Oy Vey My Daughter's Gay (15 page)

“I bear
no grudges.
 I have a mind that
retains nothing!” - Bette Midler

My best friend, Evelyn, and I were so close at one time
that John thought I’d gone over to the other team and become a lesbian myself.
John’s mind was playing games with him. Was I having an affair? And if so, was
it with Evelyn? To be fair to him, I
was
spending an inordinately large
amount of time with her. I
was
very close to Evelyn, but, even if I
had
become a lesbian, I fear she would have been out of my league.

Evelyn and I met just before Lila came out. Evelyn was
going through a traumatic divorce and she needed my support as her controlling
ex had effectively destroyed all her previous friendships. She was different
from any other friend I’d ever had: sexy, outrageous and fun. By contrast, she
could also be serious and vulnerable. When we met, we bonded immediately. Some
people have trophy spouses. Evelyn was my trophy friend. I loved standing
outside clothes shop dressing rooms, awaiting her exit and the predictable
comments from the shop assistant. “You could model that outfit. It looks
amazing on you!”

I nodded, proudly agreeing, “Yes, my friend looks good in
anything.”

As someone who can only dream of venturing out of a shop
dressing room and subjecting herself to public scrutiny, this was heady stuff.
I am usually busy picturing what the dress or skirt will look like minus the
six inches that’ll need to be cut off to make it fit. I did once venture out of
a dressing room for Evelyn’s opinion on a knee-length dress I was trying on.
(It was probably meant to be a top.) She collapsed with laughter when she saw
my less-than-sexy, black knee-highs (in those days they were called ‘popsocks’)
which stopped just below my skinny white knees. Admittedly, not a good look.

Evelyn was an aphrodisiac and, aside from sharing
gut-wrenching laughs, she made me feel young and alive. I introduced her to
theatre and bookshops and she introduced me to sexy underwear and wearing
make-up. On reflection, she was a mid-life-crisis friend.

John eventually resolved the issue of how to prise us apart
by getting in on the act.  That sounds a bit risqué, but it was all completely
above board. Evelyn would often pop by after work on Friday night and end up
staying all weekend. She even left a nightdress in our spare room. She left her
sexy persona at the door and became like our third child. She would knock on
our bedroom door in the morning in her baggy T-shirt night attire and,
laughingly, call out, “Mummy! Daddy! Can I come in?” John and I were both
hugely protective of her and, I suspect, she didn’t do John’s street cred any
harm either.

Apart from Evelyn, who still remains primarily
my
friend, neither John nor I have ever had a close friend of the opposite sex.
Some people might find that strange, especially those of younger generations,
but I know that, for us, it would be a potentially fraught situation and would
cause feelings of jealousy on both sides − especially mine, if I’m
honest.

As I’ve already mentioned, the subject of Lila being gay
had never arisen with her high school friends and her university friends were a
bit thrown when she finally came out, three years after first meeting them.
Understandably, they were a little disconcerted and hurt that she had waited so
long to mention this key fact about herself, letting them assume she was, by
default, heterosexual. The “waiting for my parents’ permission” explanation
didn’t quite cut it. They had shared all their secrets and fears with her. Why
had she held back?

Just as she had when she joined Rocky Horror, Lila had
planned to come out as soon as she went to university.  But it took her a while
to meet her friends and, by the time she did, she had just come out to us and
we all know how
that
worked out. Understandably, she lost her nerve and
thus her best opportunity to tell them she was gay. Again, just like with her
Rocky Horror friends, she missed the ‘getting to know you’ window and, before
she knew it, everyone assumed she was straight.  Instead of just mentioning she
was gay in passing as she’d intended, she was now going to have to actively
announce it.

Lila apparently tried to tell her friends on numerous
occasions and failed, assuring herself she just had to find the right moment,
but that moment never came. Or at least, it didn’t come for three years. When
she met her first girlfriend, she realised that practicalities demanded that
she finally steel herself and come out. Having arranged to meet her friends at
a restaurant, Lila emailed them beforehand, stating that she had something
difficult to tell them and that they shouldn’t let her leave until she had done
so. There was no turning back.

Her friends must have been intrigued. I wondered if any of
them had already guessed. Apparently not, because, when the truth was finally
revealed, they were somewhat relieved.  They thought she was going to tell them
she was dying! Although they were very supportive, Lila couldn’t help feeling
that they treated her a little differently afterwards. After all, she had let
them believe she liked boys for three years of very close friendship. It would
be hard to trust her again.

