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I started to write this off as sarcastically as possible, because really, it feels like a stupid question. I mean by the time you're in the sack with another man, you should already have it figured out, but in an age like ours where thoughts of survival do not occupy every waking moment, being unsure, specifically when it comes to matters of sexuality, is common place.

Tennessee Williams was gay. I nearly graduated with a B.A. in Literature without learning this information. I can't say it makes me see "A Streetcar Named Desire" in any different light, but he certainly gave me something to think about while reading his autobiography.

Though he was very "out" later on in his life, while in college he slept with a good friend who was never out and who used to ask if it, the sex, meant he was gay. Williams would always tell him "no," that he shouldn't worry about it. The playwright had wonderful things to say about this man, the way many adults do about the friends they had when they were young. He spoke of their many sexual encounters, some that would occur throughout the night, waking his "heterosexual" friend. Tennessee understood, at least when looking back, that his friend truly loved him, but you get the sense that the boy wasn't gay. He didn't even seem to enjoy the sex at all but just Tennessee. He even grew up to marry a woman.

And I know, some here will look at what I'm writing and possibly accuse me of being a right-wing bigoted homophobe for what I'm going to write, but this is not about politics, and it makes no sense when people try to pretend that the two have anything in common.

People are so quick to confuse sex with love. We see it all the time, usually with women, but it happens everywhere. Teenage girls all over the world fill their pillows with tears over the boy who left after "getting what he wanted" even though he swore his love.

And really, even the word "love" has its limitations. We use it to describe so many types of love, familial love, friendly love, romantic love and even just love of humanity, but those emotions are all so far removed from one another that they deserve their own names. You can love many people without trying to give them an orgasm. The converse is also true, but we're so quick to label people and label actions that we mix and mess everything up.

Personally, I don't believe anyone is born gay, just as I don't believe anyone is born sexually interested in bondage. My belief is that people grow up and come to a conclusion

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