Friday, October 28, 2011

Just Living

Hey everyone, hope you are enjoying your weekend.

It was a real good feeling to have my blog mentioned on the TrueHoop Blog one ESPN by Kevin Arnovitz who writes N.B.A and more for ESPN and also happens to be gay. He posted a link to my last post about coming out to a friend and it was a warm surprise to hear about it from one of the readers of my blog.

He posted a interview with Rick Welts, the former Phoenix Suns president who is now at the Golden State Warriors organization and came out last year and was the first Major sports executive to do so. If anyone wants to check it out, this is the link:

http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoop/index/_/count/16

As for me, I'm doing well, working hard and enjoying my job. It's funny, I enjoy working out in the weight room before practice and in general, I’m not one of those guys that sits in the weight room all day and look at themselves nor do I try to look like a bodybuilder.

However, it gives me a good feeling that I'm in shape and that my body looks good, my brother was joking with me that I’m a stereotypical gay that only cares about his looks and his muscles and it was funny.

There is always this conversation about how gay men tend to take better care of themselves and pay more attention to their body and their whole demeanor. I wonder if it's just another stereotypical thing that people throw out there or if there is any truth in that.

Of course for me it's also needed for basketball, so I have the perfect cover story :). I remember reading John Amaechi's book and on the back he wrote something about how all the N.B.A players spent a lot of time in front of the mirror after games, fixing their hair, earrings and so on, and that he was the gay one, so go figure.

Besides that, I’m in the same situation, not dating or meeting anyone online, just reading a lot of material on the gay fight for equality, the different projects intended to help youth and that sort of stuff, very interesting and very helpful for me to find out more.

It's been a little difficult lately for my friend who is H.I.V positive. I mentioned this before, but he has been going through a lot of things, and since I’m about the only person besides those who are involved in his treatment we are having a lot of Skype hours.

It's hard a lot of the time, he has a lot of things to talk about and to put out there and it's also hard for me. Which might sound not fair, but I have to always be able to say the right and positive thing and sometimes it's not very easy because sometimes he is just in a different place, but I have no intention of leaving him alone, so we will all do our best.

Last thing is the World Series, anyone out there that is a baseball fan had to enjoy last night’s game, it was just crazy, no other word. I was lucky that I only had evening practice, I could stay up all night, and it ended in the morning over here. It was very exciting, I was disappointed since I want Texas to win, but boy was it a great game. Hope game seven will bring us the same passion and excitement.

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Spreading The Word

Hey everyone, hope all is well.

I'm doing well, we have just had a couple of league games and we started off on the right foot, always nice to start the season well and always nice to get the practice games out the door.

We are all following the N.B.A story and waiting to see what will happen. It would be weird to have players from our league leaving suddenly, but I guess it's something everyone knows can happen, will it? don't think anyone really knows.

As for me, had a nice conversation with a childhood friend, who is still a good friend of mine. I have known him since he was eleven and we have both played basketball since we have been kids.

Granted we don't live in the same country anymore, we still try to meet up in the summer and he is genuinely a good person with a good heart. I wanted to tell him this summer and I was about to just as we were walking together down the street, but at the last second I didn't.

Anyway, yesterday I decided it's about time to tell him, we didn't catch each other on Skype, so we just exchanged text messages, which was weird. I don't remember myself ever just written to someone, hey buddy, i'm gay.

In the end I just came out with it, hahah, I wrote a couple of messages in general then just wrote : " I'l just write it, even though it's weird to do so. I'm gay. don't really know what i'm supposed to write after this, but it was important for me to tell you".

I didn't have a doubt in my mind that he would be supportive, I think i'm at the stage that it's pretty clear to me that the people that really care about me love me for the person I am and not anything else.

He was amazing, asked a couple of questions and was just great, said that of course he loves me and cares about me and what I do in the bedroom is my business and would never influence our friendship.

We talked some more about the way it influences my basketball career and how I deal with it and it was just nice. I wasn't too nervous before and it didn't change my world, it's just nice to have one more friend that knows about it, it's as simple as that, at least for me.

I don't think I will go and start telling all my friends now, but he is someone that I wanted to share the news with. There is no one that I really feel I have to tell right now, I mean it might be nice, but the important people in my life already know, so will see what the future brings.

I read that tomorrow is spirit day, so don't forget to wear something purple, it's a nice thing to do to acknowledge the LGBT youth and our opinion on bullying, something I have spoken and read a lot of articles on lately.

