My Uncle Joe

In 1988, when I was six years old, my parents explained to me what a gay person was.  And about three hours later, I met my Uncle Charles’ boyfriend (and future husband), Joe Stouter.  Last Saturday, I tried to put into words what he meant to me when I spoke at his memorial service.

Joe was with my Uncle Charles just shy of 50 years before he died of cancer.  

He spent a significant part of his life trying to be something he wasn’t.  For the first 25 years, he tried - and failed - to be a straight man.  Then, despite dropping out of college his first semester because of his dyslexia, he tried - and succeeded - at working his way up in a major wall street investment bank.  But it wasn’t him.  And in his mid-forties, he gave it all up to become a struggling artist.  

I was initially surprised that he had chosen painting.  But seeing what he could do with color and texture, it felt more like painting had chosen him.  He was incredible.

He spent the last decade battling cancer.  The pain was constant.  But he never stopped painting.  With the help of his husband Charles, he went into the studio even after he was no longer strong enough to set up an easel.  He had found the thing that he needed to do.  That he lived to do.  Literally.  

Joe taught me what it looks and feels like to live your life truthfully.  REALLY truthfully.  The kind of faithfulness to your own heart that only becomes possible when you stop believing that you need to prove your worth or impress anyone.  But it wasn’t just that he followed his heart.  He was truthful about everything.  He knew my first marriage was falling apart before I did.  He was the first man I ever knew who wasn’t too embarrassed to look you in the eye and tell you something sweet and kind.  And in his final months, he shared with me in beautiful, heartbreaking candor what it felt like to be dying. 

Cancer killed him but it never beat him.  He had found something within himself that transcended the cancer.  Actually, the thing that he had found – that had taken decades to fully uncover – WAS himself.  The cancer never took his determination to paint.  It only made his love for his husband stronger.  And it only made him clearer on what he wanted.  

Maybe there’s a deeper truth there for all of us.

We can spend a lifetime trying to achieve - and then desperately hold onto - things that never really belonged to us.  Status. Esteem. Property. Nice things.  It takes courage to stop chasing and look into your own heart.  Because your heart might send you in a completely different direction.  It might lead you to things that really do belong to you.  Deeper connection.  A sense of purpose.  Of peace.  A truer sense of self.  That was certainly the case with Joe.

But I’m biased.  I now make a living trying to help people be more honest.  With their teams, but most of all, with themselves.  I try to help them let go of the pressures and expectations that lead them away from their innate worth and inherent goodness.  I try to help them slow down to be in touch with what they really want.

And it’s scary work.  Being true to yourself can feel like a leap of faith – with much to lose.

But for me, personally, all I have to do is look up at one of the Joe Stouter originals hanging on my wall, and I’m reminded how much there is to gain.  Just about everything.