We All Fake It

Every time I attempt to try to understand the MTV Show Faking It, my thirteen year old heart feels a virtual blow from a former bully. I'm not going to lie to you. I didn't struggle to come out. I was always Y'A. I hated my mother up until the day she died and everyday I discover a fondness for this heinous, unaffectionate woman who saw in me what took me 18 years to see. I was me. My mother, by not focusing on my OCDness, by not focusing on my GAYness, made me feel pretty damn normal by default.
So what is my issue with Faking It? Every time I watch, my feelings are jumbled. I didn't have issues with my gayness as a kid, but that doesn't mean I didn't have problems and people didn't have problems with me. My gay ass was damn near last on the list of my struggles. I was called tomboy so much I found it insulting. There was always venom on the tongue like I should be in the house baking at 7 instead of running around. My mother called me a tomboy with no venom in the confines of our walls in our house like an observation. Everyone else said it like they knew me more than I did. Like they were telling me my future and it would be hard because I like to run and jump. Life is lived half out of the house. I have adoption identity issues that trump my gayness. I remember when I was in junior high school and high school when you "accidentally" let a friend go too far at your expense. They laugh a lil too hard and you allow it. My problem with the show is simple. We all fake who we are. We become who we are out of necessity, but in 2014 when the restrictions to marriage equality are falling what seems like daily, should we even promote the idea of faking sexuality? Should we watch a show about a girl clearly struggling with her sexuality get VERBALLY abused by her best friend? We have made so much progress. So much so, that I no longer have to come out. Not that I ever did. But finally my coworkers don't find it a requisite speech on my first day. 
Do we really want kids to think it is funny and cool to pretend to be gay? The realities that homeless trans and gay youth are faced with after they come out is not funny. I have a few coworkers that are in the closet at a job that has a no tolerance policy on discrimination. A job that is great in that respect. A job that has many gay and lesbian employees. I have a job where I have to pretend to be stupid. I have co workers that stop speaking to me because they feared others would discover their long hidden sexuality. Even hidden from me. I have coworkers that run on the assumption that because I'm gay I understand, we nod and smile and are not seen in a corner alone talking. The show reminds me most of these people. This is why I know a 40 year old woman who just had a baby with her gf who is in the closet. What should be the happiest time in her life is shrouded in secrecy. I can't watch the show Faking It because we ALL know when people fake it is not funny at all.

Not An Addict

I learned my days of the week thus: Thursday my dad got paid. On Thursday, my dad came home a little later, arms full with parcels we were forbidden to touch. On Thursday, my mom would tell us the Pepsi in the refrigerator was our father's mixer. We couldn't have soda. Don't touch. We had rules. He didn't. Thursday thru Sunday we tried to ignore our father while he succeeded at ignoring us.

I drink everyday, but I am not my father. I pair; I savor; I enjoy. I lie. If I am honest, I don't know where the line is. If I am honest, I don't care. I don't come home after a long day of work to a family I hate to forget I exist. I am single. I love the quiet. I come home. I work on my body. I make a healthy meal and I pair it with wine or some white or brown liquor that will enhance its flavor. Seriously. I am not saying I'm not an alcoholic. What I am saying is I can't tell. If I am a cop I can watch a show called BLUE BLOODS and family dinners aren't complete without two bottles of wine, beer, and a scotch night cap. If I am a doctor, I can watch GREY'S ANATOMY and there is wine product placement. We live in a drinking culture. Who am I to resist?

The real problem with my society now is no one is left to judge me. I can judge a friend because they are broke and yet spend all of their money on booze. I can judge a co worker for the 2 bottle of wine nightly ritual and declining health. Who is left to judge me? I work out 6 days a week and eat healthily. There is really no checks and balances for someone who drinks everyday, fair trade or organic, just the doctor's recommended dose of red wine . . . . We should all let go. All embrace our inner Mad Men with a scotch, a cigar and zero inhibitions. I contend . . . I'm not an addict.