From: snodgras@lclark.edu (Bil Snodgrass)
Newsgroups: soc.motss
Subject: Personal CO 2 "letter home"
Date: 22 Jan 93 18:39:50 GMT
Article-I.D.: lclark.1993Jan22.183950.8735
Organization: Lewis & Clark College, Portland OR

Yes, I should be sharing this with my friends, but I really am not
very good at that kind of stuff so I choose to victimize you all out
there in soc.motss land.  

First thanks for all the support in e-mail and rn :-)  

Second....I just have to express this outside of me so here it goes....

Mailed 1/23/93

Dear Mom and Dad;

To start off, I must say whoa.  I cannot continue down this path.

I haven't felt this much pain and anger for years.  Things between us just
aren't fair and I cannot afford to get into a situation where I feel 
subjected to these negative feelings.

My life is pretty comfortable now.  I have worked hard to stabilize my life
and give myself a sense of freedom to dream and reach for my dreams.  I have
surrounded myself with people from many different plains of reality.  People
with depth, people with wide open visions and people who seek truth through
knowledge and wisdom.  My life is filled with people who love for love's 
sake.  People who call to converse with me.  People who find it a joy to sit 
across the dinner from me and share supper with me.  People who travel 
thousands of miles to visit with me.

My friends are so diverse.  They differ so much from one another on social, 
economical and political issues.  They are straight, gay lesbian, bisexual
and transexual.  i know women who have been married to one another for years
and who are raising their children in a two parent household filled with love.
My very good friends Terry and David are in a commitment and are raising 
three boys.  My friends include teachers, counselors, business people, 
artists, musicians, politicians and just plain people.  They differ from 
one another so much that sometimes they don't get along with one another.
But they are my friends.

With all these differences there are a few things we all have in common.
My friends are very honest, open and caring people.  They care for me
as I do for them.  I seem to make their lives just a little more whole
just as they help to weave a wonderful depth into my life.  They are each
so fiercely independent, which is probably the most beautiful thing about
my friends.  They stick out in a crowd because they chose to be the people
God meant them to be and not people who conform to any narrow minded dogma.

In these last few years I have been very open with you.  I have gone to
counseling to work on problems in my life that can usually be attributed
to some fairly traumatic things that happened to me as a child.  Things 
that you have never dealt with, things which you choose to ignore because
you cannot relate to these events.  In other words if it didn't affect you
it didn't exist, which is so so very wrong.  Well I say to hell with that 
attitude.  Ten years ago I had deep problems and I lashed out in anger, not
knowing why I felt so lost, so alone.  After several years of counseling and 
soul searching I found out why I was angry.  Rather than coming back at you
and saying hey, this certain event screwed me up...I let go.  I decided
to let go of any resentment I felt towards you two because of my love for 
lyou and because I know you did the best you could...100%.  I know that 
and that has allowed me to heal on my own.

But what has happened is that I have made a relationship with you which
requires me to carry all of the weight.  I am the one who calls, I am the
one who visits.  I have been hit by a barrage of half-truths as to why 
you cannot visit me.  I have let them roll off my back.  (face it, you don't
visit me because you don't want to visit your faggot son an see his 
'lifestyle', which is tame compared to my siblings, and all the sick 
perversion you envision are things you have invented to go along with the way
"I live"...just makes me want to scream in agony!)

I have left parts of me home when visiting you so I could be with you and
not cause waves.... I have given you space to work out my Gayness (which
now I feel was wrong of me, because you did not care enough about me to
read up on what I was going through, to find out what the hell was happening)
When I came out to you two Dad went from believing I was Willy his son
to me, a HOMOSEXUAL.  I am queer and that is the way God in his merciful way
created me!  When I came out I did it so I could start sharing my life with
you.  That has not occured.  In other words we are living a lie.

Until you can actively participate in my life I cannot hold us together.  I
have to go on.  I dread the loss of having you in my life, but I dread the
pain you inflict on me.  god if only you knew how much this letter hurts.
I have to choose between living a healthy lifestyle or one of constant
pain like I am living now.

So surrounded by people who love and share with me I shall go on with my life
without you until you are capable of participating in a relationship at a 
family level with me.  It may happen in a few weeks or it may never happen.
But I cannot go one with the lie.  I have been open and honest with you foru
years.  YOu haven't been with me.  One thing I have learned in life is if 
people don't call and people don't visit and people don't share....take the
hint.  They don't want yu in their lives....Well I am taking the hint.

With much regret, more than I think you can realize at this point, I am 
letting go.  Letting go until you are capable of a true loving relationship.
I will not accept any cards, letters, boxes or phone calls.  I will only
accept an honest out reach from you and only when you finally decide you can
share your life with me and why you decide to share my life with me.

My love for yo will carry on through eternity

Willy
Newsgroups: soc.motss