Coping with the potential loss of a partner in an intergenerational relationship

Someone on Reddit posted a question about how one deals with (copes with) the potential loss of their partner in an intergenerational relationship. I didn't have a straight-up answer for this, but this is was what I responded with: 

I'm from India and I'll soon be 40. I have been in three relationships so far. 

The first one when I was 27 years old. It was a 3-year one with a then 67-year-old American from NYC. I knew that he had chronic illnesses but we were madly in love. He flew into live with me. He had serious complications of his long-term illnesses and had to be hospitalized in India. I then had to send him back home (I couldn't go myself because of visa issues). In NYC, he was admitted in multiple hospitals and eventually was put on life support for a few days. He eventually recovered, but couldn't make it back. We continued for a couple of more years and eventually sought other partners. Losing him multiple times was the hardest part of my life. I was diagnosed with PTSD and related depression and have been on therapy ever since.

The second relationship was with a 73-year-old man from Louisiana. Even though he is the oldest among the three, he was relatively healthy. This only lasted under a year and I was never really worried about losing him. 

The third (current) one I'm in right now is a 7-year relationship with an Indian man who is 51 now. He is overweight, has obstructive sleep apnea, and several related lifestyle disorders. He also suffers from low-self esteem, anxiety, and depression. He finds it difficult to take care of himself and his health is a constant worry.

In the last year, I lost both my parents. Even though I live in a different city by myself, I was by them in their last moments and had to attempt to resuscitate both of them. My mother's death was accidental (literally). I was in the next room and I heard some utensils fall. I called out and did not get a response, and rushed to see what was going on. I heard some strange sounds and couldn't figure out what was going on. Then I found her gasping on the kitchen floor. She died within minutes while I was resuscitating her. 

Now what this has done is that each night that I spend with my current partner, I am worried about finding him dead next to me. Often times I wake up earlier than him, and I am forced to check on him every now and then to ensure that he's still breathing and not dead. 

I know this might sound really dark and pessimistic, but that's how I am. I know that I could lose him any day and nothing is really under my control. So I try to do my best to enjoy the time I spend with him, despite the fact that the going is tough because of several issues and differences in opinion. 

I don't know if all this helps. But I thought I could at least give you someone who you probably can relate to.

Thank you - for all the inspiration

Considering I haven't updated the blog recently, I thought of cross-posting the following from a Facebook status update.

Almost three decades ago, my dad, who's a semi-professional mridangam player, gave me some lessons in mridangam, hoping that I would take it up as an instrument. I wasn't particularly interested in mridangam or Carnatic classical then and did not persist with it. Instead, I started tinkering with the Indian flute (inspired partly by my uncle, who wasa professional flautist) because I was more interested in popular music

Two decades ago, I picked up the guitar after being coaxed into it by my sister Vidhya Venkitachalam. Around then, I started jamming with my friend Sumit Pillai on drums, also picking up basic drumming concepts. After a couple of years with the guitar, I bought myself my first bass, starting my journey as a bass player. I have weilded the bass in most gigs since then, but I also have had some opportunities to perform at gigs on the guitar, shakers, and drums.

In the last few months, however, I have had the opportunity of re-exploring my "percussive" side, with several full-length gigs as a cajon/percussion player. I can't believe the kind of fun I have had doing that. Ironically enough, my cajon technique is rather similar to what my dad taught me for my mridangam (especially right hand), and I'm able to generate a rather unique snare sound with this technique. Talk about completing a circle!

At this time, I would like to thank the following people for inspiring/encouraging/helping/supporting me in various stages of my journey as a musician, especially in the context of cajon/percussion playing.

Thank you! <3

• Aarifah Eve Rebello (for letting me "shake" at random gigs)
• Abhishek Dasgupta (for pushing me at improving myself as a musician)
• Anurag Mishra (for encouraging me at gigs)
• Jairaj Joshi (for introducing me to the cajon)
• Pritesh Prabhune (for inspiring me and helping me with concepts and tech)
• Reinhardt Dias (for inspiring me)
• Rohit Chabria (for gig opportunities and letting me use your cajon)
• Roma Kunde (for constantly supporting and encouraging me)
• Shaival Chatwani (for encouraging me)
• Sharanya Natrajan (for gig opportunities and supporting and encouraging me)
• Sumit Pillai (for all the years of jamming)
• Teemeer Chimulkar (for gig opportunities, trusting in me, and supporting/encouraging me)
• Varun Sood (for inspiring me, teaching me, and helping me bounce off ideas)
• Vidhya Venkitachalam (for pushing me to take up guitar)
• Vigneshkumar Venkatraman (for such an incredibly positive attitude and inspiring me)
• Vijayalakshmy Venkitachalam (for marrying my Dad?)
• Vishal Mallu (for inspiring me and lending the cajon)

