11-08-2020, 04:39 PM
(This post was last modified: 11-08-2020, 04:43 PM by gayprojectforum.)
Hi Project,
I saw that you wished Lorenz for his Civil Union and I also join in wishing him that the realization of this dream can bring great serenity to him and his partner. It is nice to think that someone can take such steps in peace.
I’m much younger than Lorenz, but I’m no longer a kid, I’m almost 50 years old, I'm very close to 50, and my partner is only one year younger than me, this means that we don’t have to face the environmental problems that an intergenerational couple faces in everyday life. It would therefore seem that things for us have to be all in all much simpler and yet this is not the case at all.
We met at school 12 years ago, we are both teachers, but unfortunately school is the least suitable environment for cultivating a gay relationship and I think that even for straight relationships, except for traditional marriages, it is more or less the same, there is underground gossip, backbiting, there are parents who are like two-faced Janus, they show smiling faces and use honey words when they are in front of you and then, secretly, they tell the most incredible stories about you. Now, with social media, "secret" groups of parents have been created who give help each other to "defend" their children and to attack the teachers, and then there are the students, who are grown up, are not naive at all and learn very quickly from parents the worst behaviors.
Both my partner (I’ll call him Luke here) and I have always been wary of the school environment in which we must limit ourselves to a technical work understood in the most theoretical and depersonalized way. Now there is the covid and with distance lessons many problems are avoided, but before the covid we, that is I and my partner, who teaches in another section of the school, used to make our students do the periodical tests that had to be graded, in the computer lab through a program that we had made just for this use, so that the test was automatically corrected and the grade was assigned by the machine itself, because this way it seemed possible to reduce the discussions and chatter related to the fact that some students had been "taken in sight" as they commonly say.
Keep in mind that Luke and I had developed the program together, but "out of prudence" we produced two versions of it graphically very different so that no one could suspect that we had worked together, in practice the storage and calculation core of the program was the same, but those who used the program could not realize it. Fortunately for us, as we taught the same school subject, we couldn't be colleagues in the same classes and this made things much easier. In our Institute, which is very large, there is also an internal bar where you can go during recess. Luke and I go there but on different days and we decide in the morning which of us goes to the bar. We insisted on one thing only that is to have the same day off, and we both chose Wednesday, a day that nobody wants, and we've both had the Wednesday off for years now and so, at least, we have a day to ourselves to spend in common. But don't think we can be free to do whatever we want on Wednesdays. We have a certain freedom and anyhow relative because we live in a neighborhood very far from the school, where nobody knows us, but when we go to school on the subway (which is the only possible means of transport) we get on two different subway cars. You will think we are paranoid but we know we need to be very careful.
In the year we met, there was a case of a declared gay student in our school, bullied by his classmates, but not with blows and punches, but by dint of malevolent smiles and poisonous jokes. Tis guy had become the school's gossip principal argument, and the usual committee of "serious" parents had made him the emblem of the degradation of the school that does not intervene. The parents had written to the principal, who as always had pretended nothing and had not intervened either in one direction or in the other, in the end the guy went to another school. In reality we too did nothing, the boy was not our pupil and in the College of Professors no one ever talked about this situation, in theory the problem could be raised but whoever did it would have been branded for life or as a "defender of lost causes ”, if married or better married and with numerous offspring, or more brutally as“ fagot ”or“ lesbian ”, if without spouse and without children.
But now I come to my story with Luke. You will understand that, in an environment like that, looking around for any sign of availability was very risky. Luke and I met a little less superficially, that is, we had the opportunity to exchange a few words in a less formal way by bringing two of our classes (one of his and one of mine) to visit the Science Museum in Naples. It was a completely random thing, but then a dialogue was born that did not stop and went on. It took us months to show each other our sympathy, that is, to say that we could be good friends, because then that too was not at all obvious. At school we didn't even talk to each other, but we only spoke privately on the phone, at first we only talked about school, then we came up with the idea of the program to have tests done and assessed in an automated way and that way we started meeting in person outside the school. Then, partly because we liked working on a software of that kind and partly because it was pleasant to work together, we started seeing each other practically every day. The program was a gem, apart from the different external appearance we gave the version that I would use and the one that he would use, the substantial part were identical but very flexible. Each student entered the program with his name and password, and the name always appeared at the top right of the monitor so that no one could use another's password. The questions were the same for everyone but the order was random and the order of the answers was also random, so that there was no possibility of copying. The machine, as the students delivered the test, printed the answers on a sheet with the date and the student had to sign and hand in a copy of the sheet so that it was impossible to say that he had delivered a test other than that evaluated by the program. As soon as the test was completed, the program put all the series of answers on the DB and then automatically evaluated the test by assigning the evaluations automatically so that the average grade of the class corresponded to a grade set by the teacher. In short, the program was truly a gem, both in terms of graphics and technology, because at the time of returning the test, the student could be given the series of his answers and that of the correct answers with a small comment chosen by the machine itself.
