Finding My Own Home

Within Alison Bechdel’s novel Fun Home, she appears to draw out specific moment in her past life that help her come to terms with some of the things she is dealing with in her present life. She breaks through barriers and comes to terms with many of her past problems and the way she does that is by connecting herself to the things she feels most distant from. The rest of my paper is to be read without any intention of judgment to be made on others. This is how I feel of myself. This is a reflection of myself, and a personal connection I found within Alison Bechdel’s novel Fun Home.

            It has been hard for me to face my many new responsibilities and challenges that I’ve imposed on myself. Facing identity and sexual confusion has put barriers between me and what I am. I use to hate with a passion who I was, but I can’t help the fact of how I feel about things. My confusion has broken walls down in my thinking, leaving me endless visions. I’m beginning to see things as they are and as they exist, and this is pulling me away from whom I was. Which is now a good thing in my eyes.

Before, I had people telling me what was right and what was wrong and I never had that father figure to guide me on the right path so all I could do was take the word of others and fall into line with their beliefs. Reading through Alison Bechdel’s novel, I could draw similar experiences; from the being told what to wear (99) how to act, the list goes on and on. In today’s society, everything is pushed on you. From where to live, where to sit, where to eat, how to drink, every little detail has been painted on a canvas and we are expected to follow it. Everything seems to be painted, but whos holding the paintbrush?
           I wish, and I say this with a lack of faith, that there was no good or evil, good or bad side, heaven or hell, but this was not a reality, but a mere fantasy of my world. Thinking this way separated me from the reality that I do wrong, especially in my thinking. So, I got caught in these fantasies that separated me from my innate guilt. Handling all these thoughts stressed me out, it inhibited me from my work and studies, my life. These ideas burdened me. They captured me, because what I was wanted these fantasies to exist. They would make my life easier. Such things are foolish thoughts, because “God” was the only one that made things easier.
            And, I say this for myself, with “sinful” experiences and adult responsibilities, come great hardships. My experiences were actions made by impulsive and thoughtless “sinful” motives. This was brought on by my fantasy way of thinking. My responsibilities include all those of adults, which are working for basic needs, finances and miscellaneous expenses. Over all, I had the responsibility to keep what I’ve been internally given safe. That is, safe from my exterior self. My name is Johnny and I have written these words, which have been brought out internally, to free me of my conscious.

On Nov. 27, 2012 at 12:26 a.m. I begin writing about this idea that I have brought on, “What I Am.”

I am a Homosexual being. I find beauty in Men; this is what I am attracted to. This is what I am, in my human interior and exterior. When I see a man, I see his features. I see his structure, stature, composition and poise. I see his masculinity. His aesthetic features, which include physical attributes, which are relatively attractive to me. I didn’t wake up one day and decide to be this way. It was built within my cognition, such as common sense, which some don’t seem to have. But how does any of this really connect to Fun Home?
            Sometimes I think about the fact that I’m getting old and then I think about what it was like when I was younger and I remember being an innocent eight year old on Neopets spending four hours trying to make a blue loop between my grandma shuffling me off to eat breakfast and our terrible dialup connection. Then I think about how innocent I was and how I had no idea how much the world could (and does) suck, and how even though the kids my age were bulling me I was still okay as long as I was on the computer, by myself, where I was safe because no one had to know the real me. And now I am an adult with no way to pretend that the world isn’t a terrible place and I lost that anonymity because the dynamics of the internet have changed and then I get really nostalgic and I wish I could just go back in time and take eight year old Johnny and just keep him from getting disillusioned with things because I think I stopped being that innocent little kid way too early on in life…

As a kid, life was just fun and games, nothing was serious and everything and anything could just be pretend. And that’s how it was, at least in my eyes. Bechdel goes through a similar route, growing up, she was young and did things just because. She wore her hair short because it felt good, she played with the boys because it was fun. In the world, nothing is wrong until someone states that it is such. And throughout Fun Home, Bechdel lives through so much of what is “wrong” and experiences this through the novel. Something similar happened in my life and I found this novel to be one that I loved only because it allowed me to connect personally.

After reading Fun Home, I thought long and hard about what so many of the stories she told meant and there’s so much she allows her readers to see and I appreciate it even more. To allow yourself to confess something so personal takes not only courage but also a desire to understand and to be understood. As humans, we find ourselves constantly battling these internal wars that need to be resolved in order to find peace in life. And one can only be so lucky to find that peace in time. This novel has so many hidden messages; not only visually but, physically, mentally, emotionally and literally. The distance Bechdel reveals not only between her father but the distance separating her family links to me personally and others I can assume as well.

