Rude To Say No
Earlier this year, aged 26 and 23 years respectively, both my sons finally entered full-time employment. Hallelujah. No more school fees, student rent or Nike sneakers to pay for. Gone were the days when I’d have to worry about them travelling on a bus alone or collect them from birthday parties; no more sitting at parent-teacher meetings where someone half my age would tell me off for letting them come to school without regulation socks on; no more pretending I liked football. For the rest of my life I could focus on being (even more) extraordinarily selfish.
Twenty-two years ago, when my wife and I separated, quite amicably, after six years of marriage and the two aforementioned children, we were still, at 32, relatively young. We had quite cleverly managed to marry, procreate and separate while most of our friends were still dropping Es in King’s Cross warehouses. I moved around the corner to a little flat of my own and was blissfully happy. The flat was always tidy and everything was always where I could find it. When the kids came to stay the night, I would stand next to them while they ate their supper, mini-Hoover in hand, ready to catch any crumbs they might drop onto the new, rather impractical, chocolate-brown sisal.
It was around then that I decided to be gay. It wasn’t just the clean and tidy flat that led to my new life as a gay — there was the little fact that I liked sleeping with men, of course — but there was also the added bonus that I would never have to remarry or have more children. The two I had were just perfect; no more required, thank you.
My new life as a gay would, I realised, protect me from all sorts of domestic inconveniences and emotional conundrums. It meant, for example, that I didn’t need to bother with a divorce unless my ex-wife wanted one, and she didn’t seem in a hurry. And so I found myself both married and gay; the perfect combination for a commitment-phobe.
I dated a few blokes over the years and enjoyed their company. Fortunately, the size of my bachelor pad — I moved a few times but always made sure the square footage remained tight — stopped any of them imagining it could ever comfortably accommodate two for longer than a weekend (sometimes ideally not even past breakfast).
But then, after 10 carefree years, I unintentionally met someone I liked more than the others, and it soon morphed into a proper relationship. I even said, “Yes” when, after 12 months, Simon suggested he move into my tiny flat. With a dog. My new-found generosity of spirit knew no bounds. In preparation for his arrival, I cleared a shelf of sweaters in the wardrobe, emptied a drawer of socks, and removed eight jackets from coat hangers so that he could use them instead. Not only that, I removed some wedding photographs from the bookshelf next to the bed so that he could put some pictures of his family on display.
The day he actually moved in was an uncomfortable one. Simon had more stuff than I’d imagined. His clothes didn’t all fit on one shelf and he’d brought a few pieces of furniture with him. I waited 24 hours and quietly removed those to the safety of the under-pavement storage unit next to the bins outside the front door.
After a bit of argy-bargy, life together settled into a happy, if squashy, routine. In fact, all was good until that fateful day in July 2013 when legislation was passed to allow same-sex marriage in England and Wales. Initially, I welcomed the fact that gay men and women would be treated equally; it had been a long time coming and many had fought hard to see this day happen. But then slowly it dawned on me, and alarmingly I could see it was dawning on Simon, that these wonderful and enlightened times meant there was no reason why we shouldn’t marry, too. I kept quiet.
One New Year’s Eve, when a group of us renting a house in the Cotswolds started throwing Chinese lanterns into the clear night sky, Simon gave me one to release. “No, you’re all right,” I said, “you do it.” He insisted I took hold of it. I did so and quickly threw it up in the air so that I could go and get another drink.
“Didn’t you see the message on it?” he asked. “No,” I replied.
“It said, ‘Will you marry me?’” It seemed rude to say no, especially with the rest of the party all watching, and so I unexpectedly found myself engaged to a man.
Simon wanted to plan a big wedding with all our friends and relatives in attendance. Funnily enough, I didn’t. I’d had one of those already and still needed to finalise my divorce from my ex-wife. She and I were both a little put-out by this unplanned inconvenience. Eventually, after he’d met some of my family, he agreed to have a small, low-key wedding for only 15 close relatives instead. But there were more surprises in store.
It wasn’t long before gay equality dealt me another cruel blow. A number of Simon’s gay friends started having children through surrogates, adoption, or IVF with single female friends. And one weekend, Simon predictably mentioned that he, too, craved his own child. Apparently he always had. “You can have one of mine,” I offered, helpfully. But he wanted one of his own. It’s a hard issue to compromise on: you can’t really have half a baby. After months of negotiating, I suggested we adopt a Chinese baby. I already knew from research that it was nigh impossible if you were a) gay, and b) a recent divorcee. This strategy would at least buy me some time before Simon found out, too.
When he eventually discovered that a Chinese baby was a non-starter, I expressed immense disappointment and we left it at that. Or so I thought. Except Simon doesn’t like to give up... and so in April, despite my best efforts, he will become a father to his own child. He managed to find a friend of his who, single and in her early forties, was desperate for a child, too. After two bouts of IVF treatment, it all fell into (her) place.
To be fair, the plan they came up with took my feelings on the matter into account. The mother will be the primary carer, while Simon will have the baby for occasional weekends and holidays (Christmas and Instagram, I suggested). We all agreed I don’t have to be a second daddy; instead, I’ll just be “the grumpy man who lives with Daddy”. Obviously, we’ll have to see how this all works out in practice.
So while it’s wondrous that this decade draws to a close with men and women, whatever their sexuality, being able to choose who they marry, even choose what gender they are, or become a parent by myriad different means, spare a thought for people like me. The innocent men and women who, through no fault of their own, find themselves unintentionally having experienced marriage to women and to men. And even more surprisingly, having had children with both of them. Gay rights have set my own personal cause back by decades.
Jeremy Langmead is brand and content director of Mr Porter
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