Falling Into Life: A Gay Exmormon’s Journey

Chapter Ten – The Disintegrating Gospel: Gold, and Mummies, and Lies…Oh My! Part 2

Satchel Paige once wrote, “It’s not what you know that will hurt you. It’s what you think you know that just ain’t so.”

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Dirty Show

Last night Jeff and I went to The Dirty Show.  This is an erotic art show complete with performances and a cash bar.  Now, in the past few years I have become much more sexually open-minded.  I used to have definite ideas about the rights and wrongs of sex, the purpose of sex and the unfortunate experience of only having had bad sex with one pretty messed up person.  Since I have shed many of my ideals and replaced them largely with only openness I have discovered that sexuality is a huge part of who a person is.  This may seem elementary to most well-rounded adults, but my specific sexual history and experience made it very convenient to just repress this part of myself as biologically necessary for obtaining my babies.

Anyway, all is now good in my own boudoir.  I’ve “found” myself, so to speak, and along the way found my complete soul mate and we are enjoying that perfect combination of love, lust, passion, trust and adventure.    So last night, for date night, we thought it would be fun to head down to the streets of Detroit with our sense of adventure fully at the ready.  I was so unfortunately not in the mood to wear any high heels or fishnet stockings.  I had to force myself to wear my black boots with jeans and my lacy shirt with only a black bra.  Jeff spiked his hair and wore one of his fabulous party shirts.  We, in our suburban ways, had to Google map and gps the hell out of the address for this place (only prudent when headed to the underbelly of the “D”) before hopping into the non-high-occupancy “date night” vehicle.   Nine Inch Nails played on the ipod, setting the stage for our trip.  We found a sweet parking spot, right in front of the place that looked exactly like what you would expect from an erotic art show being held in Detroit.

The art work was so diverse.  There were paintings, photographs, sculptures, media work, and “functional” pieces.  Imagine any part of the body involved in any act that could be construed as sexual and it definitely was represented.  My favorite pieces of art are always those that convey strong feeling in a beautiful and realistic way and I definitely found some of that last night.  One piece that struck me deeply was a painting that had words describing a woman’s apathy about herself and sex written all across the image of her bound and gagged.  It was powerful to me and made me hope that none of my children ever use sex as a way of hating themselves.

Several of the photographs and paintings had hermaphrodites proudly displaying their sexuality.  I wondered as I stared, how do the clear-cut boundaries of religion define the sexuality of a person like this?  If they have both pieces of the puzzle, are they “allowed” to marry or be with the person they are naturally attracted to or only the one they “look like” they should be attracted to?  I mean if you are attracted to women and can whip it out, that should be allowed, right?  Who cares if you also happen to have a vagina and breasts?

Even more moving than the art work though, were the people.  The people in attendance were more diverse than I would have expected.  There were people of all ages, sizes, and styles.  People were dressed in any way you can imagine.  There were very high heels, very long boots, very short skirts, fishnet stockings, nipple pasties, tube tops and chains.  But there were also lots of jeans, tennis shoes and sweaters.  The brilliant thing about this show is that it is for EVERYONE.  You can walk into this place and just be yourself and partake in the atmosphere in the particular way that turns you on, being able to find something and probably someone that appeals to you.

The performers were as varied as the attendees in their appearance but every single one of them was confident in themselves and their sexuality in a way that made me smile.  There was a burlesque company who did some very comedic things, there were pole dancers, and there was a man with very tight and revealing leather pants who played the violin while a masked woman danced with a sword on her head.  Floating overhead were women sitting on swings while others were doing aerial acrobatics with long pieces of flowing fabric.  There were a couple of cages with people dancing in and around them.  I was particularly impressed to see one of the men clean the bars of the cage before he started writhing on them.  I had always wondered about that.

So, after walking around for several hours, partaking in the performances, people watching, open-mouthed art staring, and inhaling more than our fair share of smoke, we left The Dirty Show with one resolve for next year:  I need some better boots!

Falling Into Life: A Gay Exmormon’s Journey

Chapter Nine – The Disintegrating Gospel: Gold, and Mummies, and Lies…Oh My! Part 1

Mormons are gluttons for punishment, they had to pile on scads more scripture than any other Christian Church…

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Falling Into Life: A Gay Exmormon’s Journey

Chapter Eight – The Book and the 20/20 Interview

My Ex and I did an interview for 20/20 on ABC that was broadcast during the fall of 2007…

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Falling Into Life: A Gay Exmormon’s Journey

Chapter Seven (Rewrite – New) – Fighting Against the Knife

Oscar Wilde said, “The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick…

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Food Love

My husband and I went on a date last night.  We’ve accumulated some gift cards for Ruth’s Chris Steak House and have deserved a night out for a long time.  I had never been to Ruth’s Chris but my husband assured me that I would definitely love it.  My first bite of filet was beautiful.  So tender, rich flavor, pure yum.  The second bite, when paired with a sip of shiraz produced a sensation in my mouth that felt like fireworks, tingles, and pure beauty, producing  an involuntary “MMMMMM, Oh my God”.  A mouth orgasm, if you will.  Sitting in the candle light across from this perfect, smiling man, eating and drinking in this place with him, made me feel so loved.   It made me realize that the beautiful dining experiences of my life have all been since I met Jeff.