With her novel, Bechdel paves way for gays and lesbians to find their inner truths. She answers questions and provides details of her personal life in order to show how hidden things, always tend to come.      

A Private Repository of Curiosities

Defining/ The Closet.

The Closet:

A small and enclosed space used for storage.

The Closet:

A room for privacy or retirement.

The Closet:

A private room; an inner chamber.

The Closet:

A place of private devotion.

The Closet:

That which affords retirement; a private chamber.

The Closet:

A hidden or secret place, retreat, recess.

The Closet:

The den or lair of a wild beast.

The Closet:

A place of secluded speculation.

The Closet:

A private repository of curiosities.

However you define it,

A Closet is a place to keep things.

Clothes

Shoes

                        Boxes

                                    Secrets

                                                Skeletons

Often times, one can find themselves trapped/

In their very own Closets.

History provides many examples of those trapped/

In their very own Closets.

R. Kelly

Trapped in the Closet

After a one night stand

which sets off a chain of events,

which gradually reveals an even bigger web of

deceit, sex, lies.

Miss Ogilvy

Trapped in the Closet

Being born a Wilhelmina

but always longing to be a William.

Dies alone in a cave before truly Finding Herself.

Roy Cohn

Trapped in the Closet

Refusing to admit homosexuality

Diagnosed with AIDS/ delusions of grandeur/ living a false life

All the Angels in America couldn’t help him.

Everyday Homosexuals

Trapped in the Closet

Afraid of society/ oppression/ discrimination/ stigmatization/ hate.

Afraid/ to live their true life

Afraid/ to admit what they might think

Afraid/ of what might happen.

Coming out of the Closet can be a difficult process.

One must form and accept their sexual identity,

must respond to their potential feelings of attraction to the same sex.

Once accepted, they must choose to disclose this information to others.

And when determining how to disclose this information,

it is typical to feel a variety of reactions:

Confusion

Despair

Self-doubt

Denial

Pride

Acceptance

Which makes it all the more difficult to disclose this information.

However, once one comes out of the Closet

it may seem that all in the world is finally right

and one can go about their new found life.

However, epistemologically speaking,

Closets are contradictory places for those who dwell in them.

According to Sedgwick,

one must stereotypically strut, parade, jaunt, traverse, traipse, promenade

  down the street, road, avenue, boulevard, rue, autobahn, esplanade

Asserting their homosexuality

or else suffer the consequence

of having to re-exit the Closet.

However, this may not be the case; it may not apply to everyone.

Having to re-emerge from the Closet,

upon every new encounter,

infers that we live in these Closets our whole life.

Once one comes out of the Closet,

one should not have to refer back to the term/ Closet/ in the same sense,

even if one is disclosing their sexual identity once more.

This is what makes the Closet a contradictory place.

You can’t be in it, yet you can’t be out of it.

Staying in the Closet

obscures you from knowing

whether everyone is treating you as straight

because you managed to convince them are you straight

Or,

if they are simply treating you as straight

to keep your façade.

This folly gives others a sort of power/

control/ capability/ endowment/ dominance/ sovereignty/ authority

over your own sexual identity.

It allows them to relish in the…

“epistemological privilege”

that your ignorance/ of their knowledge/ can afford them.

And if you do choose to come out of the Closet,

 those who once relished in their “epistemological privilege”

can choose to revoke that moment from you

by not giving up their privilege

and hoarding your sexual identity

as a secret,

a secret, to which, they have sole access to.

Closets/ come in all types, colors, names, sizes.

Armoire

Broom Closet

Cabinet

Coat Closet

Cupboard

Linen Closet

Utility Closet

Walk-in Closet

Wardrobe

Water Closet…

Just like our clothes and shoes,

We can choose to live in our Closets

and emerge when it is most opportune for us.

Or, like our skeletons,

We can choose to stay in our Closets

and suppress the secrets that lie within.

Or, like those who came before us,

We can choose to exit our Closets,

and never look back.

Sure you may have to pack a bag or two,

bring your clothes with you,

a pair of shoes possibly,

maybe a bone from that skeleton to remind you of where you came from.

But remember:

A Closet is a place of storage, first and foremost.

We shouldn’t be confined to such a place.

Not even if it is the most spacious walk in Closet

that we’ve ever created for ourselves.

Not even if our coming out moment

was the most glorious moment of our life and we wish to relive it.

For if we stay in the Closet, voluntarily or involuntarily,

We become trapped.

