SBS 301 Cultural Diversity/Prof. Koptiuch         Fall 2003        Personal Memory Ethnographies


Amber Chase

A Journey of Sexuality Through Diaries

February 1996
Dear Diary,
I can still remember the day like it was yesterday:  my parents quietly coaxed me as they explained that Pam was no longer going to be part of our family.  I felt crippled.  I had already lost Grandma about five months earlier when she died from cancer, and now Pam.

She does not love us any more I thought.  My parents tried to reassure me that there was nothing we could do.  Pam had “discovered herself” they told me, and she does not feel she has a place in our family anymore.  I was completely confused.  Why did she feel unwanted?  Why didn’t she feel comfortable around our family now that she had discovered herself?

September 1985
Dear Diary,
As I have been expressing for the past year, my love for Daniel is continuing to grow; but doubts still linger in my mind.  Whenever I am with him, I fall in love all over again. But when we are apart, I can’t help but wonder if I am really attracted to him in such a way that he is really the one I want to spend the rest of my life with.  Since high school I have found myself increasingly attracted to women.  While all my friends went out with their boyfriends, I was desperately wishing that their boyfriends would deceive them and they would come running to me for comfort.  Right now I need to be comforted, but there is no one to comfort me - I don’t want my parents to know, and I sure don’t want Daniel to know; who can I trust but you?

February 1986
Dear Diary,
Daniel knows now.  He confessed to me his true feelings, and hinted around the topic of a future proposal.  I couldn’t take it any longer, I had to let him know what he was in for.  I thought for sure that after our conversation he would be done with me, but I was wrong.  I guess that just goes to prove how much of a gentleman he is.  I told him everything:  my high school fantasies of my girl friends, and even my doubts about my complete involvement in our relationship and what was to evolve.  He seemed a little caught off guard, but he somehow found his footing to say exactly what I needed to hear to cool my nerves:  “I love you so much Pam.  I don’t want to force you to do anything you are not sure of.  When and if you are ready, I will be here for you.”

January 1989
Dear Diary,
Daddy told me today that I get to be a flower girl.  I’m so excited that I get to be in Uncle Daniel and Pam’s wedding.  Pam will be my new auntie.  And I get to fly on an airplane all the way to Missouri.  Brother says he doesn’t want to be the ring boy, but Mommy says we will try.

May 1989
Dear Diary,
What am I getting myself into?  Is this really what I want?  Everyone is on the other side of the door, waiting for me.  Is it too late to change my mind?

Someone is coming, I must stop these foolish thoughts.

It was only Amber.  She looks like a fairy in her little dress, coming to tell me that they are ready for me.  She is so tranquil; if only I could be as calm as she on a day like this.

February 1991
Dear Diary,
Today Mommy took brother and I to the hospital.  We have a new cousin, her name is Maria.  Now my favorite uncle and auntie have a beautiful little baby - it’s just like a fairy tale.

August 1992
Dear Diary,
These first few years have been what I would consider as normal.  We bought a house, and even had our first child, our beautiful Maria.  But even through it all, I still don’t think this is the thing for me.  I have tried so hard to work it out though.  Daniel’s mother just passed away in July, and he is still silently grieving over her; I can’t do this to him now, he’s not ready.

He’s not ready?  Am I being completely honest?  Maybe it’s that I’m not really ready.  His family is so supportive of our marriage and helping us with Maria; what would they think of me if I filed for divorce?  Why does this have to be so hard?  Why do I have to be so self-conscious?  I am who I am, and people should accept me for that.  But still, how would everyone feel, would they still accept me?

Daniel has been really supportive; even though I haven’t said anything to him yet, he is somehow able to sense my struggle.  He says he will love me no matter what, we have Maria to look after, and no matter what happens she will have both of us in her life.

March 1993
Dear Diary,

Something is going on, and no one will tell me what it is.  Aunt Pam wasn’t at Maria’s third birthday party last month, she didn’t come to Brother’s birthday party in January either, nor was she at home on Christmas when everyone came over for lunch and to open presents.  I think she might be really sick like Grandma was before she died, and Mommy and Daddy don’t want to tell me because of how hard it was for me to come to terms with Grandma’s passing.  Grandma is still a part of my day to day life, like a  ghost - coming in and out of my thoughts.  And now, Pam is the same way - I never see her anymore, and no one will tell me where she is.  Daddy goes out with uncle Daniel almost every weekend.  And no matter how pestering I become in trying to find out why Pam has disappeared, I can’t get anything out of Mommy while Daddy is gone for the day.  She says that I am too young to understand.

March 1993
Dear Diary,

Things have been so hectic these last few months; I have hardly had any time to myself.
After several months of contemplation we agreed to divorce.  Daniel never admitted it, but I think the whole process was really traumatic for him, especially after I received full custody of Maria since the courts didn’t feel his job would allow him enough time to spend with her - he is often sent out of town on business trips.

I have tried not to move too far away, that way Daniel and his family can still spend time with Maria, but I have stayed clear away from any sort of family gathering Daniel‘s family has.  I’m not really sure how everyone would react to the situation and to me.  They had been a great family, and none of them had seemed like they would have a problem, but I don’t want to take any chances.  It took me long enough to feel comfortable around my family, and with his family it has taken even longer.

