"I am the mother of a gay son and I've taken enough from you good people."

[BobTheSubgenius]

64. I've wondered about this for decades now.

In my early 20s, in the early 70s, I had a roommate that was a very close friend of mine. He was able to, and loved to, sleep long, LONG hours. Once, when his bedroom door had remained closed (as far as I could tell) for more than a full day, an unknown young man with a huge cascade of russet hair came out, and went down the hall to the bathrom.

My response was "Huh. I'd have never guessed."

Reflecting on that some hours later, I realized I was kinda proud of my completely genuine acceptance of the situation, and realizing also that it didn't matter to me at all, which made me feel good.

Right after that, I was somewhat ashamed for patting myself on the back for my "openmindedness" (bearing in mind the period of time in which this occurred), and didn't like myself much for finding that a source of a little pride. The idea that completely accepting not only another human being, but a close friend, was anything other than "Well, of course." didn't sit well with me.

Sadly, I never got either the courage or the opportunity to talk with him about it, although we were very open and matter-of-fact about the "situation," because he died of liver failure as a consequence of AIDS before I could. I still miss him terribly, and he died in the early 80s. He was very intelligent, and interested in a lot of things and, although we could talk for hours, we had one of those friendships where even long periods of silence were OK.

Thoughts?