And if we are trapped/

Our Closets become

the den/ lair/ hideout/ a chamber of secrets/

to a wild beast.

Nature intended for beasts/ and humans alike/ to roam free.

We are not subject to confinement.

Living in a Closet,

however spacious you may have made it seem,

is a contradictory place to live:

One foot in, one foot out.

Just because you made a grand exit once,

does not mean you should have to re-experience the event again,

however glorious your experience may have been.

Simply,

Dare to be.

Step out/ don’t look back/

and close the door behind you.

Talking With My Hands

The pieces Borderlands and Miss Ogilvy Finds Herself showed the importance of understanding Intersectionality, not only in others but in defining oneself. A person is made up of many different parts- their heritage, their sexuality, gender identity, their experiences- but those are not what define them. What seems to define people these days are these unbiased, objective definitions that people see before each other. And suddenly, these are what we are. But these stories have helped me realize that this isn't true. These are merely things we have to offer, and we have to define them. We are ourselves, nothing more, nothing less.

Muriel: The Same Spelling of My Name

Audri. That’s who she was to me. Never Audre or Audrey. She was my Audri. At least for a year and a half she was. When she told me of her plans to write about us, I asked only that she remain truthful about me and our relationship. Upon my initial reading of the book, I was furious that she hadn’t. I’m not the monster she portrayed me to be. Nor was I ever. I loved Audri. So very much. She and I were compatible to a fault. We understood each other without words. We shared our poetry, our visions, and our lives. But in telling my story, I’ll do as Lewis Carroll would suggest, begin at the beginning, keep going until I reach the end, and then stop.
She was accurate in the portrayal of our meeting. I remember when Ginger first began to tell me about Audri. I was immediately enamored. Just coming off of electro-shock I’d lost the small shimmer of hope that I’d had before treatments. They call me schizophrenic. Classified as such due to my “break from reality” and “poor emotional responsiveness”. I disagree. Depressed? Probably. When asked, I tell people that prior to the treatments it felt like there was a darkness that covered me like a huge bushel basket. But there was always a small light deep within the bush that seemed to be just out of reach. After electro-shock, the bush remained but the light was gone. Along with my memories. Maybe I did have a break from reality. But all of the best minds do. My relationship with Audri is the best proof I can provide of my emotional responsiveness. The first time I spoke to her on the phone, at Ginger’s insistence, I remember the obsessive desire to meet her. We made a date at Page Three. The exact moment I began to fall? When she noticed my gambling pants. Not many people notice those things.
Our courtship went how she described it in her book as well. It was a quick fall. I wrote her letters that came from the deepest desires of my heart because with her I kept no secrets. She knew I was looking for myself. She knew how it felt to lose Naomi. I sometimes thought her to be quite mad also. Audri made me feel comfortable in leaving my treatments. Talking and spending time with her was the only therapy I felt I needed. On that New Years Eve in 1954, I knew I was going to give myself to Audri. She was my love and if her vague message of “Having rocks in her head” was any implication then I was hers as well. On January 1st of 1955, we made love and so began our life together.
It was wonderful. I split my time between Stamford and New York, my family and Audri. I would rent a room at the YWCA (to avoid her roommate) and we would spend our weekends immersed in each other’s bodies. After the incident with Rhea finding us together on the couch, and subsequently moving out, Audri and I decided to move in together. It was a gradual process because I was scared. I was leaving behind a job and my family for a young love. Maybe that’s why we faulted. Maybe we moved too fast for our relationship to keep up. But those nights we spent observing bars and those mornings scouring streets for people’s trash that we just knew we could fix up…those were the moments when I knew I made the right decision.
I guess you could say the decline in our relationship started with Lynn. She was our siren, the kryptonite of our foundation. I felt I was in the wrong for wanting her. When Audri expressed the same thoughts though, I felt an immense amount of relief. I had written about my desire for Lynn. About the hope that the three of us would be the start of a revolutionary style of living for our community. At first it seemed to go wonderfully, we shared in mental and physical emotions. But Audri always came first to me and I to her. That’s something that Lynn must’ve felt, which is probably why she took all of our money and left. That was something that was hard for both Audri and I to come back from. Audri became withdrawn. Barely speaking. She started therapy and went back to school. It was about this time that I began to realize what was happening.
I had done nothing of importance since coming to New York. On New Year’s Day, my one year anniversary with Audri, I unintentionally put the first nail in the coffin of our relationship. As we lay in bed after a long day of fellowship with our friends, Audri and I wrote our daily thoughts in our notebooks before exchanging them. I don’t remember what was written in hers because I was so focused on the pain in her eyes as she read mine. I had written of our accomplishments in 1955. On Audri’s side was her new job, starting therapy, going back to school and sending out some of her poems. My side was empty. I was holding Audri back. I was nothing next to her. She was so ambitious, so hardworking. All I could do is sometimes cook her dinner or sometimes write her poems. I was a parasite in Audri’s life. And that was something I no longer wanted to be.
When Toni came into our lives I started to feel I was worth something again. It was similar to my feelings for Lynn but these were my own, not shared by Audri. Toni and I spent lots of evenings together. I didn’t like to be alone and Audri was at school until 10pm, four nights out of the week. I had a hard time feeling like I still meant the world to her. Toni made me feel special. When I felt that I was near acting on my impulses with Toni, I approached Audri about the possibility of my having an affair. I remember entering the room with only the hope that she would express some form of jealousy or unhappiness at my request. When I put on my fake face of excitement and joy and asked her bluntly “How would you feel if Toni and I slept together?” contrary to what I desired, she looked almost elated at the fact that I asked. She never gave me a definitive answer just smiled when I told her that I had not yet climbed into bed with Toni. It was then that I knew that our relationship was unofficially on the downfall. Since Audri no longer cared for me, I looked for love elsewhere.
First was Jill. An old friend of Audri’s, Jill let us use her father’s typewriters to type our poems. The big event happened in May. After walking home from Jill’s father’s office to our apartment, Audri went straight to sleep leaving Jill and I up alone. Nothing was supposed to happen. But as Audri rejuvenated ten feet away, I expressed my discontent with my current relationship. It started with Jill comforting me and progressed to…well, Audri was correct in what she heard. I felt terrible about it. But Jill was there. Supportive and reassuring. The next day neither Audri nor myself said anything about it. However, we both knew that she knew. We made love for the last time shortly after that night.
I’m not sure exactly when I fell out of love with Audri but Joan made me feel things that Audri no longer did. At this point the hallucinations had returned and I was trying hard to keep them from Audri. I was barely eating simply because I often times forgot to. I didn’t care much about my appearance anymore. And Joan wanted to be with me regardless of this. Audri and I never officially broke up. It was just an unspoken understanding. I began to spend more time at Joan’s. Sometimes I would look down onto the street and see Audri pacing back and forth in front of the apartment. My heart broke for her but I didn’t know what to do. Every time I was in her vicinity, she cut me down with her words and I just stood there and took it. I knew I was hurting her but I couldn’t stop.
When Joan left me I fell apart. I should’ve known I wasn’t good enough for her. She left behind a swanky , classy apartment and woman just to dally around with a failure of a psychotic who can’t work or even remember a good chunk of her life. It was too good to be true. Out of women to comfort me, I turned to the next best thing…liquor. I drunk myself into a stupor every night to help me forget the shambles that my life was in. I didn’t want to remember anything so I burned everything. Sometimes as I sat in bars, head held in my hands and vision blurred, Audri would come take care of me. After awhile, she stopped. But I couldn’t blame her.

