The So Called Life Of AppleBoy

Find below the chapel talk I did last week where I work.  It was in front of about 250 people.  We had a great service and then a great walk for the 2009 AIDS Walk here in Delaware.  I have changed names to protect myself and those around me.  Enjoy!

Good Morning!  Today is the AIDS Walk and it is one of my favorite days of the year! This walk has become a very important day for me since I have been here at school.  The amount of spirit that comes from this community makes a huge impact on myself, our community and those living with HIV and AIDS.  This summer I got to spend a week with my friend in New York.  My friend and I became really good friends last year and we decided that I needed to visit the north!  Hi my name is AppleBoy and I am addicted to Facebook!  Since I am addicted to Facebook I started posting about the trip from the moment I got in the car to leave.  I would put what we did that day and I would post many of the amazing pictures I took.  I would constantly get comments from people leaving messages for me to pass to to my friend.  When I would check Facebook either on my computer or with my iPhone I would pass those messages to my friend.  One day I was reading him messages and he said “Wow I really did make an impact on those people”.  I was so intrigued by this comment that I posted a status message one evening that read “AppleBoy is going to bed after a totally awesome day with my friend!  I keep passing messages to him and he keeps saying “I guess I really did make a good impact on people”.  Note to self don’t under estimate your impact on people.”  Since that day I have been thinking a lot on the impacts we make.  Every morning I get up and come to work and in this process I start impacting a lot of things and people around me.  So you are thinking how does that make an impact on anything?  It impacts a lot so lets break this down to some of the more simple impacts that this process makes.

I get out of bed I turn on the light.  I have now impacted the power grid as I am using electricity.  I take a shower I have now impacted the water supply, the natural gas supply that heats my water and my gas bill.  I get in my car I crank it and I have now impacted the air we breath.  I now get on the road to head to work and any move I make without watching could impact many people on the road around me.  As you can see we constantly are making an impact on people and things around us but most of time we don’t even know it.  I called my mom a few weeks ago and told her about this talk and that I was going to talk about the impacts we make and she brought up a very important point and that is that sometimes we can make a negative impact.  I was thinking about negative impacts and how they sometimes happen.  We can say something sometimes in the heat of the moment that is very out of a character for us or goes against what we stand for and this can make a negative impact on people that can sometimes not be repaired.  I remember when I came out to my family my dad saying to me that I was going to hell and he didn’t care if I was his son or not.  He then said he hated gay people and that he was not changing his views just because I was his son.  Now think how this would impact you if your parent or guardian said something like that to you.  It impacted me very deeply.  It shattered the bond I had with my dad, it made me question anything he ever said to me, and it made me think about what love really is.

As you can tell it is important to think about the impacts we are making often and this can include to think before we speak because once it is out of your mouth you cannot take it back!  I was also talking to Mr. D a couple of weeks ago about this talk and he said something that I had not thought about either,  and that is sometimes it is the smallest things we say or do that make the greatest impact.  This is why we have to think about our impact because it can be bad or good and it does not take much to make a huge impact.  After thinking about this I was trying to remember something I said that seemed trivial at the time good or bad that made a huge impact on someone and it hit me.  Thank goodness it was a good one and not a bad one!  The story goes like this it was the summer of 1998 the year after I graduated high school.

I went on my usual summer mission trip with my church.  My church and another Associate Reformed Presbyterian church from another close by town teamed up.  What we did on our mission trips was provide a Vacation Bible School for a church that did not have the manpower or money to make a Vacation Bible School happen.  I was teamed up with Thomas who is 5 years younger than I and we were going to teach the middle school aged kids.  At the end of the week Thomas and I were talking about how the week went.  I said to Thomas at some point during this “to always remember that joy that God gives you so you can share it with other people.”  Thomas and I have always kept in touch even if it was sporadic at best.

During one of these times where we caught up with each other we were talking and Thomas said “AppleBoy I remember something you said to me on the last day of Vacation Bible School at HUMC and he said “you told me to Always remember that joy that God gives you so you can share it with other people.”  This nearly 9 years after I said this to him.  I was dumbfounded that something I did not even remember saying was remembered by Thomas.  He still to this day 11 years later remembers that and is currently in seminary to become a pastor.  As you can see sometimes it is not the huge things we say or do that make the biggest impacts but the smallest.

Today each one of you that has bought Cheerwine, donated money and those that are walking are doing small things that are making a huge impact on our community and those people living with HIV and AIDS here in Delaware.  Today as you cross the Brandywine River bridge you will be given a carnation to drop in the water.  Before tossing your carnation think about the impact you have made today and think about those living with HIV and AIDS and the amazing impact they have made on our lives!  So go out today and enjoy your walk knowing you have helped make an impact on someone’s life and always remember that joy that God gives you so that you can share it with other people!  AMEN!

So there is a time in my life where I know I was happy and everything was right.  That was back in 2000.  I had a job that I loved and it was a job I figured I would be at for a long time.  I am one of those people that music has a impact on.  I use music to remember times and feelings of my life.  There is this one song that brings on a rush like no other and it is from 2000.  It is Janet Jackson’s “Doesn’t Really Matter”.  I am not sure why this one song brings this rush.  When I hear it being the analytical person I am I find myself trying to figure out why this song does this to me.  So tonight the movie that this song was on was playing on Starz.  The Nutty Professor II: The Klumps.  Of course I hear a segment of the song during the movie then the full version during the ending credits.  Now I am sitting here typing this with tears rolling down my face because I think I know what the missing link is or at least pieces of it are.

1. My friends from North Carolina which have been my true friends from day one and love me for me!

2.  My family which is no longer just down the road.

3.  I loved where I lived.  Charlotte NC is and will always be near and dear to my heart.

4.  I loved the job where I was before being fired because I was gay.  Now don’t get me wrong I LOVE MY CURRENT JOB!  It tops the first job but there was still something special about it.

5. The part that I think has been missing my dad!  Yes, I am pretty sure that is the next missing part of the equation.

Now to understand this I will explain why I think this is it.  In 2000 I was just coming out as gay.  I known for a long time but I was ready to come out.  During this time I was loved by my father.  While not close we talked and I knew he was there.  I was gay and my father loved me and talked to me.  That part is what is key!  HE LOVED ME AND I WAS HIS SON.  If you have read my blog you will know that when I came out to my family my dad told me hated me and that he wanted nothing to do with me.  I suddenly not only lost a job because I was gay I lost my dad!  All this loss just because I was gay.  Now for some reason I don’t think I will ever be my fathers son anymore.  I cannot be what he wants me to be.  Instead he has a gay son with HIV that for nearly 9 years has been searching for someone to step up to the plate and by my father.  I guess I have stopped praying that God will make things right between my dad.  I know that even if we did start talking again I am not sure the pain or the wounds will go away.  It really makes one feel lost hurt and incomplete.  I guess in someways I know what it is like to lose a father.  So amazingly enough I think I finally know what my problem is and why the year 2000 is a time when I honestly felt the most happy and felt the most complete.  It is amazing what coming out of the closet can do.  Do I wish that I lived in the closet?  Hell no but damn it I want my cake and I want to eat it too!  So I guess this is now my annual Fathers Day entry even though it is a little early but I could not help the rush of emotions I get when I hear that song and my brain constantly trying to figure out why it makes me feel like I do.  Someday I hope to feel complete again but I not sure that will happen because of this one large wound in my heart my father gave me.  Till then I will keep on living a semi empty life without my father and lean on the father figures that I have stepped in his place.