My sister made everyone proud

My family is somewhat known for academics. Well, I know that holds true for most the Tam-Bram families that you know. Yet, my sister and I have been very good academicians throughout our academic careers. But yet, this news caught be my surprise initially, and pride and happiness immediately after.

Yesterday, my sister texted me stating that she had cleared the IIT-Madras MS entrance.

I'll try to put this in perspective. She is turning 41 this year. She graduated in Civil Engineering 19 years back. Since then she has taken some correspondence courses (e.g., MBA). For the last few years, she has been busy with her kid and her parents in law, who have not been in the pink of their healths.

Of course, I congratulated her and wished her the very best. She responded in a rather nonchalant manner that she may not be able to join because of her commitments to the family.

I feel sad about that, but I very well know that she can't do anything else. She, unlike me, has chosen to put family over everything else, thus, in my opinion, not taking care of herself as much as she should.

Initiating conversations about depression

For some reason, I know and/or am close to a lot of people who have known psychological issues, especially depression. For example, Vinokur, my first ex-boyfriend has a plethora of neuroses, including Type II Bipolar Disorder. My second ex-boyfriend Joe has depression, but is still in the closet. My present boyfriend J has been diagnosed with depression and is supposed to be on therapy for it, but is not the most compliant patient.

My sister has symptoms similar to me, but is not willing to take treatment. My dad and mom too have a variety of symptoms. Several of my close friends have depression and they are friends with me because they can freely and openly have conversations with me. Conversations both about depression and otherwise. I tend to empathize with them and don't force them to do things that they are not comfortable with.

So why am I ranting about it? To spread awareness about it, actually, and to share my learning experiences. About my point...

Although being perpetually distracted is a known symptom of depression, it is something that people don't notice too often. Maybe they do, but they don't attribute it to depression. I think it goes hand in hand with the fact that you don't want to seek help to treat it and that you don't want things to change. Plus, of course, if you are like me, you are likely thinking you deserve to be punished for being such a bad person.

I noticed recently that most of the time that I have known J, when I initiate conversations about some chores/tasks that we need to collaborate on to finish, he seems distracted and preoccupied with something else. He behaves like a little school kid being forced to listen to a lecture that he/she is not interested in. I used to think of this a rude, unkind, inconsiderate behavior.

Two nights back, I was at my apartment, feeling nice and refreshed after a relaxing session of EMDR. I am usually hesitant to initiate conversations. But I felt great about myself and I decided to call J on Skype. The conversation started smoothly. J was happy that I called and was playful and clowning around as usual. However, I had to initiate some serious conversation about his health and the things that we need to get done for his birthday party this weekend.

As soon as I did, however, he seemed to zone out. He started picking up things from his desk and shelves and examining them and rearranging them. He was listening to my monologue all throughout. When his turn to respond came up, he did not have much to say. This slowly built up to a point when I waited for a full minute for a response. Of course, I didn't get any.

I decided that it was time to let him know what I thought. And I did. He didn't receive it well. The conversation was awkward and he hung up unceremoniously. This was not uncharacteristic of J and the conversations that we have.

I closed Skype and started working on one of the tracks I was working on, and got lost in it. In about half hour's time, I got a call from J on Skype. This time he acknowledged that he realizes that he has been distracted and he wants to snap out of it. As usual, I suggested that he get an appointment with his shrink about it.

As a concluding note, I feel that I did something good. At the very least, I think I was successful in reinitiating the process of recuperation.

How it all went wrong today

Today has been a bad day. It started off well. I woke up early enough, made coffee, had a quick shower, and headed to the office. Although it was dull and murky, it wasn't raining on my rickshaw ride to work. I had the usual roadside idli breakfast and reached work just before my reporting time. The first hour went really well, when I thought I did well to finish the work on an assignment. Then it all started to go wrong.

