Shame or scorn, there would need to be some haven

I love this painting by Elisabeth Baysset,

for many reasons, including that it reminds

me of the boyhood home of Laurent in Malle's

immortal Le souffle au coeur (1971), while

the steps and vegetation are so like those

along the Presidio wall in San Francisco, 

and the crest of Telegraph Hill. But I love

this painting for suggesting the mysteries

as much as the laughter in a house in the

sweetest settings.

In the boyhood home I grew up in, protected 

in leafiest oblivion of place, my 11-year-
old brother was departing one afternoon for 

a dressy party hosted by one of his friends, 

when my mother, remarking on how well he 

looked, bestowed on him an approving kiss

in well wishes for a nice time. Watching 

this, at age 6 or 7, I stepped forward to 

do the same, as I might have done, any old 

time in a variety of circumstances.  

I was restrained and offered my first pretense

of shock, that such a gesture could have enter-

ed my mind. It came from my mother, announcing

that it would be inappropriate for me to kiss

my brother. A bright flicker of something ter-

rible flashed in her tone and her manner, as

if something wrong in me did not belong in the

house, and I recoiled into a furious search in-

to myself for what that could be. I can still
hear myself saying, I want to kiss Davy, too.

This was my initiation into what I would come

very soon to perceive as a grinding but unpre-

dictable interrogation through the years of my

youth, into whether or not I were experiencing

this bad thing that dwelt within me. It was, I

promise the reader, my earliest comprehension of

the need for some externality of shielding - in

my mind, in those days, no doubt simply a fairer

god - against a simmering and ferociously bitter

uproar in the one very closest to me, of scorn 

for something I simply had no idea of existing.

But what, too, remained to be done, to tranform

me into an angry and predatory bully? 

I applaud the estimable Blue Remembered Hills

blog for devoting an Easter posting to the mat-

ter of familial homophobia. I have found it to

be pervasive and sometimes immeasurably devas-

tating to people of my friendship, from coast

to coast and of every variety of background or

means. I had an easy time of it, although one

can never forget astonishment with its first

appearance. I honour the memory of my mother

utterly, with deep admiration and gratitude. 

She had recently lost her young half-brother, 

an uncle of whom I've written more than once, 

to what was explained to us all as an acciden-

tal death. She simply never could distance 

herself from anguish and an irrational guilt

in that loss, except through kindly Episcopal

counselling, blaming his death on his sin. And

he and I had been on terms, my god, of family

trust. We drew animals together, with crayons,

and he helped me to laugh through orthodontia.

Elisabeth's lovely painting haunts me with a

warmth and gaiety with which a house can shel-

ter a family. All my little torments have ex-

pired. We meet in the present, do we not, be-

cause there are people we love, to be looked

after.

Elisabeth Baysset
Les Enclauses
1996