Nowadays, as a couple, Lila and Miranda still face
friendship issues. If the friends are a couple, Lila and Miranda struggle not
to show partiality to one over the other. With straight couples, there’s an
unspoken assumption that, when they go out together, the women befriend each
other and the men bond.  There is no such rule in a lesbian couple, so Lila and
Miranda often find themselves favouring the same person, leaving the other one
out. Even if it’s not a couple, Lila and Miranda are perplexed by the
complexities of their friendships. Long-standing friends pose no problem−
rather it’s the ones they have met since they became a couple. It seems that
anyone who wants to be friends with them singly also wants to be friends with
their other half. Lila fears that she and Miranda are beginning to be perceived
as one person and it can be pretty frustrating. After all, to whom can they
have a good moan about each other?

“I’m really annoyed with Miranda,” Lila says.

“Yeah, I know. She told me,” the friend typically replies.

“She was in the wrong!”

“That’s not how she tells it.”

“Wait a minute! How do you know about it?”

“Well, she and I had a good talk about it when we met yesterday.”

“What?!!!”

“Why don’t the three of us meet up and have a talk about
it?”

“Forget it.”

Although anxious to have separate friends, individual
friendships have the potential for problems. A lesbian friend may favour the
company of one of them over the other and, inevitably, cause feelings of
jealousy. Lila and Miranda both already had a best friend - each other. Then
they got married, leaving a best friend void that has so far remained unfilled.
Lila jokes that, if Miranda ever gets a best friend as close as they once were,
she will die of jealousy.

“The Internet is
just the world

passing round notes
in the classroom.” - Jon Stewart

As well as being a voracious reader, Lila had always been
an avid writer. By the age of twelve she had written three short novels: The
Little Hamster; Flying Marshmallows and Floating Bananas and This Is Not a
Book. John still believes The Little Hamster could have been bigger than Harry
Potter, if only the publishers hadn’t been too blinkered to realise it. He was
her biggest fan and would have gone to the ends of the earth (but in reality,
our second closest big city) to persuade a publisher in person. He was
desperate to fulfil her dream (and his, I suspect) of getting her book
published. Sadly, it didn’t happen. If only self-publishing had existed in
those days. 

As well as writing fiction, Lila also had a passion for
documenting the minutiae of her daily life, religiously filling diary after
diary (and we all know how that worked out). With the Internet becoming ever
more accessible, Lila started up and managed several successful websites. But
it was online blogging that really captured her imagination and her heart.
(Currently she writes five regular blogs online, two of which are for globally
prestigious outlets and some of which have been nominated for awards.) When she
moved from Scotland to take up a psychiatrist training post in London, it was
inevitable that Lila would start blogging about her new life. In fact, those
closest to her questioned whether her move to London was for the sole purpose
of having a new and, potentially, exciting subject to blog about. If that was
the case, it was well worth the move. Lila excelled herself with her London
blog. It was an irresistible combination of personal anecdote, medical mirth
and travel blog.

When Lila first arrived in London, she didn’t know anyone.
She quickly settled into her job at her new teaching hospital, found a flat to
share with a female teacher and joined enough clubs to ensure new friends and,
hopefully, romance. She loved the Maudsley Hospital and would keep us
entertained through her daily blog postings with tales of impressive lecturers
and classes. Having chosen anorexia as the subject of her first presentation,
she was jubilant to discover that one of the most respected experts on the
subject was actually based at the hospital and only a phone call away. And yes,
she’d be happy to co-present the talk. Lila was in medical and intellectual
heaven.

Each weekend she continued with her mission of visiting a
different area of London, with a view to blogging about it. Within a few months
she had gained a level of knowledge of London and its boroughs surpassing that
of many Londoners. Combined with medical stories and lesbian dating
experiences, all written with her own brand of sarcasm and caustic wit (she is
her mother’s daughter, after all), she kept all of us back home thoroughly
amused and entertained. I read it, her dad read it, her gran read it, her
friends read it, their parents read it, my friends read it… It was like a soap
opera, only better, because it was real. If she missed a day, we demanded to
know why. We urged her on through the labyrinth of lesbian dating. We cheered
her successes and commiserated with her failures. It was exactly the new lease
of life her writing needed, with a whole host of unsuspecting new characters to
entertain us.

By this time, Lila’s social circle was growing. We enjoyed
meeting her new friends and getting to know them vicariously. She invented
humorous and descriptive names to protect their anonymity. Initially we heard
much about ‘Fabulous Dinner Party Girl’ (FDPG), on whom it was obvious Lila had
a crush, but we noted with interest that, over the months, ‘Film Club Friend’
(FCF) was also becoming an increasingly regular feature. As the name suggested,
she was the founder of the (lesbian) film club Lila quickly became enamoured
of. FCF seemed perfectly suited to Lila and had all the same interests. Apart
from her obvious love of cinema, she too was an avid reader and enjoyed the
theatre. Lila was working hard at not falling in love with her, as were we.
Sadly, FCF was already in a relationship. Not only that, but, according to
Lila’s blog, FCF already had a large fan base− or ‘harem’, as Lila
scathingly described it.  Even if FCF was to break off her increasingly rocky
long-distance relationship, Lila would have to get in line.