First it was the constant barrage of interruptions. Junior editors asking me doubts, the project managers constantly shuffling and changing work, people randomly coming up and stopping by, work-related e-mail and instant messages on your computers. I know multitasking is not efficient, but how the hell do you ask people to stop interrupting you? One could argue that being interrupted is a given in a work environment similar to mine, but I don't think that still doesn't explain why people don't think of ways to establish guidelines to streamline all of this.

And then the personal life interruptions started to mount. Messages and e-mails from my sister and Jay. I simply cannot seem to ask them to stop interrupting me. They probably are having an easy day--well, at least I know that sister was taking a day off to recover from an upper respiratory infection--and they want to share it with. Or so it seems like. I don't want to be rude, but it still does make me stressed and anxious. Usually, my afternoon catnap does wonders. It did today too. But after that, the constant stream of interruptions kept me on edge all evening. How I wish I could just block everything and just do my work.

Then the day became worse. Unnecessary wait for the rickshaw, heavy rain on the way with me getting partially wet, crazy traffic--all of this when I was trying to reach my apartment in time to receive my guitar amplifier from someone that my friend was sending it with. In the middle of all this, there was a playful, teasing Jay, at the other end of a Whatsapp chat. Eventually, I let him know that I would appreciate if he would be a little more understanding and less teasing when things are not working out for me. I don't think he completely understood but there was a temporary relief from the frantic texting.

Then I walked into my building to screaming kids, as usual. I walked into my apartment to find that the maid hasn't come in an done the cleaning. Eventually, I learned that my friend was not going to be able to send the amplifier after all! I was so edgy by this time, that I felt that I need to have dinner and go to bed early. So I dial the restaurant downstairs to only find out that there telephone line is engaged for almost half an hour! In between all this, some more texting with Jay. Eventually I got through to the restaurant and got some dinner.

I tried to read a book for a bit but the most annoying ads in between overs on the cricket broadcast and the screaming kids on the corridor did not let me concentrate. Then I had dinner and I felt slightly better. Jay tried some philosophy on the fucked-up-ness of the world on text. That's probably not what I wanted. Eventually, he asked me if I would like to have a phone conversation. A usual, I refused because I felt that we would have a very edgy conversation. It was hard to make him understand why I must go to bed early.

I watched the last few overs of the test match while sorting out my medications for the next few weeks, putting the cocktail of pills in my monthly pill box. I realized that I was relatively short of one of the six I was on. That means that I have to go get another prescription from the shrink and go to the pharmacy and beg for them to give the drugs to me! Aarrgh! The only other things that I can imagine that could have made this day worse are losing my wallet, getting dumped, and have multiple limbs amputated in a road traffic accident.

I want this day to end. Please.

What a disappointment!

On my fifth evening of my visit home for my Mom's minor eye surgery, my father reinforced my mental image about him - as an ill-educated, conservative, uncaring tyrant.

After slyly asking me when I would be returning to Kerala next, he asked me, "I know you have said no previously, but marriage proposals are still coming in. Why don't you get married?"

To this, I said that I'm disappointed at this question and that I thought he had understood what homosexuality is.

He said, "Many people in our family have suffered from this condition?"

I asked him, "What? Homosexuality?"

He said, "Infertility."

I told him, "It's because of people like you that people of alternative sexual orientation commit suicide."

He said, "It will be good for you and solve many of your problems." By problems, he meant depression, which he thinks is caused by loneliness.

I said, "I have my partner now and I'm perfectly satisfied with that."

He had that evil, bull-shitty smile which screamed "You fool!" as a response. What a disappointment of a father!

All throughout this, my Mom was caring and smiling and was agreeing to what I was saying.

She deserves respect. My Dad does not. Period.

Getting better all the time

The last week has been really good me. Well, except for the fact that I got kicked out of my main band. Otherwise, with the help of the new medication (I suspect whether it could have such an early effect – maybe placebo effect) and early lessons of cognitive therapy, I am feeling all round better. I have a homework – to track my mood throughout the day and find out what triggers my negative moods. This is helping a lot. The people that trigger my bad moods are those who are close to me who have hurt me previously (e.g., parents, Vinokur, and Joe). I should avoid contacting them when I’m feeling vulnerable, I think.

