I kind of laugh as I write these lines. When I think about this blog, it more comes from memory than present. When I look back now on some of the writings, now, I think I probably wouldn’t have exposed myself so much. When I look back in time, I see a man, a man that was very troubled. I had no idea of the path before me, and when I looked behind all I could see were the remnants of the wreckage of a hurricane of disastrous circumstances. Maybe it’s a little easier now. What’s the old saying, “Time cures everything?” I am not too sure. What I do know is that life has changed, and I have, and I am still adapting to the change. Part of me longs for my past life, but not as much anymore, and there is the blessing. I have begun to truly accept that I am a gay man, and not just a gay man, but a gay man that is older. Dr. Ashton? Well, he is twenty-five years older than I am. He is beginning to forget things more often. My sadness here is only due to the fact that he has such a brilliant mind, and I realize that none of us are exempt from time. I still enjoy my evenings with him, and we still spend time on the weekends together. Even here, I wonder how it all began. You meet someone, and somehow no matter the age, gender, race, or financial differences, an attraction overruns your reason. A passion overruns all sense. A story so often told, but not really to be totally understood until you have experience it. Last weekend I met Dr. Loren Olsen. I have written about him so many times on this blog. When everything first was occurring with me, his book, Finally Out: Letting Go of Living Straight, really saved my life in a way. Not to rehash so much about what I have written before, but at the time I thought that late realization of being gay, married, and in love with a man, had only happened to me. Yeah, crazy! It just wasn’t something I have really ever heard much about. He spoke to the San Antonio Prime Timers. A group of older gay men, who’s primary purpose is to have fellowship in a culture that doesn’t really value older people. I enjoyed Loren’s speech, he was quite frank on some subjects, I even found myself surprised he would say some things, but he did speak of the real truths of being older and gay. Our bodies are aging, and we need to accept this fact. If I have something to tell you, it is I come back to this blog a very changed man. The pain, the hurt, and the suffering, that I thought would never end, well, it has. I fell down an emotional spiral staircase of despair in a sense, but I have stepped myself back up. The pain has made me stronger, I am not even sure if that makes sense? I am beginning to become more into myself. The more people I meet who are just like I am, especially through Prime Timers, I see my story isn’t really anything new. What is new to me is that I first thought that I was faced with a suffering that would never end. I now see, it has subsided. I walk a new path with much more confidence, much more wisdom, and much more empathy towards others and their troubles. I believe that true human growth comes by facing and conquering our challenges, no matter what they are. To feel alive and good again is probably one of the greatest gifts I could know, and now the situation that I thought was so dire, so horrible, I now see as a blessing in human growth.
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Christian Cantu
Coming Out Late Archives
December 2019
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