drex, pots, and heroes

First off, today I explain where the name 'drex' comes from, because a few of you have asked. When I was in sixth grade, some friends and I decided that we were going to make a video game. We created concepts for the world, characters with backstories and subplots, and overarching plot to drive the storyline, a magic system, a battle system, and even went so far as to compose character themes and overworld music. Yes, we were nerds in the greatest sense, attempting to put together an RPG. Of the characters created, we each created a character that were essentially avatars of ourselves. My character was named Drex, a shortened form of a street near where I lived, Drexel Drive. Since that time, I have used Drex as my online moniker everywhere I go. I have a significant presence in some circles, and my name is widely known. In some ways it's a 'risk' attaching it to this blog, but I've determined that the barriers between my many lives or personalities ought to be more blurred than I've kept them. For years I maintained a real life persona, and online persona, and my secret gay persona. There are aspects that I like and value in each of those personalities, and there are aspects that I don't care for all that much. I've been trying to reconcile it all and pick out the best parts and make them mine, so I can be one full me. It seems to be going fairly well, for the most part.

I'm so glad I didn't skip my philosophy class today. My teacher invited an eccentric teacher friend of his to come in and speak to us, showing how philosophy can be more a way of life than a method of thinking. This man was weird, but he was incredible. He's a potter (he's been commissioned by the Church to do pottery for some of the historical sites and such, so the next time you visit a church history site and see pottery up on the walls or a glazed porcelain pitcher on the heavy wood table, think that he might have made it) in addition to being a high school teacher (and he taught at BYU in the 70's), and he brought his pottery wheel to include sort of an object lesson. He spent some time shaping clay, showing us different forms of clay, explaining differences between clays and what has to be done to create something out of clay. He was extremely adept with his hands, did some beautiful work, and ended up making a really spiffy pot with a cobalt glaze along the outside.

One of the things he touched on was the difference between the clay that makes porcelain, stoneware, and earthenware. All three types of clay are formed over ages, with erosion taking off microscopic pieces of granite and accumulating together. Clay cannot be made by man, because we simply can't form pieces of granite a quarter of a micron thick. At least I think that was the measurement he quoted. Anyway, all three types of clay are the same material. The difference is how far they stray from the rock, and therefore how many contaminants are with them. Primary clay, used to make porcelain, remains close to the origin and has few contaminants; the clay that makes stoneware has more contaminants, and the clay that makes earthenware has many contaminants. And I hope I'm spelling that right. Anyway, earthenware is heated to 1800 degrees to bake, stoneware to 2100 degrees, and porcelain to 2400-2700 degrees. If earthenware is heated above 1800 degrees, it melts into a puddle. Likewise, stoneware heated above 2100 degrees melts. The correllation isn't too much of a stretch - as we stray from the rock, our origin, we pick up contaminants, and those impurities means that we cannot withstand greater heat and end up as lesser forms of what we could have been. Porcelain can be heated to lower temperatures, and so celestial beings can minister to lesser beings. Earthenware melts at porcelain temperatures, and so telestial beings cannot withstand the glory of the celestial kingdom.

This wasn't discussed in class, but the beauty of our situation, mirroring the clay example but straying a bit from the strict analogy, is that the Atonement and repentance can rid us of impurities. Christ has made it possible for those of us who stray to be able to pick ourselves up, rid ourselves of our contaminants, and move ourselves back to the source.

That's where the analogy ends and I opine some more along some lines that Hidden talked to me about a few months ago. Sometimes we see SSA as a trial, and other times as a blessing. Another perspective is that it is expanded agency. We are given an entirely different set of choices that the 'normal' person doesn't have. Granted, a faithful Latter-day Saint views the choices that are opened to us as inherently wrong, but the choice is there. Heavenly Father entrusts us with more choices, and it is up to us to choose liberty and eternal life through Christ or captivity and eternal death through the devil. We know what God wants us to do, what He hopes we will choose. We were given the choice because we have the capacity to choose right. And yet we are not compelled to act, and compulsory means are not used to force our hands. We are trusted. It is understood that sometimes we will falter, and occasionally some may fall off the strait and narrow path, but that is the purpose of the Atonement - to lift us up out of the mists of darkness, to dispel the misunderstanding, to clean us off and place us right back on the path of righteousness. The way is simple, though not always easy. We even have an iron rod to remind us where we're supposed to go and to help us put one foot in front of the other. I know I'm mixing some metaphors, but it makes sense to me.

