fic: Free to Be
Media: Fic (original)
Title: Free to Be
Rating: PG
Spoilers: n/a
Warnings: None
Word count: 558
Beta: My Narrating Selves tutor, Chris.
Summary: Growing up in the country can be both amazing, and way too restricting. Just because you call somewhere home, doesn't mean you can live there. Writen for a uni assignment.
Author Note: Writtent for a uni assignment for the Narrating Selves unit (which I got 92% for!). Had to be based on a personal experience. Kalgoorlie is a small, isolated mining town, about 600km east of Perth in Westen Australia.
Free to Be
I come from a small(ish) country town in central WA called Kalgoorlie. As a gold mining town, it can be a bit rough at times. The pubs are open from six in the morning right through until three o’clock the next day, to cater for the shift workers. Kal is famous for its brothels (being the only ‘legal’ brothels in the state- for historical reasons), and teenagers wear work-boots to school so they don’t need to go home until they knock-off work later that night. Even so, Kalgoorlie is a pretty good place to grow up. The schools are pretty good (for a country town), and there is a huge range or sports and community groups There are churches on every second street corner, and nothing ever opens on a Sunday morning. Overall, it’s a good place to raise a family.
Except if you are gay.
As a child, I loved Kalgoorlie. The people were nice, I had good friends, life was good. Then I hit high school, and realised that my hometown was not always so nice.
When I was thirteen, I came out to my best mate (who turns out gay too).
When I was fourteen, I told my mum I wasn’t so straight. She didn’t believe me.
When I was fifteen, I had sex with a girl for the first time (it was a one night stand). Later on that year I also became a Christian, which changed my whole outlook on life.
When I was sixteen, I came out at school. Now that went down well. In a school of a thousand students, I was the only queer person out. You can imagine the kind of attention I got for it!
When I was seventeen, I started to get really vocal. I’d had enough being treated like shit by people in my school. I would wear slogan shirts to school (which Mum banned at home after my little sister started saying “what does ‘Dip me in Honey and Throw me to the Lesbians’ mean?”), and I would call people out on their homophobic comments.
When I was eighteen I was on Youth Exchange, and a whole new world of Gay Belgium opened up to me. But it didn’t feel right. Empty somehow.
When I was nineteen I moved to Perth for uni, and everything changed.
I went from a tiny town where I was branded a freak and weirdo, to this big city where it isn’t such an oddity to be gay. Finally, I could be myself, and no one would care! The campus Queer Department quickly became a second home, in a way that Tels Quels (a Belgian gay and lesbian youth centre) never did. Mum is still in denial over my sexuality, but now I don’t live at home, I can’t shove it in her face anymore. We are both dealing with it in our own way. It is strange to call Kalgoorlie home now. A place I loved for so long is now constricting. I go back, and I feel as if I am being shoved back into the closet. I thought I came out when I was sixteen, but now I realise that I was still trapped in the door. Now though, I am out and free, in this big, wide world that is quite happy to let me be.
Title: Free to Be
Rating: PG
Spoilers: n/a
Warnings: None
Word count: 558
Beta: My Narrating Selves tutor, Chris.
Summary: Growing up in the country can be both amazing, and way too restricting. Just because you call somewhere home, doesn't mean you can live there. Writen for a uni assignment.
Author Note: Writtent for a uni assignment for the Narrating Selves unit (which I got 92% for!). Had to be based on a personal experience. Kalgoorlie is a small, isolated mining town, about 600km east of Perth in Westen Australia.
Free to Be
I come from a small(ish) country town in central WA called Kalgoorlie. As a gold mining town, it can be a bit rough at times. The pubs are open from six in the morning right through until three o’clock the next day, to cater for the shift workers. Kal is famous for its brothels (being the only ‘legal’ brothels in the state- for historical reasons), and teenagers wear work-boots to school so they don’t need to go home until they knock-off work later that night. Even so, Kalgoorlie is a pretty good place to grow up. The schools are pretty good (for a country town), and there is a huge range or sports and community groups There are churches on every second street corner, and nothing ever opens on a Sunday morning. Overall, it’s a good place to raise a family.
Except if you are gay.
As a child, I loved Kalgoorlie. The people were nice, I had good friends, life was good. Then I hit high school, and realised that my hometown was not always so nice.
When I was thirteen, I came out to my best mate (who turns out gay too).
When I was fourteen, I told my mum I wasn’t so straight. She didn’t believe me.
When I was fifteen, I had sex with a girl for the first time (it was a one night stand). Later on that year I also became a Christian, which changed my whole outlook on life.
When I was sixteen, I came out at school. Now that went down well. In a school of a thousand students, I was the only queer person out. You can imagine the kind of attention I got for it!
When I was seventeen, I started to get really vocal. I’d had enough being treated like shit by people in my school. I would wear slogan shirts to school (which Mum banned at home after my little sister started saying “what does ‘Dip me in Honey and Throw me to the Lesbians’ mean?”), and I would call people out on their homophobic comments.
When I was eighteen I was on Youth Exchange, and a whole new world of Gay Belgium opened up to me. But it didn’t feel right. Empty somehow.
When I was nineteen I moved to Perth for uni, and everything changed.
I went from a tiny town where I was branded a freak and weirdo, to this big city where it isn’t such an oddity to be gay. Finally, I could be myself, and no one would care! The campus Queer Department quickly became a second home, in a way that Tels Quels (a Belgian gay and lesbian youth centre) never did. Mum is still in denial over my sexuality, but now I don’t live at home, I can’t shove it in her face anymore. We are both dealing with it in our own way. It is strange to call Kalgoorlie home now. A place I loved for so long is now constricting. I go back, and I feel as if I am being shoved back into the closet. I thought I came out when I was sixteen, but now I realise that I was still trapped in the door. Now though, I am out and free, in this big, wide world that is quite happy to let me be.