Taking the Leap

It’s my boyfriend Preppy’s birthday, and we’re seated in a plane awaiting takeoff. There’s the little surge of excitement, because this is the first time we’ve flown anywhere together. It’s one of those tiny puddle-jumper planes, like celebrities fly after they’ve gotten their pilot’s license. I half expect Patrick Swayze or Angelina Jolie to step out of the cockpit and sign autographs for the passengers.

Thinking of Angelina makes me remember to add “A Mighty Heart” to my Netflix queue when I get home. I meant to see it in theatres, but I went to see that movie with the talking rats instead. I felt awful about it at the time, because I knew “A Mighty Heart” was a more important film, and I try to support such things, but those damn talking rats were funny.
“You wanna go get margaritas later?” asks Preppy.
“Anything you want, it’s your day.”
He smiles.
“I love you.”
“Love you too. Wanna move into my house?”
“Absolutely.”
This is the five-hundredth time I’ve asked him this question since I made the official offer a week ago. I keep asking because I like it so much when he says yes again.

Preppy is kind enough to indulge me.
When The Ex moved in with me, it was because he was on summer break from college and had to move out of the dorms. We figured we’d try it for a few months, and if it was a complete disaster, he could move back on campus when the new semester started. All of his worldly possessions amounted to one carload: His clothes, a computer, some photos, bathroom stuff. He might have owned a coffee mug. The first summer we were together, we went six weeks without electricity because neither of us could afford the bills. That’s the beautiful thing about being nineteen, in love, and kinda stupid- You can still romanticize all of these glaring deficiencies.
But, as trips to the bar so painfully remind me, I am not nineteen anymore.
This is totally different. Preppy has his own home and life up in Smyrna. A move will require actual planning, and a truck of some kind. Various agencies will be notified of a new address. Phrases like “Will my hutch fit in the dining room?” are being bandied about. We’re two grown men, making a very big decision: We’ve learned from past experience that once you move in, there’s never going to be a time that you DON’T live together again… unless you’re no longer together. So is renting a U-Haul tempting fate in some way? Should we leave well enough alone and maintain separate households, even though he goes back to his place roughly once every two weeks?
When Preppy and I started dating, I came to the realization that I had spent two years being very careful approaching relationships, because I didn’t want to be hurt again. This policy had unfortunately led to a series of men who felt that I was always holding something back, keeping them at a safe distance. I had to learn the difficult lesson that a life lived without risk tends to be a life without much joy.
So we’re taking the risk.
“Okay, gentlemen, we’re at fourteen thousand feet, let’s go!”
The guy at the front of the plane gestures to Preppy and me, and we are shoved forward by the men seated behind us.
“Baby, I love you, this is the best present ever!” says Preppy. I don’t have time to respond, however.
Because my boyfriend just jumped out of the fucking plane.
If you ever want to know how you really feel about someone, I encourage you to experience the sight of their body falling towards Earth at 140 miles per hour. There’s no time to think, just react. We’ve already established that whatever adventures lie ahead will be experienced together. So I fall out after him, into the open sky, an odd cocktail of terror and exhilaration overwhelming me as I burst through clouds and the cities below come into view. Then the chute opens, I snap back up, and I’m fine. Delighted, actually. I float along, enjoying cool breeze on my face, another fear conquered. It’s a little easier letting go now, safe in the knowledge that someone’s waiting for me when I reach the ground.

Style and Substance

“Oh, would you look at that! I’ve never seen that before!”
I grinned at the tiny woman sitting in front of me, proudly displaying my t-shirt.
“I made it myself,” I said. “Would you sign it for me?”
“Sign your shirt!” she exclaimed, delighted. “Oh, I feel like a rock star!”
The photo on my t-shirt was of her, laughing broadly, wearing a hat with a giant sunflower. Below, I’d included a quote of hers I loved: “I laugh much, much more than I cry.” She giggled as she grasped a pink Sharpie between her talon-like acrylic nails.
She signed, “Love, Tammy Faye.”
I was at Outwrite bookstore, for Tammy Faye’s signing of her perkily-titled book “I Will Survive… and You Will Too!”. The place was packed like I’d rarely seen, and when she faced her admirers, she was overwhelmed. She thanked the room for the love we showed her. The crowd was mostly gay, which was hardly surprising. Tammy Faye was fabulous and warm-hearted. You know you’re a gay icon when Bernadette Peters plays you in your life story. She sang, she spoke of her life with wonder and gratitude, and had us eating out of the palm of her outrageously manicured hand.
“You did such a good job on that shirt! I need that picture! It’s beautiful!” she said. Everything she said was an exclamation, a glorious idea dawning on her that must be shared.
She had her husband give me an address, and the next day I mailed her a copy on glossy paper. She sent me a note of thanks a month later, apologizing profusely for how long it had taken to thank me for my gift, but she’d been promoting her book. She also told me she was certain I was “A blessing to many, many people.”

Coming from someone like her, I considered that high praise indeed.
I saw the interview on Larry King last week and knew we wouldn’t have her for much longer. The image of Tammy Faye was heartbreaking. She had, as always, made an effort, despite the cancer that had left her weighing just 65 pounds. Her ever-present wig and makeup were firmly in place, as she was facing her public, and wanted to look her best. Speaking was a tremendous challenge, and she was in obvious agony. Yet when King asked her how she was doing (which, by the way, is an absurd question to ask someone on hospice care with terminal cancer), she gave a half-smile and responded, “Oh, pretty good, Larry, considering.”
That’s how she faced every challenge in life: The eternal optimist, willing to look past whatever horrors she faced, and see a bright future before her. Her unwavering faith carried her through having it all and then losing it, watching two husbands go to prison, battles with her own drug dependencies, and enduring years of being a public punchline. But she used every single one of those challenges as a new opportunity to reach out to others. She invited people suffering from AIDS complications on her PTL talk show during a time when Ronald Reagan would not utter the word. She never used her faith as a weapon against others, instead utilizing it as a tool to build understanding between communities. She saw goodness and hope in everyone, even Jerry Falwell, who had orchestrated her family’s downfall and publicly derided her in the name of God.
Tammy Faye was, sadly, a rare creature: A nationally-respected and recognized Christian who genuinely wanted to heal and unite us all. She was a woman who respected people with beliefs or lives different from her own, did not judge, and was standing at the ready to embrace anyone in need.
In that interview with Larry King, on what would turn out to be the last night of her life, Tammy Faye thanked the gay community for coming to her rescue when she had lost everything, and sent her love. My hope is that we will honor this remarkable woman by following the example of her bravery: To seek out what is good and true in life, to find room in our hearts to accept those who would deride us, and to find the substance beneath our own style.