It all started on May 5th, 1981, when we gave birth to a baby boy. He was a lovely little boy, with blonde hair and brown eyes weighing only 4lbs and 8 ounces.
We named him Mikey David.
As the years would go by, our little Mikey would turn into a handsom little boy. We lived in a small country town and wanted only the best for our son. We enrolled Mike into a small catholic privite school. The school had many rules and Mike had to wear a uniform and was told he was not allowed to do many things. He was taught the ways of our Lord and went to many long religous studies.
Mike respected the ways of the Bible and fellowed them with great respect and love. He was very kind and loving toward anyone and everyone he would come in contact with and he gained many friends.
Ever since Mike was 3 years old he had a great love for music, and when he was only 5 years old we enrolled him into piano lessons. Mike was a very fast learner and quickly picked up. By 8 years old he had picked up over 3 insterments (piano, sax and guitar) and started his own little band.
His love for music would fellow him into the next few years. He would join the church choir and become strongly envolved with the school's show choir.
Around the age of 16 Mike started to become very distant from his family and friends. Normally he would not be able to stand one mintue without talking to someone, now he would spend hours alone locked in his room. He told us, he just wanted to be alone. We would hear him cry at night, and we knew our son was depressed. This went on for months and finally we had enough, and we took Mike to a doctor to get some help.
The doctor requested that he go once a week and talk to a theropist.
Weeks went by and things did not seem to change around our house. Than one night out of the blue, Mike came to us. "Mom and Pa, sit down I have something to tell you." Than he went into a long story about how he had felt so uncomfortble in the last year. How he had sinned and how he should not even be alive. "I am gay..", he said. Now I must tell you, in our religon, that is a sin, looked very down upon. He was in tears telling us that he had gone against everything he ever learned. Yet he knew for sure he was different, and that he was gay.
It took us almost a hour to think it over, we just sat there staring at our son. Than we gave him a hug and his father spoke out.."Son, we love you no matter what." That is when the struggle begain.
In the next week Mike would speak the truth to his friends and teachers. He was disowned by many of his bestest friends and was looked down upon by many of the teachers as if he was not human. That is when we decided to move, to a better place for our son. We would be moving to the twin cities, of MN. Hopefuly they there would be more excepting of our son's chosen life style.
In Minniapolis our son would join a support group for gay teens. He was not shy to be him true self and had many new friends that excepted him for who he was. Mike joined a local Luthern church, who respected his life style and he was taught it was ok. He joined a band and everything in his new life was prefect. He could have never been happier. He even had the sweetest boyfriend, Jonathan. We were very happy for our son.
Mike understood not everyone was accepting of his way of life. He often spoke at schools around the state with his support group teaching teens about his way of life. We never thought our son would be in danger.
It happened on May 3rd, 2000. Right before his 19th birthday. Mike was in a small town in Northen Min. speaking in front of a large crowd on gay rights. A shot came from the left side of him, and shot him smack in the side of his hip. He feel to his knees, when another shot was fired and hit him in the chest. Mike died with in only a few mintues. The killer never caught.
It was a crime of hate, of one person.
 
Mike once told me. "Mom, I can not help the way I feel..I was born this way. I love just being me. Why can't people just understand." Mike was right. No one can control the way they feel in their hearts and they should be able to express their feelings in any way they want. We are so proud of our son and everything he stood for. We only wish he was with us today.
The song on this page is Forever Young. It was one of our son's favorites when he was here on this earth.
@2000 The Johnsons
Graphics by FourKings
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