I wrote this a while ago on a day of remembrance. In 2010 there were a number of gay students who were taking their own lives. It devastated me. So people got together and wore purple shirts in honor of their lives. I was sitting there in my purple shirt crying. My heart was breaking for these students. Here's what I wrote:
Purple Shirt 10/20/10
I put this shirt on and I dedicate it to you. Young man. Too young to die. It’s purple because it reminds me of your pain. Of bruises hidden from the world. Buried beneath a facade of laughs and an heir of superiority. Anything to get through the day and to hide yourself away from one more round of teasing. Purple is beautiful, in it’s brightness and boldness. It is soft and gentle. It is loud and confronting. It is royal and honorable. All of the things that you were and could have been if you had chosen to live longer. If you had chosen to hang on for just a few more years. Holding on until the torment ceases and this moment fades into a distant memory of a time during your awkward teenage years.
We all have them. Sometimes mine got so dark that I wanted to end it all too, but I didn’t. Thank God. And I only have God to thank for that. But you didn’t realize it. You didn’t realize that in the midst of all your pain there is a God who loves you. That it doesn’t matter what His followers might say, God is crazy about you. But you never got a chance to hear that. All you heard instead were the lies, shouted to you by an enraged enemy. Whispered to you in the middle of the night. The torture you felt when you looked in the mirror and saw your own face looking back. The torment between feeling something so honest and pure, and not knowing if what you felt was right. But isn’t love right? When is love ever not right?
You never understood how you could be made this way and you tried so hard to make it stop. But, it wouldn’t stop. So instead, you embraced it, thinking that maybe by being who you are you would eventually be happy. And so, you got up each day, put your pants on one leg at a time, and walked out the door. Going to school. Doing normal things like a normal boy. All the while, you were mocked for just living your life. Not understanding why other people could hate you so much.
“There must be something inherently wrong with me,” you thought, as you tried to look into your own eyes. But you couldn’t see it. You couldn’t see why other people could be so angry with you. But as time went on, you started to see it too. You started to believe the judgments. You started to absorb the hate. And soon looking at yourself in the mirror became too much. Wrapped up in a world of lies, surrounded by shouts of anger, buried beneath daggers of disapproval and hate you felt like you were being eaten alive. Soon the pain became too strong to bear. So you decided to give them what they wanted. No more “living in sin.” No more sitting in isolation. No more representing all that they wanted to be, but were too afraid to become. When the weight of the mocking became too much, you did the worst thing you could do. Ending it all with a self-inflicted wound. Thinking that what you were doing would be best for all.
So today, I wear this purple shirt. Hoping that my choice of wardrobe will somehow make amends for your choice in departure. Hoping in this way to show you that I care. Even though it’s too late for you to see it. But somehow still, through the solidarity of a nation showing our support for your soul, hopefully others like you will see us, standing together, and know that they are not alone.
