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Monday, November 9, 2009

What Might Have Been

From Fortune magazine, "Queer Inc:  How Corporate America Fell in Love with Gays and Lesbians" (2006):
Mike Syers, a 42-year-old partner at Ernst & Young, was coming out in a very big way. About 3,000 partners of the firm had gathered in Orlando for a conference last year. A two-minute video of Syers played on giant TV screens throughout the convention center. He sat in the audience watching himself.

"When I started in public accounting," the onscreen Syers said, "I really didn't think there was a long-term career opportunity for me. Being a gay man, I didn't see gay partners." But things were different at E&Y, he said. He felt comfortable and welcomed.

As the screen went dark, Syers's BlackBerry began vibrating. Messages of support poured in. Afterward a partner came up to him to say that his son was gay, and that he would call home that night to tell his son how proud he was to work at E&Y.

E&Y had asked Syers to make the video because he is a leader of bEYond, the company's GLBT employee group. bEYond is only two years old, but it sent 72 people to this fall's Out & Equal convention. It also sponsored the 2006 Reaching Out MBA conference, a gay and lesbian recruiting event that attracted about 700 MBA students to New York. Courting them were Accenture, Dell, Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan Chase, Lehman Bros., McKinsey, Merrill Lynch, Microsoft, Target and Toyota, among others.
I almost feel like crying.

Back in 1975-77, after dicking around through most of junior college, I thought I'd finally settled on a good game plan:  I'd become a CPA.  I managed to get an associate's degree in accounting at the college by dint of a year spent packing in all the courses I could carry, then transferred to a university that had a great accounting program, well regarded in the corporate world, where almost every graduate got a job just for the asking.  I even got a job working part-time for a CPA, doing the simpler kinds of balance sheets and tax returns.  I thought I was on my way to a successful, rewarding future.

But after I got to university, although I was doing well in my classes - and studying my ass off, attending extra tutorials and study halls - I slowly began to realize that I didn't fit in.  As far as I could tell all the other guys in my accounting and finance classes were straight as a board; most of them seemed to be the jock/fratboy type, and outside of class interested only in baseball, football, Playboy, and Camaros.

The accounting department was run by a gruff-but-kindly old guy who had made a mint in the corporate world, then retired and started a second career as a professor.  He worked us like the devil in those classes, but you didn't mind because you knew you were getting all the right tools and knowledge for a CAREER - only 18 months away if you stuck it out and took summer classes.  But the old guy had set up an internship program where you could get placed with a major accounting company like Ernst & Ernst - now Ernst & Young - for 9 months of on-the-job training.  It lengthened your schooling, of course, but the up side was that most of those interns subsequently got hired by the companies they'd interned for.

It was all but a sure thing, if you studied hard, made good grades, and measured up to expectations.  And a sure thing sounded great to a 21-year-old guy from a broken home, living in deep poverty, with no rich or even mildly affluent parents to help him along.  I reached out and made a grab at the brass ring.

But the feeling that I just didn't belong grew and grew.  One time, seems like it was early spring semester, there was a big do organized by our department chair at his country club, I forget the occasion; but although attendance was strictly voluntary, you knew it was a good thing to show up and have your presence noted.  So I duded up in my best and most fashionable togs, including the platform shoes and wide tie, and went.  Like a fool. 

Continue reading after the jump.
Also, enter to win a prize; see contest rules at the end of this post.


Update July 2011:  I'm the one in the middle.
Because of course all the other fellas showed up with a date on their arm.  I had no date, no girlfriend, and for that matter no boyfriend either:  nearly three more years would pass before I finally connected with a gay group on another campus and came out.  I was still in deep closet mode at that time.

So I showed up, mingled a bit, drank a couple of Harvey Wallbangers to be sociable - and went home, reflecting on what the future would hold for me in the corporate world.  Already we'd heard from returning interns about what wonderful parties and retreats the big corporations held for their employees from time to time, the golf tournaments, the football tickets, the dances and soirees.  It all sounded very cosmopolitan, a glittering prospect.

