musingsofadepressedgay

[musingsofadepressedgay]

It is absolutely fucking wild how little accountability church leaders need to have

A while back I was a girls camp

(Intermission for those of you who have never experienced a girl's camp)

Picture this, every young women between 12 - 17 is taken up into the mountains with nothing but clothes toiletries ✨️feminine products✨️ (side note why are we so afraid to call them fucking pads or tampons but whatever it doesn't matter rn) a journal pen and scriptures

Phones were not allowed and even if someone snuck one in most of the time we were out of cellphone range because it is time to 'disconnect with the world to connect with god' and at the end of the week everyone is peer pressured into telling about how they didn't want to go but thier mom made them and now that they went they are so happy and feel so close to God because spending a week doing nothing but team building activities all with metaphors about how it is our devine right to be a stay at home mom and we should be honored to submit to our husbands cause Jesus loves us and God knows what's best, while operating on 5 hours of sleep tops, is so eye opening and all that grand stuff

Sometimes there would be showers, sometimes there would be flushable toilets, sometimes some jackass would hide a life sized cardboard cut out of Justin Bieber inside of the Porta potties

Anyway now that we have established the vibes

I was at girls camp, around 14 or 15 years old, and we were going canoeing, because see girls camp is just like scout camp! They go white water rafting but we get to canoe in a reservoir

Now you could have 3 people in a canoe so me and 2 friends went off to go get sunburnt and paddle around for a bit before heading back into a cramped car to listen to the girls gossip about whoever the guy of the week was, because that's what we were expected to do

One crucial design flaw in said canoes is that they aren't actually buoyant enough to float if they get flipped upside-down, they just slowly sink as the air trapped underneath escapes when you attempt to flip them back over

I know that because we tried to take a sharp turn and capsized

Now after we figured out that not only had we flipped the canoe but now we were at a chance of being the only people to lose a whole fucking canoe to the bottom of the reservoir we begin to panic and tread water while holding onto the canoe and calling for help

Eventually some very nice young adults who were out paddle boarding took pity on us and offered to help flip the canoe so it wouldn't sink

Seeing as the canoe had already sunk enough that flipping it would just make it right side up while still underneath the water they had me sit on the back of their paddleboard and hold the canoe to tug it back to shore while my friends swam along side it to help keep it afloat

There are 3 important factors to this situation that are crucial to note

The first is that it is early spring in the mountains, the reservoir was filled with water from melted snow and some of it was still frozen over in shallower areas, on top of that ot was a chilly, and windy, day that felt decent when the sun was out but when you are in the cold water, it in fact did not feel decent

The second thing to note is that at the time I was incredibly short and built like a stick, not much muscle, not much body fat, just a small prepubecent teen (I know I was 14 or 15 however I was a 'late bloomer')

The third thing to note is that the kind paddle boarders who helped us were men in thier 20s or something, idk I wasn't really paying attention to how old they looked, but they were conventionally attractive

And so it was when we finally hauled the boat to shore and got it flipped right side up that we were told by our camp leader that we were not allowed to canoe back across the entire reservoir that we had paddled out to, but we were expected to swim back

To teach us a lesson about flipping a canoe to get the attention of the conventionally attractive young men

(It is worth noting that they were not even paddle boarding near where we accidentally took too sharp of a turn and we had been treading water and holding onto the boat for a good 8 or so minutes before they showed up)

But clearly we had done it all for the attention from boys because we were spending a week in the woods with no boys and so we flipped the boat for an excuse to talk to them

(Secondary note: I am very gay, I did not even understand what they were accusing us of until someone spelled it out for me because the possibility someone might flip a boat for a chance to talk to guys did not ever cross my mind)

And so it was that we went back into the water to swim the whole way back, now we were not just ignored, at one point some other girls took pity on us and told us we could hold onto thier boat as we swam to make it easier for us, and they were towing our boat (that we weren't allowed to paddle back ourselves) so they didn't mind a little extra weight of us holding on while we swam

We got to do that for all of 5 minutes before our leader yelled at them for showing us sympathy and told us that we needed to swim the whole way back on our own

Everyone had finished canoeing and was getting ready for the group picture by the time we got back, we had been swimming as fast as we could the whole time but we had to go back the entire distance that we had canoed out to

