being away from a highly structured environment also allowed me to gain my own opinions on things. I also worked at a call center with Joshua, Megan and all of their gay friends so that helped me see things in a different light as well.
I had changed my sexual orientation on my
Myspace page shortly after moving in with Joshua. It was official; I was out of the closet to the world. I slammed that door hard and flushed the key down the toilet never wanting to ever go back in. It felt amazing!
My family and I rarely talked but when/if we did it was over instant messaging. My Mom and I would still argue even though we were not even really speaking to each other which only made things more crazy because then we would interrupt one another without all the noise so instant messages would be flying back and forth. ‘I WAS BORN THIS WAY’ I would say in capitol letters and she would then always respond with ‘You’re conforming to the gay agenda – you are being influenced by others who don’t know the truth’!
SIDENOTE: Mom’s know when their son is gay. They may be in complete denial the entirety of his childhood but they ultimately know they have a homosexual son within a few years after his birth. I was four years old when I stole my friend Kate’s magic wand from her Halloween costume and said, ‘Look Mom, I’m a fairy!’
I was running low on clothes so I set up a day and time that would be good for me to come by my house to get all of my stuff. I was not excited to face my family.
Josh came with me that day and helped with what we could but with my Mom on the verge of a meltdown so he decided to wait in the car.
I was standing in the entryway to our house on the tile landing looking up at my Mom sitting on the stairs brushing the tears from her face. David stood at the top of the stairs against the banister looking down at me with this look of not knowing what to do and
Kody, my younger brother, was falling apart in the kitchen. To this very day, the image of my 13 year old brother sitting at the bar, head in hands crying like he did when my Dad left still haunts me. Up until this point I had not thought about how my younger siblings were going to handle this. Luckily my little sister was at a friends house and my baby brother was sleeping.
“It does not have to be like this!” My Mom’s tears were ruining her mascara and eyeliner making her look like a messy watercolor painting.
“What
doesn’t mom?” I really could care less about the tears I was causing. I just wanted to be out and away from all of them.
“This Jordan. You leaving does not have to be like this!”
“Well how is it supposed to be Mom? You want me to come baring farewell gifts or what?” How was it really supposed to be? I knew that if I lived there, being a homosexual was not going to be an option and I was not about to be someone I
wasn’t. They were going to make me go to church and at the time being a Mormon and being gay did not make sense to me.
I took everything with me but left my baptism journal and anything that had to do with the church in the garbage; I was done. God, the church and everything I had learned meant nothing to me anymore.
I got in the car with Joshua and fell to pieces. I slept the drive home.
* * * *
For any newly out gay boy who is raised Mormon, your first alcoholic beverage and first clubbing experience are always the best. You are nervous to drink because you are afraid of losing control of yourself but for some reason the thought of it is extremely appetizing and your scared
shitless to go dancing because how the hell are you supposed to know if you are a good dancer? Regardless of what kind of gay man you are, clubbing is a very important element for every gay individual to experience. The club is like the mother ship; let it be your guide and show you the way.
The gay club is like an interactive learning annex on homosexual men and gay culture. I know that sounds totally ridiculous but it’s true.
Heavy beats, hard tempos, bright lights and glitter bring out something in everyone, whatever that may be. Upon entering the club, regardless of what kind of person you are, you leave a part of yourself at the door. You know when you want to say something to someone and there is that something that is holding you back? Or when you are tempted to do something totally random and there is that tiny little strain saying not to? That is what you leave at the door.
* * * *
Sound is Salt Lake City’s one underage gay club. It’s trashy and tragic but my hell, is it a blast.
Joshua had proposed the idea of going dancing one night. It of course sounded like fun but I really was not sure what to expect. I had never been to a club before and being newly 18 I felt like I was going to get in trouble for being seen at a club.