O then, if I have seen so great things, if the Lord in his condescension unto the children of men hath visited men in so much mercy, why should my heart weep and my soul linger in the valley of sorrow, and my flesh waste away, and my strength slacken, because of mine afflictions? (2 Nephi 4:26)

Sometimes I need days like today and glimpses into eternity like this to keep me going. I didn't think I needed it today, but if the Lord sees fit to distill some dew and grant me some understanding, however faint, I'll take it.

~drex

PS, we have heard back from a handful of you about our Heroes marathon, and those of you whom we have met and added on Facebook have been invited on there as well. We'd love to see even more of you, so if you have the time to drop in at any point between 4:30 and 1:30, feel free. We've got 14 people for sure coming at some point (I think 5 or 6 of those are only coming for portions), with 2 maybes. If I'm remembering correctly. At any rate, it'll be fun times. We will be starting from episode 10, but we'll preface it with a recap and interpretive dance so anyone who hasn't seen the first 9 can be up to speed.

historical: first encounters

Pretty fantastic day today. I got to sleep in, it was gorgeous outside, church was abidable, we had an incredibly fun dinner at my aunt's house, and we hung out with Hidden and heard his hilarious performance of assignments from a class he took. We're pretty much all patched up now (to the relief of Salad) and the three of us are going up to Salt Lake to see the Joseph Smith movie tomorrow night. Incidentally, I bet we could get away with taking one (or squeezing, two) more if there's anyone from Provo/Orem that wants to come. I haven't cleared it with either Salad or Hidden, but odds are they'd be okay with it, and if not you'll just have to deal with the rejection. (: I'm excited, though. And I have to remember to bring a box of tissues, because I've definitely used at least 6 every time I've seen it, and I'm not anticipating it being any easier this time around. What can I say; I'm like a faucet.

Ok, so I'm flipping through my journal for fun historical insights into who I am. One entry made me giggle. I went to a school dance (girls' choice) my freshman year of high school at age 13. The girl I went with "was in Mathcounts and is way smart, essentially a girl version of me." PS, a year later she came out as a lesbian. xD Sorry, looking back that just cracks me up.

I guess I never recorded anything about the next few major milestones in my self-discovery, so this will be the first record. By my sophomore year of high school and at the age of 14 and 15, I'd come to terms with my SSA and had realized that it wasn't something that was likely to go away. I was still trying to figure out where I stood on it, and while I was nursing an interesting crush on a girl (I have yet to figure that one out, because I wasn't physically attracted to her - it might have just been a weird best friends thing, but I'm not certain), I was having a plethora of crushes on guys. That year the strongest crush was a senior kid that was in choir with me. It was very juvenile, but hey, I was just 15.

The next year was much more hazardous - I'm fully confident that only the intervention of the Lord kept me from ruining my chances at a mission and possibly facing other ecclesiastical repercussions [as a side note, I've toned this down some. This is a very vivid memory, and some aspects of that week would be just a bit too graphic for my taste]. With the old seniors graduated and the new senior tenors not really stepping up, I basically headed up the Tenor I section in the auditioned choir and the hand-picked madrigal choir at school. Among the Tenor IIs we had some decent strength, but a big boon for the section came in the form of a sophomore kid named Dylan who transferred back up to our school from New York City, where he'd been in a boys' choir boarding school something-or-other. The kid was openly bisexual, and extremely cute. So I silently crushed on him. A few months after my 16th birthday, the orchestra and choir went on a competition trip to Virginia Beach. I was in both the orchestra and the choir, and I had friends in the orchestra, but I wanted to make more friends in the choir. I'm sure secretly I wanted to room with Dylan and that that influenced my decision, but my memory on that point is pretty hazy. In the end, though, I did room with Dylan and two other tenors from the choir. Turns out one guy was also openly bi (and extremely disgusting - picture 400 pounds and unshaven, age 17, in lounging clothes on the bed eating vienna sausages out of the tin off of his stomach, and you can picture this guy), and the other guy was loosely closeted bi. What a situation for a stalwart LDS SSA youth to be in!

Two things saved me that week. One was my incredible naivete, and the other was what I see as intervention from God but what could have just been a series of unfortunate circumstances. I'll skip most of the filler. At one point Dylan and I had a pillow fight in our PJs (his consisting of boxers and an undershirt), and we ended up on the bed with his legs wrapped around me. If I had half a brain for the whole sexual undertones/overtones/tones thing, this would have been an obvious come-on. Luckily I was completely ignorant. If he had walked up to me and asked me to do something scandalous with him, I probably would have dropped everything and done it, but instead even his most obvious machinations didn't do anything to me. He would put a towel on, drop his boxers, and leave them in the room with me while he went to take a shower. He talked about not getting any on the trip. Seriously...how much more obvious could he get? We even talked about his lifestyle some of the time in the bus. But I was blissfully unaware of any interest from him.

