»Gay in East Texas...«

Gay in East Texas

By JOHNNY JOHNSON, The Daily Sentinel, Nacogdoches, Texas

Sunday, January 16, 2005

EDITOR'S NOTE: * Names have been changed.

Jason stared straight ahead at the somber wood paneling. He shifted uncomfortably in the pew, waiting for the service to begin.

When it did, he cringed slightly as the overhead speakers crackled with the sounds of feedback and Southern gospel, sang by an unseen someone in the back of the chapel.

Just four days earlier, Jason, his best friend Chad*, and the rest of the crew had decided on a night out at Jitterbugs - the two-step capital of East Texas, known for cold beer and hot women - neither of which was of particular interest to this group.

They were only there to see Jason's sister sing during the local finals of the 23rd Annual Colgate Country Showdown, a regional version of "Nashville Star."

At the end of the night, Jason's sister didn't win, but everyone had a good time and it was a change from the usual Saturday-night routine.

When the lights went up at midnight, they drained their drinks and joined the rest of the crowd in a long, slow shuffle out the double doors, into the pasture/parking lot outside. Western-clad line dancers were already revving up their quad-cabs and dualies like some kind of urban-cowboy invasion force, readying to descend on the late night drive-throughs.

It was a muggy, almost-summer East Texas night. Even at a mild 73 degrees, it was miserable.

They broke off from the pack, and headed toward their vehicles. Untucking shirts and loosening buttons they called out their "Call mes," as they reached for their individual door handles.

It would be the last time Jason saw his best friend.

On the way home, Chad's car left the roadway, hit a culvert and went airborne. It hit two pine trees before landing. Chad was dead at the scene.

The funeral

The funeral was wrong from the start.

The music, the absence of photos and personal items - the service was devoid of anything remotely Chad.

I don't know whose funeral I was at, because it wasn't Chad's, Jason recalls.

Fifty-five of Chad's Nacogdoches and Lufkin friends had come up the day before for visitation. They were greeted with whispers and cold shoulders. They weren't wanted.

"Earlier, a bunch of us decided to put a collage of pictures together to put by the casket or at the gravesite or something," Jason said. "It was really tasteful, and didn't portray the (gay) lifestyle or anything, but when we got to the funeral home, his mother refused to even let us bring it in the building.

"They didn't want any of us there, and someone said that if we came to the funeral we were going to be asked to leave. But Chad was our friend. We weren't not going to go unless his mother flat out said it to our face.

When the rumor started circulating they couldn't attend the funeral, someone called a group meeting, which called for a caravan back to Bullfrog's in Nacogdoches, where they could discuss their options over a burger and a couple of drinks.

Everyone was a little divided about going to the funeral, Jason said. We didn't want to cause a scene, and yet some of us kind of did.

Some people wanted to go together - strength in numbers and all - but Jason wasn't so sure about making waves.

I was his best friend, he said. I didn't want to be pointed out and told not to be there. My friend Crystal and my mom and sister were going with me, and just because they didn't want gay people there, I didn't want them to be told to leave. But a big part of it was that I really didn't know how I was going to act if I were told to leave.

When they arrived, Jason and his three guests sat down in a pew near the middle of the long and narrow chapel. He was grief-stricken and a little nervous, waiting for something to be said.

But when something was said, Jason couldn't believe what he was hearing.

Instead of a ceremony that reminded everyone who Chad was - how he would never back away from a confrontation, miss a chance to speak his mind or take any crap from anyone - the eulogy turned into a sermon about the sanctity of marriage, the holy union of man and wife, the inherent evils of homosexuality, and how Chad was probably up in heaven at that very moment, making small talk with the recently deceased former President Ronald Reagan.

The Bible-thumping rhetoric told Jason all he had to look forward to in the afterlife was eternal damnation.

Growing up in the conservative Bible Belt of Deep East Texas, Jason had heard it all before. He, like all his friends, was a sinner - holding a one-way ticket to hell, unless he denied his sexual orientation and sought repentance.

He had quit letting those things get to him a long time ago.

What did get to him was that all those words of fear and intolerance were coming from the only place Chad would ever have allowed them - directly over his dead body.

Growing up gay

Jason grew up in a small town near Lufkin, in a loving and devout Christian family. They took their church-going seriously.

He was the kind of kid that every parent prays for - picture Woody from Cheers. He was well-behaved at school. He didn't drink, cuss or smoke.

