Coming out at Christmas

INTRODUCTION

While working in the Features Department of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram in 1990s and 2000s, one of our Christmas traditions was to publish personal essays about the season by different feature writers. On Dec. 16, 2002, I recalled the painful experience of coming out to my father a few weeks before the Christmas of 1993.

     While visiting my mom earlier this year, I found a folder in his file cabinet that contained my original coming out letter to him, along with some literature from PFLAG and a few pamphlets. It also included a copy of his response to me. My mother had never seen it as he never showed it to her before sending it to me.

     On National Coming Out Day this year, I read his letter at our YesterQueer Gay History Happy Hour and I had meant to share this essay as well much sooner, but you know how the holidays go. 

     Rodney Garland Camp passed away on July 26, 2022. On Dec. 30, 2023, he would have been 84. I’m not sure if he ever saw this particular piece, but I like to think he would have enjoyed it. I hope you do, too.

Coming out at Christmas

A long letter to Dad spurs pain, strengthens family bonds

— and gives the holidays a greater meaning

BY TODD CAMP

Illustration by Jon Krause

It just didn't seem like a good, old-fashioned family Christmas unless someone's alcoholism was announced over eggnog, a divorce came up while caroling or a cousin began saying grace before dinner, only to get sidetracked into a lengthy dissertation on how she's dropping out of school, getting a tattoo and spending a few months hitchhiking around the country in an earnest attempt to "find herself."     

So after years of witnessing sibling rivalry, the occasional barb launched at "mom's side of the family" or the whispered verbal shearing of a familial black sheep, it was finally my turn to join the pantheon of dysfunction.     

It was a month before the Christmas of 1993, and I had just spent two grueling weeks writing what I can honestly say is the most difficult assemblage of words I have ever put to paper. College entrance essays, phone book-sized term reports, even editor-driven newspaper features in which every word was challenged, manipulated or mocked, seemed like bathroom-wall free verse compared to the scrutiny I gave this single-spaced, two-page missive home.     

Which is funny now, because almost 10 years later, what with my finely honed editing skills and 20/20 hindsight, I could easily pare all the emotional verbosity to one simple sentence: "Dad, I'm gay."

None of the overwrought histrionics or the meant-to-be-supportive psychobabble culled from a half-dozen "How to Come Out to Your Parents Without Inducing Heart Failure" self-help books I'd pored through over the summer. Just a succinct, Ellen-esque, "Yep, I'm gay."     

And while I was pretty much comfortable in my gay skin – having told all my friends, co-workers, and most of the state of Texas through a weekly comic strip in the gay press – I still waited until the Thanksgiving leftovers had cooled in the fridge before I worked up enough courage to drop that letter in the mail.     

Letters, plural, I should say, because I sent one to Mom as well. But who am I kidding? She saw the random signs: A dog-eared copy of Boy's Life with Greg Louganis on the cover, the nearly threadbare soundtrack to Grease, not to mention all those long weekend nights worrying when I had snuck out to drive into town and see the Rocky Horror Picture Show. Her letter was just confirmation of the inevitable.     

But Dad only saw the poster of the red swimsuit-clad Farrah Fawcett on the wall and assumed all was right with the world. For him, the letter was a complete and utter shock.

Looking back, I can't imagine why. An only child, I had no interest in sports – my short-lived stint with Little League was disastrous and we won't even talk about the rodeo days. Dad's desperate attempts to share his passions for fishing and hunting always ended in frustration, and while both my parents always encouraged my interest in art and culture, I can't help but think he was a little embarrassed by my lack of interest in the "manlier things."

     But we were always close, which is why I almost hate to admit that the catalyst for my decision to tell him came not from some deep-seated urge to set the record straight or even the idea that I owed my parents the truth. Nope, as is often the case with my decisions, my motivations were purely selfish. I had met someone, and the thought of spending Christmas away from him seemed more inconceivable than the thought of spending it away from the others I loved.

The decision not to go home was mine. I figured it was one thing letting my dad know that his only son liked other guys. But bringing home a date to stir up visuals would probably be too much to handle.

I was also aware that I hadn't missed a Christmas with my family in 26 years. Each Christmas Eve, the Camp clan would gather around the tree of whichever household lost the coin toss and we would open presents, one at a time, until the living room was buried beneath drifts of crumpled wads of colorful wrapping paper and curly-cue strands of hand-spiraled ribbon.

Some of my friends' families did the Christmas morning thing, or tore through their packages willy-nilly so that no one saw the loot until the debris settled – something I'm still getting used to with my partner's side of the family…. But this was our tradition.     

Christmas Eve. One at a time. The whole family.

     Except me.

