I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. One of my jobs with id Magazine is to talk to and meet many people and most importantly…listen. One story I have heard in the past six months that I just don’t quite understand is this: Men who’ve been married for 15, 20 and 25 years, finally come out of the closet. Not effortlessly, and that’s the sad part.

One story I heard a month ago was of a 20 year marriage. The man came out and then asked his wife to cover for him for a number of years…to continue to live the lie. I can’t imagine what this does on the psyche of a person, let alone both of them. Keeping this hidden from view, and the wife going along with keeping the secret for a number of years astounds me. It also reminds me of enormity of the work we have to do.

The media and society have always questioned the importance of coming out and Gay Pride events. “I don’t want to know what you do in the bedroom, I don’t tell you what I do, and why do you have to prance around and be proud about it?” they say. These types of stories and hardships are what it’s all about. We have to endure a lot of pain, emotional turmoil, and heal a good crop of scars dealt us as children and young adults. Those who ask those questions haven’t heard of the long journey it can take one to be accepting of their sexuality. If they have, they’ve pushed it aside and ignored it.

I’m sure we could could fill volumes upon volumes of warehouses with all of your stories alone. This my friends will be how we as a community can turn the tide on so many fronts, marriage equality being one of them. With Basic Rights Oregon’s Marriage Matter to Me Oregon campaign, I’m hoping that the conversations we have across the state spark the process for some to come out and live a life of peace with themselves. We’re bound to connect with many who are still in the closet. Winning the hearts and minds of our state is the only way we’ll get marriage equality in Oregon, and it will also be the way to assist our state to be a more accepting place for people to live their lives being true to themselves. Yes, it be fabulous to duplicate the movie “Too Wong Foo, Thank You for Everything, Julie Newmar” into reality, but that isn’t likely.

That is one of the reasons we created id Magazine. To put a face on our community and eventually get it into the hands of many around the state, making a connection with people, and give those who are tortured with their sexuality or indifference a ray of hope of being accepted for who they are. There are LGBT people in Bend, Scio, Klamath Falls, Redmond and Medford. I can’t imagine what it’s like to be gay in Scio. However, id Magazine isn’t restricted to LGBT people, we include our allies as much as we can, and we don’t demand that everything has to have a “Gay Angle” in order to be in the magazine. We want to reach everybody, Gay, Straight, Purple, Brown, Green or Orange.

On a grander scale, you can see this same fear from corporations, T.V. shows like American Idol, and Hollywood in general. Adam Lambert is the first (as far as I can recall) singer who has been openly gay from the gate, only to rocket to superstar status. Yet even his handlers made it clear of their fears when saying about the OUT 100 cover, “Oh, well, he can be on the cover, but only if there’s a straight person on the cover too. And it can’t be too gay.” Is there even such a thing with Lambert? Too gay?! WTF? We’re gaining some ground though on this front. When Wendy Williams on The Wendy Williams Show proclaims, “Oh honey! Coming out gay or bisexual isn’t shocking anymore! You have to come harder to really get our attention!” you can get a glimpse of our future. Still, you don’t see Ian McKellen in a romantic lead in a blockbuster. We still wonder who’s gay in Hollywood, but we have some stars who are brave enough to weather what storm they may experience in coming out. Neil Patrick Harris is a prime example. He’s still capable and believable as a womanizer on “How I met Your Mother” and is quite successful.

We’re fortunate to live in Portland, Oregon. We don’t have to worry about being found out, we can pretty much live out and proud. Well, except for those who’s story I mentioned in the beginning. For most of us, we live in a nice accepting bubble of society. Go beyond Portland, Eugene and Astoria and you begin to run into territory where our bubble bursts. Yet even in Portland people are afraid to hold hands down the sidewalk, unless you’re on NW 23rd. We’re not that OK with repercussions yet and even in Portland we have work to do.

Here’s my question for you: Will Gay ever be OK, and if you think so, why? How? What are you doing to make it happen?