Simply Amazing!
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I searched for this topic and am glad to have read all of the shares.
I’m 37 years old, have been out as Bi all of my adult life but have only seriously dated straight men.
My queer desires only seem to surface when I’m drunk- i’ve never known how to act on them when sober and barely even recognize my queer attraction. i’m also often afraid i’m gonna let the person down by not being gay enough or being too inexperienced… fears that i’ve never gotten past. it’s like there’s this whole part of me that i’m unaware of.
i hope that as i work on my relationship with myself through sobriety, i’ll be more emotionally available to different and deeper types of intimacy than the ones i’ve experienced so far.
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Hey Liv.
No one is not gay enough, if you dig someone it will happen… Believe me 
try and explore this curiosity sober and with someone good and trustworthy and worth your curiosity and intimacy.
Good luck 
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My anger only came out when drunk 
. In a bad uncontrolled way that was. And I don’t think I ever had sex sober in my life. Well a couple of times since I got sober. No success with that yet but that’s a whole different subject.
What I want to say is that love’s love. I hope very much you’ll find it Liv. Choosing yourself first is an excellent first step. Welcome 
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Queer Vegan from Scotland
I came out as gay at 14 then again at 16 then as Bi at 18 and 21 (just to please family) I then came out as gay again at 25 lol i’m now happy with Queer
Just be you don’t change or pretend to be who you aren’t just to please others
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So I saw All of us Strangers two nights ago and I wrote this about it on the movie thread here: “I’m not sure yet quite what to make of it. A trip for sure. Fantastic acting and images. So let’s just say it’s a great movie right? Right.”
Two days later I’m still not sure what to make of it. But I keep thinking about it, feeling, reading about it. It’s not a “queer movie”, that would be an insult, it has far too many universal themes to be called that.
But at the same time it’s an incredibly personal movie for me and has so much to do with my queerness. I’m a bit older that the main character but not that much. And so much is totally recognisable and relatable. The alienation. The loneliness. The not feeling part of normal life. The not talking to parents about it. I never allowed myself to feel bullied but I was, I was called the gay professor in my street in my early teens. I fought my bullies because I decided long before that I was going to take care of myself but that cost me dearly later on in life. Because I took care of myself in the only way I knew as a little kid, by isolating, by not letting anyone get near. Also I didn’t even know I was gay/queer back then. I just wanted to be ‘normal’.
Later on there was the fear for AIDS, which stopped me from having sex. And also stopped me from looking for relationships, although that was already neigh impossible from the way I grew up as a kid.
It’s interesting how lockdown is mentioned in many reviews as something the viewer remembers and feels looking at the eerie desolation and isolation much of the imagery in the movie depicts. For me, and maybe for the director too, it’s how my life as a whole has felt. With a funny aside that during lockdown I was working as a nurse and was exempt from lockdown. I kinda liked the empty streets at night tbh. And my life didn’t feel very different.
How drugs and booze are a big part of the queer scene is registered, not judged. I don’t think of that as an omission, it’s just not the focus of the movie. It sure isn’t glorified either.
Anyway, the more I think about it, the more I love it. I could quote most of this interview with director Andrew Haigh, so much I feel and recognise and relate to. Just read it instead if you like. Love.
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Sounds really interesting Menno. I will need to watch it.
Great observations. Me and my boy pal at school were the gays who didn’t know we were the gays. And we found each other like safe velcro. We went shopping and did nerd stuff together when young, just knowing we were different. Then went out and supported each others burgeoning sexuality as teens in clubs in Birmingham (it had a gay village!) And believe me, the depravity of that time still rocks me… It didn’t seem the gays like us could be safe at home and then we also had to conform in the club scene with the drugs and the drink and the missing weekend and hotel stays and… Same old story.
I found out that my young boy bestie used specific toilets in the town centre while I waited at the bus stop. I guess he was groomed or part of the seedy underground. I don’t know but it makes me so sad for him, the boy. Why? Isolation and fear and need.
I have my own sketchy experiences to be honest, but it’s the past. It’s the responsibility of people tackling these issues in film and media to now really hit a right note as the legacy is so mistold, and by virtue, a victim of misunderstanding, fear , distaste and being Othered.