I Have Been Changed For Good

     Hello, my name is Daniel Jenkins, and a book changed my life. Now, I know this sounds just like any old self help seminar where I’m about to share with the world the marvelous effects of a particular weight loss solution that “really works,” however, that’s definitely not the case here. Sharon Bridgforth’s book loveconjure/blues is an entrancing piece of performance poetry that follows love, loss, and in the dramatic moment I’ll be highlighting for everyone’s reading pleasure, change. It’s through this episode in the text involving change that I learned how to live life to the fullest, and while it may not “really work” for everyone, I can say it sure as well could come close.

     Before we get to the meat and potatoes of this book and its relationship with me, let’s start with a little background about my life. Now, I’ve always seen fliers ever since I was little that read the infamous top-of-classroom-banner text in neon font, “You never know what you can do until you try.” My teachers, classmates, and parents encouraged me to step out of my comfort zone and try something new without being scared of fault, and while I did conquer a few daredevil obstacles like doing a somersault on the trampoline and learning how to ride a bicycle in 4th grade, I don’t think I ever took any big risks. To tell the truth, I never wanted anything to really “change” dramatically. I wanted everything to just stay the way it was. Change was some kind of monster, maliciously bent on ruining my life if I ever tried to step into its dark, foreboding lair. I suppose this fear of change led to my compulsions that have followed me throughout my college career, aiming on a fear that if I don’t wear the right clothes or do the right things in the right order, my day will change for the worse, and I will be very sorry. My love life has been affected by this fear as well, inhibiting my fear of making first moves, because what if I did aspire to make that change in the relationship and move forward, and what if it went wrong? I couldn’t handle this sort of pressure, so I just let it drop and my sought after loves dropped right along with it. However, that’s whenever Gay and Lesbian Literature Class and this book came in.

