Monday, October 25, 2010

Welcome All Again

If all goes well, I’ll have a steadily paying job as a software engineer.

It will be interesting juggling this job with the dance academy, but seeing as there’s a potential family start-up in my life, I need to lessen financial risks and fortify my financial stability.

I hope that the Academy won’t suffer. I teach in the afternoons, so I’m rather confident it won’t.

Anyway, good vibes my way would be appreciated. I both really need and really want this job.

Monday, October 18, 2010

Random Admissions x 2

i'm not especially convinced of primarily man-made global warming
The correlation between the sun's cycle and Earth's temperature is strikingly convincing to me that the primary cause of global warming is the sun.
Don't get me wrong, though. I believe, 100%, that we are crapping up the protection we have from the sun. I am all for taking care of and improving the environment.
I'm just not convinced we are the primary cause of global warming.
i worry about the taste differences between [gmb] and me
I love, love, love the sculpture on the right.
[GMB] pretty much hates it. His style is much more modern than mine.
He's also pro gay rainbow. I personally think it looks tacky and cheap.
That said, my worry is quite insignificant. I'm pretty sure we'd be able to find common ground were we ever to find ourselves decorating a house together.
For example, I think we'd agree on most things in the kitchen pictured below:

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Day Ten Thousand

Today is my 10,000th day on Earth.

... maybe that's why I'm so blastedly exhausted all the time...

Saturday, October 9, 2010

(500) Posts on Blogger

Well, this is actually my 503rd post... on greenly chalked.

I've had two [main] blogs before this one. The first was a blog titled something like LDS Eunuch. I started out as a hopeful celibate gay Mormon. Things, I thought were going fantastically... but the life that I had envisioned, the life that the Mormon leaders promised just wasn't the life that I was seeing.

Trying to understand how I could find a happy life as a gay Mormon (which direction I could go if not the one I was sincerely taking, the path dictated by the leader), I tore down LDS Eunuch and started to write under the blog, Chedner 101. Things progressed to the angry and bitter phase. By the end of Chedner 101, I was feeling quite finished with the church.

Not only did I feel like there was no room in the church for gays of any kind (except those who were hoping to become straight), I felt like nobody really wanted there to be room. I gave up, walked away, and started from scratch... which is where greenly chalked began.

I don't know if I've really had a purpose or theme to this blog. I've mostly just thrown my random thoughts out there. Perhaps I could say that it reflects my search for a purpose in my life; however, the latter search has been much less haphazard.

I have been extremely mindful of the choices I make. Each step is carefully analyzed to make sure they are not detrimental but are beneficial not just to me but to those with whom I share this life.

While I'm definitely still a "work in progress" (who isn't?), I can honestly say that I am pleased with who I am and with who I am becoming.

And my life, my purpose, is finally becoming what I had always envisioned (if not slightly 'physically' different--but the 'spirit' of my hopes and dreams are finally coming to fruition).

Friday, October 8, 2010

Merci à tous

Thanks everyone for your comments and emails (a few to which I still need to reply).

It is helpful to know that one isn't completely one's own.

I sent a revision, following the advice of removing the dramatic ending, of my last posted letter.

My parents haven't responded yet. I am extremely anxious.

I honestly don't know how I can be a member of my family as things are. Not being good enough for them is too damaging to my mental health.

... maybe I can learn to be okay being sub-par in their eyes...

Monday, October 4, 2010

It's just...

... so unbelievably painful knowing that my happiness, the best life I can live isn't good enough for 99.99324222% of the people who are the most important to me, that my life makes them uncomfortable.

I don't know if I have the energy for this anymore.

Dear Mom & Dad, (revision 1)

As I have mentioned before, I am completely at peace with God. I know what I am doing is what I should and need be doing, not just for my temporal but also my eternal joy.

