Some Anecdotes

This blog post will be a little bit more personal and heavy with material than some of my previous blog posts.

When I was sixteen, I got a job working at United Supermarkets, a grocery store chain centered mostly in the Texas panhandle and lower sections of Oklahoma. The particular store I worked at was in my hometown of Levelland, your stereotypical small Texas town. Everyone knows everyone's business, and on the weekends most people drive to Lubbock to go clubbing and get wasted.

I started working at United because my parents had a spare car that they were letting me use to get around, but I had to come up with my own gas money. It was an exchange weighted mostly in my favor, because the two years I worked there before I started college I was able to save up a decent amount of money to be able to move out.

In high school, I was not immune to the rumors circulating my sexuality. Teenagers can be assholes; in trying to claw and tear your way to surviving high school, you hurt people on the way up. I wasn't a saint, either. I hurt people, too.

The rumors I could deal with, or at least placate every once in a while. The high school was small, so usually I just had to feign romantic interest in a girl. The good thing about such a small school was I could pretend to be interested in a girl, and then "find out" she was already dating someone, then make a slight showing of having to move on. I was barely starting to come to terms that I might not be part of the "norm" in society, and didn't want to have to navigate high school on top of that.

Work was different. I'm not sure what it is about working in retail that just makes people believe they can treat the employee on the other side of the counter however they want. I have many friends and family members who have experienced the horrors of retail, and are all too familiar with them.

There were multiple instances where I was harassed for my perceived sexuality. Something that the customer I was working with had no idea for sure if they were right about me or not, but were making an assumption based on limited information. The sound of my voice, the way I carried myself, my appearance.

The first time it happened I was sixteen. I had been working there for half a year by that point, and summer was about to end and school pick back up. I worked mostly evenings sacking groceries.

We were always told to make conversation with the customers, to make them feel like they were welcome and that they should come back to the store. We were encouraged more so to do it with elderly customers because our town was made up of mostly elderly people.

So this old man comes up to the register. The cashier greets him, is perky and friendly. He's talking to her no problem. I chime in with a quip about something, and the cashier and I share a chuckle. I ask the man about his day. He doesn't answer. I shrug it off; it isn't the first time a customer hasn't answered me, it won't be the last.

I load up his bags in the basket, and I let him lead me out into the night. We didn't have far to walk. He had parked his car in one of the handicap spaces near the entrance. It was a silver-colored sedan, like an El Camino.

So he pops the trunk, and I'm loading his bags into the trunk, trying to make small talk. Completely ignores me again. I shrug it off again. Working in retail, things like that happen all the time.

So I load in the last bag. I stand up, give him a smile, and tell him to enjoy the rest of his night. What he said in response knocked the wind out of me.

He told me to have a great night, and then he called me a faggot. He lumbered over to the driver's door, opened it and got inside.

He started the ignition, so I pulled the empty basket behind me up the walkway back to the entrance. I was stunned speechless.

I remember going to the bathroom to try and compose myself, and then I went back up to the front. The store manager was on shift that night, so I went into his office to talk to him.

It took me a while to get the words out, but when I did, he basically laughed in my face and told me the old man was joking and didn't mean it. I told him the hate and hurt behind his voice said otherwise. The manager told me to just get back to work.

The second time I was nineteen. This time I was the cashier. I was cashing out a family this time. The mother and father of the family were maybe five or six years older than me, two kids, a boy and a girl. The boy, was running around his parent's feet, toy cars in each of his hands as he raced around the front of the register. The girl, still a toddler, was sitting in the cart seat of the basket. It wasn't unusual for parents to do this; where would the cashier run with the baby? They wouldn't get very far.

So I'm scanning groceries, making small talk. The mom is smiling and laughing with me, and responding to everything I say. Sometimes she bends down the talk to her son or whatever, but she was really nice.

The father, on the other hand, was not having anything to do with me. He was standing pretty far away from the register, just watching me and his family. Then, suddenly, he comes and grabs his daughter, and holds her protectively in his arms as he walks back to his wife.

"You could've left her in the basket, she wasn't bothering me," I said.

The wife looked at him. She reiterated: "She was good over there, honey."

He didn't respond to either one of us. I shrugged and kept working.

So I get to the end of the transaction. They had WIC items, so they used their WIC card. Dad is tapping impatiently on the tile floor while mom runs the card. She finishes that part, he swipes his debit card and punches the keys so hard the machine bends a little further backwards. The receipt prints, I smile and fold it up and hand it across the counter.

"Have a great night!" I say. "Enjoy taking it up the ass later," the father responds. And they walk away.

In her defense, I saw his wife smack his arm as they crossed out of view. But a pat on the arm is so minuscule compared to the damage he did. There's something to be said of the fact that I'm still thinking about it, eight years later, whereas that man and his family probably have no recollection of what happened. The old man who called me a faggot when I was sixteen probably doesn't remember either, if he's still living. It's been ten years since that happened.

But I still remember it. I remember the time a classmate made fun of me by suggesting I had the hots for a male teacher, because I asked why he was running late. I remember the time a classmate told me that our high school theater program would never have a leading role for me, because I was "too gay" to play a leading male part.

We teach children as young as five to treat others how you want to be treated. The rule doesn't transition as well into teenage years, or adulthood. Would you want to be sent to a conversion camp? Would you want to be barred from adopting children based on your sexual preference? Would you want to be publicly ridiculed and said horrible things to at your job based on an assumption?

There have been studies conducted as recently as 2012 that suggest that gay men have a prevalence of PTSD. I believe it. It might seem silly to say, but as I write this blog post, I'm sitting here shaking from a combination of anxiety and anger. Most gay men I know have experienced anxiety or depressive episodes, or are being treated for a disorder relating to it.

It always makes me mad and upsets me when YouTubers "act gay" with their friends, or call each other "fags" as a term of "endearment." Basically making a big show of pretending to be gay, but always having the privilege and the ability to say "I'm not actually gay, I'm just kidding!" I don't watch people who create content like that, usually at the first suggestion or derogatory word I'm gone.

I had a friend once, when I told him how much it upset me that I was being ridiculous. What that basically says to me, and what it says to me when people pretend to be gay when they aren't actually, is that they're an asshole. These types of people enjoy making light and amusement of the horrible things that gay people experience and go through across the planet in their everyday lives, and they think it's something to laugh about with their bros, because how else can you express appreciation for your friend without pretending to be in a homosexual relationship, right?

It also suggests that the experience of gay people isn't the only thing they make light of. These people can usually afford to, from a relatively privileged position. I can't hold hands with my husband at anywhere other than a movie theater, but I'm glad you can pretend to make out with your best friend in front of a million viewers, then remove the veil with a laughing "just kidding!" Gay men are being killed in Checnya, pushed off rooftops, or shot by their own family members. But thank goodness for queerbaiting!

I know this blog post is a little bit more on the personal side, and not my usual light-hearted brand of humor. Sometimes the things you've experienced just weigh so heavy that you have to get them out. I hope the stories I've shared today have made you think, and if there's anything I can impart, it's this: when voting in elections, when making decisions, when interacting with others in the world, please remember the golden rule. Treat others how you would like to be treated. Thanks for reading!