When the other girls helped me out of the water I looked like I was badly sunburnt because of how red I was, but it was just my whole body turning red from how cold the water was

I remember vividly that I was crying when the group photo was taken because my feet were burning with every step I took because they had been in the snow melt for so long that when I stepped onto the sand it felt like hot coals

(Yet another side note, having walked on hot coals bare foot before this was worse, the coals was over with fast and my nerves barely had time to react but with this I was so cold that I felt like going into the air I was burning except when the wind blew I was shivering so hard it felt like I was spasming)

We made it back to camp and shockingly none of us felt any better after changing into dry clothes, maybe being in cold water for 20 minutes isn't just something that goes away by getting out of the church approved swim suits

We were told by the church leader that we were allowed to take a shower to wash off the reservoir water and help us warm up, I had to turn the water to cold just to stop myself from feeling like I was being boiled alive

I got home and went straight to my mom to tell her of the injustice I faced, because whenever I told any other adults at camp they just laughed about how cute we must have thought the boys were

I finished telling her and her response was to tell me she already knew because the camp leader had texted her about it

However it was okay because she gave us her one shower she was allowed for the week (the campsite we were at was working on conserving water so the leaders were allowed one shower each and the girls were told they could just deal with not showering for five days) and that because the camp leader was really looking forward to her shower but she gave it up for us, it was all worked out in the long run and there was no fault or blame

I now have experienced things that hurt worse, but at that age the burning feeling around my entire feet as they sunk into the sand was one of the worst physical sensations I had ever felt I can still feel it if I think back because it was such a strong memory of the way my feet stung and my teeth shivered and I cried in front of all of my peers even as I tried my hardest to stop so that I didn't look like a cry baby infront of them

But she didn't get to have her shower

So it alllll evened out

Nobody remembers it besides me and my friends

I don't think we ever got an apology that wasn't followed by a 'but she was doing what she thought was best' or 'but she made it right by letting you have her one shower for the week'

Because it doesn't matter

Whatever the church leaders decide is right is what is right

It doesn't matter who gets hurt along the way

Let the lords will be done

And whoever speaks the will of God can't ever be wrong, and so any harm they do must be right

#exmo #long post #sorry this one is really fucking long #once i started writing it was cathartic to get it out without other ward member telling me to stop complaining #and that it was a long time ago and i shouldnt tarnish her reputation #every once in a while i remember this and go wait a minute that is pretty fucked up

[musingsofadepressedgay]

You do not have to stay up and wait. The end of the world is not coming. You do not have to act as a witness. Nothing bad will happen if you close your eyes. Go to sleep. The man called Jesus is dead. The terror of that night was over a long time ago. Humans hurt each other all the time. It doesn't mean anything. There is nothing you can do about it right now. It's late. The world will still be there in the morning.

Go to sleep.

[musingsofadepressedgay]

My first gf was scared of being affectionate with me in public, I didn't understand it at the time

Sure a group of dumb 12 yr olds called us slurs when they saw us but what does it matter

I didn't care what they thought and would tell the whole wide world to fuck off so I could hold her hand

But now I hesitate to put my pride stickers in my car window where I had planned to put them when I bought them

At first it was because I was worried because I couldn't see me car from where I worked and I didn't want anyone to vandalize it while I was working because I don't have money for repairs

But the more I thought about it the more I realized I can't trust that it won't be vandalized outside of my house

I've seen worse happen

Here in the 'idealistic suburbs'

I still feel the same way I did years ago with my first ex, but now I also feel the same fear that they did

The need to hide away anything diffrent so that nobody tries to break it

I still feel that same love, the same joy, the same pride

But I miss the naivety, the feeling that anything that came our way we could overcome

The feeling that together we were invincible against any hate that tried to stop us

And yet here I am today, with my pride stickers still in my dresser drawer

Swept under the rug

Tucked into the closet

Trying to walk the line of pride and survival

Caught in a mix of love and fear

#idk shitty poetry i guess #long post #tw homophobia

[musingsofadepressedgay]

Name your price darling, whatever you want I'll give it to you

All I ask is that you pretend you are here for something other than your next fix

You don't need to love me darling, you don't need to mean a word that comes out of your pretty mouth

You can wring me dry, take every last drop of anything you want, leave me used and burned up

Just let me believe that you want the same thing as me

I'm not stupid darling, I know you never cared but give me just one more night, just one more lie