I know that I am doing my best. If I make a mistake, then I'll learn from that mistake and move on. However, dating [GMB] has been quite the opposite of a mistake. He is one of the best things to happen in my life. He inspires me to be the best person I can be. He fills my heart with gratitude and love for life. He is a comfort and peace to me. I have felt absolutely no guilt or shame but the exact opposite in my relationship with him. The fruits of our relationship have been nothing but good.

I really am just doing my best, and I wish you could honestly see that.

I love you, I want to please you, and it hurts deeply to know that my best is not good enough for you. It's a pain that I simply cannot continuously bear.

I hope you will, at the very least, watch this clip from a movie based on a true story and sincerely listen to the final monologue: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SHV9h7Lgvn8 .

... because such are the fruits of your words and actions; such is what your words are actions are doing to me.


Love,
Andrew Martin

Dear Mom & Dad,

[This is a proposed letter in response to my parents telling me, in a nutshell, that they cannot support me--because it "is a moral issue," based on "eternal principles." Your critiques are much appreciated; I do not want to make the situation worse.]

This is, indeed, a moral issue. For both me and you.

As I have mentioned before, I am completely at peace with God. I know what I am doing is what I should and need be doing, not just for my temporal but also my eternal joy.

I must and will live according to my own testimony. I must and will do what I believe is right and good. If I make a mistake, then I'll learn from that mistake and move on. However, dating [GMB] has been quite the opposite of a mistake. He is one of the best things to happen in my life. He inspires me to be the best person I can be. He fills my heart with gratitude and love for life. I have felt absolutely no guilt or shame but the exact opposite in my relationship with him.

The moral dilemma is no longer mine but yours as you decide whether or not you truly cannot support me.

Supporting me would not change and need not challenge your beliefs about eternal principles. You do not have to believe that I will make it to the Celestial Kingdom with my family.

Supporting me would mean that you support my choice to live according to my own testimony. Supporting me would mean truly seeing and loving me for who I am, letting the fruits of my life speak for themselves.

Supporting me would simply mean that you accept that I am merely doing my best in life.

I am merely doing my best in life. I really am, and I wish you could honestly see that.

I love you, I want to please you, and if my best is not good enough for you, then I will never be able to truly please you. It's for this reason--you not being able to see that I am sincerely doing my best--that I would have to separate myself from the family. I can't subject myself to such emotional abuse. It's not healthy for any of us.

But separation would ultimately be your choice and not mine. My choice is to live the happiest, healthiest, most productive and honest life I possibly can. Your choice is to accept my best or not. If you cannot accept my best, if I am unable to please you, then I quite literally (if I truly am seeking out the happiest, healthiest, most productive and honest life I possibly can) have no other decision than to leave the family.

I do hope you can support me. I hope you can accept my best.

Love,
Andrew Martin

Saturday, October 2, 2010

An Organic Life

We have to recognize that human flourishing is not a mechanical process. It's an organic process.
~Sir Ken Robinson
Humans are not robots.

The End

True Love & Compassion

That I hurt
Would you hurt, too
Be it a prick
Or a wound that flows
The Nile

Would you wade with me
Through sorrow’s falls
Yet sail with me its gulfs
Or would you drink, instead,
The salted grief
That flows from me
As hurt

True love and compassion is more than just feeling sad when another person feels sad or feeling happy because another person feels happy.

True love and compassion is more than understanding why another person feels happy or sad.

True love and compassion is feeling sad for the exact same reasons another person feels sad; it is feeling happy for the exact same reasons another person feels happy.

It is sharing the emotions of the other person.

The opposite is taking another person's emotion and trying to make it your own, e.g.:
"You're happy because I made you happy."
"Your sorrow is making my life difficult."
"Your sorrow is my joy."
"Your joy is my sorrow."
In my experience, the last is the most difficult to bear as it takes a certain kind of haughtiness, one which feels especially cold and hollow, to pity someone else's joy.

That I joy
Would you joy, too
Be it a grin
Or a love that breaths
The Sky

Would you drift with me
Through mirth-y sighs
Yet fly with me its lofts
Or would you choke, instead,
The sweetened bliss
That breaths from me
As joy