Not all friendships are meant to be. The best you can do is be yourself, keep your expectations low.-Judge John Hodgman

I saw this very recently and it really, really stuck with me:

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/29/magazine/judge-john-hodgman-on-forced-friendships.html?rref=collection%2Fcolumn%2Fjudge-john-hodgman&action=click&contentCollection=magazine&region=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=10&pgtype=collection


I will always like the people I like and I also (I would like to think) will always like people, in general. But to hope for a friendship that is just never ever going to happen or is only going to come from some kind of cluelessness that results in an awkward and unintentionally forced friendship...well, that is just asking for a lot of heartache and putting someone you really care about in a very uncomfortable position.

 

This cover is so absurd you just might laugh, unless, of course you are a lesbian and you are old enough to remember when this attitude was very common or you know people who still believe things like this. I have done everything I know how to do to "not" be gay and it just does not work. I have tried praying it away, I have tried steeling my heart against any and all emotional or romantic feelings, I have always been and most likely always will be celibate. 

None of that makes a difference nor does it (as far as I am concerned) make me any less gay that I am not a 'practicing' one...as the far right Christians like to say when referencing the kind of gay people they believe go to Hell.

I cannot keep people who believe gays and lesbians are 'evil' or 'sinful' from thinking that just as they cannot keep me from being who I am, no matter how much they may believe in 'ex-gay' therapy. In an ideal world I would be thrilled if anti-gay Christians could at least grasp that being gay is about far, far. far more than sex and that it really is so that love is love. I just do not think they will ever understand that.

It absolutely breaks my heart when those who are constantly subjected to horrific attitudes and hateful comments from homophobic people in their lives end up hurting themselves in some way or, worse, ends their lives. It seems to me that people who engage in any kind of homophobia (especially the hateful kind) should not get to judge or be surprised when their words and actions are such a huge contributor to tragedy.

Recently, a study was released that stated suicide rates among gay youth went down when gay marriage became legal. Many on the far right debated this or expressed incredulity or even said the study was falsified; thing is I firmly believe this and completely understand that this could definitely be the case. When I was younger and thought about harming myself it would have made a huge difference if I had been living in a time when being gay was not considered 'sick' or 'sinful.' 

http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/22/health/teen-suicide-same-sex-marriage-study-trnd/

because sometimes you just wish you could say it out loud...

I think I have the words now, the ones I have been struggling for almost since the very first day I met you. I found them, I think, in a dream the other night and then, just today, in a picture I saw of you I wasn’t expecting to see…you, with your husband and children, looking very strong and yet also very protected, the epitome of class and containment and even a subtle kind of royalty you may not even be aware you exude.

Right from the start there have been three horrible things that have taken what should have been beautiful feelings and pure and sincere intent and twisted it all into something very heartbreaking and shameful. No matter how straight from the heart my emotions are, no matter how wondrous they feel to me, they are still not appropriate because you are happily married (1), very traditional and very straight (2) and I am me, a ‘me’ that is your polar opposite and completely unworthy of knowing you, much less being your friend (3) 

In the dream I had the other night you were renewing your wedding vows and you were the happiest I have ever seen you. You invited everyone from work and a lot of us came and were thrilled for you. You sang, of course, that voice of yours so magnificent and authentic in its beauty. I could actually hear your voice in my dream and I fell in love with you again, even though I knew the dream was actually a goodbye and I should be feeling less, not more.

Though many people still believe being gay is wrong, this ('this' being how I feel about you, how much you mean to me and how you live so vibrantly in my heart) is not wrong because of that. I just happen to be a woman who is head over heels over another woman who does not feel the same way at all. No, the wrongness, the absolute very bad wrongness,  is that my feelings come from my not being able to send them packing, to put away all of this interior nonsense and accept that some people are too good for you, even if you just silently love them💔 

"Don't melt too much into the universe, but be as solid and dense and fixed as you can. We all live together, and those of us who love and know, live so most. We help each other—even unconsciously, each in our own effort, we lighten the effort of others, we contribute to the sum of success, make it possible for others to live. Sorrow comes in great waves—no one can know that better than you—but it rolls over us, and though it may almost smother us it leaves us on the spot and we know that if it is strong we are stronger, inasmuch as it passes and we remain. It wears us, uses us, but we wear it and use it in return; and it is blind, whereas we after a manner see."

Henry James

 http://www.lettersofnote.com/2012/03/sorrow-passes-and-we-remain.html