If anyone here is a baseball fan then I hope you enjoy the world series, I'm rooting for Texas, but why wouldn't I, it's still the team that brought us George Bush and we need to be thankful for that :)

Enjoy the rest of the week everyone......

Thursday, October 13, 2011

100 Posts and Those Republicans

Hey everyone, turns out today is my 100 post in this blog, like I said in the past, more than I thought I would ever get to, along with more followers than I expected.

I guess a lot has changed in those 100 posts, I have a lot of new email friends, I see myself in a different light and I feel different about myself, so i'm sure those are all advantages that will stay with me after I stop writing.

I do get the feeling that nothing is urgent anymore and that I rarely have something that I have to blog about or feel like is a matter of life or death, guess that's as normal as can be and might not be a healthy thing for my blog followers.

In the meanwhile I have used another email account I have to keep updated with advocate and websites of that nature. I find it hard to read about a lot of movements headed by republicans or just plain idiots that have the desire to repeal and reverse a lot of major decisions and actions that have happened and have increased our rights as a gay and minority group.

I'm sure that some of you reading this post have much more knowledge on the matter and could shed some more light on the subject, can any of the decisions/laws that have been changed be reversed again?

Could DADT, be enforced back into the army? could states that legalized gay marriage reverse that decision if the republicans take the congress seat in that specific state? It might sound like a very simple questions to most of you, but it interests me and I have to admit that I don't know enough on the subject.

Personally i'm not sure that I would get married and i'm not sure that i'm headed to the army yet, but it scares me that there is an option, if indeed there is, that things might change again in certain areas of the LGBT achievements as of lately.

In my day to day life, nothing exciting is happening in the moment, working hard, feeling good with myself and in full action as the season is here. We are all following the N.B.A situation and waiting to see what will happen.

I mentioned before that like most leagues in Europe we also have players in our league that have an N.B.A contract and will have to leave the second the strike is over, if indeed it will be over, it's interesting to see.

I also wrote about my friend that found out he his H.I.V positive, it's not been an easy time for him. I'm trying to help, but it's not easy all around, he's not very optimistic at the moment and it's my job to try to motivate him, which isn't always easy and I hate to say it, but sometimes is also hard on me.

It's funny that i'm already thinking about it, but I saw a great article about a city that I haven't visited yet and seems like a great place to enjoy my summer. So even though it's far far away, it's already on my mind, guess that's life.

Wednesday, October 5, 2011

Sleepless In Europe

Another week is moving along and with it the season is just around the corner. I'm excited and waiting to get underway.

I have to admit that lately I have been going around with a good feeling inside my heart, can't really explain it or do I have a specific reason for it, but that's just the way I feel.

The weird part is that at the same time I have been having real sleeping problems. I mean, it's not that I sleep 2 hours a night or something, but i'm waking up really early and can't get more than 5 hours of sleep at night.

I can't really explain it, I feel great pyshically, we have been working hard, but i'm handling it, the weight room and all the other things don't bother me too much. I make it back home real tired but still.

Guess there is something on my mind, can't put my finger on it, just know that it's a very weird situation. I can truly say that since the last summer I continued to devople, nothing practical has happened, but I feel like a different person.

Much easier going, feeling much more comfortable, reading more about "my world" and things of that nature. Of course all those things are things that are in the inside and not towards the outside world, but I believe this is the first step.

On the weekend I sat down and read a little about teenage suicide, especially the one's of Justin Aaberg and Jamey Rodemeyer, I'm almost sure that I mentioned this before, but this was a lot to take in.

I found myself in tears reading about them and about everything that transpired, we all know how cruel kids can be towards others, especially those who stand out in a crowd and are easy targets to pick on and get good reactions from the crowd around them.

I do wonder if the suicide is just because of the bullying or if there is more to the subject. Of course I didn't know any of those precious kids, but I'm sure that having to deal with being gay is something that is always hard, especially at a age like that.

Together with the bullying might just be too much, it's really so sad, kids taking their own life at an age like that, just writing about it makes my body shiver.

I know that this is life and that bullying will always be around and that younger kids are always more vulnerable, but it's hard to take in, along with the large number of kids that get rejected by their parents just because they are LGBT youth.

I guess it's just the way of the universe to remind us that we live in a cruel world where there is no real justice and life is far from perfect. We only wish that the good guys will always prevail but guess it's not meant to be, at least not in our world.