For unlucky parents, the teenage years might mean finding out their children are experimenting with sex or drugs. Jason's found out that their son believed he was being called to the ministry.

Like many rural East Texas boys, Jason got into the ag scene. He learned his way around a steer auction and ended up with a shelf full of ribbons to prove it.

The standard line that I knew I wasn't interested in girls at age 5 didn't apply to Jason. He was the model heterosexual small-town-America, vice-president of the student council. And he had all the Sunday-school answers down pat.

Girls were instantly attracted to his smooth features and farm-boy shoulders.

I played the dating game, and actually I was pretty popular he said. There were lots of other people I grew up with in high school who were obviously gay, and it was a lot harder for them. But I was just being the good little Christian boy. I had everybody fooled - I had myself fooled.

I knew I was not attracted to women, but I never thought I could actually be gay. I prayed that God would heal me of it, and I told myself it was just a phase.

It was a repeated prayer that always went unanswered. So as if to compensate, Jason went out with all the pretty girls in high school.

Sometimes a rumor would go out that I was sleeping with one of them, and they'd egg it on, Jason said. My best friend would say Oh yeah! He's really good in bed.' And I'd just laugh it off and say whatever.' I mean damn' was a bad word to me back then.

The people who know me in Nacogdoches wouldn't have known me back then. I wasn't the same person.

For all practical purposes, Jason became a chameleon - just as comfortable in J. Crew as Wrangler - just as interested in Star Trek as the flavor-of-the-season nighttime soap drama.

The gay scene

Eventually Jason came to terms with the fact that he was attracted to men. He started meeting other people like him and eased into the gay dating scene at SFA.

Being gay in East Texas sometimes means living a double life. It was something he had already subconsciously known. And it didn't take very long before he had learned to adapt to living a semi-out-in-the-open gay lifestyle - following most of the unwritten rules to make gay life easier in East Texas.

— Never walk down the street holding your boyfriend's hands.

— Don't make a habit of mixing your day life with your night life.

— Anex is safe. Jitterbugs ... not so much.

Surprisingly, that last rule has less to do with a perceived redneck mentality or the number of hunting rifles in pickups outside Jitterbugs, and more to do with the good drink specials at the Anex. But whatever the reason, the Anex became a sort of sanctuary.

If anyone ever came up to me and tried to start something I'd just go tell the bouncer and they'd kick him out," Jason said.

But they weren't always safe, even in the safe places.

Every year, during Rush Week, it never failed - we'd go out and someone would always say faggot this' or faggot that.' And Chad would never hold back. He had no fear, Jason said. But he's not here anymore.

Coming out

Because he wanted to go into agribusiness, Jason transferred to Texas A&M. When he got there, he was surprised to find out that Nacogdoches and Lufkin had a larger gay crowd than one of the largest universities in the state.

His steady boyfriend, Sean,* had come to College Station for Thanksgiving weekend, and they had just gotten back from bonfire when the phone rang. It was Jason's mother.

We need you to go to your aunt's house in Austin.

Why? What's wrong? Is everything OK?

Her only response was, We know.

When he got there, his aunt had called everyone at her church to ask them to be in prayer for Jason.

When his mom and dad arrived, they unloaded on him.

It wasn't supposed to be like this. It was supposed to have come out at just the right time, during normal conversation, with a well-rehearsed statement that Jason had replayed in his mind countless times before. But it didn't turn out that way.

It wasn't on his terms. He wasn't ready. They dragged him, kicking and screaming, out of the closet.

I'm bawling, they're quoting scripture, and I just can't keep up, Jason said. Even as well as I knew the Bible, they were much more versed than me. And I couldn't just walk away.

Truth and consequences

Jason's parents laid out three take-it-or-leave-it, it's-not-getting-any-better offers - none of which included going back to A&M in the spring.

A) He could go to a straight camp in Phoenix, Ariz. - Exodus, which, according to the Web site, has been "helping people proclaim freedom from homosexuality through the power of Jesus Christ since 1976."

B) He could move back home with his parents and begin an internship with their pastor or:

C) He could move in with another aunt and uncle in Dallas and undergo sexual orientation counseling.

Moving back home wasn't happening.

Neither was moving in with Sean. Jason wasn't ready to write off his entire family.

He was down to two choices, and while hanging out at a summer camp with a bunch of gays who were in the same situation kind of sounded like fun, he decided to move in with his aunt and uncle, who agreed to pay all of his bills if he went to gay counseling.

