Filling the Void

You never know how much someone was a part of your life until they are gone. In their place there is a big gaping void that leaves you feeling incomplete.

When I say “incomplete” I mean it in a very real way. When “Dorian” and I were together, just about all the time I was not at work or school was spent with him or driving to see him or planning on seeing him over the phone. Any “spare” time I had was based on his schedule; for example, I’d go to the gym or hang out with friends when he was in class or visiting his family (who despised me, more on that later). This was “filler” time for when I could not be with him. Often I would bring him around my friends to hang out with both at the same time. (This brought about another headache, again, for later). Now that “Dorian” and I have parted ways, I experience the void as a lot of free time. Those with little free time are right to want to jump up and punch me in the face for not seeing this as a blessing. Maybe in time I will. But how do I begin to fill this void?

I had an epiphany today, while at the gym. It was not really an epiphany but more of a cognizance of something I have heard before from various people. Allow me to explain the mental avalanche that lead to my pseudo-epiphany. I was contemplating the void and various ways with which to fill it. After pondering the obvious (like my poor burned house, my fitness goals, fraternity stuff, maybe some volunteering), I wondered what was filling the void before “Doryan” and I got together. This is from whence the epiphany came. I stopped dead on the elliptical as what many friends have known and I have refused to acknowledge suddenly hit home: the void has always been filled with someone not something. Before “Dorian” there was “Murry” and before him there was someone else and so forth. (In fact there was a point where both Murry and Doryan were filling the void, a fact of which I am neither proud nor boasting about, simply stating). For the last eight years of my life I have either been in a relationship or dealing with someone on a non-platonic level. When I was not filling the void by pouring myself emotionally, financially, sexually, intellectually and/or spiritually into a relationship, I was out looking for the next “void-filler” and was not complete until I found him. This is not to say I did not love them. I have loved several times and been in love twice. I guess you can say my motives were not entirely pure in entering these situations however; I needed someone to fill this void in my life.

Looking further back I realized that the void was not always as large as it has become. In high school I was a social hermit. I had made the decision a very long time ago (before I even remember consciously making this choice) that I was not going to pretend to be what I am not; that is, heterosexual. At the same time, I did not want to deal with what I perceived to be the incredible ignorance and homophobia of my peers when it came to this subject. The result was that I only went to school to attend classes and to keep to myself. Even though I participated in extracurricular activities such as the National Honor Society and wrestling, I had constructed an impenetrable barrier so that no one could know who I really was. I had no friends outside of the associates I communicated with during school hours and though I was lonely at times, I was also very self-reliant.

During this period in my life, I lived in my head and no where else. I was fine watching my sci-fi shows, reading my Stephen King books and doing my schoolwork. I remember reading Dante’s Inferno and being challenged by my junior English teacher to write our own version of Hell. I practically re-wrote the entire thing only with my vision of who should be punished and where. I had that much free time on my hands. Needless to say, I received an A for my efforts and glowing compliments from my teacher. When I was not tearing through assignments I was either reading, playing video games or watching Star Trek. I realized I was a geek and that I was missing out on the social aspects of my life and that I could find some friends somewhere but I did not see the need. I was getting very good grades that would eventually lead to a free college education and more importantly, I was happy. This is not to say I did not have my dark days. I got depressed like any other gay teenager but I always managed to pull myself out of it. My being happy was totally my responsibility and for the most part, I took care of myself. This was not the case however, once I started college.

With college came unbounded freedom to be myself. Ten years of repressed sexuality came out and fairly quickly I became notorious among the LGB community at College Park. I simply loved the idea of finally being able to express myself sexually and possibly even have a boyfriend. This is where the void came into being. Before I was complete and needed little from the outside world (except for family), but in order to make time for my new “hobby” (men), I had to create the space. Thus, I started diverting more of my time and energy into processing situations that I found myself in, whether positive or negative. Looking back, most were negative although with them came valuable life lessons which were as important as my positive experiences. Pretty soon, however, a cycle of addiction came into being. The more I interacted with the LGB community, especially the men, the more time and energy I devoted to it and the less time I spent on myself. Now, some people have had it worse than me. I never failed out of school, or did drugs or anything SUPER destructive, however, slowly but surely I shifted responsibility for my own happiness into the hands of others and every time, I would be let down. This experience in itself has taught me much about myself and people in general, however I am somewhat of a hard-head when it comes to life lessons. It appears I still have not learned because here I am almost nine years later, repeating the same mistakes. After yet another failed relationship, I feel detached and floating in the world; I feel purposeless.

So now what? A history lesson is no good without having learned from it. All philosophical contemplations aside, I am someone that deals in specific plans and actions and words; I have trouble dealing with abstract emotional concepts as they apply to real life. Maybe that’s why I am so hard-headed. So what is the plan? Well this blog is step one. I’ve always found writing to be very therapeutic in the past though I have not written poetry or “blog-like” articles in a long time. I guess writing was one of those things I sacrificed to create the aforementioned void. I actually had a novel in mind a few years back that I started to write. Who knows? Secondly, I am going to continue this Mary-J-Blige/Tweet/Keyshia-Cole “I’m going to take care and love myself marathon”. As cliché as many R&B artists (mostly women) make this process, it truly has been remarkable how much I have been neglecting myself and my needs and how much better the world seems once I stopped doing that. Since painting the burn marks and cabinets in my kitchen (the one my blessed little sister made) I’ve been a lot less depressed when going to the kitchen. Since getting to bed early (a luxury that living in Laurel and filling the void with someone who lives far away did not permit), I have had much more energy and a more positive out look on live and much more motivation to hit the gym. It has been these “me” types of activities that have kept me sane and have made the healing process all the more bearable.

Now, I will not make the unrealistic and cliché denouncement of all men that everyone seems to make after experiencing a particularly heart-wrenching break up. No, I am not about to retract all I have said thus far; instead, I am just going to be real. Just because I am going through it and have decided to do a lot of “me” things, does not mean that “me” will not need some “attention”. Even if its from a “maintenance” man. The key is that I will make sure that I have taken care of all my personal responsibilities to Julio before I go devoting any of my resources to someone else. And that’s REAL.