I'm hooked on what you are selling, the idea of you wanting me is intoxicating enough I can ignore the truth that I was never anyone to you

Let me believe, leave me in the false fantasy, take what you want from me

And once you have had your fill, the novelty has worn off, once my devotion has lost its charm

I know you will leave me behind to find a new shiny toy to entertain you, or maybe you will find someone who you can love, but for today, let me dream that I am enough

That I am what you want, rather than the consolation prize you gave yourself when you couldn't get what you wanted

I'm not what you want, but let pretend I am

#idk shitty poetry i guess #lesbian yearnings #gay yearnings #long post #sad yearning

[musingsofadepressedgay]

I was told my whole life that my body was a temple, something holy, something to prove myself with, not something that was mine never something that I controlled or owned

My body was something that i gave up as a show of devotion, keeping my body exactly the way that they wanted it to be

My body is foreign to me

I walk through the halls of a temple no longer maintained, that I was never allowed inside of

It still doesn't feel like mine

I once claimed to be the new God of the temple that is my flesh and bone

It didn't last long before I gave up on that lie

My body is no temple, but it still isn't mine

Somedays it goes to the highest bidder

Somedays I try to change it to make it feel like it is actually mine

Most days it is just there, right enough to stay wrong enough that it never seems to fit right

And so it remains, despite my best efforts, a temple, a place to worship, but never a home for me

Never a place I can live

#exmo #long post #gender dysphoria

[musingsofadepressedgay]

“Wanna make a monster? Take the parts of yourself that make you uncomfortable—your weaknesses, bad thoughts, vanities, and hungers—and pretend they’re across the room. It’s too ugly to be human. It’s too ugly to be you. Children are afraid of the dark because they have nothing real to work with. Adults are afraid of themselves.”

— Richard Siken, Editor’s Pages: Black Telephone

[musingsofadepressedgay]

Yearning is CRAZY like what do you mean i’m in shambles over how badly i want to buy someone their favorite little snack

[musingsofadepressedgay]

Vast empty darkness

Interupted by your fire

I'm warm in its light

#idk shitty poetry i guess #lesbian yearnings #gay yearnings #tried my hand at a haiku idk how i feel about it #we will see perhaps ill delete this later

[musingsofadepressedgay]

How do I say I love you when it dies on my lips every time

I know love is more complex than this so it has to be a lie

So I rewrite the phrase, love feeling like something I am inequipt to give and too juvenile to declare

I want you

Feels too selfish, I know you have other places to be, you have enough strains on your time without factoring in me

I change it again

I miss you

Feels wrong, I don't miss you so much as yearn because I cannot miss what I never had because I was afraid

I don't want to lose you

Isn't right either, already defeated before we have even started

I care about you

The words feel stretched like a water balloon filled to the breaking point filled with so much hope that they are not strong enough to carry

I send it anyway, pretending not to notice the way it rips at the seams, wondering if you will see what I have hidden inside

Barely contained beneath the surface

I want to love you, it peeks through the gaps

Please let me try, pokes it's own hole

Oozing out from every message I write

The ink betraying me, forming into messages I try to cover up, worried that I will scare you away

But try as I might I cannot stop myself from picking up my pen again and starting again underneath the previously crossed out words

I

I

I

I don't know how long I can keep covering my intentions with weak excuses

I am afraid of you

Afraid of loosing you

Afraid of how fast you became so much to me

Afraid of becoming too much for you

Afraid of showing my heart and playing my hand

Afraid that when the chips are down I have played the fool and made us both pay

Afraid you will say no

Even more afraid you will say yes

So I never ask you

But the question pounds in my heart echoing in every letter I write

Could you try with me

Would you like that

To see if we could love eachother

Even to just pretend that we are right for eachother as we are

I scratch it out

Not yet

Not yet

How's it going is what I settle on

The discarded words clutter my brain

Do you want me the same as I want you

Would you like me if you saw more of who I am

More of the mess that dies before I can speak it

Burnt away on my tongue the taste of ashes strong never letting me forget

Every word I swallow

I don't feel worthy of loving

So I scratch out each line that's asks of you what seems impossible to me

And so I wait for a later that may never come and I fill it with every phrase I cannot say and I try to hide how much of me it has consumed

