Case in point, I had a very close, positive relationship with my father both as a child and later as an adult. In fact, until he died about this time last year, I had been his primary caregiver for several years.

Speaking of traditional masculinity, we hunted and fished together among other things.

Regular winter fishing trips to Florida with him are some of my most cherished memories.

I was a better target shooter than he was, which always got his goat. I’ll give him this, though; he had better instinct for sniffing out largemouth bass habitat than I have.

If the Christian conversion therapy causal theories you should speak of had anything to them, I would not be gay.

But I am and have known since I was 10 or 11 years old.

My father broke the paradigm a bit. Despite the fact that he was a conservative Christian minister, he never make me feel shame about being gay; well, not after he knew.

It’s funny how I remember him in the early 1970s trying to teach me not to cross my legs “like a girl" when I sat. I laugh about it now, but people took those things seriously then, and I guess maybe they do today.

Those habits remain. I instinctively catch myself if I cross my legs the “wrong” way.

I’m still gay, though. Funny how that works.