Brokeback Mountain

As usual, acting on impulse, I woke this Sunday morning wanting to see a movie that would start playing within the hour. Skipping my shower and bringing my gym gear, I headed out the door ready for a tearjerking experience. I was not anticipating the season's worst rain storm hitting today, but I persevered as I stood for 30 minutes in the rain waiting for the Number 12. The wet and cold sneakers or the less than olympic sized screen did not bother me. I figured that Ang Lee would be able to help me transcend all this misery by giving me a treat with two cute men frolicking in open country under the stars and free from societal constraints. I was a little concerned that by buying a ticket online I had somehow surrendered on principle by paying that service charge of $1. After all, I could have saved that money if I had just bought that ticket by standing in line. This theater in Oakland certainly did not offer us online buyers a VIP table for pick up. Nevertheless, I settled into my 5th row center seat (or thereabouts), pulled my hair back into a bunch and clipped it with a black spider clip. My long hair lately has given me opportunity to fuck with people's minds in a gender-bending way that makes me feel empowered somehow.

The movie was spectacular. I almost teared up at the most crucial scene, but I didn't. I think because I had read the story ahead of time, I was prepared for the scene. When I saw the trailer a few months ago, I jumped to find that story because the trailer alone left me so intrigued and a little sad. The movie put me in a spell that I might even call relapse into depression.

But why?

Was it the acting, the actors, the characters? Was it the music? Was I reminded of something I long for? Was I just relating to the characters? Was it longing? Maybe it was just a good movie that tugged at my hearstrings...but why the strong daylong obsession over it and how I reacted?

I think I finally figured it out after I went to see a second movie and after a full meal. I believe I was reacting to the movie that way because it reminded me of that hidden reality I kept safe from the outside world before coming out of the closet. Brokeback Mountain is the place where the two characters go to live out their reality, safe from the day-to-day obligations of work, family, breeding, and macho behavior. On that mountain they were just two people in love with one another. Everything was right, there was no wrong. They could be themselves. The two men were unable to reconcile that world with their off-mountain realities. When they were not together, the two men had bills to pay, children to raise, wives to love, jobs to do, assholes to kick around, etc.

Seeing how this movie portrayed the banality of their lives really hit home for me. Before coming out, I had a secret world, my own "mountain" where I could retreat from school work, parents, sibling rivalry, stress, etc. It was all mine, and nobody could damage or pollute it. Everything was good and safe. Before coming out, my boyfriend and I made love, and it all felt very natural, dangerous and secretive. My childhood had been filled with secret sexual fantasies. I withdrew into them far too much I think, all the while knowing that my perfect world would fade away the moment someone found out because it was all wrong and unnatural.

Now I live openly about my sexuality, and my colleagues and friends all know who I am. My family knows who I am. Yet, all the bills and all the job stresses, daily mundane nonsense of living in this expensive city, all of this is not the perfect Brokeback, no fucking way. Coming out has lifted a load off my shoulders, one that I carried for 20 years, but coming out has not brought with it the perfect idyll I thought I would find. If the Brokeback cowboys decided to move in together and set up their own farm, would they have that perfect life together? Jack Twist thought so. I am so frustrated with the mundane as it is, would I feel the same as Jack if I met someone, my own Ennis Del Mar?

Being out takes effort it seems. I thought this would be easier because I would not be hiding anything anymore. I am not happy with my gay life today even though I know I am living the life I want to live. Perhaps it's just loneliness, perhaps it's just the movie. Perhaps I am really depressed. Who knows. To be continued...