Thursday, March 20, 2008 | by nathan

Vignettes

What are the moments in your life that walk with you? The formative ones, the stories you’re always telling? In an effort to challenge myself to become a better writer I’m going to try to tell some of these stories, to share some of these moments as concisely as possible. Sarah Brown is the queen of this; definitely read her "Impressions" series, but as she’s a really, really hard act to follow, do me a favor and read mine first.

We’re sitting in her car, and she’s crying. I’ve cried over this stuff enough, though I’m just barely holding it together after she’s just told me that I’m going to be excommunicated for being gay. Honestly, if it wasn’t so deeply sad, if I wasn’t feeling so insanely guilty for hiding it from her all these years, I’d find it incredibly funny. We’re Protestants, I think to myself. We don’t excommunicate. Only it’s not funny - it’s the moment I’ve dreaded. She’s hurt because I didn’t tell her for all this time, and I’m hurt because she doesn’t realize that I knew all along that when I told her that this is how it would go down. It’s my worst fear come to life. Finally I tell her that we’re not going to solve anything like this, that there’s no point in talking right now because emotions are running way too high, and I get out of the car, feeling guilty and low. As I’m walking back to my apartment someone shouts my name; two of my friends have their heads out the window of their apartment, and when I look up they toss a water balloon at me. It’s just some harmless fun; any other day I’d find it hilarious. For now, I am defeated. When I get back to my room I don’t cry, but I wish I could.

I’m staring at a computer screen in Creative Writing class when I hear my name whispered somewhere behind me. If I was a dog, my ears would perk up; as it is, the activity on the screen freezes and I can’t help but listen; as is common in high school, people are talking behind my back without bothering to check whether or not I can hear them. "Constantly!" shouts the girl in the conversation, who I’d long considered a close friend. "He is constantly eavesdropping on me!" She has a point, I suppose; I was, except that her naturally-loud voice carries through the classroom. And despite the fact that I’d been putting a lot of distance between us for a long time, that she was the first person to teach me that friendship is so often one-sided, it hurts. Until I hear the teacher mutter under her breath, heard only by me, "It’s not eavesdropping if everyone in the goddamn room can hear you." Then, I feel better.

He has found a pad on which I’ve written an entire treatise, a letter to myself saying, basically, "Nathan, you’re gay, and can you not see that Jesus is so totally okay with you?" I felt better after writing it; so cleansed and refreshed, in fact, that I’d left it behind in the room where our fellowship group had gathered. A day later he shows up at my room, the pad in his hand, saying, "I think we should talk, because I found this, and I didn’t really mean to read it, it’s just I was trying to figure out who it belonged to. Anyway, let’s take a walk." I’m dreading it, but I trust him. We take off down through Reynolda Gardens and he tells me that he’s been dealing with the same thing, but no one can ever know. I promise to keep his secret. We walk through the thick, humid spring air, magnolias and crocuses blooming all around us, the trails quiet. When we take a break and sit, he pulls a pack of cigarettes out of his bag. I smile and say, "I’m just learning all sorts of things about you today."

Like any writing project, this one turned out very differently than I anticipated. I didn’t mean for any of these to necessarily be sad; I just thought of three tiny little stories and told them in the order they came to me. What are some of the moments that have shaped you?