However, my relationship with Luca has grown thanks to the work done on this program. Of course, each of us knew well that the other was unmarried and had never talked about women. Over time Luke accepted the idea of staying for dinner with me and eventually sleeping with me, obviously in separate rooms, but slowly we had come to pass together from lunchtime on Tuesdays up to 7.00 am on Thursdays and from lunchtime on Saturdays up to 7.00 am on Mondays, there was no need to even make an appointment, we both knew things would turn out that way. There was no need to state anything explicitly, little by little the embarrassment dissolved by itself, and fears disappeared and we came to trust each other. We both were fully aware of how things were, then a bit of physical contact also began, a bit awkward at first, but then more and more free. One day he said to me: "What if I went to sleep with you?" I just looked him right in the eyes and we hugged. It was Saturday April 19th 2008. Since then we have lived together, only at school we behaved like strangers, but we used to go on vacation together, and then he decided to rent his house, which is smaller than mine, and move in permanently with me. We have exactly the same salary, and he gives me half of what his rent pays him, because he lives in my house, all expenses are 50%. He had proposed to me to make a joint account but I preferred that we have two separate accounts, because if things did not go well between us, we had to be free to go our separate ways.
It's been 12 years and I can say we got along perfectly. We don't have a form of symbiosis, no, we have some friends in common but not all of them, let's say better that among us there is no rule that friends must only be in common. I'd say we've been a nice couple for 12 years now and here I come to the point. About a month ago the speech of the Civil Union comes out. I state that I have nothing against Civil Unions, that's clear! After he mentioned it I went to see the related legal rules which are much less simple than I thought, in particular to dissolve the civil union unilaterally there is a two-phase procedure with a three-month break between the first phase and the second and then there is the choice of the property regime. I think that out of common sense guaranteeing the separation of assets especially when it comes to people of the same, let's say, economic strength is the most appropriate thing because this would greatly simplify the end of the civil union if it were needed. What scares me the most, however, is that taking a step like the Civil Union involves a change of official marital status, that is something legal, external, which in some cases has no real meaning ... I mean that nothing changes between us, we don't have to give birth to children, then there are work issues, for example that the severance pay in the event of the death of one of the two is up to the other, ok, it's an important thing, but one should consider dying before retirement and frankly it's an idea I don't even want to consider. We have been living in the same house for 12 years, in the sense that we have a residence in the same house, we have no assets in common and we have never had patrimonial problems of any kind and as for mutual assistance, between us, it has never been lacking, but it never failed spontaneously, not out of legal obligation, perhaps this happened because we never had real economic or health problems, neither he nor I, and therefore there was almost no need for mutual assistance, but I'm convinced that if one of us needed it, the other would not only not back down but would do everything he could.
I saw that you wished Lorenz for his Civil Union and I also join in wishing him that the realization of this dream can bring great serenity to him and his partner. It is nice to think that someone can take such steps in peace.
I’m much younger than Lorenz, but I’m no longer a kid, I’m almost 50 years old, I'm very close to 50, and my partner is only one year younger than me, this means that we don’t have to face the environmental problems that an intergenerational couple faces in everyday life. It would therefore seem that things for us have to be all in all much simpler and yet this is not the case at all.
We met at school 12 years ago, we are both teachers, but unfortunately school is the least suitable environment for cultivating a gay relationship and I think that even for straight relationships, except for traditional marriages, it is more or less the same, there is underground gossip, backbiting, there are parents who are like two-faced Janus, they show smiling faces and use honey words when they are in front of you and then, secretly, they tell the most incredible stories about you. Now, with social media, "secret" groups of parents have been created who give help each other to "defend" their children and to attack the teachers, and then there are the students, who are grown up, are not naive at all and learn very quickly from parents the worst behaviors.
