Hello? Anyone still out there?

Sooooo... I decided to log back into my GR account tonight and Lo and Behold, I saw this link. 

I'd completely forgotten that I had this blog until tonight. I've been so caught up in my life and everything that's been going on with university and family that everything was pushed to the side... This blog being one of the first casualties, along with the majority of my social network accounts (except facebook haha).

Looking back at my last post in August 2011, I thought about how much my life has changed over the last 2 years - how much I'VE changed over that time. I would have never thought it possible that I would grow and change as much as I have in such a short period of time. Two years ago I was only just starting to come out to myself and those around me. I was scared, plain and simple... scared of how drastically things would change and terrified of how I would be perceived by others. 

But a lot has happened since then...

I gradually made more lgbt friendly friends at uni over the years and I found their presence a great help in learning to be more open with who I am. I managed to save up enough money to go on an exchange semester in America to Ithaca, NY for the first half of this year which I know has had the most influence in shaping who I am today. Ithaca College would have to be one of the most gay friendly institutions I've ever seen. I think they'd literally paint the buildings in rainbows if they could. It was here that I was truly out to everyone I met and within the first few months there, I found myself with my very first boyfriend. I knew that it was never going to last however, and we split just before I moved back to Australia because long distance is just way too complicated.

Coming back home to my family where I'm still in the closet was ridiculously hard. Sometimes I regret the fact that I can't tell them who I really am while I'm living in the same house. Things would be so much easier if I were able to move out and have my own place to escape to. Since I've just graduated with an degree in Nutrition and Dietetics, it looks like moving out might be only just around the corner... once I actually manage to find a job that is. And that opens a whole different kettle of fish regarding discrimination and everything that I have to worry about there, which I'm putting off thinking about. 

A really great quote by Sean Kennedy, one of my favourite authors, sums up pretty nicely how my journey's been:

"And I know when you’re a teenager everybody feels different and alien to the other people around them but there seems to be an added dimension when you’re queer. It’s because for that period of time you’re more isolated than anybody else and you truly think you are the only one of your kind. So you create fantastic barriers and defence strategies for yourself to survive. And when you get older and realise that you can take them down it’s an internal and eternal struggle to do so. Fear is the best anti-motivator in the world."

When I started this blog, I was an 18 year old going through an identity crisis. Right now, I couldn't be happier. Before, I could have never dreamed of being this comfortable in who I am and who I'm becoming. I'm now 21 years old... I still don't know who the fuck I am, and I'm okay with that. It's taken me 3 years, and I don't really know when things started to change, but I've learned (to some degree) to deal with whatever the fuck life throws at me.

Cheers Guys!

BJ

Learning to Deal... With Politics

Okay... I realise that most of the posts I do are practically just me whinging... and This is going to be no different... haha sorry guys! But in my defense this is legitimate and something I've been thinking about for a while now...

As a homage to Family Guy, I will entitle this: 'What Grinds My Gears' ;)

Ever since NY legalised same sex marriages, my mind's been kind of working overtime trying to figure out what the fuck the Australian government is doing to follow America's example in the human rights department. I've determined that they're doing fuck. all.

After a little research (thankyou Wikipedia) I discovered that every single bill to get same sex couples the right to marry have been either suspended indefinitely or outright rejected. In the state I live in, Queensland, the most I can hope for is a 'de-facto' relationship... not even a domestic partnership. Plus, marriages performed overseas aren't recognised in Australia because of a bill passed in 2004 redefining the term marriage to specifically exclude same sex relationships.



I may not be in a relationship at the moment, but just thinking about the blatant bigotry these bogan backbench bureaucrats are showing really pisses me off for everyone that is put in such a difficult position by fellow Australians. What the fuck happened to the laid back, easy going, multicultural Australia I knew growing up? If we're so tied to America as a political power and a social influence, why aren't we taking a leaf from their book and legalising shit that ought not to have been prohibited in the first place? If all men are created equal, why do we have to continually petition to get what should be ours by default? grrrrrrrr...

Sorry guys, I'm not usually so politically driven, but as I said earlier, it's been gnawing away at me for a while and I wanted to write about something real for a change... for everyone, rather than me bitching about my life specifically... even if you're not from Australia... ;)

Talk soon :)

BJ

Oops...

Okay, I'll be the first to admit that I have been really slack... :S  My computer signed me out of my account a while ago and i'd forgotten my password so rather than spend the 20 seconds necessary to answer my security question and change my password, i figured that since no-one read my blog anyway i'd leave it for a while... haha

I got a little bit excited when I signed in just now and saw some new faces! :D *happy dance* welcome all to my ummm how to describe it? Teetering-on-the-brink-of-dynfunctional-and-slightly-crazy-life :P haha I hope you don't get too bored ;)

Well I guess I'd better fill you in a bit on what's been happening in BJ land since my last post...