I think, don’t hate what you don’t understand.
It’s a sin, the UK programme did a nice job for raising a general public awareness to explore the heartbreak and sadness around queerness.
My boy contracted HIV. He got super sick and found out.
He’s also fabulous and does stand up comedy and just got married to an amazing man last year.
His viral load is managed and non detected.
He is living the dream, I’m super proud of that man I call my best friend and I’m super proud of the young lad that was forced on the ropes of a people that tried to keep him down. He’s too fucking fabulous to be kept down.
Strength Menno. Love to you always . 
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Love back & thanks friend 
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This is a big deal. Thank you @Mno @Tragicfarinelli for talking about this and your experiences. It has been hard for me to continue to accept my queerness being in a long term het relationship. I sure do love seeing queer love stories represented. I can’t wait to see this one.
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If I were to recommend a good queer film…
A portrait of a lady on fire.
French and beautiful.
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Hey a whole thread of my peope. This is really nice to see. I’m gay and non-binary/third gender although for me gender identity is mostly meaningless on a personal level as i just view myself as just being human and living life. my best friend is trans male to female and bi. I also have the family issues mostly with my mom but she is still always there for me and im currently living with her but kinda ready to move out. Unrelated to any of this also have ptsd from my dads current wifi who last time i saw or spoke to them was his gf. Anyway figured id share a small tidbit with yall.
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i can’t wait for it to arrive 
Hey Menno, I watched this movie last night and felt compelled to come back here and write you. I loved the movie and it left me with such sorrow and anger and I’m still thinking about it today. I can’t quite believe how perfectly it summed a lot up gently and deeply.
I think my stand out was when he said (to paraphrase): I always felt like a stranger, even in my own family. Coming out just made it official. I’ve hashed the delicacy of the script sorry, but I can’t stop thinking about this one part in the film. It’s so true and I will remember parts of this movie forever.
Menno, let’s not ‘get this all tangled up again’. We exist and deserve.
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I’m still processing stuff that happened in my life. It’s not just about my queerness. It’s all intertwined though. And it’s intriguing how what you wrote just now, connected some imagery from the movie to my own memories. My boyhood room was on the fifth floor, overlooking a long street being mostly occupied by sycamore trees that were growing towards each other. Looking from the window of my room it’s always empty in the street. In my memory that is. As empty as my room with its high ceiling and small, lonely, insignificant me in it. Just like Adam is looking out over a desolate and empty London.
Funny how this connection just came about in my head. Makes the assignment I’m working on for my creative writing class just that little bit more complicated though. We’re supposed to describe a (physical) view in 250 words. And this is the view in my mind I want to describe. Anyway. We sure exist and deserve. Thanks friend
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Good luck with the assignment, sounds interesting! I’m an English lit major and creative writing minor graduate. I had good times during that three years of creative writing, was like therapy in itself! I should write myself again actually. Hugs 
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This is what I made of the assignment. 250 Words isn’t much. X
The view.
Early this year I saw a movie all the way to the end. The image that stayed with me is that of a man, standing in front of a window, in a cold apartment, high in an empty flat, looking out over an empty city. Clouds are floating by, the sound of the wind, the rustling trees, silence.
It’s my own view as a child, enlarged. My boy’s room was cold, with a high ceiling, on the top floor of a house that always felt empty. Looking out over a long street with sycamores, and a small square. Sycamores that were growing towards each other, fighting each other for the sun. Sycamores that now, 50 years later, have passed each other crosswise, their crowns sticking out above the flat rooftops on the opposite side of the street.
The square where I battled for the right to play, with the boys from the other side of the street, the side where the working-class neighbourhood began and mine ended. The square where I was welcomed with “Hey faggot professor, what the fuck are you doing here? Fuck off!” To which I reacted in one of the two ways I knew how to survive.
I attacked the biggest one with all I had. He fought back by scratching and pulling my hair. That surprised me. Didn’t he just call ME a faggot? The taste of blood in my mouth. The burning scratches and grazes. My throbbing head. It was all good. I was alive. I won. I didn’t belong but I could play there.
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Very good Menno! Evocative!
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Yes it did! 
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