Sheila

February, March, April, May...

Four months was all it took to watch her get swept away. Through the fear and the white walls and the sea views and the long road from her door to the familiar clinical scent and back to the bed that replaced the comfort she knew for thirty years. Three husbands, a life of adventure, with the perfect mix of sass and class. Growing in her bones, growing in her chest, making her brittle. Cancer. Cancer. Cancer. Chemotherapy. Cancer. Radiation. Cancer. The illness that made her cry. Cancer. Pray. Cancer. Laugh. Cancer. Fear. Cancer. Stage IV adenocarcenoma. Cancer. Less than five percent survival rate. Cancer. Three weeks left. Cancer. Hospice. Cancer. I miss you. Cancer. What can I do to help, Nana. Cancer. I just want to make the pain go away. Cancer. DNR. Cancer. I Love you so much. Cancer. Mom, you have to come home. Cancer. I wish I knew how to save you. Cancer. Look into medical schools. Cancer. I'll always be with you. Cancer. I'll be back tomorrow. Cancer. I've only seen my father cry three times. Cancer. What am I gonna do? Cancer. Cancer. Fucking Cancer.

Summer is closing it's doors once again, draping the furniture of a different life in sheets so the sun can't bleach the wood. Shut the windows, lock the shutters. Turn out the lights, unplug the clocks. Mount September on the road to fall. With it comes the fear thats kicked up on your boots staining the tails of your coat. Let the winter chill consume the skin beneath your knitted layers, freezing the peach fuzz on the small of your back. Let the chill wash you. Let the chill numb your face. Before October approaches the chill will feel like home and the fear feels to familiar to be a bother.

An open Letter to the United States

In the news recently, Jason Collin’s came out as the first concurrent professional male athlete in U.S. History. Though, he’s received backlash from NFL players and ESPN announcers, the support from his family and friends; Collins categorized as “truly inspirational”. Additionally, Hip hop artists Macklemore and Ryan Lewis’s hit son “same love” advocates equal rights for the LGBTQ community. The first time I was really immersed in any  gay rights protests was in 2008 during the prop 8 campaign. I was amazed at the fire spit from both sides of the picket line. One side yelling for equal rights and the other shouting for the right to choose. Both of these arguments are so definably American, that this fight no longer surprises me. Both sides are fighting for the future world of their children and grandchildren. So here I am stuck at a crossroad, with the fight at my door begging me to pick a side, I choose the pro-life side. What do I mean by “pro-life”? I mean I choose the side that has  more human lives lost; more lives lost from teen suicide and bullying. More lives lost at the hands of murder and “misunderstanding”. I choose the side of Matthew Shepard. I choose Ryan Keith Skipper. I choose Harvey Milk. I choose the loved ones who lost their family, because of the hate that followed from openly expressing who they were and following their hearts.

I was taught to always introduce myself and stand behind my words. My name is Devin Hiller. I’m an EMT,  a Student, and I come from a middle class background. I’m the Daughter of a Public Defender, the Granddaughter of a woman on wall street and the Goddaughter of the Deputy Director of the Women’s Division of the Human Rights Watch. I’m surrounded by powerful women who always told me to study hard, follow my dreams and work hard to earn what I want out of life. However, the one thing none of them could teach me first hand was how to live life as a gay woman. I’ve always been gay. My family knew I was gay before I did. My mother likes to joke that I ended up gay because she listened to Melissa Etheridge during her pregnancy. My Dad helped me come out to him by joking “you can only play softball for so long, Devin.” And my Grandmother said it was so nice to finally meet my “little friend” when I brought my first girlfriend home for thanksgiving. 

To be honest, I still don’t know how I ended up as a gay woman. Both of my parents are veterans of the U.S. Airforce, white-collar workers, who took my siblings and I to our respective soccer games, ballet lessons, and violin recitals. Neither of my siblings are gay, making me believe that parenting was not a factor. I grew up on Star Wars and Disney movies; and unless Han Solo was hiding lady parts in those skin tight pants of his, I think his relationship with Princess Leia was heterosexual. When I played house in elementary school a boy played the husband and a girl played the wife. No homosexuality there. In middle school, we went over the first round of sex education, and unless I missed the part about how gay people reproduce, It a was heterosexual version. Finally in High school, when I came out during junior year, no one seemed to know much about lesbians because I kept getting the same question, “how do lesbians have sex?” to which I replied “let me know when you’ve tried it”(my mother may have taught me tact, but she also taught me sarcasm). So here’s my childhood in a nutshell and I still can’t figure out how I became gay in a world so heterosexual; It must be in my genes. How did any of the U.S. become gay in the predominately heterosexual culture? To make it through the years of teasing and bullying that comes from grades one through twelve, and still be gay and living is next to a miracle. 

Taking the focus of this letter back to the present day, I wonder how our country can call its self a representation of what our founding father’s meant for us? When the colonies broke away from the British Crown, we gave ourselves the freedoms of John Locke’s natural law, which included basic human and economic rights, making each citizen equal from the time they are born to the time they die. Weather you are a woman, have different skin pigment, share different religious beliefs, or if you grow up loving a different gender; Being born in the United States of America gives you the birthright to be treated equally.

So, Here is my request America, let me grow old with the woman I marry, with a dog and a house. Let me send my kids to school without them being teased for having lesbian parents. Let them sit uncomfortably through the birds and the bees, and tell me “how embarrassing I am”. Let my children grow up without the worry that their parents could be assaulted because they love each other. And finally Let my future children grow up in a world where they can be swept off their feet by their own Prince or Princess Charming without feeling the pressure tho hide what they are or who they love.

My Name Is Devin Hiller. I’m 21. I’m an EMT. And I’m gay.  

This is what I meant... 

“You say you're 'depressed' - all i see is resilience. You are allowed to feel messed up and inside out. It doesn't mean you're defective - it just means you're human.” 

―David Mitchell

I'm sorry I jumbled words when you needed ears.

I could be completely content laying next to you, listening, for years beyond this one.

Goodbye Facebook. I'll be back the next time I actually need to use you. But you're taking over my life and I can't be myself, so i'll be here, being me with real friends, not the 900 I don't know or never talk to.

its been fake,

Devin