Claws. . .

17 right, 39 left, 5 right.  

I open my locker and take the books I’ll need until I come back again at lunchtime.  Ding, ding, ding, ding … our High School bell was a series of seven “dings.”  By the seventh bell, you had to be in your seat or you were late. Thankfully, during freshman year, my first period class was Algebra and it was directly across from my locker.

Mrs. D. taught Algebra and she had an unbelievable resemblance to Dr. Ruth.  It was truly uncanny.  She was all of five feet tall and always dressed in red or colored business suits.  Her lapel or shoulder was adorned with a little jeweled insect, usually a ladybug or a bumblebee.  She had a huge collection of them and they changed according to her outfit.  I found them beautiful and intriguing.  She used to tell us that on weekends she would do math problems for fun.  It was beyond my comprehension that anyone would do that.

She would begin to do roll call and I could feel the knots in my stomach starting to build.  As she worked her way towards the letter “N”, my anxiety would take over and so would the nausea.  “R.N.?”  “Present!” and then he would look over and leer at me. 

R. had one purpose in high school and that was to make my life a living hell, in every way possible, every single day.  I would pray every morning that he would be absent but that was seldom the case.

After first period, I would make my way to the other classes throughout the day.  I would strategically plan the best way to avoid him.  Yet, like some sort of a plague, he was always there, usually with the other “macho” guys in school calling me a faggot every chance they got.  When verbal slurs wouldn’t do, he’d follow me into the bathroom and kick open the stall and then laugh.  I would always go into a stall, using the urinals would be just asking for them to stand around and try to pick a fight with me.  To date, I almost always choose a stall over a urinal.

When the guys weren’t bothering me, their girlfriends were. Passing me notes in class telling me that they found me “hot” and asking if I would want to go out with them.  They’d laugh hysterically while I read it, and would then try to exaggeratedly “flirt” with me to see how the “faggot” would react.  I was a daily source of amusement for them.  As if beginning the day like this wasn’t bad enough, I also had R. and all his gang for last period, an all-male PE class.  

I would do everything within my power to escape PE class and the changing room.  We’d have to change out of our school uniforms into our PE shorts and tees.  I hated this part of the day more than any other.  As a norm, it started with insults and ended with socks, shoes, and dirty clothes being thrown at me.  I hated it so much that at one point I tried to go to the guidance counselor, Mrs. F., and explained what was going on in hopes that I could be excused from PE all together.  She told me that I needed to grow a tougher skin and stop being such a wimp.  She was the same guidance counselor who, when reviewing my Career Aptitude Test, told me I would only ever be suited to be a florist, flight attendant or dog walker.  “What a waste of a good education”, she said.

There was also Mr. L., our religion teacher. Part of his syllabus was to tell us that being gay was a guaranteed acceptance to hell.  He preached this often and forcefully during his teachings.  

I wish I could say that I endured this only in High School but nothing could be further from the truth.  My earliest memory of abuse was in 3rd grade, Mrs. C.’s class.  My mom picked me up from school one day and I said to her “two boys called me a fag at lunch.  What does that mean?”  I remember her face turning red and her getting nervous.  She said it was a bad word and asked why they called me that?  I replied “I don’t know.  Is it a really bad word?”  She said “Yes, very.”

As the taunting went on through grade school, so continued to grow my anxiety and depression.  By the time I made it to high school, I was a very unhappy person.  Year after year of being treated like this leaves an indelible mark on your soul and your psyche. I didn’t come out until I was 19.  My self-hatred was that strong. 

Fast-forward twenty years and countless hours of therapy later and I’m an openly gay adult.  My family is completely accepting of who I am and I am blessed to share my life with my husband, Oscar, whom I’ve been married (not legally though thanks to Florida’s laws) to for the past 5 years.  He has been a never ending fountain of support and love for me.  I thank God for him daily.

I was having an argument with my sister once and she said,“Why are you so angry, it’s like your claws instantly come out!”  Ahhh, my claws, ever ready, always sharp.  The thing is that not everybody should be experiencing my claws.  For that matter, they should always be retracted when it comes to my family and friends.  I wish I could put them away.  Moreover, I wish they didn’t exist.  

It is said that “anger only consumes the vessel that contains it.”  I don’t like being an angry person.  Frankly, it’s rather exhausting.  I’m thankful to have the life I do today and I’m proud to be the man I’ve become.  I do my best to lead a positive and meaningful life.  However, when anything goes wrong, when someone irks me, when I feel mistreated, ignored, or even looked at the wrong way, my claws come out.  I’m not proud of them but they are an intrinsic part of me.

I’ll be forty in a few years and ironically I received the invitation to my twenty-year High School reunion just a few days ago.  Will I go? Probably not.  Yes, times have changed.  Thanks to Facebook, I’m friends with a few of the people I went to High School with.  It’s interesting, many of them never looked at me twice when we physically knew each other.  Now, they “like” pictures of my husband and I on vacation or having a romantic dinner.  Yet, I think I’m quite content with never having to walk into my High School again.

This is the age of the, “Stop bullying” and “it gets better” campaigns.  What I would have given for these campaigns to have existed when I was in school.  We are formed by our experiences.  My experiences created these claws.  I have written this piece in hopes of being able to begin to declaw myself and to realize that I no longer need them. Yes, one must always be able to defend oneself and those one loves.  I continue to work on constantly being a better version of myself.  My life has been a series of transformations and reinventions. These claws are heavy, cumbersome, and get in the way of all I do.  It is my hope that I will continue to grow and that soon these talons will cease to exist.

Santi Gabino

I have the pleasure of knowing Santi, personally.  

He was a beacon of light and guiding hand on one of the most important and cherished days of my life.
Santi & Family open the doors to their farm, inviting the world into a space worthy of fairy tales.
What's more powerful than the scenery is their cornerstone:
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making sure your moments are savored for years to come.
(bio written by Tara Mazzeo Jackson)