The little piece was for a second edition anthology by the Lambda 10 Project. The info I got was that the editors would be receiving about 100 submissions from people around the world, more than were submitted for the first book, Out On Fraternity Row: Personal Accounts of Being Gay In a College Fraternity. I think they were accepting a few dozen pieces or so to be published. I didn't hold out much hope. But, I wrote a little something and sent it off with my forms and such. Mine probably wouldn't make it very far in the editing process, but I figured I had something to give back.
The first Out on Fraternity Row literally jumped off the shelf at me way back in 1998. I was haunting the gay/lesbian section at Borders FAR FAR FAR off campus (I might have been in Bloomington-Normal) and, while reaching for a book, OOFR fell off the shelf. I scooped it up and ran off to an empty corner. Looking back, it was one of those moments that make me wonder about guardian angels.
A few months earlier, I was reading my 3rd grader's journals and making up a few student teaching "reflections" while my brothers ate another horrid dinner in the frat house basement a few floors below. Steak and potatos isn't always a good thing. I turned on the TV and found CNN reporting that some guy named Matthew Shepard had died out in Wyoming. Reporters called it a hate crime. I had to look that one up.
It wasn't that I got caught up in all the mob reporting that built upon and built upon and built upon itself. I cared. And I didn't know why. Blah blah blah, gay boy finally wakes up...and finds himself student teaching in rural central Illinois, living in a fraternity house and coaching a college men's sports team. Interesting...
I used to hide my OOFR in different places. Ironically, the only place I couldn't put it was in the closet, since my roomie and I shared that. Literally, not metaphorically, it turns out. It took me a while to read the whole thing because I kept skipping to the ending of each narrative. Maybe I was looking for some kind of happy ending. Maybe it was my ADD.
Mushy,touchy-feely stuff ensued involving some pretty difficult and, at times, painful self-reflection. The true value came in understanding that endings can be happy even though they don't seem to be.
So, at any rate, a year and a half ago I mailed off my manuscript draft and forms out to North Carolina or some other GFP (God-Forsaken-Principalite for those that haven't read Andrew Tobias/John Reed). I didn't expect anything but a 'thank-you-but-no-thank-you' e-mail in return. Well, at least I tried, I thought.
A month or so later I got the e-mail. But, as feel-good stories go, it wasn't the one I thought would come. It welcomed me into the second phase of editing. My piece had been accepted!
BUT: Not all of the pieces accepted would be included. There were rewrites and revisions and restructuring and...basically reworking the entire thing. There were phone calls with the editor and lots of e-mailing and second, third, fourth and fifth deadlines. I hadn't expected to make it past Round One that I hadn't REALLY thought about what I was writing. Did I really want THIS published?
As I really read what I had written, I grew increasingly uncomfortable. My piece sounded angry in a passive-aggressive sort of way. It didn't feel 100% true to life. It pointed a literary finger and wagged it at a number of people who didn't deserve it. It had a certain feel that indicated a need for medication (Sorry Tom Cruise and Co.!). It read like an invitation for pity. And, I hadn't meant it that way at all.
I e-mailed it to a couple of people. I got a few e-mails back. The consensus was: I hope that's not the way you remember things; good luck, but not too much.
I ended up withdrawing the whole thing from further consideration. Thereafter, every other day I got a message on voicemail or an e-mail (with the subject line in capital letters no less) asking me to reconsider. There were offers to make me an anonymous contributor, to change certain identifying details (not sure how that would have worked out) and the like. It was flattering. Which, come to think of it, usually goes a pretty long way to get me to do something. I responded to one e-mail and cut off correspondence with the editor.
Now, the book, Brotherhood Revisited, has been released and is in bookstores now. I'm definitely feeling a sense of regret. But, I'm also feeling a pretty considerable amount of relief. I appreciate not having made a big mistake in telling a story that wasn't as true as it should have been; my memories of all things Champaign-Urbana aren't as reliable as I'd like them to be. But, the honor of having my writing published...that's a pretty big regret.
Here was the opening to the story which was assigned the title "Flyin' Hawaiian" by the editor. How was he going to change some identifying details? Oh well. Enjoy.
“It’s my Flyin’ Hawa--iian!” squeaked a familiar voice.
I knew it was Leslie, our House Sweetheart, hidden somewhere in the mass of people. She appeared, pushing through the crowd gathering in the narrow second floor hallway of the fraternity house. Seeing her arms outstretched and that one-of-a-kind Cheshire-size smile reaching across her face, I forgot all about the week’s troubles.
“Hawa--iian!” echoed Amy and Kristen, pushing through the crowd. They both reached out their arms for hugs of their own, Amy sticking her tongue out at me.
“Cool tongue ring. Bet that’ll come in handy,” I joked. “So how’s everyone doing?”
“Just fine now that we have our Flyin Hawa--iian,” sang Leslie, Amy and Kristen together.
A stein full of seven and seven appeared in my hand and I turned to see Scott, lip full of chew, towering over me.
“That’s for my Hawaiian brother,” Scott proclaimed, aiming at my forehead, but poking me in the shoulder.
“Thanks…,” I started to say, taking a sip that I regretted a second later. “But, you all know I’m not Hawaiian, right?”
“You’re not? I thought you said he was,” said Amy, looking to Leslie and Kristen.
“No, if you’re from Hawaii, it doesn’t mean you’re Hawaiian…,” I started to explain.
“But…,” Amy stuttered.
Leslie tucked her hands into her overalls, Kristen toed a stray carpet square back into place and Amy’s brain tried to work past the alcohol and through her new tongue ring. Scott spit his chew into one cup and stared into the other.
By all accounts, I was killing our buzzes.
“Never mind. It’s your FLYIN’ HAWA--IIAN!” I cheered, trying to toast my drink without pouring it on my head yet again.
“Hawaiian!!” the trio of women sang again, heading down the stairs for another night at the bars.
There’s no harm, I thought, in letting people believe what they wanted. Assumptions may involve an “ass,” but, in the end there’s still “u” and “me” together. I learned to live with the assumptions people made about me because, I reasoned, no one got hurt in the end.
In central Illinois, few people really needed to know the difference between “Hawaiian” (the ethnicity) and “from Hawaii” (the home state); the assumption that I was Hawaiian made me unique and interesting.. In all my time in the fraternity, no one really needed to know that I was gay. Hawaiian wasn’t bad. Just one of the guys? Even better.
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