Way back on Thursday, May 26, 1994, I met someone who would have a profound impact on my life. But the story starts a little earlier, much earlier actually.

I was born into a religious family -- Mormons on my mom's side and Catholics on my dad's side. Definitely a unique union, which might say a little bit about where I am today.

As a very religious youngster in junior high and high school, I realized that something was wrong with me. As someone famous said about ten years ago, "Yep! I'm gay!"

Of course, I now realize that there's nothing wrong with me, anymore than there's something wrong with any other law-abiding and contributing member of society. I'm simply God's method of birth control since I have never wanted a child. Don't get me wrong -- I love children, as long as I can pick them up at noon, take them to the Zoo, and drop them off back at their home at supper time. In fact, for 13 years, I did just that every Saturday for my favorite aunt and uncle in Tomball, Texas, to give them a respite from the daily grind of raising two children.

I went to church "religiously," and, to use the words of a Catholic priest that I confided to, "prayed to Almighty God and the Lord Jesus Christ to cure me of my affliction."

Many girlfriends came into my life -- many -- some real -- Lynda, Kathy, Michelle, Carrie -- but most imagined. I was trying to prove to myself and everyone around me that there was nothing wrong with me. I asked Lynda to marry me, but her parents said no. I asked Michelle to marry me, but she said, "Let me think about it" -- after five years of dating. "Let me think about it." Code for "Not in this lifetime."

Finally, on April 15, 1993, at the age of 38, I went to the bank to transfer money to my checking account to pay my taxes, withdrew $5,000, and took off in my 1989 Mustang GT for Canada. My intent was to commit suicide. Since I was a graduate of Texas A&M University, and lived in College Station at the time, I was simply too patriotic to kill myself in the United States. I would let Canada deal with an unknown body.

I left behind a thriving business with about eight employees, two dogs (Sugar and Penney), some real estate, a couple of cars and a motorcycle, and a huge record and CD collection. I took about 100 CDs with me, including all of The Beatles, of course.

My journey took me north to Fargo, North Dakota, but when I got there, it was cold, so I decided to drive west and find a warm spot for a warm, dead body. I got to Vancouver very early in the morning, so I was sitting out in Stanley Park when a tired jogger sat down next to me. I commencted "It's beautiful out here," to which he replied, "Are you from Texas?" I guess we really do have a Southern drawl in the South.

A couple of minutes later his "friend" jogged up and sat down. Turns out that the two of them were gay, were originally from Houston, and had both gone to San Diego to live together. They were in Vancouver celebrating their fifth anniversary. After hanging with them for a few days at their insistence, they convinced me to give any big city on the West Coast a chance to show me that I could live a happy and openly gay life, and probably find someone else to love and live with, as well.

With $4,300 left, I drove down to Seattle. Raining. Nope.

I drove to Portland. Raining. Nope.

I drove to Sacramento. It reminded me of Houston. I was trying to escape from Texas, so nope.

I drove to San Francisco. Cold. Nope.

I drove to Bakersfield since I had an old college friend who lived there. Turns out that he had moved back to Texas just the week before. If Bakersfield wasn't good enough for Cary, it wasn't good enough for me. So nope.

Just Los Angeles and San Diego left.

I headed to Los Angeles, not too far away. After "staying with traffic" for a few hours, I thought something was wrong, so I pulled over someplace called "Oceanside" to look at the map. Hmmmmmm. Totally missed Los Angeles. I guessed they didn't want me. On to San Diego.

I had been to San Diego just eleven months earlier on my way to Monterey. I knew it was a gorgeous city, but I didn't know if it was the place for me. I arrived on April 27, 1993, and spent the next few days laying out at Blacks Beach and sleeping at the KOA Kampground in Chula Vista.

On April 30, the news and weather were making a big deal about having had 10 inches of rain in January, no rain for 90 consecutive days. They also said that 10 inches of rain is the total annual rainfall, so it was a very rainy January.

Hmmmmmm. Ten inches of rain in 12 months? I've been through several hurricanes and Texas thunderstorms that dumped ten inches of rain in just a few hours. I think I could like San Diego. I stayed.

After a couple of weeks, I hired a gay attorney, Gary Holt, to help me close down things back in Texas. Gary was also the founder and Artistic Director of the Gay Men's Chorus of San Diego, which I promptly auditioned for and joined.

The next eleven months found me retired and doing nothing but singing, laying out at Blacks Beach studying the world's great religions to see if there was room for me, and going to the Gay Men's Coming Out Support Group at The Center for Social Services. On my birthday in 1994, I put myself back into the work force out of sheer boredom with doing nothing each day.

My first temporary job led a full-time position which required a lot of travel opening wireless offices throughout the nation. My home base, though, was San Diego. In addition to my salary, I would be paid $1,500 a month living allowance, have a rental car, and get at least one paid trip home each month. My first office was in Farmington Hills, Michigan, and on my first trip home, for Memorial Day weekend, I went to the Thursday Coming Out Support Group. The date was May 26, 1994, and that's where my whole life got turned upside down.

I had been writing a monthly coming out newsletter for the Support Groups at The Center, and one of the members had taken a liking to my writing. We met that Thursday evening, and the rest is history. His name is Jim Frimmer. He's currently a Realtor with Century 21 and also works at Borders Books and Music, a company that supports its gay employees with medical benefits for their significant others. Of course, he's here at ActiveRain, too.

But why should you care about all this?