I have spent my entire life trying to figure out the ultimate puzzle. This is not a puzzle that comes in a box or a bag, and it does not come with instructions or pre-cut pieces that tell you how to put everything together and get to the bigger picture, the final product. This is not an extensive way for me to somehow show you I like puzzles, because truthfully they are boring and I do not get the excitement in putting together pieces from a box. I have spent almost 25 years on a far more practical puzzle, and I consistently battle with the idea that I have either begun putting it together, or I’ve broken the pieces and made things worse.

I cannot describe with enough accuracy the feeling of “broken,” as a person. You can fix a broken bone, you can fix a broken toy, you can fix a flat tire, but you cannot necessarily fix someone that feels broken, who maybe is broken. You see, the image in front of you looks put together. The limbs are all attached, the head is there, the heart is beating, and hopefully you are wearing clothes. Beneath all of these layers of togetherness, broken lies waiting for a moment to rear his ugly head (or her head, for the female readers). Just because you cannot see that something is broken, does not mean that it is not. Now granted, that may also mean that just something is not broken just because you think it is. But being broken is painful, and its painful to people in different ways.

Growing up, in those moments, I was foolish enough to think the primary characters of my life, my mother and father, would disown me for some reason because of my sexuality. I thought they would shun me because of the non-traditional life I wanted to life by simply being able to say that I am gay. I spoke to inanimate objects around the house, hoping they would keep my secrets. I listened to people talk about fags every day in life around me - on the bus, in school, on the playing surface. With each passing gay slur, the pieces of puzzle felt more and more broken. With every attempt to put the puzzle together with a traditionally heterosexual lifestyle, the idea that girls were hot and “wouldn’t you like to get with her”, I only made my puzzle worse. I failed to see that in order for my puzzle to go together, I had to do a few things. First, simply accept internally the fact that I desired a physical connection with the same sex. To this day, I still battle questions of people asking how I know, etc. Honestly, stop fucking asking that question because it is both rude and based in homophobia. The same way you know your sexual orientation as a straight male or women is the same way I knew mine, you asshat. Do not question my sexuality and the way I live it, because you have no idea what has gone into making the pieces fit.

I battled with the demons of religion and sexuality, with traditional masculine settings in sport related to sexuality, with isolation of suppressing a truly beautiful part of life. Instead of putting one element of life together as my peers did who traditionally define themselves as straight, I negatively impacted my own experiences as a teenager going through traditional period of life in which most things are confusing: puberty. Puberty was made worse as a closeted teen, because in the early 2000’s, you can bet your bottom dollar that sex education, or education as a whole really, did not necessarily cover LGBT issues. I was just left to sit there in the awkwardness of my closet, which admittedly, was not as fabulous as the one I have now full of aspirations and shoes. But because no one could see this piece of me, suppressing it deep inside until I felt it buried, I let the pieces break. I doubt my own worth, my perception of self, my value as a person. Instead of looking in a mirror and seeing my own reflection, I saw a broken mirror. Instead of staring at myself in a puddle after a rainy day, I saw a ghost trying not to be seen by anyone.

Broken is beautiful. Broken is something that can be fixed. We, as people, are allowed to be broken at times in our life if we are struggling to piece everything together. I, at time of writing this, am struggling to piece together things that are relevant for a 25 year old but when I am 90 and senile (as if I make it to 90 first of all), I won’t see a broken puzzle. I will see a puzzle awaiting its last piece, as I finish out whatever chapter of life I am on. If it was not for the time I spent feeling broken, and the years I have put into slowly chugging forwards towards feeling whole as a person, I would not appreciate where I am today. Today is perfection, nor is perfection what I am seeking. I am seeking one more theoretical piece with each passing year to put into the puzzle, knowing that I am walking towards completion as opposed to drowning in the alternative…because the picture is looking whole.