I walked in the main door and was mesmerized by what I was looking at. I felt like I had entered the land of OZ. Half naked guys were dancing in cages, cigarettes were in almost everyone’s hand, people were holding blue magic potion looking drinks in the 21 and over section and the base of the music was absolutely killer. Where was I? We hit the dance floor and the vibration went straight through my body causing me to totally get lost in the music; the whole atmosphere was intoxicating!
“The club was alright…” Joshua said on our way home.
“ALRIGHT? That was so much fun!”
“The clubs in Seattle are so much more fun.” He always talked about Seattle.
The next day, Joshua and I were invited to our friend Michael’s house for a cocktail party. Like the club I was very unsure of what to expect from this little gathering. I knew there were going to be drinks but I was so unsure of how I felt about alcohol. I had smelt it once when Joshua’s sister gave us some but the smell of it was already making me gag.
“You’re supposed to drink that?” I remember saying. It smelt like hairspray.
We arrived at the party and I was immediately handed a Margarita. Within about three gulps I was feeling warm and happy. The drink was quickly gone and another one miraculously made it into my hand so by the end of the night I was quite chipper and social. I did not feel out of control but everything, no matter what, made me laugh. Joshua did not drink that night because he was not sure how I was going to act and wanted to take care of me, which he did.
That summer was one of the greatest summers of my life - it was a definite turning point for me. I was dating a great guy, had a good group of friends and was living my life freely without worry. I had no curfew, Sundays were spent spending time with friends and I was working making my own living.
The summer was dying down and Joshua came to me with an idea. He was going to have to go to back to Seattle for fall quarter and he was thinking he and I could get an apartment and move there together. I of course was all over that idea! Joshua and I would spend hours every night looking at pictures of the city and he would educate me on what it all was like. I began to send resumes out to people who were hiring and we even apartment shopped online and found an adorable apartment right downtown on 7
th and Cherry Street which was not far from his school’s campus. Within a couple weeks we had paid our deposit and had an apartment waiting for us upon arrival. I was way beyond stoked and was ready to experience something new, I was ready for an adventure.
My Mom was not too thrilled to hear the news of me moving hundreds of miles away and did not understand why I was choosing Seattle over LA or New York. In her mind she pictured me living in elsewhere because if I was going to keep dancing, Seattle just did not seem like the place to be. We never really talked much about that because it would only start us fighting and I think we both wanted our relationship to succeed. I went to spend an evening with my family to say goodbye and it was a little awkward. I look back now and I think it was because of how drastically everything changed in such a short amount of time. One day I was there, the next day I was out and then the next way I was moving three states away. I gave my siblings a hug, told them I loved them then gave my Mom a hug. Ever since that moment when I was caught skipping work and my Mom cried holding me, our hugs had forever changed. Every time she would wrap her arms around me I felt as though she was holding onto hope. Hope for me to be
ok. Hope in that I would always know that no matter what, she loved me.
David and my step sisters were not there that night so he and I had arranged a time for us to meet up to see a movie. Him and I are the biggest movie buffs you will ever meet so it was the perfect farewell. He was excited for me but I could tell he was sad with how things had turned out.
After the movie we were walking toward his car and he popped the trunk. Sitting in it wrapped in a big silver bow was a blanket and some silicon cooking stuff, something I had always wanted. How gay!
“This is from Mom. You know she loves you right?” He said handing me the gift.
“I know…” And I did know. Moms never stop loving their sons, no matter what.
“And I love you too Jordan!” David pulled me in for a hug. “I will always be here for you no matter what, always have been, always will be.”
David came into our family for many reasons. And one of them was for me; I know that I would not have been able to handle things without him and I know that I would not be here today if he had not come downstairs that night to talk to me. He was/is one of the greatest most genuine people I know; I never once doubted his love or compassion. He was what a Dad should be.
He dropped me off at Joshua’s house and hugged me again.
“I love you Jordan. You will always be my son!” I could hear him start to cry.
“I love you to David!”
That was the hardest goodbye.