The new shrink

I finally managed to come out of my depression closet and write something on my blog a few days back. Now, I took it another step forward. I met a new shrink.

The first sitting was rather remarkable. He must have asked me maybe eight or ten questions. I would just go on and about my past. The most that I talked about was my relationship with Vinokur and how it came to an end.

It felt telling a stranger about everything that affected me negatively from the past – from parental physical abuse, incestual sexual abuse, being looked down by my family almost throughout my childhood and adolescence, the hospital changing my perspective of life, why I came to Mumbai, to how I fell in and out of love and was broken into pieces – everything.

My shrink listened to me carefully. At the end of of our session, he offered me a comprehensive plan. New antidepressant (bupropion), slow tapering off of the cocktail, introduction to cognitive therapy, and regular physical exercise.

Although, I have been feeling much better in the last few days and I was even more content with myself that I finally took a measure toward getting out of the rut. Let’s see where this leads me.

Cousin’s wedding in Kerala

I don’t quite remember why I agreed to it, but I did. Oh yeah, my uncle was threatening (in a friendly manner, of course) that if I don’t make it, there would be drastic consequences. Anyway, I had agreed to attend my cousin’s wedding in Kozhikkode, and had dirt-cheap JetLite tickets purchased three months back.

The to flight was eventless. But then onward, everything was chaotic. Nobody knew how far the wedding hall was from the airport. I finally hired a cab and set out on my own and found the hall. There, I was greeted by all sorts of faces from my past – which I have been trying to hide from, I must admit.

The reception of my relatives, in general was really, good. All of them were happy (or pretended to be) and did not ask too much. A couple of questions about marriage popped up here and there, but I was able to tackle them with humor. After all, I had to keep my word to my parents – they didn’t want me coming out to my extended family.

The only memorable, rather scary, instance was when an uncle took me to the side and started asking me questions like “Are you the old Kris?” “Are you hiding behind a veil” “Are these questions causing you discomfort?” “When will you come back to us?” Then it dawned on me that he was on FaceBook and had seen most of my pictures with Joe.

I guess he knew that I was gay but was shocked and was not very well read about homosexuality.

Of course I met with my Mom and Dad, sister and BIL, and my BIL’s Mom and Dad. I also met all the uncles and aunts that I like and those I don’t like too much. So it was a mixed bag. Some of the cousins that I knew as very small had grown into adolescents and shit. That’s like scary.

Well, apart from that, I spiked up my wedding gift to my cousin (a relatively expensive Bvlgari grooming kit + condoms + lube), and hung out with Ray over beer and beef fry. That was nostalgic. We even rang up some of our old ‘fuckbuddies’.

Dysfunctional families

I’m sure everyone thinks that they belong to a dysfunctional family. I believe that more dysfunctional relationships exist in families than elsewhere. The more I think of it, the more I believe that this might be true.

Think about it. In any other relationship, people are brought together because they are interested in something that is common to them. The key word here is ‘interested.’ In families, people are together because of ‘relations’ and most probably, they have nothing in common except for this ‘relation’.

Relationships need this commonality of interest to flourish. That’s why friendships stay - if you work on them - whereas familial relationships bite the dust. This is true in my case. I don’t have any truly ‘healthy’ relationship with any of my family members.

What’s your opinion?

Two months

I have been away from the blog for two months or so. In those two months, my life has changed for the better.

• September 25th: I went to Rajasthan to perform with a Bollywood playback singer, Kshitij Tarey
• September 26th: I met Joseph Anthony Ruffino, my boyfriend! <3
• Late September: I start going on a diet and gymming regularly!
• September/October/November: I finally have sex!
• September/October: I had many gigs with Cirkles and Overhung!
• October 5th/6th: I had two gigs with Monali Thakur, a Bollywood playback singer!
• October 15th - I lose 2 kgs and 2 inches everywhere!
• October 22nd - I contract dengue fever with thrombocytopenia.
• October 24th - 29th - I get admitted in a hospital and undergo supportive treatment and platelet transfusion.
• October 29th - My sister flies in for my discharge. I catch up with her.
• October 31st - I install an AC in my apartment
• October 31st - My parents fly in to stay with me for 5 weeks.
• November 1st - I buy a gas connection.
• November 7th - I turned 32 years today! Wish me happy b'day! And I join back work!