But where would I fit into that shimmering picture?  A single man - secretly gay - no girlfriend, fiancee, or wife.  Not into sports or the complexities of automobile engines.  No friends or family in that world to help me bluff it out, either.

I realized it just wouldn't work.  I couldn't keep up the appearance of being straight forever, I'm not that good an actor.  I didn't know how to answer people who asked, "Do you have a girlfriend?" in a way that would throw off suspicion.  One study buddy casually offered to give me the phone number of his girlfriend if I wanted to take her out - I had observed that she was pretty, and I think he wanted to dump her anyway.  But suddenly I was embarrassed to have to say, no I wasn't interested in getting a pretty girl's phone number.  How many more moments like that, all the sudden traps, lay ahead in this future I thought was so right for me?

The end of the story is, after a couple of semesters I was just too intimidated to continue.  Only a year away from a big-time career; but I just didn't think I could pull it off.  I was afraid of being found out, mocked, snubbed, defeated.  So I dropped out.

Eventually I got a degree in something else, and thanks be to God it's been fairly good and I've been able to pay the bills all these years, living modestly.  And who knows, accounting is pretty dry after all, I might have gotten tired of it anyway.

But I didn't see any hope for a gay man in that world back then.  There were no other gays around, not where I lived in the Deep South:  nobody was out.  Most of my time in college, with very rare exceptions, I never saw anybody else in my classes that I even thought might be gay.  It was just me, in the silence of my heart. 

And that made, probably, a huge difference in my life:  the road not taken.  Certainly a huge financial difference:  after all these years, I'm only just now making what accounting grads were starting out making in 1977, adjusting for inflation.  And it's not just the money I didn't make:  it's the opportunity to be a full person, to follow my dreams, to succeed on my own merits like anybody else.  I'm glad things are different now for the next generation.  And about damn time.

Because there's a huge cost to being in the closet, alone and afraid and invisible.  Huge.  That's why we must never go back.

First pic:  self-pic of me just after graduation from junior college.  Would you have dated this guy?

Second pic:  the memorable country club do.  Can you spot the queer in the crowd?

Correct answers get a prize.  You must be over 18 to participate.  Void where prohibited.

11 comments:

Stan said...

Man do I ever know what your talking about! I graduated from a Junior College here in NJ back in '73 with and Associates in General Business. I had 2 years of Accounting I and II and found it so fucking boring and way too conservative for me too!
My best friends Dad got me a job at GM working on the assembly line for a year and I made more money then I could spend until the gas crisis hit and got laid off. It would be a few years later when I would settle into a medical career where I found the people I worked with at the hospital more liberal and more open, accepting to gay people.

David said...

1. Yes, had I been of age I would have dated you. In fact, I would have dated your brains out.

2. I'm going with the young gentleman in the light colored suit.

Anonymous said...

What an extraordinarily sad tale. It reads as if you are still affected by mountains of guilt, doubt and self-loathing. Are you sure that, you just weren't afraid to succeed?

"...a 21-year-old guy from a broken home, living in deep poverty, with no rich or even mildly affluent parents to help him along...."

You looked around and found an excuse to fail and took it.

"But where would I fit into that shimmering picture?...I realized it just wouldn't work. I couldn't keep up the appearance of being straight forever, I'm not that good an actor."

And most sobering of all.

"I was afraid of being... defeated."

But Russ, you defeated you. You dropped out by your own admission. Blaming it on "being gay" is like blaming "being black" or "being female" or "being short." Get some help, do some work and grow.

Just think you could have been born GAY and BLACK and FEMALE and SHORT and in TEXAS. Then, you could have had some attitude!

Russ Manley said...

My dear, I feel so sorry for you. Not because of being gay, black, female, short, and Texan.

But because your pain is obviously so great that you think no one else's could possibly compare.

And that you have a right to trash somebody else's life and sit in high judgment on their motives simply because, at the bottom line, they are not you.

