Living Proof

We weren't your typical everyday Italian/Catholic family. We held all the traditions of a typical New York Italian family, like the smells of dinner being prepared at 8am and dinner served by 2pm on a Sunday afternoon. We went through the motions of ceremonial rituals of a typical Catholic family: CCD, communions and confirmations, but rarely attended mass because those Sunday dinners were started way too early. We were always taught about God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit, but we weren't bashed over the heads with bibles. We were taught right from wrong, but like any normal kid, two wrongs always equaled a "right". Kinda still does till this day. I remember grandma giving the "evil eye", and then telling us to always forgive one another. Sometimes Mom and Dad would fight about something. Dad would throw something against the wall and then Mom would be in another room in complete silence pretending to sleep. He never hurt her or any one of us, but he had outb...

Kind of latching onto my previous post about being verbally abused and other various things, I'm sitting here thinking about ways to cope with those types of people. I truly believe that your words and especially your actions will dictate what kind of life you will have, whether it be a peaceful one, or a life filled with tons of unnecessary drama. As I season with age, I'm also learning that my own words and actions have a cause and effect. If I slap a complete stranger in the street, chances are I'm gonna get a slap back or perhaps a tenfold in return. As my own mother always said, "Turn the other cheek." But that's kinda' hard for me to do sometimes. Then my mother-in-law said something pretty wise to me a few weeks ago. She said, "Whenever you're being verbally attacked, let them hear themselves go on and on. Let them hear their own voices. Don't say a word. Just walk away." She wasn't saying to just let people walk all over ...

Recently, a friend had written a post entitled, " A Twelve Step " which spoke about addictive friendships/relationships and I wanted to expand on it through my own experiences. Let's use some fun clichés first: "No two people are alike", "each person is like a snowflake, unique in their own way" - true true true, blah blah blah. But there is a common denominator among unhealthy relationships, and that being the addictive part. Like in an intimate relationship, the break up to make up scenario is one I think we all have been through. We hate em', we love em', then we hate em' again. It definitely takes two to mingle and two to really brawl. I am grateful that my wife is the polar opposite of me. She defuses when I'm up in arms. After seeing her calmness, that alone calms me. I'm learning through her how to be calm. It's really not in my nature, but I try. When you have two people who are friends or in a relationship, who ha...

We can all sit and mull over the incidents that occurred in our lives and point fingers until the cows come home, but many us aren’t being accountable for our own faults and wrongdoings. It’s easier to be the victim and run over to mommy and tattletale about Johnny poking you too much. There’s never an explanation of why Johnny was poking you though. We’ll just leave it at that and hear one side of the story - I mean come on, you’re the victim here, right? Maybe you’re not where you are in life because somebody screwed you over. Maybe you’re not out dating anymore because someone has poisoned all potential future mates for you. Get over it. If we really think about long and hard: whose fault is it anyway? Did you let someone screw you out of a heap of money? Did someone cheat on you and leave a bad taste in your mouth? It couldn’t be because you went into the relationship while the person was getting out of another or possibly still in one, could it? There are so many patt...

Too many of us assume why we are the way we are. We do this, because something tragic happened to us in the past. Does our past manifest our actions later on in life? Do we counteract whatever it was that hurt our hearts so deeply from the past? Do we rebel and keep resenting it over and over again? Or do we go along our paths as if nothing happened? If nothing ever happened to us, then we have nothing to counteract; we have nothing to rebel against. As I said in my previous post, I truly believe that I was born gay. I believe every person who’s gay was born like that due to genetics. Other people think it’s simply a ‘choice’. For some, as Miss 1999 pointed out, it may have been a choice for shock value, rebellion and for many other reasons. But the people who knew and grew up being gay have this stigma of being abused when they were younger, or being abused—period while being in a bad relationship. And yes, that happens a lot. I have a page on Myspace where I connect with old friends...