Oh, well

This is what I ended my last post with. It very well sums up the situation vis-à-vis my parents visiting me this winter. Yesterday, after considering everything, I wrote an e-mail to my Mom explaining everything – warning her about potential incompatibilities, arguments, limitation of my apartment, etc.

Yesterday evening, I chatted with her regarding the possible dates. She said that my cousin might probably get married around that time – nothing is confirmed now – and they might have to plan around that wedding. I said okay.

This morning, she repeated the same thing and said that she’s not sure about visiting. I thought aloud that it might be a good idea after all as it would relieve me off the pressure of hosting them.

She said: “Then, we won’t visit you.”

I said: “Thanks Amma.”

So much for the effort. :(

Tailspin

It started out with two conversations yesterday. One with someone I love and another with someone I’m supposed to love. Both tread over my mental minefield seemingly without a care. Whiplashes and big gashes. I was hurt and suddenly had lost faith in everything.

It was plain obvious – no smile, no spark, no positivity. Some I know from far far away tried to pick me up and make me feel better. He succeeded marginally. But what really helped was a a few of hours of sleep, albeit light, in the background of some eclectic music (loud).

I woke up early, almost having forgotten what had happened the previous night. I managed to make a lot of out the precious early morning. Then, went to work. The entire day was exceptionally productive. And on my way back, I tweeted – “ Time to give an extremely productive day an ending that it deserves. Don't you dare to spoil it now!”

No sooner had I reached home, there was an e-mail waiting for me – which broke me down completely. Then there was someone else on Skype who did his bit. And finally, I went to the chat room that I hang out usually, where I received some scathing comments under the pretext of humor. I ran out of the room scared.

I have never felt worse all year. Is this another episode of clinical depression that has been otherwise well managed by my medications? Only time will tell.

Father's Day - not your kind

Today is Father’s day. A day in which people say all kinds of lovey-dovey things about their fathers. Unfortunately, I don’t have anything of that sort to share with you. My relationship with my father never took off. He was in another parallel universe altogether, I think.

The only lasting memory from my childhood that I have is my father picking up and throwing me out of the pooja room when the ball that I was playing with accidentally popped in there and I went there to pick it up. I landed about 4 feet out and didn’t have any serious injuries.

From that day onward, I knew that I was not going to get any ‘classic’ love from my father. Oh, well!

Need For Humor

How much does humor have a role in your life? In my life, I would say almost 90%. I can’t live without humor. I can’t hang around people who can’t appreciate it. Those who don’t get my jokes go to the chopping block.

One of the first persons on this list was my sister. She stopped getting my jokes awhile back and our relationship has deteriorated since. Although my mother is a little dense, she still gets some of my jokes. My father, whose sense of humor is more developed than my mother’s or sister’s, still is weird. Only in actual physical conversations would I get him to appreciate my jokes.

Anyway, why am I on a rant? Because I have to go out with two people in the near future – one, who doesn’t seem to get my humor and another one who’s the jack of all kinds of humor. I’m sorry but I’m already having a bias toward the second one. The first one better be interesting, failing which he’ll have to be axed.

Naïve Mom

I explained what happened between me and him to my Mom. In an e-mail, that is - we still don't talk or chat. She told me to be positive and said that the right man would come. I replied saying that I am a little sad because I wanted to become a father soon.

She wrote to me today saying: 'If you want to become a father, you have to marry a girl!'

So innocent, so naïve.

I told her that there are other options like surrogacy and adoption. She hasn't responded back yet!

Family drama

My folks have found a buyer for our old house and they are almost on the verge of selling it. Once the transaction is done, they will be left with a lot of money. They insist that I receive a share of it.

Going by the past history between me and my folks, if thing have to ever improve, money should not be a part of our relationship. I have clearly indicated that I don’t want any money from them. But my Mom keeps on insisting. This situation makes me not want to video chat with her anymore.

Conversation with my parents

My sister has finally gone back to Chennai with her kid. She is staying with her in-laws at the moment because her husband is on a work-related US tour. Apparently, she’s unable to find an ‘aaya’/maid/nanny to take care of the kid in Chennai. If she could, she can move to her own apartment and have some peace. I hope she finds happiness and comfort soon as taking care of a 5-month old kid is not easy.