     I got a response in the mail five days before Christmas. I opened it not with the fervor I would a giant, well-wrapped, heavily Scotch-taped present, but more like a report card after a particularly slacked-off semester.

     My new boyfriend, Doug, sat with me as I read over phrases like "the greatest nightmare a father could have," "totally abhorrent to me" and "never accept nor condone."

     It hurts as much to read it today as it did 10 years ago, and I know how it all came out. Ironically, his last sentence read, "... hopefully there will be more Christmases that will be happier than this one," and, sure enough, there were.

     Doug and I did go home the following Christmas, and apart from a few awkward, paper-cut painful conversations, Dad never spontaneously combusted, so the experience was written off as a success.

     I watched over the years as cursory nods became handshakes and handshakes became hugs. Dad took a genuine interest in Doug's dance career and never fails to ask about him when I call. I don't think he was prepared to actually like my partner, and as I've watched their relationship develop over the years, I've begun to wonder if they have more in common than Dad and I do.

     I know they both seem to get a big kick out of joking about my complete lack of knowledge when it comes to cars.

     It got easier every year, and now it's hard to imagine when Doug wasn't a member of the family.

     I've survived almost a decade's worth of gay-related grief since then. I've lost friends. I've ridden an emotional, national news-inspired roller coaster through Contracts With America, Don't Ask Don't Tell, and the murder of Matthew Shepard. I lived through a terrifying time when zealots threatened my career. Yet it astounds me that those old typewritten sheets still maintain their power to hurt, like an unhealed bruise reawakened after whacking it on the edge of the coffee table. But the experience made me stronger, my family closer, and, oddly enough, the holidays more meaningful.

     Besides, that was nothing compared to the time I had to tell my folks I was a Democrat. But that's another story.

The Response

I received quite a few responses to the column, including some angry letters to the editor and a few jeers.

Letter to the Editor from Dec. 28, 2002

     Why must the Star-Telegram glorify the lives of lesbians and homosexuals in some recent and very prominent articles?

The latest – “Coming out at Christmas” by Todd Camp on Dec. 16 – would have us believe that this is an "acceptable" way to live one's life.

Obviously, the Bible is not believed by those who enter such relationships. We all sin, but we must all work to eliminate the very appearance of evil in our lives.

In I Corinthians 6:9, we are told that the "unrighteous" will not inherit the kingdom of God. The list of "unrighteous" includes homosexuals.

Why should articles condone these lifestyles anymore than articles would approve of thieves, idolaters, drunkards, swindlers, etc.? Such articles serve no good purpose, and we shall not be deceived.

– Jane Morgan, Covington

From Cheers & Jeers, Jan 4, 2003

Jeers: To the Star-Telegram and staff writer Todd Camp for his Dec. 16 essay, "Coming out at Christmas." Camp said he had already told his family, friends and co-workers and much of Texas through a weekly homosexual paper that he is homosexual. Why did he need to tell the whole world, and why did the Star-Telegram help him do it?

– Jerry Davis, Richland Hills

Cheers: To Jane Morgan for her Dec. 28 letter about the essay "Coming out at Christmas," and jeers to Todd Camp for writing it. I have had it with all the "coming out." Please get back in the closet.

– Sonny Wooten, Lillian

But not all of them were hateful…

From Cheers & Jeers, Jan 4, 2003

Cheers: To Todd Camp for his Dec. 16 essay in the Life & Arts section, "Coming out at Christmas." It was interesting to read about a different side of Christmas and relationships. Cheers to him for being honest and open with his father and encouraging others to do the same.

– Beth Scott, Arlington

Jeers: To the closed-minded and judgmental people who jeered the Star-Telegram and Todd Camp for his Dec. 16 essay, "Coming out at Christmas." Get a grip, people! If you don't like an article in the newspaper, skip over it. The paper is not published only for you and your small minds.

– Cindy Perkins, Benbrook

My favorite response, however, came from someone at a local gay bar called Vivid which used to be downtown in the same location that is now home to Thompson’s Speakeasy and Cigar Lounge. A young man shyly approached and asked if I was Todd Camp from the Star-Telegram. I answered that I was. He then told me that reading my column had given him the courage to come out to his own parents and that he would never forget me for helping him do so. 

     “You are my Ellen,” he said with tears in his eyes.

     Comedian Ellen DeGeneres had come out very publicly in 1997 on her ABC television series, “Ellen,” and the compliment brought me to tears almost immediately. I remember thinking that it was the nicest thing anyone had ever said to me.

     Later that year, I got the chance to tell Ellen herself when she came to Dallas to promote her new talk show, “The Ellen DeGeneres Show,” premiering in September. I cried while telling her and she cried while hearing it. As far as I’m concerned, his response alone made all of the pain involved in writing the piece worth every sting.