Too scared to love too scared to lose

#idk shitty poetry i guess #lesbian yearnings #gay yearnings #long post

[musingsofadepressedgay]

I have gotten equal amounts of this lesson and the 'chewed up gum lesson' nobody could seem to decide if we had inherent worth in gods eyes or if it was dependent on our 'purity' and obedience

The mormon church loves to believe in becoming 'new again' but they will never be okay with my default

They never actually want to wash away your sins, just everything that makes you diffrent from their idea of what a member should look like

Did anyone else have the church lesson where they crumple/soak/cut up a dollar bill? And then they’re like, see, it’s still a dollar bill— and equate that to how we still have the same worth, no matter how many sins we commit. All we have to do is properly repent for the slate to be wiped clean.

Except no matter how many times I repent, I will never not be gay. I could deny it forever. I could cut off a third of a dollar bill, and that third would be lost to the void. And sure, I could exchange it, but then it’s really not the same dollar bill. It’s just exchanging a damaged bill for an undamaged bill. It sort of just feels like a messed up form of religious capitalism, banking and overwriting my trauma. I don’t know, this has really been on my mind today.

#exmo

[musingsofadepressedgay]

Take a deep breathe in, feel the way your lungs expand and your chest moves with it

You're alive

The blood in your veins, the muscles and nerves and every other part of you just repeats this fact

You're alive

You don't have to be happy about it, you can be upset, regretfully, angry, but it still remains

Right now

You are alive

Let yourself live

I was raised to live within the rules, hold myself back and keep myself in check

Not giving into the wants of the flesh

But can you feel it

The warmth of your skin

The beating of your heart

You're alive

I may be no more than the sum of my parts

No celestial being, no god, no savior

I certainly haven't been able to save anybody when I have tried

But this moment right now

I'm alive

And I'll play the devil, you can give me the blame if you need an excuse

But live

Use the bathbomb you have been saving

Make yourself feel good

Sin a little

Sin a lot

You aren't made to spend your whole life in repentance for every toe out of line

Let yourself free of guilt, if even for just one night

You are alive

And the world is always changing, live before you lose the chance to

You are alive

Please savor it

Your body wants to live, give it the chance

#idk shitty poetry i guess #exmo

[musingsofadepressedgay]

I should have warned you darling

If I weren't selfish maybe I would have

Told you that I'm nothing more than a stray

That I would follow you home to sit outside your home in the cold and rain hoping you would let me in

That I would sit by your window hoping you will notice that I am sitting through every storm for you, silently begging you to take pity and bring me into your arms

It was cruel of me darling

To make you think the decision was inconsequential

That I wouldn't follow behind

Sitting at your feet longing for your scraps

I know I don't deserve more darling

But I am desperate for it all the same

Open your door and let me nose my way in

You really shouldn't darling, despite my pleas

Once you throw me a bone I won't stop nudging your hand for another

I'll greedily take anything I can

But it will never be enough

Be careful darling, once you allow me to hope

Once I taste what you are offering

Darling, I'm insatiable

#idk shitty poetry i guess #lesbian yearnings #gay yearnings

[musingsofadepressedgay]

"you shouldn't bite the hand that feeds you" if you insist on treating me like a beast then you can't be shocked when i play the part

#if the hand that feeds me is also the hand that attacks me it should come as no surprise when rather than a care taker it becomes a cage

[musingsofadepressedgay]

Don't worry about saving me for later, I'm not a delicacy for a special occasion I'm not made to be handled with care

Darling take your fill, indulge yourself in whatever you would like

I will never last forever, don't bother in taking your time

Consume every last drop of me it doesn't matter if you don't leave anything behind

Darling I'm expendable and there is no one better way for me to go out than to be torn apart in your arms

I've bared my soul to you and I can see the way you are dying to bare your teeth in return

Don't be shy

Have a bite

If my last sight is you what a wonderful view to fill my mind

You know I wasn't made to last

Drink up every last drop till you have had your fill, I don't mind

I'll be whatever you want as long as I can be yours

As long as you don't leave a part of me unchanged

As long as you consume all of me

Overpowered in your presence

Every part of me just another part of you

#idk shitty poetry i guess #lesbian yearnings #gay yearnings

[musingsofadepressedgay]

