Life before gay

The growing popularity of Facebook has given me the opportunity to reconnect with a lot of people I’d lost touch with over the years.

I mean, I’ve kept in touch with a few people via email and the like in the ten years since graduating from college, and the (cough) 14 years since graduating from high school. But it’s easy to lose touch, and get caught up in your own life, and I’ve moved a few times… and, and, and.

Or at least that’s what I told myself.

But with over 50 people from high school and almost as many from my college years now included as my “Facebook friends,” I have to wonder why I haven’t maintained more of those relationships over the years.

I think it really boils down to the division between “life before gay” and my life today.

I was 20 years old when I finally came out to myself, and it helped me to understand why I had always had a tough time relating to people authentically. I was always somewhat reticent, always holding something back—and all the while, I was putting on a great façade (or at least, I thought so).

But now, more than ten years later, I realize that I’ve let go of many people and memories from those days at Morris Hills and at Lehigh, because it’s easier than trying to connect the dots between then and now. The few people I’ve held onto throughout are incredibly important to me, and it’s been nice reconnecting with some of the people I’d lost touch with, but ultimately I feel some of these bridges won’t be rebuilt.