It has been a while since I have written anything. It is not because I couldn’t think of topics to discuss & write about, but because I thought maybe I am not being heard, one is bound to be surrounded by such insecurities when starting something new and so was I. But in recent days, a lot of people liked my writings and said I should write more and hence here I am with more. Just like one needs something impactful to make a comeback, I followed the same regime and decided to write about something which is extremely close to my heart and something which exists in the core of every gay man. Exceptions exist? Or not? That’s subjective. And I am not willing to discuss that, instead I want to discuss something more significant.
It seems like yesterday, when I was a teen yearning for that sparkling love, “filmy” love, romantic love; when that single look from your crush was enough to paste the blushing smile on your face for the whole day; when you knew that you are bound to find love just like everybody does in the movies, fairy tales, like your mom and dad, love stories etc. But the feeling of being different crept in too and slowly also the fear that maybe my story won’t be the same as they presented. However, the overwhelming power of love and optimism was strong enough to subside such fears in me. And with onset of puberty, my 14th year, it was suddenly a new world, I started having a fashion sense, wanted to look good, new hairstyles and eventually had the first crush; the one to impress, with all that stuff. It was a season of love in my life for the first time. Obviously I loved my parents and family. but that was a different kind of love, one unknown to me until that time. I fell head over heels for him. I was a total hindi filmy hero in my pursuing of love for “him” except that i was gay unlike many hindi films. I wrote letters, took photos with him, hugged him at every possible chance, even kissed him, asked him for his number. he was totally straight, he had three girlfriends, total casanova, but it didn’t matter to me, I was much in love with the feeling of being in love. A lot of you will understand what I mean to say in the above statement. Eventually he also grew fond of me, but he couldn’t love me the way I loved him, he was straight. I understood that and decided to confess my love for him and let him go after that. and I did that, risking my closeted sexual orientation to be exposed, but he didn’t do that. He just smiled and left my life (he was a senior, 12th class, so he left the school, I confessed it through a letter at his farewell). After that the whole journey of “love” began. I had many such crushes and incidents.
So by then, I was never reciprocated with the same love with which I used to love, most of them were straight actually. But I didn’t even had the terminology of “gay” and “straight” to define people with at that time, let alone finding the right person to love. These incidents started taking their toll on me and that dormant fear of not being able to find the love of fairy tale also started growing, because I was different, I was gay. People laughed at them, there was not even a single love story where a prince charming meets another prince charming, how will it ever happen to me ? Such fears started creeping in. But I was fiery enough to douse them.
So, at 18, I, for the first time fell in love with a bisexual man, 6 yrs older than me. For the first time, he reciprocated, he “hugged” like I belonged to him. We kissed like we belonged with each other. And for the first time, I was mad in love, possessive, obsessive, passionate lover, continuous calls, text messages, even those wannabe shayari messages; which, if I tell you now, you will die laughing at. But I did all that. Soon he got so busy with work and I grew so impatient with him that there were a lots of fights and differences between us and slowly we started moving towards a break up and before we reached there he told me his marriage was fixed.
My heart broke but in a way I was glad that love left us before he left me. After that my way of looking at love became different, it was not spring season anymore, it was a dark winter then, with few flowers and momentary sunrise. After few lonely years, I was back in the game. At 20, I saw a guy at college campus, I fell for him at the very first sight, felt a very strong connection, I started stalking him. There I was in love, once again. I was so happy because I thought I won’t fall in love anymore but I did. I stalked him a lot and one fine day I risked it all again and asked him to meet me through a message full of lies.
He did come. I told him everything, I drew his sketch and showed it to him. He was touched and obviously he knew by then that I am gay but he didn’t say anything, just smiled and respected my emotions, and left. I thought maybe, that maybe he will love me back, that undying hope was there, but he never met me or replied again. I grew sad. And now finally those fears, apprehensions started winning and i started caving in. Now I must tell you, that by then I had never had sex, I did have sexual escapades with school friends and some other people, even cam sex but never full-fledged sex on bed. One of those guys introduced me to PR, and I started the search on PR for love and now for the first time “sex” too. I started meeting guys, I met people in parks, did a lot of sexual things, funny things, adventurous things a lot of memorable things with many people. But that one person’s position was still vacant. That man. Even some crushes happened on the way. some negative incidents also took place which actually made me think why do I have to struggle so much to find love? Why am I not that practical man who just happen to know that such love happens in books and fantasies? I was never that.
Meanwhile I started contributing to the gay movement, making videos, blogs, attending gay prides and got busy with my final year and internship. And finally, I graduated last year. It was also the time that I started looking for one mate seriously to spend my life with. But it seemed like a forced agenda; a practical matter. I wanted to fall in love but I just couldn’t, so after a while I stopped trying. Now my heart didn’t flutter. I wasn’t sad, I was numb which was worse. This remained for months.
I recently joined some classes to improve some skill and there were many hot guys, some really beautiful ones too but i was not bothered. I felt cold really. But last week, I was just online listening to some of my old favorite songs, on the you tube list, I saw a song which I used to listen to in my teenage years, at that time, I didn’t really understood the meaning of that song but I knew it had a deeper meaning. No points for guessing which song it was, it was, “gali mein aaj chand nikla… jaane kitno dino ke baad gali me aaj chand nikla…” (come outside, its full moon) and then I had this epiphany, that no matter how much time it will take but one day for every person, “gali mein chand zaroor nikalta hai” and there I was feeling those frozen veins warming again with warmth and feeling of love. Do not lose hope. I did but I gained it back and I hope you do too. I know how many of us have resorted to promiscuous sex to escape from that feeling of love; how many of us want to fall so desperately in love with any person that they compromise their needs and compatibility, how many of us are ready to wear a mask of straight or bisexual person so that they need not face the fear of not finding the love; how many of us have lost the hope; how many of us have frozen their heart. I know all of it as I have experienced it. The song reminded me of the beautiful heart I have, which has hope. I am doing the same; I wish to remind you that there, in the core of your heart, there is love, there is hope, there is optimism, do not let those die, you will meet that man now go out with an open heart and see, “kya pata gali mein itne dino baad chand nikla ho”. If this touches your heart and helps even a bit or even one of you to feel hopeful, my purpose will be fulfilled. Listen to the song, its beautiful. And do write to me, please. It will encourage me to write more.