Life can throw you the biggest curveballs sometimes. You think something is black, and then damn if the next day doesn’t make it white. I have learned that life is gray, and that things rarely happen the way you think they might. The unpredictable is the only thing that is predictable.
I have a good friend named Amber. We first met while working at a gay bar in Nashville. I moved there in 2001 with my bandmate, David. She was a small, cute girl, very popular, with a lot of energy, and a contagious smile. Amber really came into the picture when David and I started having band problems—they started partying together.
I remember the day he told me Amber was pregnant. Obviously, I was in shock. David was into guys and Amber was into girls—the math did not compute. How in the world did they end up sleeping together? I learned that it had a lot to do with Jägermeister. Things moved rapidly after that. They decided to keep the baby; they ended up moving out to CA; and then, they “found” God and got married. I started wondering if I even knew my friend anymore. How do two gay people end up pregnant, married, and walking with God?
I was suspect at first—I really despise all the ex-gay stuff, and so many people I had known who had tried to change their sexuality for God or the church were either miserable or dead. Me being so black and white (and very gay), I could not understand how Amber could be gay one day, and straight, married, and Christian the next. I thought—there is no way she could really be happy.
But she is—and they have both taught me a lot about life and love. They never tried to get me to “change,” nor have they ever made me feel like I had to hide who I was. But it blows my mind: how can all these commonly disparate things co-exist? How can I get an email from Amber asking me about whether my partner and I will be doing artificial insemination and talking about our kids playing together while concluding with “I will pray for you?”