Our first perfect meal was in Moab at The Center Cafe.   It was our first weekend together and we already knew that we loved each other.  We walked there in the rain.  I don’t remember what we ate but I do remember that the restaurant was warm, cozy and very intimately romantic.  Someone there was celebrating a birthday and shared their cake with the entire restaurant.  Plates and greetings were passed around and we felt like we were having cake with family, not a room full of strangers.   Sitting next to Jeff, having brilliant conversation, holding hands, and eating cake, I knew we were on to something great.

The first time we talked about marriage, very frank and serious talk about marriage, was over sushi at The Happy Sumo in Salt Lake City.  We sat there for hours drinking Japanese beer, eating sushi rolls and sashimi (my first time) and discussing the pseudo-hypothetical idea of second marriage.  When I hesitantly took my first bite of sashimi I was shocked at how good the ocean could taste.  We left there slightly tipsy and pretty assured that it would take something miraculous and great to entice either of us to marry again.  I don’t know about Jeff but I already knew that we were talking about us.

I must say, though, that the most loving dining experience we have had occured just recently.  We traveled to Salt Lake City without the kids to spend some time with friends and were surprised to death that Etienne flew in to see us.  He treated us to one of the most beautiful dining experiences of our lives.   The waiter was disappointed that we did not have time to stay three hours and linger passionately over our food.  We did stay long enough to have three bottles of wonderful wine and eat various tapas with our hands.  It was intimate and beautiful.  The waiter loved on us and we loved on our food and each other.   There was crying, laughter and connection that was fueled by the food we were eating and the place we were eating it in.   I don’t know if Etienne realizes how much we loved that experience with him or that we’ll treasure it forever.

It’s one of life’s perfect moments when people who love being together can convene over wonderful food.  The combination of atmosphere, company and food is magic and I’m so glad I’ve gotten to experience this part of life.

Falling Into Life: A Gay Exmormon’s Journey

Chapter Six – The Disintegrating Gospel: Behold the International House of Handshakes

Oh God, hear the words of my mouth, please tell me this is a mistake. Heavenly Father can’t see  my faithful heart without a sign?

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Falling Into Life: A Gay Exmormon’s Journey

Chapter Five – Here’s the box, now get in!

I think the best analogy to use in describing what is was like being a Mormon is that of a pre-natal child attached to a life-long umbilical cord. Being born and raised a Mormon is much like never being born at all…

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Falling Into Life: A Gay Exmormon’s Journey

Chapter Four – Growing Up a Happy_© Mormon Kid

I was relatively happy as a Mormon kid…

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In the Land of Women

This was one of the perfect moments in life to watch this movie.  Of course I don’t know what other perfect moments there will be in my own life for this story but in this particularly perfect moment there was #1 and I alone on the couch for the evening.  This doesn’t happen often because my husband is engaged and we are newlyweds.  It took a trip, for him, into Iowa (ask me how cold it is there in January…ew) with four of the six for me to have a night alone with #1 and this was the perfect setting to watch In the Land of Women.

This truly is the story of women (and the poor, good man within them) and all the complexities that come with them:

• Aging
• Blooming
• Death
• Drive to be desirable
• Individual purpose in the midst of raising children
• Lives of our children vs. lives of our own
• Motherhood
• Motherhood during times of questioned mortality
• Being the perfect example for our daughters of  everything that is good about womanhood
• Dangerous cancers of reproductive organs that are specific to women
• Rage vs. Fear vs. Appearance of Calm
• Exploration of  love and lust and sex (the first time and possibly the last)
• Power
• Insane need for a positive attitude when everything around you is falling apart
• Chopping off of body attributes because of cancer and cancer treatment
• Vomiting
• Bitching
• Kissing
• Excluding
• And, ultimately, connecting and loving

If you know any of my history, you know that a movie such as this would be important in my life.  Unfortunately #1 is old enough to know the history that we share, painfully.  So it was easy, as we were passing in the kitchen, to stop and hug and say, “I love you”, and then linger.  We lingered for a very long time.  The funny thing is, she held on when I almost let go.  I can’t tell you how much that means to me.  Please hug your daughters, or anyone you need to know that you love them above all others.