Prior to living in London, Lila’s limited experience of the
capital was a weekend stopover en route to South Africa to visit my brother, when
she was eight years old and a week-long school trip when she was twelve. Lila
was hugely disappointed by Buckingham Palace on the former trip. We had
travelled from warm, sunny Mallorca and, as we stood shivering in the grey
morning mist of an English November morning, Lila said to me, “I don’t get it.
Buckingham Palace is all grey and miserable. It’s just ordinary bricks. I
thought it would be made of gold.” It was no match for Disney castles.

Now it had been over a year since Lila had left Scotland and,
as on our previous trips, we were desperate to see her, as well as to
reacquaint ourselves with her new lifestyle in the ‘Big Smoke’. We were fast
becoming experts on downtown Peckham and its surrounding area. We had driven
down to London and, after an exhausting ten hours, we arrived at the designated
restaurant late and traumatised.

“Hi, Lila! It’s so great to see you,” I said, catching my
breath. “So… what did I miss?”

“What do you mean?”

“The blog! The blog! We haven’t read it today, because we
were driving!”

“Seriously? That’s all you care about?”

“Of course not! So…?”

“So...” she said, prolonging the agony, whilst grinning
from ear to ear. I got together with Film Club Friend… Actually, her name’s
Miranda.”

“Oh, no! I can’t believe you finally hooked up with her and
I missed the best instalment.”

“But mum, I’m here,” Lila said, laughing. “I can tell you
about it first hand.”

“I know, but it’s not the same thing!”

After a year and a ridiculous number of setbacks, they had
finally gotten together. I knew how much this meant to Lila and I was genuinely
thrilled for her. I knew I still had no real understanding of how it felt for
her to be a lesbian, because we had never got to the point of really talking
about it, but it was great that John and I were able to share her excitement.

As usual we had a fabulous weekend. We did London
touristy-type things; met Lila’s flatmate; saw the iconic Maudsley Hospital and
ate some ridiculously expensive food. The one thing I really wanted to do −
meet the miraculous Miranda − would have to wait for a while yet.

Lila’s blog continued apace, with comments about her new
love pouring in from faithful and concerned followers. Like us, they had been
kept entertained by the antics of Miranda and her harem of Film Club admirers
for the past year. Unfortunately, Lila had not always painted FCF in the
kindest of lights. It now transpired that, jealous of the others, Lila had in
fact used her blog to vent about FCF and, in doing so, had prejudiced her
friends and family against real-life Miranda.

“Are you sure she’s right for you? … She has had rather a
lot of girlfriends! … Are you sure you can trust her?”

Lila started to panic. The blog was anonymous, but she was
beginning to feel like Miranda might be her ‘forever girl’. If that was the
case, Miranda was going to encounter a lot of blog readers when she met Lila’s
friends and family, all of whom already had a jaundiced view of her. One night
Lila phoned me in an agitated state.

“I’m going to have to tell Miranda about the blog.”

“Lila, you can’t!  She might not be able to forgive you,” I
pleaded.

“I know, but I can’t base the most important relationship
of my life on a lie.”

I couldn’t believe I’d been so naïve. How could I not have
foreseen the potential dangers inherent in this blog? As Lila’s mother, I
should have been the sensible grown-up waving a warning finger and tut-tutting
knowingly, instead of laughing my head off and helping Lila take anonymous
photos so she could post them on her blog. Damn my daughter for being the
mature one in our relationship. It appeared that I was choosing to be Lila’s
best friend instead of her mother at all the wrong times.

Soon after, Lila told Miranda about the blog. I can only
imagine how hard that conversation must have been. Understandably, Miranda was
very upset and said she wasn’t sure if she could continue a relationship with
someone she couldn’t trust.  Someone who had, in effect, used personal details
about her new friends to entertain her old ones. Ironically, despite the
uncomplimentary references in the blog to her love life, Miranda was most upset
by her prosaic nickname, ‘Film Club Friend’, in contrast to the far more
glamorous-sounding ‘Fabulous Dinner Party Girl’. She was also bitter that Lila
had referred to her flat as ‘small and pokey’. At the end of a week spent
comforting a tearful Lila over the phone while trying to assuage my own guilt,
Miranda appeared at Lila’s door with a huge bunch of flowers. “I think we have
something too special to throw away!” she said.

That night Lila gained a girlfriend and lost a blog. Oh,
and she eventually ended up joint-owning the ‘pokey’ flat in question.