Big Gay Jim's Big Gay Media Circus

Of all the Mercury retrograde info shocks in the world, Governor McGreevy has come out of the closet. It’s all anyone is talking about here in Jersey. Anyone who says men don’t gossip was not in our break room moments after the big speech. I happened to catch a couple clips from his announcement in a Chinese takeout restaurant while I waited for my noodles last night. What really touched me was that he seemed to fully understand what a crossroads following your truth really is, and how difficult and rare and shiningly blissfully painful it is to step up and take the big leap off of life’s abyss with total faith that there’s some kind of cushion at the bottom, or at the very least that you won’t go "splat".

For anyone with half an ounce of respect for the daring reality-shattering, stomach-dropping, risk-everything-for-freedom personal choices we all make in hopes of a happier, jucier, more cosmically fulfilling existence, Jim made the boldest of all possible moves: he sacrificed everything for his truth. And I, for one, am 100% behind him (ahem). Of course, the cynics say that with the pending lawsuit from his former lover, his marriage and career were pretty much fucked anyway. But still, it takes giant, jangling brass balls to get up in front of the free world and admit you had an affair. With a guy, no less (we won’t even get into the now blatant hypocrisy of his opposition to gay marriage). It’s more than Clinton was capable of, and it wasn’t near this sordid.

But the poignant grace of a powerful man humbly stepping into his truth is thoroughly cheapened by the sheer self-absorbed audacity to ask his cuckolded wife to stand there impotently while he announced to the world that his marriage was a sham. The poor dear, it had to be the most humiliating day of her life. The tight and horrified fake smile of Mrs. McGreevy, who had apparently been listening to a bit too much Tammy Wynette as she swallowed her fourth Valium with a whiskey chaser right before the cameras rolled, said it all. The time has passed to stand by your man, honey. There’s nothing to salvage - his political career is over. He likes to fuck men. It’s time to buy Kleenex in bulk, attack the sofa with a ball bat, mourn the loss of your dreams and the work you put into his career, scrape what’s left of your dignity off the bottom of his shoe and try to move on. There is someone out there who will love you for no other reason than your simple radiance. If nothing else, use his bravery as an example. Follow your bliss. Learn that you deserve real love the way you want it. Find out who you are as a woman, plain and strong, outside the role of political trophy wife, and put your whole soul into being her. It takes a long time, but it is utterly worth it.