  I already thought taking the class was a huge risk on its own, as I never visited the queer groups on campus because I was scared of all the judgment I might be faced with, being a relatively scrawny gay man myself. However, the class became welcoming and everyone met each other with smiles and warmth that I never experienced before, and my mood lightened. Soon after reading many books of “lovely” despair and loneliness, we get to a text called loveconjure/blues, a performance piece of poetry written in vernacular that’s all about love and living life, two things I wished I’d desperately had been experiencing. And me, being more than eager to crack open the spine of the book, dove head first into its pages, and a buxom beauty ready to dominate my life was waiting there for me.

  This beauty, coincidentally named “Change,” was the one woman that is responsible for helping me actually learn the true nature of "change."  The woman “Change” is described as being a “grey-eyed gap tooth thick lipped cookie black woman with tight lightbrown curls rumbling all the way down to a bounce on her behind,” so, obviously a pretty fierce looking woman (Bridgforth 63). This is exactly how I pictured change was in my life, fierce and entrancing, something that demands attention wherever it goes. Now in the story, change waltzes into a bar during some relationship troubles between two of the main characters of the story, named Lushy and Bettye. Lushy and Bettye already had some troubles going on between them, but still had feelings for each other and didn’t know how to change for the better, and that’s when Change walks in (Bridgforth 63). As Change enters, some people get up and leave, secure with the lives they are living and not wanting to change, which I immediately identified with. For the people that stayed, including Bettye and Lushy, Change grabbed a microphone and wailed a huge note at the top of her range with enormous strength, shaking the whole bar and me, the reader, as well. After her note faded, our character Bettye fled the bar after almost killing Change and Lushy followed Bettye out. Outside the bar, Lushy apologized for every wrong she’s ever committed to Bettye in a tear-jerking conclusion to their relationship which showed how vastly important this buxom beauty was in Lushy’s development as a person.

  After reading this, my head almost exploded because of the enormity of the epiphany I had. I had been running from change. Every time she sauntered into my life I pushed her away and ran like those people in the bar, scared of the true power “change” could bring to my life. However, this book was telling me that change wasn’t always bad. Change could be good as well. Running away from change isn’t what was best for my well-being  and only accepting change and letting her sing her sweet note would bring me that utter happiness I was looking for in one way or the other. And in a weird twist of what I like to call “Change-ception,” I changed as a person by opening myself up to change in my life. I became aware that change is something I had to let happen, because running from it would halt my development and I’d never be at the point Bettye and Lushy were in loveconjure/blues.

     Recently, I can tell the world I have in fact changed. I’ve been reaching outside of my comfort zone, “trying” new things I never would have before, and opening myself up to new experiences that might in fact teach me harsh lessons or might just help me live a happier life. Now, I’m not sure if I convinced everyone that reading this book “really works,” but consider my own work my experience with my own buxom beauty named Change, and while I can't say that I've changed for the better, I can say I've "been changed for good."

Works Cited:

Bridgforth, Sharon. loveconjure/blues. Washington DC: RedBone Press, 2004. 63-67.

Print.

Comment below on the final chapters of Fun Home and how they connect to your reflections on our class.

Recommended Viewing

If you have time please see Rent, which was bumped from our syllabus, and other resources below which focus on the AIDS epidemic in the US and its impact on queer lives.

• Rent. Dir. Chris Columbus. By Jonathan Larson and Stephen Chbosky. Sony, 2005. Film.

A re-imagining of Giacomo Puccini's opera La bohème, set in late 1980s New York amidst AIDS, addiction, and poverty.

• Sex in an Epidemic. Dir. Jean Carlomusto. Outcast, 2010. Film.

Excellent documentary about how queer activism and sexual experimentation fought and ultimately changed the official and medical response to HIV.

• Wild Combination: A Portrait of Arthur Russell. Dir. Matt Wolf. Polari, 2008. Film.

A film about one of my favorite musicians: his creative flourishing in the late 1980s New York art/music scene before his death of AIDS in 1992, and the archive he left.

• Act Up Oral History Archive. ACT UP, 2008. Web.

Online archive of video interviews with surviving members of the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) New York, a group that was crucial in saving lives and getting attention during early days of the epidemic.

Add more references and short descriptions below.