February 1996
Dear Diary,
After further questioning, I found out that Pam had discovered that she did not love Daniel.  Other family members of mine had gone through divorce before, so I did not see a problem.  I questioned my parents, “why doesn’t  Pam just come to our family gatherings with her new boyfriend?”  That is where the problem lay - Pam has not divorced my uncle for a different man, but for a woman.

This was something new to me, but for some reason it did not impact me in the way my parents had anticipated.  For all that mattered to me, she was still my aunt, and she could love whomever she wanted.  But that is not how Pam felt.  So for the past three years Pam has stayed clear from any encounters with our family, afraid of how we would feel with her there.

March 2000
Dear Diary,
Today I was looking through the family photo album, and I found pictures from Maria’s sixth birthday party.  What a day - the day Pam’s ghost disappeared.  After their divorce Pam became a ghost that loomed into and out of my thoughts whenever I saw Daniel and Maria at family gatherings, and Pam physically wasn’t there.  As time wore on, her looming influence on my thoughts fluctuated.  But after she gained confidence and bravely entered the realm of some family gatherings, her “ghost” disappeared, it was like my unconscious questions of why had finally been answered and I was content.

February 1996
Dear Diary,
Today was Maria’s birthday party, and as I lay here in bed I wonder why it took me so long to agree with what Daniel has told me over the last few years - his family does not hold anything against me and still accepts me.

After years of reassurance from Daniel, and begging from Maria, we decided that for Maria’s sixth birthday we would have one birthday party.  For all the others since our divorce, we had always done two separate parties:  one with my family, and one with his.    So today Maria and I met at Chucky Cheese’s with my family, Maria’s friends, and Daniel’s family.  All day yesterday I was really nervous about how they would all react.  The only thing that got me out of bed this morning, and into the car was Maria’s smiling face - she was so excited that it was her birthday and she was having a party with both mommy and daddy.  She made me realize that it didn’t matter what everyone else thought, this was her day and I wasn’t going to ruin it for her.

At the end of a long day now, I am left appalled.  None of Daniels’s family showed any signs of differentiation towards me.  I feel they still accepted me, I am who I had always been, and they accepted me for that.

February 1996
Dear Diary,
Today is a special day.  Not just because it was Maria’s sixth birthday party, but because Pam came.   The party was a success: Pam realized that no one in our family held her sexual “difference” against her.  She is still the same Pam that I had grown up loving when I was little, and her sexuality did not change that.

February 2000
Dear Diary,
Over the years, I have grown more comfortable around them.  Just like with my family, Daniel’s family is one of the very few places out in society where I feel I am not judged because I have a girlfriend and not a husband.

October 2003
Dear Diary,
In one sense, I felt a connection to Pam and Daniel’s marriage because I was the flower girl in their wedding.  I was only five at the time, and events as uncommon as that have a huge impact on a child’s memory.  When they divorced, I felt like a piece of myself had gone down the drain along with their marriage.

This whole ordeal reminds me of Toni Morrison’s novel Beloved, in the sense that occurrences and tribulations of the past continue to reemerge into the present and the future until the questions are answered and all persons involved no longer have a piece of themselves that has been repressed.  Because Pam and Daniel’s relationship started as a fireworks show for me as a young child, the finale that I had anticipated to come, never did.  But in a sense, the finale that ended their marriage was only another beginning, like an intermission into my gradual decent into understanding and acceptance  to what life holds for me, and those around me.

Sexuality is one of the many ghosts of society, reprocessed but yet still alive and fighting for acceptance.  People will always be fighting for rights against discrimination towards those not fitting into the “norm.”  Like those of the Civil Rights, Women’s Rights, and other movements, sexuality has also had its share  of battles, scars, and wounds that are still open today because the battle is still fresh.  More and more though, it seems that sexuality is an open topic; it does not have to hide in the closet.  Throughout my lifetime so far, the late 1980‘s and 1990‘s, sexuality has grown with leaps and bounds:  those out of the “norm” have become less reluctant to share their sexual preference with those in seclusion, such as with close family and friends.  It appears now that sexual preference is a character trait that is hung out with the rest of what makes each person who they are.

For many others like Pam, especially during that same era - the 1990’s - the clothes of sexual preference slowly became unpacked from the box in the closet.  During this time, as more and more individuals admitted to and accepted living a socially known life of sexual differentiation, society as well became more acknowledging and accepting.  Although these particular individuals in comparison to the rest are moving more swiftly, at least the ball is rolling.

What makes Pam’s sexuality even more influential to me is the impact that this incident has had on other experiences I have had later on as I have grown older and matured.  This experience showed me, with somewhat of an insider’s bias, that individuals should not be judged by sexuality alone, because there is much more to them.  Each individual carries with them their own life story that everyone else can learn something from.  In high school, I acquired several close friendships with those whose sexuality was similar the Pam’s.  Even though their “view” was not the same as mine, it did not get in the  way - I was able to see past the invisible shield that they are discriminated for and befriend them for who they are - all baggage included.  Without my experience with Pam and Daniel’s marriage and divorce, I’m not sure if I would be the same person I am today, with the same friends I have.  Would I be out there discriminating against the very people that I today call my friends?  I guess I can only hope that that would not be.


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