Well, because she has left, my Mom and Dad are back to being by themselves in Kerala. Today, I woke up just at 11 am, just in time to chat with her. We had a pleasant video chat conversation where we talked about the various issues regarding my sister and myself. Although I tried pushing in the conversation about my visit to Delhi to meet my friends, she seemed resistant to talk about it. I left it at that.

My Dad also joined in for a bit during the chat. He looked older than ever with his new pair of gigantic-looking spectacles. As usual, he was trying to ask me about my ‘career’ in Orthopedics. He also wanted me to gain national recognition by performing in the AIR or some TV channel so that I can put that up on my resumé. I wanted to ask him about his predictions regarding my future, but again I restrained myself.

It’s crazy how I want my family to be involved in my emotional life. It’s almost as if I’m seeking their approval. Doesn’t everyone do that?

The Indian Express Article

Today, an article about gays and their use of the internet to 'come out' was published in the Indian Express. Yours Truly was featured in the article, that too with a photograph. Here's a link to the article.

The Digital Afterlife of the Queer
Richa Bhatia, Indian Express, Jan 26, 2011*

Coming out to family and friends is not always easy. A number of
dedicated websites have now developed to provide LGBTs with a support system

It was in his early twenties that Madurai-born Shridhar Sadasivan typed the keywords—connection, community, Queer Chennai on the Yahoo group MovenPick (a non-sexual support space for lesbian/ gay/ bi/ transgendered (LGBT) people in Chennai). What was he looking for? Confirmation that his sexuality would not be an impediment in the larger social context, something that MovenPick provided. As opposed to children from hipper, and less conservative outposts, Sadasivan, now in his early 30s “suffered with shame and guilt” all through his teen life. “I had no clue about homosexuality. I had no one to reach out to. I tried to kill myself. I found Internet and it helped me understand my sexuality, accept and be comfortable with who I am and then come out to my friends and family”, shares Sadasivan, who is now currently based in New Jersey, United States, where he works in the IT industry.

Past the closet days, Sadasivan is now making a splash with his profound stories that are published in the Tamil magazine Thinnai and Thendral. He is also a member of the executive team of Orinam.net, a bilingual LGBT resource website and is trying to create awareness in the mainstream about LGBT issues through his writings. “Indian kids normally discuss attraction, sexual feelings with friends. But kids with same-sex attraction can never discuss with their friends, so there is no support system other than the Internet as of now,” rues Sadasivan.

It is a common queer narrative. The rise of the Internet has kickstarted the emergence of a worldwide queer support system. “The personal coming out experience is certainly enhanced by the emergence of online communities. The website lends them anonymity, as people do not give out their real names. If you are anonymous, you can say whatever you want, people can’t judge you,” says MJ, Mumbai-based co-founder of the two-year-old portal gaysi.com, a first-of-its kind initiative in India, where the desi-gay community comes together and shares personal stories of their struggles and their coming out narratives. Over the past two years, the website is seeing traffic from all over the world,with about 500-600 hits a day of late. “Besides international dating sites, there is no online platform where desis can come over and connect. So we set it up pumping in money from our own pockets,” said MJ. Though still not a commercially viable project, she is wary of asking for donations. “The advertising revenue is next to nothing, so we are looking for other ways of marketing, including endorsements from corporates who are not hesitant to support our cause,” she says. 24-year-old Agnivo Niyogi sees larger implications for the LGBT presence on the web in the socio-media landscape. “Of late, the LGBT community is seen as a good market to invest. It can prove commercially viable through right marketing and niche products. We already have queer stores and queer e-zones,” said the Kolkata-based Niyogi, who is also a contributor to the one-year-old monthly magazine Gaylaxy, an online LGBT magazine. Though there are overseas niche websites such as TwoBrides.com, TwoGrooms.com — a one-stop-shop for gay weddings that offers products, information, wedding stories and ceremony topics — the scene in India is very nascent. “People are not willing to come up with such ideas. There is a lack of initiative,” rues Niyogi, who works as a content developer with New Age Knowledge Solutions.

