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[NQV] Coming Out discussion (13)
(continued)
I think that I am "closeted" like many other people -- but will
it be forever? And the difficult question is not whether the
closet door will always be "closed" but whether or not it will
be "bolted shut". And what would we do with the keys, will we
throw them away so that the closet door will be sure to stay
closed forever -- with our full knowledge of that grim decision
to bolt it shut by our own hands? I don't have the answer to
this question myself. But I hope that I can restrain myself
from suffocating myself to death in an impasse.... Here's
something from Lu Xun to think about:
"Imagine an iron house having not a single window and virtually
indestructible, with all its inmates sound asleep and about to
die of suffocation. Dying in their sleep, they won't feel the
pain of death. Now if you raise a shout to wake a few of the
lighter sleepers, making these unfortunate few suffer the agony
of irrevocable death, do you really think you are doing them
a good turn?" (from Preface to "Call to Arms")
Indeed, I often think of my closeted existence as analogous to
Lu Xun's iron house. Am I frustrating myself to death with the
thought and anxiety about being locked into my closeted existence
without a way out? And would I dare poison myself with the foolish
hope that there might be a way out and that I'd have to fight for it?
And ultimately to die in frustration and despair? Well, I sure hope
that the situation isn't that grim, that is the reason why I still
resist the idea of bolting myself shut in the closet forever. But
since I CAN'T "come out" of it either -- at least not yet, and not
for a long time to come -- would it be possible to delude myself to
think away the closet, to think that it never exists at all. Well,
that's the way to try to take a more positive attitude about the
whole thing, if I don't think of the source of my unhappiness,
perhaps I'll die happy. Yes, perhaps, like the inmates in that
iron house of Lu Xun, I'll be suffocated to death anyway, but if
I die in my sleep, at least I won't feel the pain of death. As if
that is any consolation ....
(to be continued)
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