I'm sure you have had a very rough time along the road, and you didn't deserve that. But you aren't the only one who has been hurt; and there is no comparing suffering. Which is why we all - black, white, straight, gay, male, female, old, young - need to treat each other gently, with compassion and understanding. We're all in this mortal life together, and we all walk a stony road.

Everybody gets hurt, and some hurts can't be helped - just because we are hurtable human beings. But we can work together to remove the unnecessary hurts from one another's path.

God bless you and help you, sister - and send you a humble, merciful heart. Peace.

Gary said...

I can relate big-time to a lot of what you wrote. It is obvious that what we went through growing up in the 60's and 70's is much different from the way people who are now 20 years old approach the world. Because of the lack of acceptance as gay people, we had to do a lot of pretending and covering up and denying. Because of the searing disapproval (and high potential for bodily harm) we would have faced, we could not live our lives openly and were often forced into isolation. This was especially true for those of us who lived in someplace other than a large city. We did miss out on a lot of opportunties we might have otherwise had when we were younger. It affected us socially, psychologically, and financially in many cases. I think a lot of us emerged from the closet with some scars.
I try not to be too bitter about all of that and focus on trying to making a difference for myself for the time I have left on this planet, and for those younger gay folks who still have most of their lives ahead of them.
We have come a long way since the 1960's and 70's but we still have farrrrr to go. And you're right, we can never go back.
And about the pics---
#1 - Yeah, I definitely would have dated you and probably would have tried to engage in some (then) illegal behavior with you!
and
#2 - I bet you're the guy in the white suit.
Peace,
G

Russ Manley said...

Thanks Gary, you understand the point of this post. And like you, I hope I am making some small difference for good with my little blog here; at least, I try.

And yes those illegal activities were great, I was a big-time violator.... until the Supremes struck down the sodomy laws and took all the fun out of it. Kidding.

I'm going to leave the contest open another day or two for last-minute entries - Dave and Gary have their entries in, any more takers?

rptrcub said...

What a fascinating post. Thank you for letting a fella from my generation know what it was like to have to go through that. I couldn't imagine if I had to face that choice -- fit in as a heterosexual and be miserable and make more money, or be true to myself.

Russ Manley said...

Your welcome, rptr. I do envy the freedom your generation enjoys. It's not just about the money, you know - it's being who you really are, not living behind a mask 24/7 everywhere you go, everything you do - in a world where nobody at all was out, and you didn't know anybody else like yourself at all.

Be glad you live in this time.

Sebastian said...

Russ, that was a powerful post, and it got me thinking. I graduated college in 1972, and I can't tell you the number of gay guys I knew who were high achievers in college, only to fizzle in the next couple of years. They dropped out of law school, a school of international relations, banking, the military, and business. I never related that so much to the homophobic climate, but of course, that was a major factor. I remember being in my 20s and wondering how long I could remain unmarried before everyone assumed I was strange. The world is so different. I'm reading a book, styled a memoir, called "Since my last confession." It's ok. But what knocks my socks off is that the author, Scott Pomfret, is gay, an SEC lawyer who writes gay pornography on the side. I grew up in a world where we were programed to fail, and where it was just assumed that you would be fired from any decent job if you were known to be gay. The world has changed, my friend, thanks be to God.

Oh, and thanks for those photos of you up above. Very, very nice.

Russ Manley said...

Thanks for the comment Sebastian, and you're right: being in the closet takes a terrible toll. Of course the homophobia ate at me all the time, and I bet a lot of us were programmed to fail that way. It does bad things to you - as we know from reading the headlines even today.

It just dawned on me, I've never really told that story to anyone, just kept it locked away. I'm glad I can share it with you guys who understand the point of it. And remember what all that was like.

BTW I gave my roommate Pomfret's book for Xmas, read a few chapters myself. I too was blown away by his bio. Sure is a different world, I'll say.

Glad you like the pics of "me" . . . there's some fine print you may have overlooked, but keep thinking that buddy, it does my heart good.

Rick said...

I'd say it's got to be the gal in the "maxi" dress. Looks a lot like the new mayor here in Houston.:)

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