The last day of the trip, I had basically decided I was going to go after an encounter with Dylan. Which was mildly amusing, because the night before he'd been talking about how he thinks everyone in the world is bisexual and just doesn't realized it, then decided that I was the only straight guy on the planet (probably because I didn't react to his flirtations) and that all supposedly straight guys should be as cool and accepting as me. Anyway, since I didn't understand flirting I was just going to be incredibly forward, and my excuse for doing it, or the circumstances I wanted to create to set it up, was another pillow fight. Shortly before I was going to put my plan into effect, one of the jerks in the choir basically threatened Dylan and said that he was going to tell Dylan's older sister about his orientation (how his family didn't know I will never fathom), which threw Dylan into such a funk that he wasn't in the mood to play or anything. I honestly feel like I was unwittingly moving into a temptation that would have been beyond my capacity to bear, and that God all but plucked me out of the situation in order to keep that promise that we won't be tempted above that we are able. In the end nothing happened between us, Dylan and I chatted and emailed for the rest of the school year and he loved being able to educate me about his lifestlye and the terminology and such. To this day the smell of the cologne that he wore reminds me of him, but I'm incredibly glad that nothing happened between us and that God had His eye on me. Even if I wasn't committed to a path following the gospel, he was a player and I would have been a fling, but since I was on the path to serve a mission it means that much more to me. Especially looking back and seeing just how treacherous the path I was treading was. God's a good guy.

~drex

historical: first inklings

First off, the day. I actually had a really good day once it got going. Getting two and a half hours of sleep doesn't make for the best start to the day, but work was good and then I got to school. Had a midterm in my cross-cultural family class, which I dozed off in. I swear, that class kills me. I dozed off 3 times during the first test earlier in the semester. This time wasn't quite so bad, but ugh. Anyway, finished pretty fast and ran off to find Hidden. We hung out for a while, basking in the sun, and then Salad skipped her class to join us and we all stayed out in the sun for almost an hour and a half. It was awesome. I skipped the rest of my classes for the day so I could take a much-needed nap. Salad, Hidden and I skipped around the mall for a while then came back and mostly just vegged and ate dinner. Probably one of the most laid-back, fun evenings I've had in a while, and very appreciated. I don't know how I'd deal with life and the stresses I've got if it weren't for the unwavering support and love of Salad and the aid of good friends. Or friend, since that's about where I'm at these days. :P

Before I get into the first of my 'historical' posts, I just want to emphasize what a great blessing good friends are. I don't make good friends easily, because I'm fairly insular and introverted, and if I sense any untrustworthiness or flightiness, I'm slow to trust. It's been immensely beneficial to have trusted friends whom I can talk with, and it's really reminded me that I have to make sure I'm the type of person people can trust as a friend, so I can be that pillar of strength if the need arises.

Okay, so I intend on having a series of 'historical' posts - basically blasts from my past giving insight into who I am. I've never been much of a journal-er. Blogs, online journals, and the like are typically more cathartic for me because I crave the feedback, but there were the situations where my journal was just the escape I needed. I'm sure all you Mohos out there (I agree with whoever said that reminds them of a sickly sweet treat, but it's a good descriptive term) who kept journals have looked back and seen the tell-tale signs. Some of my tell-tale signs are quite pronounced, in part because I've always been fairly honest with myself and came to terms with my SSA early on in my high school years.

The earliest, most vivid memory I have of SSA happened after I moved in the middle of third grade. I was not too much older than 8. We moved to a new state, and I started at a new school. There was a boy that I became friends with not too long thereafter, and once while running around playing tag during recess, I had the thought pop in to my head "I really want to kiss him." Considering we were all in the phase of kissing-is-gross, that was a really weird thought, and I dismissed it.

The next strong indication of what I would be dealing with came in sixth grade. Multiple elementary schools funnelled into one middle school, and we were put with kids from different areas that we hadn't met. One of those new kids was another member of the church (this was upstate New York, so members were few and far between) from across town that I developed a crush on. In fact, that crush continues to this day, and if I see him on campus (he's married now) I still get a little flutter inside. Awkward. Anyway, here's an entry from my journal, dated Sunday, August 11, 1996:

"Yesterday I got back from an international camp near Watertown. I had a strange feeling when I helped Tyler [name changed] stay above water in the watermelon sprawl [we were chasing a buttered-up watermelon in knee-deep water on the side of a lake, and Tyler was wrestling with the watermelon and a bunch of guys while I made sure he didn't drown], and I can't explain it, but I've felt it before."

