October 3, 2009

It was no different than the hundreds of other friend requests. Someone I do not know requests to be my friend and unless they're a made up profile from someone in the Philippines or a party promoter I accept. Many people get all holier than thou when talking about Facebook friends. "I only accept friendships of people I know." Well, they obviously don't have a widely-read blog and web persona that many people enjoy. I accept these friendships with my fans. Without them I'm nothing.

That is a joke, btw. So, yes. Back to the story. It was late and James Shellhammer added me. Gay. Middle aged. Lives in Missouri. I was intrigued, but there are a good number of Shellhammers out there. Someone with, gasp, the name Brad Shellhammer is already my friend here on Facebook. He knows a friend from San Francisco. Seriously, though, who knows two Brad Shellhammers? Andrew Alford does. There was also that girl with the last name Shellhammer in the news many years back in San Francisco. She either got a lung transplant or lost her arm to a shark. I don't remember. But I remember her name. Point is there are other Shellhammers. There's also a tranny named D Shellhammer. Love her too. There's even a Shellhammersville in Pennsylvania.

After accepting James' friendship I went to bed and woke at 7AM. In bed with laptop in lap I read a note from James Shellhammer. He's my father's half-brother. I have two uncles and two aunts I never knew about. My father's father, who I thought to be dead growing up and who we never knew anything about, had lived. He'd remarried. He had other kids. Georgi looks at me and says James "has your hairline and your cheeks." I call my mother, astonished. Yes, she tells me she's known about this for a week and was going to call me. Sheesh, mom. Not the news you sit on for a week.

In 1990, before he died, John Ronald Shellhammer, my father's birth father, told his family he had fathered a son. That was my dad, Richard Lee Shellhammer. Twenty years later John's family, my father's brother and sisters, tracked down my mother. They found out that their brother, my dad, was dead.

And on Facebook my gay uncle finds me, his new gay nephew. The world moves in mysterious ways. And thoughts of my father. And my grandmother. And my father's childhood. And my own family line all go from very dormant thoughts to front and center. And it is fascinating and exciting. And makes me guilty a bit.

I've never really had the connection to family that others I know do. We had a broken home growing up. My siblings and I were just a little too far spaced out to be in school at the same time and to develop close friendships. And my own homosexuality and dreams of escape, from small-town life, and my father, fueled a path that I set out on: to explore, to get away, and to make family from those I choose. Not those that were chosen for me.

From college until 30 I purposefully kept distance from siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins. This was easy being in California and New York. My family remained close to one another, physically. I got out and needed to make sense of my life. My loves. My thoughts. I wrote and healed and made peace with my father's death, his abuse, his drug addiction, etc.

I could have been a better brother. I could be a better uncle and better brother now. I could call and write and do more than the obligatory gifts at Christmas and sending a gift a few weeks after a birthday. But we're all busy and we're all over the place and we're all so different. At least our lifestyles are. I think Facebook has been a good thing for me and my sisters. I get to eye in on their lives. I do love how liberal politically my sisters have become. My brother, sadly, is not on Facebook. Which is a shame.

I needed to escape my family to create the life I know and love. And in doing that I neglected the people in this world who have known me the longest. From out of nowhere a dark secret, a hidden family, a connection to the people who came before and who share my blood, arises. It shows its face in unexpected phone calls and, not surprisingly, the internet. The place I have found my voice this past decade is the place I find a connection to my father.

My new gay uncle James has read my website for years here and there. Not because he thought we were related but "simply because you are the famous person that you are." Thanks uncle James. Feed that ego.

And at a time of stability in my life. Don't laugh, people. Even in the upheaval of job, home, love, finance, and spirit that 2009 has been, I sit here, clicking away, the most stable I've been. I am resolute in my love. I feel blessed to have friends for life. I feel confident in my professional abilities. And I have found a voice again. My writing flows as naturally and loudly as my ridiculous, feminine voice.

I am in a good place. I have a great career and job I love. I have the most adoring, beautiful lover. I have hundreds, literally, of friends to laugh with and lean on. I live in the most inspirational city in the world. One thing missing though: family.

Maybe this is a sign. A call to action. For me. My mom. My sisters. My brother. My aunts. My uncles. My cousins. New and old.

I look back at the past. Imagine the history and the meager beginnings. The blood relatives. And maybe, just maybe, I should embrace rather than shy away. Writing these things is one thing. Doing them, for all of us, is another.

You can choose your friends. You cannot choose your family. You can, however, choose what you do with them.