The Yellow Balloon
I am not there, I did not die."
-Clare Harner
Imagine that for as long as you can remember, you’ve been asked to stand in a field and hold a balloon. You do not understand why this field or this balloon or the particular importance of why you need to do this. But everyone tells you that you do. It’s the only way you can get approval.
And so you do it to please. Everyone seems happy about this but you. You notice the sun has emerged from the clouds to bake your face. It’s making you uncomfortable. You want to go inside and drink a Pepsi, not caring what happens to the balloon. But you’ve been told that the sun is God and it will be furious with you if you let go of the balloon. You don’t want to make God angry. So you hold on tight.
I’m 5. Perhaps 6 or 7 but let’s just go with 5. One of my earliest memories is of my friend Sue. Sue had long, strawberry blonde hair that fascinated me. Indelible in my memory is a day in class when I observed her hair, long and straight, meeting at the nape of her neck. Attraction yes but there was another feeling, a deeper feeling and it didn’t have anything to do with her…
You want to let go of this balloon. You’re hurting. Doesn’t everyone want to protect children? Doesn’t God love me? Your pastor said that ever since Roe v. Wade, the United States has been at war with God. You don’t want to go to war with God. You’d lose.
I’m 10. It’s a gray, rainy Sunday in February. I even remember the date: Maryland Men's Basketball was playing a rare late-season non-conference game against Missouri. I wanted to watch it but I couldn’t 'cause I was supposed to be at some girl’s birthday party. When I got there, I discovered that by dint of good fortune, I was the only boy in attendance. My male classmates had backed out. And I was happy. I was never a happy child but on that day, I felt an indescribable bliss. What basketball game was worth that? I didn’t want to go home after the party. I cried that night for reasons I couldn’t understand. The party remained lodged in my memory for over three decades and for the longest time, I never knew why…
You’re at your breaking point holding the balloon. Some say God's love is not a choice because it's there for you, others say you must choose it or burn in Hell. Either way, both expect you to hold on to the balloon. It’s incredible to you that Hell would be even worse than how you feel but you want God to love you. You want someone to love you, anyway.
I’m 16. I’m in my bedroom almost every night. I like talking to girls but never have the confidence to ask them out or go on dates. I lock myself away because I don’t understand why anyone would want to be my friend. I stare at the walls. I count the hours until I sleep. I’m waiting, dreaming of a woman to rescue me…
And then the years pass and wow, do people praise you for holding the balloon. You’re doing the right thing. You’ve been doing it right all along, or so you're told. You don’t understand why you’re getting such praise: you’re just doing what you’re asked to do. But the praise sustains you, even as the sun continues to boil.
I’m 30. I'm on a retreat with an arts/activist collective I've been volunteering with. I like that I can do background stuff to help people, most of them women. It feels like the logical end point of my need to apologize for my manhood. But I only know a couple folks in this room, the other 20 or so are strangers. What will this be like? As we start the first day, one of the leaders explains that they are queer. Growing up, "queer" was a slur and the last thing I want to do is be rude to someone. After small groups begin, I meekly go up to her and ask her about it. An hour later, I’ve made a new friend, one who in the future would play an enormous role in my life. At the end of the retreat. I’ve made many new friends. It’s a beautiful space, I tell myself, made by beautiful people, most of them queer (now understood as not a bad word), female, and femme. And I mistake the sense of belonging I feel for the sense of comfort I acknowledge because I still cannot admit who I am…
Eventually, you realize that praise alone cannot sustain you from the sun’s heat. You want to put aside what others want for your life and let go of the damn balloon. But you can’t. You just can’t. You’ve disciplined yourself for so long and you’re not far from the finish line, which they say is where your eternal reward awaits.
I’m 36. I come out to my wife as queer. Truthfully, I don’t feel queer. Yeah I have attractions that go beyond women but c’mon. Queer? And I’m risking my happy marriage of ten years to share this? I just feel the need to belong. Because I know there is something more to me than how I have lived but I cannot admit it…
At last, you run out of reasons to hold on to the balloon.
I’m weeks away from turning 40 and going through an existential crisis. Predictable for a man facing 40, right? Owning this, I’m of age to be honest about it and do something. I try different things…a lot of different things. Nothing satisfies. Then one night, I read an article. And I asked myself: if I could live my life consequence-free as a woman, why wouldn’t I do that? And I further asked myself: if the only reason I'm not doing it is risking the wrath of others, why is that preventing what I want for my life?
One day, you decide to let go of the balloon. You don’t overthink it, you just release it. If the sun is going to eat you in a fiery death, then you’ll accept your fate but this is no way to live.
I’m 40 and I come out to that person from the retreat ten years ago…
You first realize how painfully hard you have gripped the balloon for so long.
I’m 40 and I come out to my wife, mother, and my best friend…
You get nervous as you see it float away.
I’m 40 and I wear makeup for the first time. Not a smashing success. But on that same day, I find a new place. A home-away-from-home full of people like me. People who will love me even if they don’t know me…
The balloon begins to collect altitude.
I’m 40 and someone calls me by my real name because they do not know me by another name…
The balloon is about to be beyond your grasp. This is your last chance to save it...
I'm 40 and I slap a patch on my abdomen. For the first time in my life, my body feels peace, and I realized that the man I pretended to be was actually a dysphoria coping mechanism...
You watch the balloon float away, higher and higher. You stare at it and wonder why you held on for so long in the first place. The sun is not coming to eat you. The people are not marauding your body over a perceived failure. They’re nowhere to be found. They're dealing with their own stuff. You are alive, breathing, living your life at last for you.
I’m 40 and I come out to my Bishops…
The sun was not God. God is the cloud coming to cover the sun. God is the shelter from the heat. God knows who you are and what you need. God never asked you to hold the balloon and is disappointed in those who made you do so for such a long time.
I’m 40. A friend of my wife’s does my makeup. I feel beautiful. For the first time in my life, I see myself. I see me. I have never seen me…
You ask yourself: why am I still standing here? So you leave, but not to go home. Instead, you find another place. A place with others who have let go of their balloons. It’s a party. You are welcome. You are loved. You don’t know what happened to the balloon. You couldn’t care less.
I’m a few weeks shy of 41 and at last confident to tell the world my name: Allison Noel Whitney.
You pull out your phone to tell everyone where you are. You don’t know how they will react. You hope they will be loving. You hope the ones who did not have to hold the balloon will celebrate. You hope they will see the God of endless mercy and not the God of burning anger. You took care of what you could control: you let go of the balloon. Whether they go searching for that or come to celebrate you is up to them.
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