So I went and met this youth pastor who introduced me to two people who supposedly turned straight, Jason said. One guy was a former prostitute and heroin addict who had sex with men for money. The other person said she used to be a lesbian because she slept with a girl once in college. I told them that neither of those people related to me whatsoever. I didn't do drugs and I didn't sleep around. Sean was the only person I had ever been with.

"So they called my aunt and uncle and basically said He's gay. There's nothing we can do for him.' And somehow, I was off the hook.

New life

After the soul-searching and self-discovery in Dallas, Jason was starting to be more comfortable with who he was. He came back to Nacogdoches to be near his family and to see if it was possible to live a normal life with his boyfriend.

His parents eventually came to pseudo-terms with their son's sexual orientation. His father even helped him build a house in Nacogdoches.

He was "home" - close to a large support group of friends and his sister.

But something was still missing.

Whether it was the fear of not being accepted, or fear that he really was living a life of sin, Jason had just never been as strong or out-in-the-open as Chad. Jason was living what you might call an "openly secretive" gay lifestyle. His friends knew he was gay. His bosses and less-familiar co-workers did not.

At the office, he never could bring himself to display his boyfriend's picture on his desk. And in the rare occasion that he did decide to bring a date to the annual office Christmas party, his real date would have to go under the heterosexual cover as the date of a female co-worker.

Six years after "coming out" to his parents, Jason still didn't feel like he could use his real name in this article without embarrassing them. And his father still holds out a glimmer of hope that one day Jason will settle down with an old-fashioned East Texas girl and make him a grandfather.

Choices

A couple of weeks before Chad died, a group of Jason's friends decided to go to Jimmy's, a honky tonk near Lufkin.

"It was some place we never went, and I don't even remember whose idea it was or why we went, but honestly, we had a good time," he said.

The next day Jason received a disturbing message from his mother who had called out of the blue to ask if he was at Jimmy's last night.

Jason's response was to ask "Why?"

"Someone had called my aunt and told her that some guys had been waiting in the parking lot that night to jump us," Jason said. "But apparently one of them knew my grandfather and recognized me. That's why they didn't do anything to us.

They called my aunt and said this was a warning, but if we ever stepped foot back inside the bar again, we'd be killed."

The threat echoed in Jason's head as he stared at the casket of his best friend.

And as the procession in front of the body began, Jason took another look around and realized Chad hadn't just died - he had disappeared.

It could just as easily have been Jason in the box at the front of the room. He wondered if his funeral would be any different.

Jason walked past the casket and continued outside, where whispers and timid glances indicated that some people there thought that Jason was "the boyfriend."

They didn't know his friend. None of them - not even Chad's parents.

He was only an hour-and-a-half away, and they didn't even know where he was living.

As the casket was loaded into the back of the hearse, Chad's parents got in their Dodge pickup. Jason's vehicle ended up right beside them. He couldn't miss the brand new bumper sticker urging people to protect the sanctity of marriage by denying gays that right.

For most of his openly gay life, Jason had lived in Nacogdoches. He grew up just down the road from where he lived now. All his friends and family lived nearby. His job was decent, and his house was in his name. But it wasn't enough.

There were a lot of other things going on in his life at that point, including the fact that he had just ended a seven-year relationship with Sean. But he had been forced to stare at that sticker all the way to his best friend's grave. He had had enough.

Decisions

If there was a shred of doubt, it disappeared after he received a card from Chad's mother.

"I wish I could say thank you for the flowers," it read, "but you never truly knew my son."

The employees at Bullfrog's had gotten a similar card for the plant they sent to the funeral. Their card said "sorry for the loss of profits." And family members immediately took down the roadside cross that Chad's friends had placed at the accident site.

It had been three weeks after Chad's funeral, and just days since the "thank you" card, when Jason closed his eyes and made the plunge. He put his house on the market and gave his two-week's notice.

He had talked about moving before Chad died, but the funeral service, the "wish-I-could-say-thank-you" cards from Chad's mother and that hurtful bumper sticker - proudly displayed by parents on their way to bury their gay son, finally made him understand why he could no longer live in East Texas.

Does Jason believe there will ever be a time when he might come back and be accepted in rural East Texas for who he is? He shrugs, as if he hasn't given it a lot of thought.

He really doesn't care anymore. He's done pretending.

I'll be back to visit," he said, "but I'm ready for a change.

Johnny Johnson's e-mail address is jjohnson@coxnews.com.