Both my partner (I’ll call him Luke here) and I have always been wary of the school environment in which we must limit ourselves to a technical work understood in the most theoretical and depersonalized way. Now there is the covid and with distance lessons many problems are avoided, but before the covid we, that is I and my partner, who teaches in another section of the school, used to make our students do the periodical tests that had to be graded, in the computer lab through a program that we had made just for this use, so that the test was automatically corrected and the grade was assigned by the machine itself, because this way it seemed possible to reduce the discussions and chatter related to the fact that some students had been "taken in sight" as they commonly say.
Keep in mind that Luke and I had developed the program together, but "out of prudence" we produced two versions of it graphically very different so that no one could suspect that we had worked together, in practice the storage and calculation core of the program was the same, but those who used the program could not realize it. Fortunately for us, as we taught the same school subject, we couldn't be colleagues in the same classes and this made things much easier. In our Institute, which is very large, there is also an internal bar where you can go during recess. Luke and I go there but on different days and we decide in the morning which of us goes to the bar. We insisted on one thing only that is to have the same day off, and we both chose Wednesday, a day that nobody wants, and we've both had the Wednesday off for years now and so, at least, we have a day to ourselves to spend in common. But don't think we can be free to do whatever we want on Wednesdays. We have a certain freedom and anyhow relative because we live in a neighborhood very far from the school, where nobody knows us, but when we go to school on the subway (which is the only possible means of transport) we get on two different subway cars. You will think we are paranoid but we know we need to be very careful.
In the year we met, there was a case of a declared gay student in our school, bullied by his classmates, but not with blows and punches, but by dint of malevolent smiles and poisonous jokes. Tis guy had become the school's gossip principal argument, and the usual committee of "serious" parents had made him the emblem of the degradation of the school that does not intervene. The parents had written to the principal, who as always had pretended nothing and had not intervened either in one direction or in the other, in the end the guy went to another school. In reality we too did nothing, the boy was not our pupil and in the College of Professors no one ever talked about this situation, in theory the problem could be raised but whoever did it would have been branded for life or as a "defender of lost causes ”, if married or better married and with numerous offspring, or more brutally as“ fagot ”or“ lesbian ”, if without spouse and without children.
But now I come to my story with Luke. You will understand that, in an environment like that, looking around for any sign of availability was very risky. Luke and I met a little less superficially, that is, we had the opportunity to exchange a few words in a less formal way by bringing two of our classes (one of his and one of mine) to visit the Science Museum in Naples. It was a completely random thing, but then a dialogue was born that did not stop and went on. It took us months to show each other our sympathy, that is, to say that we could be good friends, because then that too was not at all obvious. At school we didn't even talk to each other, but we only spoke privately on the phone, at first we only talked about school, then we came up with the idea of the program to have tests done and assessed in an automated way and that way we started meeting in person outside the school. Then, partly because we liked working on a software of that kind and partly because it was pleasant to work together, we started seeing each other practically every day. The program was a gem, apart from the different external appearance we gave the version that I would use and the one that he would use, the substantial part were identical but very flexible. Each student entered the program with his name and password, and the name always appeared at the top right of the monitor so that no one could use another's password. The questions were the same for everyone but the order was random and the order of the answers was also random, so that there was no possibility of copying. The machine, as the students delivered the test, printed the answers on a sheet with the date and the student had to sign and hand in a copy of the sheet so that it was impossible to say that he had delivered a test other than that evaluated by the program. As soon as the test was completed, the program put all the series of answers on the DB and then automatically evaluated the test by assigning the evaluations automatically so that the average grade of the class corresponded to a grade set by the teacher. In short, the program was truly a gem, both in terms of graphics and technology, because at the time of returning the test, the student could be given the series of his answers and that of the correct answers with a small comment chosen by the machine itself.
