Tag Archives: gay

Jose, Comic Book Colorist and Illustration Chair, Baltimore

photo by Kevin Truong

Jose, in his own words: “Being gay means having an opportunity to look at life from a different angle, sideways if you’d like. Being part of a minority always gives you a view with a unique perspective, and makes you examine many things that others take for granted. It also makes it easier to empathize with other minorities and unpowered people.

Being a gay man of my generation also means to me that I am part of the last to care about what has been called the “Gay Canon”: The places in art and culture where our kind has survived and have reflected their joys and longings through the ages, from Sappho to Michelangelo to Oscar Wilde to Tennessee Williams… With acceptance and tolerance LGTB people are quickly being assimilated into mainstream culture and this “secret knowledge” is getting lost..

I grew up in the turmoil of a changing Spain during the transition from dictatorship to democracy. All my adult life has been in Baltimore. Having only lived in big cities, I have not had as many problems as those living in rural areas. The biggest hurdles for me have been legal: growing up in Spain homosexuality was illegal, and when I arrived in this country it also was illegal (you could not even get a student visa if you were an out gay person). So for many years I was in constant jeopardy of being evicted, fired, arrested or deported.

The gay scene in Baltimore is small but very, very friendly and unpretentious. There are a handful of bars and clubs and everyone is always welcome. We also have a very active LGBT community center with lots of events and groups…

I came out to my friends at 16. In a way, we all came out, since we decided that “everyone was bisexual”… I was out since then to everyone but my mother. I came out to her 20 years later, at 37, after wanting to do it for many years. At first she did not take it well, but now she is part of a support group of parents of LGTB people in Madrid, and, after ten years, has become a leader and example for parents that attend the group.”

Spencer, Health Clinic Volunteer and VP of Operations, San Francisco

photo by Kevin Truong

Spencer, in his own words: “I grew up as a gay, Japanese-American, devout Mormon in Boise, Idaho. Convinced that I would overcome my sexuality by throwing myself into a diligent Mormon life, I locked myself in the proverbial closet and promptly ingested the key. This meant not just complete immersion into the Mormon Church, but to stand out from among even the most devout practioners. Wasn’t I told that salvation would be mine if I did everything right? And for all intents and purposes, my upbringing in the Mormon community was idyllic: soccer and baseball with my Mormon brothers; shoveling snow for the elderly on winter morning with my Mormon leaders; I was an Eagle Scout (whose favorite Merit Badge was kayaking), a proud and decorated member of Troop 83.

It is October 1997, and I am standing at the Salt Lake City International airport waving goodbye to my family. My crisply folded itinerary tells me that I will be landing at Hiroshima Airport in fifteen hours. My two-year Mormon mission has begun. Elder Jared is Caucasian, and at twenty, only one year older than myself. He is the first of seven mission partners that I will encounter over the next twenty-four months. These two years spent in Japan speed by, faster than I used to slurp down long strands of ramen at the noodle shops, elbow-to-elbow with well-dress Japanese business men.

My attendance at Brigham Young University yielded the same results: teeming with fresh-faced Mormons, the community came built-in. My junior year is when my communities began to overlap. After much consideration and prayer, I felt strongly that for me to be happy in life, I had to allow myself to love freely, and that meant disavowing from Mormon beliefs and beginning the slow process of accepting myself as gay.

San Francisco has been my home for the last nine years. This is my community. I’m an avid sportsman; completed my first triathlon in 2010, the Escape From Alcatraz. Participated in an Urbanathlon in 2011, finished 47th out of 1,161.”