I stayed home today, and I picked up a book, Farther & Wilder: The Lost Weekends and Literary Dreams of Charles Jackson. Yes, most people may come across Jackson as the author of Lost Weekend. The 12 Step Movement would embrace the book and film of the same name, but many people do not know anything about the author or his life.
In Lost Weekend, the main character, Don Birnam would go on a five-day binge fest. I am going to admit right here and now, I did not read the book, but I have seen the movie. Only by reading Jackson’s biography do I now know that the main character had a hidden gay sexuality in the book. Why am I not surprised that the film hides this fact? Jackson’s greatest success found him hiding facts. Everyone assumed that Jackson was Birnam, but he insisted he was not, after all Jackson was married with two children. However, it is the book after Lost Weekend, that is relatively unknown. The book, Fall of Valor, deals with a 40ish married college professor and his love for a younger man. Remember, this is the 1940s. Funny, the film industry embraces alcoholism, but it shunned a married man with homosexual tendencies, as if alcoholism is more acceptable than homosexuality. Again, the author denied this had little to do with him. As the years proceeded, Jackson will celebrate his success with the mansion in the suburbs, the high society friends of Manhattan, and two children. Hey, it’s the American Dream! Unfortunately, time waits for no one, and it’s always there. Time will outlast any human. All the denial in the world will never hide the fact that Jackson unlike myself was liar. Jackson’s homosexuality will pop up its head in the end. You see, the bourgeois suburb is no place for a homosexual man, especially in the 1940s. Jackson would leave his life, and of all things pick up with a much younger foreign factory worker. Jackson probably thought he was of a higher social class, the younger man would love him. In the end, Jackson would leave the 12 step movement to engage in pills and alcohol. The younger man would care for him, and after Jackson died, his family thought the younger man would want part of the estate. He would only ask for a small bracelet, proving the point class has nothing to do with money. This book is a good read, and you can read it in front of people and no one will think you are reading about hidden homosexuality. How could I not internalize it? Man, I get it. even now, who wants to be homosexual and alone? Homosexual, alone, and older? I guess the book proved something about me, I was never going to out run the Truth. By trying to, I was unfair to my wife. I really thought sexuality didn’t matter. I loved and still do love that woman, but you cannot out run Truth. No, this isn’t a pity pot rant. It more the realization that to be really, really, honest takes guts. How many people fool themselves? They never step up to their fears. I am one of the lucky ones, I did, and I am one of the lucky ones, there are many out there who take the cowardly way out. Jackson didn’t. He embraced his sexuality in the end. He was married to his wife his whole life, but did not live with her. She loved him until the end. Movies aren’t real. Again, I write not for myself, but for the person out there who struggles. I want you to know that life isn’t for sissies. But to be who you are! Wow, how many people can really say that? I can, and I am becoming so much more aware of my spiritual growth through my acceptance of Truth. I know that I am one of the lucky ones.
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December 2019
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