There wasn’t any internet in Thiruvananthapuram, when Krishna Kumar Venkitachalam, now 31, came to grips with his sexuality. There was no one to talk to either. In his early days, Venkitachalam, logged on to Yahoo groups to “find friends online”. Since then, he has moved base to Mumbai, where Venkitachalam, who has a degree in Orthopedics, works in a KPO by the day and slides into the musician avatar as Kris Bass and gigs by night. Bass is also a popular blogger at www.engayinglife, a seven-year-old blog started in Mumbai. It was through the blog that Venkitachalam chose to come out in 2007. “My sister and her husband first read the blog in 2003 and came to know about my orientation, though I officially came out to my parents in 2008. My mother had known about it for sometime but chose to ignore it since she thought I was too young. She is very supportive, though my Dad is still shaky about it,” shares Venkitachalam. His blog, about “a queer, amateur songwriter and a bassist gives an insight into a person who is also gay”. These days, he is perpetually online, hanging out in chat rooms “not to seek sex but intelligent conversation”. “I am not a gay activist,” notes Venkitachalam. “I am just letting people know that I am pretty much a next door type guy, who also happens to be gay,” he said.

Of course, there are errors in the article. First of all, there WAS internet when I came to grips with my sexuality. That's how I got to know that there were millions of men like me. There were very few people to talk to, and I came out to my friends first. Then, this blog wasn't started in Mumbai. I started blogging when I was in Thiruvananthapuram.

I don't exactly know the time when my sister and my brother-in-law came to know about my orientation, but I guess it was around 2004/2005. I was always out on the blog and I have hardly used it as a means to come out. Of course, my friends, when they come across it at first, come to know about my orientation (because the header says that I'm queer).

I have always come out to people personally - either by telling them on their faces that "Dude, listen how can I get in bed with you?" or "Girl, do you have a father/uncle than I can have sex with?" - or by joking about it, just like I did in the first part of this sentence.

I had indirectly come out to my sister way back in 1999 when I had made a website for myself. At that point, my home page had a statement saying that "I'm definitely not a heterosexual." My sister had read it and I thought she had chosen to ignore it.

Then, I came out to my Mom and Dad in 2009. That was the first time they came to know about it. I don't think they have ignored it ever. But they do have problems in talking to me about it. I must admit that my Mom is getting much better at it now.

So, I became famous once more. Thanks Indian Express.

Farewell to a friendship

I had another chat conversation with my sister this afternoon, the first one after our previous one in which we insulted and hurt each other. As a modus operandi, I started the conversation asking about how things were and how the weather was etc – many of my friends had advised me that it was the best way to go about such an unhealthy relationship. She said she was fine and asked me if I was and we thanked each other. I thought things were working out well. I tried to dilute the conversation by sending her and my Mom a recent picture of me taken at the New Year’s Eve party.

Eventually, however, she brought the topic of our previous conversation. She said that she was sorry to have been so blunt and hurtful. She said that she didn’t like to mask her feelings and wanted to be honest about how she felt about me. I told her that we had fallen out of the friendship that we had – we were each other’s best friends for many years during our combined childhood, adolescence, and early adulthood – and that to maintain whatever that was left, it was best that we became ‘fake’ friends.

I also mentioned that I felt more free during online chats with my mother because she seemed to understand me more and appeared generally kinder and more gentle in her dealings. She seemed hurt – more hurt than me, probably because I already knew how our relationship was going to end up anyway. She said that she would rather be not in close touch than be ‘fake’ friends, to stop being touch with me for some time at least. I couldn’t say anything but ‘yes.’

I guess, things ended up just the way that I had written in the song ‘Hope It’s Over’ about me and her. The final line ‘Yes it is’ sounded a tad too harsh, but it’s exactly what has happened. This is the song that I had dedicated to her in the only gig of mine that she had attended. This was in late 2009, I think. Anyway, an ending which might be sad, but is true.

Hope It’s Over (2008)

When did I stop being, what I used to be
Where did I start falling, you weren't looking
What did I start chasing, it feels so long
Whom did I leave stranded, I fell so hard, I felt so low

Was it you, was it me, who knows

When did I stop listening, it was deafening
Where did I stop looking, what lies ahead
What did I start wishing, wish I'd be there now
Whom did I try faking, I tried so hard, I felt so lone

Was it you, was it me, who knows
Was it you, was it me, who knows

The hope that is left, is it too heavy to confess
The hope that is left, it's so easy to forget

Was it you, was it me, who knows
Was it you, was it me, is it over?

Is it over?
Yes it is.