I wrote this comment to a Facebook post in the group Heartstopper Netflix. I was on a roll and couldn’t stop.

Here it is for my blog readers to enjoy. And yes, I really have left this blog go to seed. It would be good for me to write in it more.

Here’s the comment…

I’m a 46 year old gay man, 25 years partnered and I welcome you to our wonderful world.

This group is an oasis of the coolest most understanding and kind human beings on Facebook. Maybe the show drew us together. Maybe it was fate.

Heartstopper touches us all. For me, I see myself as Nick and Charlie, a mix of both, and I also feel parental too. I feel supportive and protective over them, and every episode I fall apart watching them, all of them.

I only wish that people feel the openness and magic of this wonderful work, so they can explore themselves, reinvent themselves, and feel brave enough to stick out your chin and declare your truth.

The narrative of Heartstopper is the gift, for me, a story that shows that there can be love. It can start with ardor, agape ardor, affection, infatuation, crushing, all of it.

But more, there is no instance at all of overwhelming sexuality. It redefines being gay for me, yes, at 46, that I can feel love and it doesn’t have to start with fumbling libido racing to win everything. I can be gay and like someone, and feel that grow into romantic affection.

The lack of tedious tropes and the blazing honesty of this work is a lighthouse for all LGBTQIA+ human beings to steer towards a safe harbor we never noticed before.

In a world where awful seems broadcast, there is this island of hopeful wonderfulness, in all of you. Heartstopper gave us a lot, so so much. It gave us a narrative, it provided us new permissions we never dared afford ourselves, and it created a fandom that quite literally carved a platform of awesomeness out of the tempest that surrounds all of us, that seems endless. This is a safe place. To feel our truth, to feel like all of this isn’t a waste heap.

I love Heartstopper. I love it’s message, and I love what it is doing to all of us. Every one of us. Changing us. Helping us. And the more I think upon it, maturing us. Maturing me. At 46 and giving myself permission to feel something I never dared feel before.

I feel brand new again. And I feel like my old Daddy self as well.

This show makes me cry. It feels good. Somewhere between a blessing, a benediction, a baptism, and a cleansing.

It’s making me a better gay man. It’s making me a better human being.