Some Feel-Good News From Boston

Steve Buckley is on the left in this photo

This afternoon I was out in the car, listening–as I often do–to the local sports radio station, WEEI. It was the beginning of the afternoon drive time program “The Big Show.” Instead of talking about the Red Sox, Patriots, and Celtics (almost never the Bruins), the guys on the show were participating in a “coming out party” for frequent co-host Steve Buckley, a sportswriter for the Boston Herald.

After years of hesitation and months of talks with friends and co-workers, Buckley had decided to announce publicly that he is gay. He wrote about his journey in his column in the Boston Herald today.

Years ago, Buckley had come out to his mother; and while she assured him she totally accepted and loved him just as he was, she advised him not to go public as he wanted to, because she feared his sports writing career in might be damaged by “prejudice.”

Here’s a bit of Buckley’s column:

Just over seven years ago, before Thanksgiving, we were getting into the car outside of a CVS when my mother said, “I think you should go ahead and do that story you’ve been talking about.”

“Really?”

“Yes,” she said. “Just go ahead and do it. And then we’ll have a party.”

She was talking about the story in which I would say that I am gay.

[….]

“Do it,” she said. I thanked her. She smiled. And then I made the biggest mistake of my life: With a vacation lined up for the first week of December, I told her I’d get to it when I returned to Boston — just before Christmas.

The vacation came and went. The day after I returned to Boston, I received a call from the Lifeline people telling me my mother was being rushed to Mount Auburn Hospital, where she had undergone radiation therapy during the summer. The family gathered at her side. The next morning, she suffered a heart attack. She died a few days later.

There was a funeral at Doherty’s, and then a very soulful, reflective Christmas. And then a Super Bowl, and then spring training. The story didn’t get done. Whenever I revisited the idea of coming out, I’d foolishly dwell on how it was to have been a big family event, my mother pulling everyone together. When that was lost, I guess I lost my way.

On the radio show today, Buckley explained that many of his friends knew he was gay, and that he would have told anyone who asked him. But he still felt he wasn’t really being true to himself. He needed to go public.

After he wrote the column last night, Buckley received thousands of calls and e-mails from friends, readers of his column, listeners to WEEI, and several professional athletes. He answered questions from co-hosts and took calls from listeners throughout the three-hour show today, and toward the end of the program he said that he could honestly say this was the happiest day of his life.

As someone who has listened to Buckley on the radio for years, I couldn’t help smiling as he talked and as the other guys on the show supported him–and these are very macho-type guys.

While I’m not gay, I am a recovering alcoholic, so I know what it’s like to have a deep dark secret that you’re not sure you want to reveal. After a number of years of sobriety, I decided to just be open about it; because my sobriety is a huge part of who I am. I’m a completely different person today because I stopped drinking. I’m not saying it’s the same thing as coming out of the closet, but I can identify with that feeling that you want your friends and family to know you as you really are.

Anyway, this story made me feel really good, and so I wanted to share it with you all. I hope it makes you feel as happy as it made me.