I was raised in a little backwater Texas town that sported the population of 3000 souls in 1960 and had absolutely no idea what gay or lesbian meant. Growing up, when I reached that age of being attracted to others, I found myself madly in love with...yes and I dont want to hear any laugher....my female P.E. teacher. I don't guess I ever told anybody that I was madly in love with her, but I was. But at the same time, I kind of had a crush on a young blond boy who had gone to school with me ever since Kindergarden. And of course, I never told anybody about that one either. *grin* By the time I got into high school, I was on the local girls fast pitch softball team and was deeply and madly in love (or lust maybe? Who knows!) with the coach, whose name was Sam, but was a beautiful dark haired, blue eyed woman. I don't guess I ever really had a "date" with a boy during those teenage years, but that was mainly due to my father being a lawman in the county and the boys being afraid to come to my house for fear of meeting up with him. Now, even though I didn't have formal dates with boys, thats not to say that I didnt meet up with a favorite or two on occasion at the wild keg parties at somebody's abandon farmhouse (which happened quite frequently because there was nothing else to DO in backwater Texas). So that's not to say that I didn't have those sweaty, steamy, gropey, back seat, steam up the windows times with boys, cause I did. Because, quite frankly, I didn't know any other way to be. Every other girl in my class was having those same sweaty, steamy, gropey....with boys. Yet my true love remained my dark haired, blue eyed, softball coach.

I cant remember exactly if it was my freshman or sophomore year, but one of my classmates invited me to spend the night with her. She lived way out in the country on a farm and I went. Late, in the middle of the night, I remember that she reached over and kissed me, smack full on the lips...and touched me in places that only boys had touched me. I have to say, I was thrilled, but scared half to death and so spurned her further interest. Let us skip now to college.

Several things happened at this point in my life. To start with, I was young when I first went to college, only 17 years old, and was in major culture shock because I was living outside my 3000 population backwater Texas town for the first time in my life. I got put in the dorm with all the Phys Ed Majors (LOL) since I was undeclared. And I met the Dean of Women who looked more like she should be a Mr. instead of a Mrs. with her short hair and suit and tie....man's suit, that is. My eyes began to open to a whole new world. I found out that women could be with women, that is in a sexual/partner relationship, but it wasn't ever supposed to be talked about in "proper circles". It was the first time I heard the word "lesbian" used and, red faced as I was, had to ask what it meant. And that's when I began to wonder, is that really what I am. Because you see, all my TRUE LOVES (LOL) had been women that I had idolized.

One night, one of those Phys Ed majors (who will remain annonymous in case she hasn't come out yet) asked me if I wanted to go eat pizza and ride around. Since she had the best pot in the dorm, I quickly said yes. Unbeknownst to me, what she wanted was my body, not my companionship in her pot smoking endeavors. However, she did indeed come through with the best pot I ever smoked in my life...and I did indeed come through with my body, to both of our delights. But I was still just that kid from backwater Texas who was supposed to grow up, go to college, get married (to a boy!) and have grandbabies for the folks to bounce on their knees. There was a young man in my Geology class who had taken quite an interest in me and asked me out every time I turned around. I spurned his every advance until he asked me one day if I wanted to go horseback riding. And that turned the tables completely. Now of course, I only went because I was missing horseback riding. I soon became enamoured with him because he delighted in sending me dozens of roses at a time and treated me like I was a princess, which was not something that anyone else had ever done for me. So I moved on past my pot buddy and soon found myself married to my Geology classmate, Jim.

Two kids and 7 years later, I was divorced and living back in backwater Texas. Although I now knew what lesbian and gay meant, I was too busy trying to raise those two kids and finish the college degree I had neglected to get, to worry about either sex wanting to date me. I spent several years single and not dating. I was now a paramedic/firefighter. A woman in a mostly male dominated (at least at that time) field, I think I was asked out by every man within 900 square miles and turned every one of them down. Because, you know, I really didn't want to be with a man. I was still in love with that dark haired, blue eyed softball coach I had in high school. *grin* But the pressure was on from family and friends that my children needed a daddy and I needed a husband to take care of me...which always perplexed me since I was taking care of all three of us quite well on my own. But a certain young man named Doug wouldn't take no for an answer and kept asking me out and asking me out, while family and friends kept saying "Why don't you go out with him? He is so sweet." And so I did. Well, it wasn't long before that young man asked me to marry him and I said no...many times...while family and friends kept asking "why dont you marry him? He will make such a good father and husband." And so I married him. Not so much because I loved him, which I did more in a brother/sister kind of way, but because I was so tired of the pressure.

