What I Love About Being Gay
Told with the help of a simple game of strip poker.
The furthest I’ve ever felt of not belonging was at a house party in my early 20s. The small crowd was teeming with heterosexuality, and there I was: a homosexual outcast. How could I relate to any of these people? It also didn’t help the fact that this was bogan territory, set amongst the facade of government housing, where the fear of druggos and dole bludgers is rife. And yet I went there anyway because I trusted the person who invited me.
But something happened that night that made me reconsider everything I knew about being gay. And it was a simple game of strip poker.
I remember thinking, as the clothes slipped from our bodies, that the straight guys were gonna get antsy about me being there. But somehow not one of them did. We all whinged when we lost and we laughed when the dangly bits were on show. And as I thought about it, I felt the trust between us was borne out of the fact that I wasn’t expressing my sexuality. I didn’t suppress it (it was kind of hard to do that), but I didn’t bring it to the forefront of my personality as I have always done. Instead, I focused on all the other things that make me… me. My charm, my love for music, my power with words. And even though I still felt I didn’t belong, I somehow did.