I finally got a job! In a retail store selling "outback" country clothing! I'm the only guy working there so I keep copping the whole "brokeback mountain" joke from my brother all the time... A couple of months ago I would have gotten really offended but since I started coming out to a few people and gaining more confidence in the process, I've learned to dish his shit right back... I told him he should come into the store some time because his boyfriend might enjoy him in a pair of assless chaps ;) hahahahaha

Hey, I wouldn't mind if my future boyfriend owned chaps... ;) haha (That's mainly for you Ang :P)



Anyways... Uni has just started back after a months holiday... It's good to get back into the swing of things but at the same time I'm dreading having to actually think again... it's been great just reading for a month and not having to function too much... oh plus, I don't want to waste all the money I earn on Coffee... (first week back and i think I've spent nearly $60 just on coffee... I have a problem and need to deal with this slight addiction. :S hahahaha :)

Promise I'll have something a little more exciting to tell you guys next time ;) but in the meantime,

Thanks,

BJ :D

With Coming Out...

Yesterday was THE big day! :D well... technically, it was 4am this morning, but that's beside the point.

Today, I came out to one of my best friends.

I can't say that it was one of those stand-still movie sequences where the world stops moving for that split second before the sudden impact of the worlds just spoken hits you like a freight train... But it was in slow motion... (no - it wasn't because I was drunk... yes, I may or may not have been drinking fairly heavily the entire night but I had complete control of my faculties at the time). 

We were laying in her bed just talking... we've been through alot of tough times together and helped each other alot over the years, but up until now, due to past experiences, I haven't been able to completely trust anyone I've known for ages. Apparantly, a gay couple at the party thought I was dating her ex because we were hanging out the entire night... She told them that, no, neither of us were gay... his boyfriend told him his gaydar was broken (funny, he was dead on about me but pretty sure my gaydar actually IS broken!) haha

Anyway, when she told me about it while settling into bed, I asked her if she was sure... she brushed it off. Later, I don't know how we got onto the topic, but we were discussing each other's "types"... She described both her perfect guy and perfect girl (she's bi)... I sucked it up and told her my perfect partner is "tall, they have to look after themselves, have brown eyes and reddish brown hair... (at this point I hesitated - purposely keeping the description vague so I could pussy out if need be - and had a bit of an overly dramatic internal battle, but eventually sucked it up and finished with)... and they have to be a guy."

I could have died right there. She just looked at me. For ages. The same expression plastered onto her face. A mixture of shock and something I couldn't quite identify at the time... I wasn't entirely sure how she'd react because i'd tried subtly bringing it up months ago but she'd groaned and dismissed it... After the initial shock began to wear off, she gathered me into a bone crushing bear hug and all but screamed "congratulations" in my ear... 4 O'clock in the morning. Drinking. Loud Noises and Bright Light. Not a good combination.

We spent practically all morning talking about anything and everything - she accepted me so naturally that we moved on from my giddy "high" feeling brought on by intense relief, fatigue and of course my good friend alcohol - to her sex life and relationship problems! (Which, I think, is exactly what I needed at the time)...

I'm finally moving forward. This is a MASSIVE step for me. It may only be one person, but baby steps can take you a long way.

I just want to say that Ang, you are an amazing person and I count you as my best friend. If not for you, I would never have had the courage to do anything... I'd still be living the lie my life was before... too afraid to be myself because I was so caught up in the way others percieved me. Thanks to you, I'm  finally taking control of my life. After all these years... I'm finally dealing :D

Thanks everyone for your support,

BJ

With Confidence

Okay, so I admit that I've kind of been ignoring my blog because I was embarrassed... but after logging on here this afternoon and seeing that yes, I did infact have more than 1 person following me, I decided to give it another go and hopefully get back into the swing of writing :)

So I think I should probably straighten out the whole frothing girls thing... It turns out that if you just ignore them and play hard to get, they lose interest... I still feel bad about it because I don't really talk to them any more and my mate is still a little bit awkward when I'm around his girlfriend, but it's more or less over :)

I think I should also add that I love uni! (other than the classes and exams and stress, of course...) Last night, I went to a party the uni threw! The theme was Hookers and Deviates - so there was an excuse for the girls to wear nothing but lingerie and the guys to turn up shirtless or wearing cheerleader's uniforms ;)! It was awesome! I went as Vince from Shamwow! ;) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vm03Dgu_yXA because i could never pull off the muscle look and I'm pretty sure I'd put more than a few people into the emergency department from idiopathic brain anneurisms if I wore a dress - but in my modest costume everyone mistook me for security because of the headpiece :S haha I even got chatted up by a guy using that as a pickup line! hahaha but he was smoking so that's a big no. :P