However, my relationship with Luca has grown thanks to the work done on this program. Of course, each of us knew well that the other was unmarried and had never talked about women. Over time Luke accepted the idea of staying for dinner with me and eventually sleeping with me, obviously in separate rooms, but slowly we had come to pass together from lunchtime on Tuesdays up to 7.00 am on Thursdays and from lunchtime on Saturdays up to 7.00 am on Mondays, there was no need to even make an appointment, we both knew things would turn out that way. There was no need to state anything explicitly, little by little the embarrassment dissolved by itself, and fears disappeared and we came to trust each other. We both were fully aware of how things were, then a bit of physical contact also began, a bit awkward at first, but then more and more free. One day he said to me: "What if I went to sleep with you?" I just looked him right in the eyes and we hugged. It was Saturday April 19th 2008. Since then we have lived together, only at school we behaved like strangers, but we used to go on vacation together, and then he decided to rent his house, which is smaller than mine, and move in permanently with me. We have exactly the same salary, and he gives me half of what his rent pays him, because he lives in my house, all expenses are 50%. He had proposed to me to make a joint account but I preferred that we have two separate accounts, because if things did not go well between us, we had to be free to go our separate ways.
It's been 12 years and I can say we got along perfectly. We don't have a form of symbiosis, no, we have some friends in common but not all of them, let's say better that among us there is no rule that friends must only be in common. I'd say we've been a nice couple for 12 years now and here I come to the point. About a month ago the speech of the Civil Union comes out. I state that I have nothing against Civil Unions, that's clear! After he mentioned it I went to see the related legal rules which are much less simple than I thought, in particular to dissolve the civil union unilaterally there is a two-phase procedure with a three-month break between the first phase and the second and then there is the choice of the property regime. I think that out of common sense guaranteeing the separation of assets especially when it comes to people of the same, let's say, economic strength is the most appropriate thing because this would greatly simplify the end of the civil union if it were needed. What scares me the most, however, is that taking a step like the Civil Union involves a change of official marital status, that is something legal, external, which in some cases has no real meaning ... I mean that nothing changes between us, we don't have to give birth to children, then there are work issues, for example that the severance pay in the event of the death of one of the two is up to the other, ok, it's an important thing, but one should consider dying before retirement and frankly it's an idea I don't even want to consider. We have been living in the same house for 12 years, in the sense that we have a residence in the same house, we have no assets in common and we have never had patrimonial problems of any kind and as for mutual assistance, between us, it has never been lacking, but it never failed spontaneously, not out of legal obligation, perhaps this happened because we never had real economic or health problems, neither he nor I, and therefore there was almost no need for mutual assistance, but I'm convinced that if one of us needed it, the other would not only not back down but would do everything he could.
I mean that for us as a couple the civil union, at least in this moment of our lives, would not bring any advantage. This is to say only about the legal issues from our point of view, however, in fact, these are all theoretical discourses and one may want the Civil Union in itself, as a formal recognition of a life in common, I not only understand this but I accept it very well. I started thinking: “If he cares about it so much, what should I do? Should I tell him no? Objectively, I'm not afraid of being involved in problems because of the rules of the Civil Union because I trust Luke more than myself. " After some time Luke mentioned the same speech to me again a couple of times, because he saw me hesitant but he understood that in any case I would never say no to him, and in the end I said yes. He was happy ad a child with his teddy bear! Something I would never have expected. But then we went to the details: who do we tell? Not to my parents! Because they would feel incapable parents, punished by God through a son who is not only gay but also thinks of joining civilly with another man. Luke had barely the intention of telling his parents, but the more he thought about it the more it seemed impossible to him, because his parents, whom he only sees twice a year, know that he has gone to live together with another "person", but they don't know that he has gone to live with a man, and if they knew they would run the risk of dying of a heart attack. So no parents! I have no brothers or sisters; he has a brother but they never got along and they haven't talked to each other for years, so no families! Is there someone else? Two or three mutual friends who know that we are just friends and that we have never invited to our house because otherwise they would have noticed that we live together. Someone else? The school colleagues? But inviting any of them would be like inviting the fox into the chicken coop. In the end he said to me: “Oh well, we can't tell anyone … ok, no Civil Union!” And that's how the story ended.
Then I tried to think about what would have happened if they had known at school? They would have immediately made a nice committee of mothers ready to defend the little baby from the satanic clutches of two ... unmentionable ones who would certainly have ruined that so tender child, who loves his mom so much. And I imagine the principal who for fear of the committee of mothers would have put himself on leave until the end of the storm. Dear Project, the speech is bitter but realistic, I don't deny that elsewhere things can be different, but here the game rules are these, they don't lynch you because they don't know it otherwise they wouldn't have the slightest scruple. I'm happy for Lorenz and his partner but unfortunately it is not possible for me and Luke to follow their example.