OPINION: RIDE ON STRANGER

What happens when you come out and find you don’t connect with your tribe? Where to next?

What happens when you come out but don’t connect with your tribe, asks Ross Larkin.

Ithought it would never happen. I’d accepted the probability of a life firmly wedged in the closet, along with the loneliness and deceit that would likely entail. I felt sure nothing could be worse than admitting my shameful secret to the world. Turns out, however, coming out was a breeze compared to life thereafter.

In fact, as others will no doubt relate, nothing compared to the relief and exhilaration of opening that closet door and being released from those shackles of repression.

I assumed that once I was out and proud, I’d be swiftly assimilated into a clan to which I truly belonged. Instead, I felt less at home in the LGBTIQ+ community than I did in my former, inauthentic, closeted days.

What struck me first was the level of hostility. Whether it was bars, clubs, queer events or dating apps, it seemed that beneath the surface of up-beat pop, glitter and dancing, was a core of attitude, judgment and nastiness.

Defensive scowling appeared the norm over smiling and, unless someone wanted to get into your pants, any attempts to engage were usually disdainfully dismissed.

Even more apparent than this, however, was the realisation that any similarities or common interests I shared with my queer peers seemed to start and end with being same-sex attracted.

That I was into punk and alternative rock as opposed to girl power pop suggested I was an angsty weirdo. That I abhorred going to the gym deemed me less than up to scratch. That I didn’t drink or like to party meant I was an antisocial bore. That I preferred to take things slow and get to know someone before sleeping with them made others lose patience.

It was clear. I didn’t fit my own tribe. I’d been rejected all my childhood for being different, only to feel rejected as an adult from the community I was meant to finally belong to. If I thought being in the closet was lonely and isolating, being out of it was desolating.

For the longest time I withdrew and kept to myself. I didn’t date and barely socialised. I was ashamed at being so left of the gay centre that I appeared to be irrelevant and invisible. I concluded I would probably never find partnership, never experience love, and that thought made me jaded and different.

After years of borderline reclusion, I’d had enough. I refused to accept that being so offbeat destined me to a life alone and convinced myself there had to be subcultures I’d not encountered. I began to dig deeper.

I explored meet-up groups with common interests. I tried smaller, less mainstream venues and atypical LGBTIQ events. I attended gay film festivals and approached the kind of guys I wouldn’t previously have gone near; the kind I’d always assumed wouldn’t look twice at me. The alternatives. The geeks. The quiet ones in the background and even some of the unashamed, flashy guys.

What I discovered was that many of them were not who they seemed, at first, to be. Allowing myself to be vulnerable revealed more depth and similarities than I would otherwise have ever known and I found an array of subcultures to which I not only related, but thoroughly belonged to.

Today, I’m a proud alternative, tea drinking, weekend gardening nerd, happily not watching RuPaul’s Drag Race, but quite partial to the occasional Will And Grace. My tribe and I joke about how we can’t stand crowds or loud noise and prefer early nights and board games to any kind of night life. We talk music and film nonstop and have zero interest in fashion, yet love digging through op shops and markets.

It seemed I was a minority within a minority and, ironically, that gave me a more complete sense of identity than anything ever had.

I even came to realise that I could also enjoy, appreciate and connect with the more everyday LGBTIQ clan; not in spite of, but because of our differences.

I abhorred the gym, didn’t drink or party, I was into punk rock, not girl power pop… all suggesting I was an angsty weirdo!