Two years later, I found myself living in a large metropolitan Texas city, having come to the realization that I would never be happy in marriage with a man. It was time to set myself free and begin to live as a lesbian. Now it may sound like I took that leap into lesbianism overnight, but I didn't. Through several years of sitting on a therapists couch and talking to a good friend who was a female Methodist Minister, I came to realize that I wouldn't go to Hell if I was in a loving sexual relationship with a woman and that it didn't make me crazy either. Doug and I divorced and are still friends to this day. We just weren't meant to be husband and wife.

So here again I found myself single, with two junior high age children, but now having the courage to stand up and be an out lesbian in this brave new world of mine. About three months after my divorce was final, a woman that I worked with asked me to go eat lunch. Now normally, I didn't socialize with people I worked with. Call me weird, but it was just a rule of mine. I kept my work and personal life seperate. But I was lonely and tired and went to lunch. Probably the second sentence out of her mouth was "So you're gay". Now not having led the Bohemian lifestyle in my workplace (or anyplace else for that matter) I was curious as to how she figured that one out. Her reply was, "Well, I'm gay too and I just kind of figured you were so I thought I'd ask." My answer to her was "Yes, I'm gay" and there began a relationship that lasted 5 years.

That relationship didn't end because we fell out of love, there just seemed to be too many issues that we couldn't reconcile. In the end, sadly, we each went our own way. The first 6 months that we lived together, I knew that I had to tell my children SOMETHING because they were soon going to begin asking questions. Telling my 2 children that I was a lesbian when they were in junior high was probably the hardest thing I ever had to go through, with the exception of brother dying at a very young age. I was so afraid that they were going to not love me anymore and want to go live with their dad. I was just terrified. Both the kids took it very well. The only problem my oldest child saw with it was that he was afraid that his friends wouldn't want to be his friends anymore if they knew. But he said he was alright with it. So I promised him that I would be discreet. My youngest sighed in relief and was glad because people had asked him if I was gay and he didn't know what to tell them and now, at least he knew what to say. To this day, my children, who are now young adults leading their own lives, love and cherish me and often praise me for being a role model. And I am fiercely proud of those two kids. And I dont't even have to be discreet anymore. LOL

Next, it was my family's turn to be told I was a lesbian. I refused to be an "in the closet" person. I decided I would go with the least of the many evils and approached my sister, who is 5 years older than me, first. I had it all planned out. I asked her to go and eat out with me one evening, just the two of us, and I planned on talking and steering the conversation into the eventuality of telling her that I was a lesbian. Well....we got through dinner, we got in the car, we drove to her house, we pulled up in her driveway and still I hadn't screwed up the courage to tell her. She started to get out of the car and I started to cry, not sobbing, but tears running down my cheeks. I told her I really needed to talk to her, that there was something I really needed to tell her. She grew all concerned looking, probably thinking I was going to tell her I had cancer or something from the way I was acting. And I blurted out, by now almost sobbing for fear of losing her as a sister, that I was a lesbian and did she still love me (all in one long sentence, with no breath in between). There was a long pregnant pause and she burst out laughing and said, and here I quote, "It's about time you figured it out". At that moment in time, even though I had never physically fought with my sister, I could have punched her in the nose. She assured me that she would love me forever and, having known me as a child who regularly used her GI Joe's to blow up HER barbie dolls in mock battle, she wasn't the least bit surprised.

Since my mother and brother had preceeded my coming out in death, I only had my father left to tell. And I waited a LONG time before I could actually say the words to him. It was long past the end of that 5 year relationship...actually (ok, dont laugh) it was only in 1998 that I finally said the words to him. We were having a deep conversation and I told him that I had something that I really needed to tell him. Again I began to cry because he was the only parent I had left. My bond with my father runs deep, much deeper than the one I had with my mother. I told him, "Daddy, you know I'm a lesbian don't you?". He responded with a small burst of laughter and the statement "Kid, I'm not stupid, you know". I told him that I knew he wasn't stupid but that I had never said the words to him and I needed to say them. And I needed to know how he felt about the subject. He told me that he felt like people were born gay and that he loved me and always would. My father never ceases to amaze me and my love and respect for him grows deeper every day.

Now, many many years after that fateful lunch date when my co-worker picked me up on her gaydar, I am out to the World. I am in a loving relationship with someone my family knows and respects. My son's girlfriends have no qualms over my lifestyle and love my significant other also. I've come along way from that backwater Texas kid I once was to become the person that was within.