What PRIDE means to me - Part 3

I love to have fun, in a way.

Pleasure is hard to come by and beautiful when it comes together. I believe that true pleasure is a skill, honed to learn appreciation for the details of life. When I was very little it was quite easy to have a good time, it came naturally. Then, as I was taught my natural loves were strange or wrong, I forgot how to take simple pleasure. A love of fine food and high culture did not fit my surroundings. My desire to enjoy the company of other boys was confusing, even before I knew what sex was and long before I knew what it was to be gay.

So to compensate for the pleasure that comes from the soul, I twisted my desires to fit my surroundings. I tried to project an identity I could understand through shopping for a new one in brands. I substituted my love of creative ingenuity with an obsession with the riches found in snobby travel guides, business journals and decedent home design magazines.

Substitutions tend to leave me either fat or hungry for more. The rare authentic item is an explosion, a rapture in which the world aligns and makes sense, if only for a moment. Food is one such pleasure. Rather than garnering praise by eating huge amounts as I did as an unhappy and skinny child, I eat to savor. Oh, to savor a brilliant meal, like the oxtail and gnochi dish I had for my birthday, is a religious experience.

I am still learning to take pleasure in the company of others. That skill is the greatest challenge in life; to be oneself fully with no reservations. I have come a good way and have seen that the more I risk in taking simple pleasure in the good around me, the more that good rubs off on me. It is scary to risk open pleasure and be judged by those around as a dork, faggot or worse. But like any good skill, pleasure learns to overcome all challenge in the pursuit of authentic fun.