Nearly every entry from that point onward documents whether I'd felt that recently, and under what circumstances it would occur. Eventually I figured out that I was experiencing crushes, but it took a while. Looking back, I wish I'd kept a better journal, but what I've got provides some fairly decent insight into how the journey has been. Some of it is still only floating around in my head, so I hope I'll be able to get it down in here. We'll see how brutally honest I can be about myself.

~drex

my coming out experience

Well, my friend Hidden warned me that integration into the Mohosphere would be quick. :D Hello to all you people randomly dropping in! I shake you warmly by the hand, Willy Wonka-style. I've had a request by someone close to me that I unlink a few things, and other requests to beef up my profile a bit, so I'll be getting on that after this entry gets done.

I finally caught up on some sleep today. Other than that the day was mostly uneventful. Class, work, class, psych stats test (ugh), wretched movie. Scripture study tonight, as Salad mentioned, was very fun, and fairly insightful. I picture Lehi getting ticked off with the river, calling it Laman, then coming up with some warm and fuzzy explanation why when he's confronted on it (no, that's probably not how it happened, but it's funny to contemplate). Then there was "O that thou mightest be like unto this river, continually running into the fountain of all righteousness!" (1 Ne 2:10) Can you not picture Laman running headfirst into the side of a fountain over and over again? Maybe I was just really tired.

I've been asked to share my coming-out experience. I've been planning to do so, but it's a potentially long story, and I'm potentially long-winded, so you'll have to bear with me. Now that I've told my parents, I'm more or less comfortable with anyone else finding out. I have planned to be completely out for a while now, and with the perspective I am taking into and out of this, I see little reason for people to freak out at me. I'm sure it will happen at some point, but it hasn't happened yet, so the bubble hasn't burst. So anyway, a few days after telling my parents (I came out to them almost two weeks ago) I made sure to record down my feelings about the weekend, to make sure I wouldn't forget. I'll copy some of that (long) entry here:

"After pictures Salad and I drove in my car back to [my parents'] hotel. I told Salad that I wanted to come out to my parents sometime while they were in town. It’s been a desire that’s hit me probably the last 3 times I’ve spent time with them, and it seemed like it would be right, especially in the context of dating Salad. Salad obviously offered as much support as she could give, and I kept thinking about it.

"Before [my brother] and I left to get the food, I told mom and dad that I wanted to talk to them alone at some point while they were visiting. That time came later Saturday evening. We sent Bob home with Salad’s car and orders to meet at our place in the morning, and the kids went to bed, leaving mom, dad, Salad and me. My heart was pounding a thousand times a minute, and Salad was extremely supportive, leaning on me and wrapping her arms around my middle. She was a huge help in getting me to talk. So we sat down, and I was finally able to come out and tell them about my same-sex attraction. It was a nerve-wracking experience, because despite my belief that they’d be understanding, there was always that slim chance that they wouldn’t; I also didn’t know just how well they’d end up taking it, despite my belief in their unconditional love. Mom, always the talker, talked about having lesbian friends who chose the lifestyle, which worried me a bit because I never chose this. She seemed to understand my explanation of how I see things, though, and eventually was more openly supportive of me. Dad didn’t say much, though love always radiated from his eyes, but I must admit that his silence made me very nervous at times. Ultimately he was also very supportive and understanding, and while they both expressed concern for the path I have to travel and the fact that they’d be disappointed if I let it hurt my foundation in the gospel, the fact that I view it all from a gospel perspective won out and they understood me. Having that out in the open has been a great relief to me.

"I had texted Hidden before I talked with mom and dad, to let him know I was planning on talking about it that day if I could get them alone. That was partially because if I had to report to him, I figured I’d get it done. When the night was done (after 1AM), I texted him to let him know that it went well.

"So here I am now....Mom and dad know about my homosexuality, Salad and I are closer than we’ve ever been and I’m seriously contemplating engagement. I want to take it slow, so it won’t happen anytime too soon, but the cards are on the table and I know it’s a distinct possibility. Sometimes I wonder if we weren’t supposed to hook up until now because we would have moved too fast into something we weren’t ready for at the time. I think I’m getting to the point where I could be ready for it. I have to wonder when it’ll click for me, but so far it’s falling into place. I’ve never felt more comfortable, more loved, more safe, and more free in my life. I can see myself living with Salad for the rest of my life. I can’t see life without her – but that’s what I thought about Panda and Psycho before, and we’ve grown apart. It’s not love yet, but I think it’s getting there. I’m just very glad that we’re so open with each other, and that we talk about things. It’s been wonderful, and I hope it only gets better."

~drex