Darling I was made to worship

Everything I've ever known was given to me while I knelt

Things look so much more beautiful from on my knees

Darling you were made to be worshipped

The blinding radiance of you demands it

The intoxicating feeling of being in your presence

The overwhelming desire you spark in me

To create a universe just so you can be the center of it

Darling I would be your devotee

Is there any divinity more pure than that of my arms around you

Is there any god more true than the idea of your arm around my shoulder or my head leaning against your chest

I cannot think of anything more pure, any act more divine in nature than the way you feel against me

I have no need of any omnipotent being, any higher power, when I have you to occupy my mind

I don't need any blessing besides that of your touch

You were made to be worshipped

And darling, I have no higher purpose than worshipping you

#idk shitty poetry i guess #kinda exmo #lesbian yearnings #gay yearnings

[musingsofadepressedgay]

Don't be afraid to cut my heart out

I wasn't using it for much

So if you need to hold it in your hand and feel the way it pumps

Or watch the way my blood flows through my veins I'll let you open me up

Let you see my innermost workings and what keep beneath my surface

And if you drop it, I'll be alright

It was enough to feel your touch

You can keep my heart

If you want to

I'll be fine just know a part of me is with you

And the part of me that you left behind will settle for the memory of your touch as you removed what you wanted to keep

I could never be mad at you darling

No matter what state you leave me in I could never escape from the warm embrace you give my mind when I think of you

You can take me apart darling all I ask is that you allow me one moment in your arms while my heart is still beating

#idk shitty poetry i guess #lesbian yearnings #gay yearnings #yeah this one probably falls under the codependency tag that if i had it would be pretty goddamn full

[musingsofadepressedgay]

They are fixing a road nearby where I live, it's been broken as long as I can remember,

we would all ask the bus driver to hit the big puddles on the side where the broken asphalt met the dirt

My brother would cuss out the cars parked on the side of the road with minced oaths as he learned how to drive because they took up over half of the small road

They are fixing because a new temple is being built not too far from it

The old road is no longer good enough, because despite not ever connecting to the new temple and being a back road that not many people use it needs to be fixed with a new temple coming in somewhat near it

The road will be easier to drive on now

And there might be enough room for people to drive around the cars without needing to slow down to a walking pace

For some reason I am left mourning the old road, the pot holes and the way it crumbled into the dirt, the way I splash through the puddles on rainy days in my car and remember a younger me cheering as the bus driver did the same thing

The nostalga glossed over to make way for something pretty and new, nothing shiny or old allowed nearby the new temple

No imperfections allowed, however nostalgic they may be

Glossed over like everything else that doesn't match the picture perfect image

I was 11 when I got my first makeup set, for me to wear to church, not to school

In church makeup means looking your best, in school it means you are cheap and looking for boys

It's the same makeup but if you wear it at church it will only be permitted boys who will see you

My mom put on my makeup before my cousins baptism, had my aunts look over to make sure I was dolled up for the event, afterwards she bought me makeup and told me to follow what they had done, soft neutral tones, make up meant to look modest and demure

Palatable

Covering up the imperfections

They say come as you are, but as soon as you get close enough they will change it to come as we like you to be

Save the meltdowns for the car

It was a common enough experience parents would joke about it

Kids melt downs are for before church, once you entered it was happy faces

Gloss over every emotion that isn't pleasant

Keep it locked away until you were far enough away to be permitted to let the mask fade

Cover it up with something shiny, no loud noises, no loud emotions, only crying allowed is when you feel faithful enough to go in front of everyone and softly cry as you talk about how good the church is to you and then get praised for being so open even when you say the same repeated lines

Nothing loud, nothing unique, nothing that shows the imperfections that lay beneath

If you bury them deep enough maybe no one hut you will know they are there, and that exactly how it is supposed to be

Imperfectly alone

And perfectly synchronized

Sometimes it still hurts to not be part of the ruetine part of me craves the generic praise and empty smiles the doing things Right instead of Wrong

Being a part of something instead of alone with nothing

Leave your personality at the door but become Whole with Everyone Else

A Family

Forever

Isn't it enough to be imperfect, can I atleast not be the only one

Crying only happens behind closed doors behind empty smiles

Covered up like the cracks on the asphalt

Like the puddles that no other kids will cheer when the bus driver veers off road slightly to get a big splash

Like anything else that isn't Just Right

#exmo #long post