Coming Out to My Gay Brother…

So here’s how it went…

To put it mildly, the experience was a bit surreal. I had been mulling over the decision to tell him ever since I planned on flying out to SF. My brother has been out since 1991. I figured he was the least threatening audience in my family that I will ever have. However, once I got to SF, I lost my resolve and didn’t think I was going to tell him. The visit had been rather subdued and I was even more uptight than usual.

Easter Sunday, I went to church that morning. (Old habits die hard.) My brother woke up later, around noon, and told me he had planned for us to go out to a neighborhood park. Thinking I was hetero, he forewarned me that there was a gay event going on in the park. I told him I had already made some plans for part of the afternoon. My brother and I agreed to meet up at 3:00pm.

At Dolores Park, my life became utterly surreal. The “Hunky Jesus” contest was going on and all these hot guys were running around, yet I had to keep reminding myself to “act straight” so my brother wouldn’t figure things out. After the contest, the two of us found a spot of grass to sit on and started to just talk about things. When the congnitive dissonance became too great, I balled up all my courage and told him.

I could almost make out an hourglass icon cover his face as he processed what I had just told him. I believe the first words out of his mouth were, “HOLY SHIT!” Then he was silent for another several minutes. Then he stuttered a bit beginning to say something then not saying anything. So he finally asks me if this is just a phase I was going through.

The scene became even more surreal when he started to question if I would feel the same way if I found myself in a physical situation with another guy. So then I told him that I had experience with guys. That elicited another, “HOLY SHIT!” Several more minutes of silence. Followed by a few minutes of vocal sputterings.

At this point I became concerned that perhaps he wasn’t going to be very accepting of this declaration. Finally he started to smile and told me how happy he was for me. He explained that he would never in a million years have guessed that I was gay. He had always thought of me as a military guy and just couldn’t imagine me in any other way.

Then he asked me when I was going to tell our father. To which I replied, “the day after he dies.” This elicited a laugh. We discussed the relative pros and cons of telling other members of the family. Eventually he became a bit too older-brother-ish and started to give me advice on finding a LTR.

We talked for a little while longer there at the park. After a while we decided to head back to his apartment. As we were leaving the park I told him about how I had to censor myself when we first got to the park. I had told him how I almost said out loud, “wow, look at all the eye candy!” He nearly died of laughter when he revealed that he had been thinking the same thing but thought my hetero- mind would be overwhelmed by the comment.