After last night I realise now how far I've come and how much i've grown in confidence over the past few months... In the past I couldn't string together anything that even resembled a coherent sentence while speaking to a guy because of the constant fear always nagging at the back of my mind that I'd slip up, offend someone, show someone something about myself that would give me away and result in me eating concrete ... I was talking to guys wearing next to nothing - hell I think i'm even crushing on the guy who came as a fireman stripper! That would have had me in hysterics before... but i was strangely at ease and I think it's because I've finally fully accepted my sexuality :D Hey, I was comfortable enough to flirt... granted everyone was pretty drunk and i was relatively sober, so they probably won't even remember it today... but that's beside the point...

One thing i didn't appreciate finding out last night after alcohol had loosened everyone's lips (and not in the good way) was that people i went to school with were spreading rumours about me... yet again. But it's alright... I got through it before, and once people meet and get to know me better they'll see that really, i'm not that bad... :)

Until next time ( I'll work on not being so slack), thanks guys!

BJ

With Girls

Holy Crap. What do I do? I'm at a complete loss...

Here's the thing... I'm caught in the middle of something that i have absolutely no intentions of getting involved in... I'm really confused and really worried that if i do something wrong i'll hurt someone's feelings and lose a friendship... maybe all of my friendships if i told the truth...

So here it is... I have 2 girls after me... Like, claws out, snarling teeth and wild eyes after me. And i don't really know how to tell them that they're both REALLY not my 'type' without at least hurting their feelings... damn.

But that's not the worst part. The worst part is the fact that one of the girls is currently dating one of my really good mates. :( I feel so bad - both for him and myself - because he doesn't realise that she's playing him and because if he finds out (i've been told by several people) that she's willing to dump him for a fling with me... (uuuhhhhhhh... not. going. to. happen.) i'm worried that he'll blame me for trying to steal his girlfriend away...

How the hell am I supposed to clear my name without saying she's REALLY not my 'type-type'...? That although, yeah, she's pretty... i'm gayyyyy.... I can see that going down well with my christain friends.

Uurgh. Just leave me alone. Why can't they go find someone else (straight!) to torture. Their gaydar must be as dysfunctional as mine because i didn't think i was doing that good of a job at hiding my sexuality... This is all so complicated. :S

I guess I'll just have to wait it out and let you know how it goes...finally, learning to deal... with girls *shudder*

Laters, BJ... :)

With Procrastination :)

Alright... so I lost my nerve there for a couple of days, haven't posted anything interesting *deleted* and am just generally freaking out haha... which tends to happen when I get stressed...

I've just started the really busy part of my uni semester (the few days before every exam and every assignment piece is due - and I realise i haven't started any of it) *facepalm... haha you think i'd have learned from last year that you can't bludge the entire year and expect to get Distinctions in every subject (unfortunately)...

So here I am... spending all of my time reading the entire PsyCop series by Jordan Castillo Price, creeping people's bookshelves on goodreads and obsessively checking facebook, blogger and my emails. All of this in the hope that i can procrastinate just that little bit longer - forget for just a few more precious seconds that i'm about to get raped by my mid semester exams... Which is more than just a definite possibility... :S

Speaking of procrastinating from subjects :

Oh, the irony! My degree is a Bachelor of Nutrition and Dietetics, right? Get this... Quite possibly one of the most boring and tedious subjects i (or anyone for that matter) could possibly have been exposed to during my course is - get this - NUTRITION! The lecturer is so boring! I may as well not even turn up to classes, because you don't listen - usually I just sketch during it and ignore the lecturer completely (my friends text me requests) Here was my latest "masterpiece" I was given 10 minutes to draw our lecturer being stabbed by a leprechaun... hahahaha (shoddy quality is due to shotty photography - thanks Pat) hahaha (and the shoes are crap... but never mind them - emphasis on sketch)

I felt really guilty while drawing it - mainly because I'm a nice person and after having done defensive Combined Martial Arts (Karate) for 7 years resulting in a total of 5 broken bones, several concussions and a few dislocated fingers, i really don't like violence that much :) haha

However, it was after a while, when i started getting texts for pictures of a our lecturer as a tranny that i started getting worried and all terrible thoughts about this pic left my mind completely and i became more concerned for the people that i hang out with... :P

So although I even love the word "procrastinate," i unfortunately can't practise it right this very moment - BIG exam on saturday, 2 assignments due on monday and another exam on wednesday :O FML. :)

Until Next Time, See ya... BJ