CREATIVE NON-FICTION
My First Pride as an Out and Proud Trans Man!
I hadn’t intended to go to Pride this year
We hadn’t intended to go to Pride this year
As I explained in this article, my wife and I hid all our rainbow flags to help sell our house so we could move 1,719 miles to a part of the country where we hope to feel safer as a transgender couple.
Then, violent threats (or “feedback”, according to a local mayor) from right-wing extremists led the Apex Festival Commission to cancel the Drag Queen Story Hour at Apex Pride in North Carolina. The local LGBTQIA+ communities were not happy about this development. We collectively shared our own feedback, which the mayor labeled “hate speech.”
It seems the mayor didn’t like the word “bigot.”
Long story short, after the cancellation received national news coverage, the Apex Festival Commission ended their involvement. Equality NC stepped up, took over sponsorship for Apex Pride, and reinstated the Drag Queen Story Hour for children.
Though we hadn’t planned to attend this Saturday event, we wanted to celebrate a big win for our local LGBTQIA+ communities. This wasn’t just a Pride event. It was an opportunity to show that we were proud of our people and those who support us for standing up for all of us.
I’m so glad we went to Pride this year
This was by far the most fun I’ve ever had at a Pride event! We watched the drag queens (and drag king!) dance and lip sync to popular songs. For anyone concerned about the sexual nature of this show, most of the drag queens were dressed more conservatively than the average cis woman going to Sunday church. The remaining one was dressed more conservatively than your average Disney princess and was just as beautiful.
* Being queer and trans doesn’t make us inherently inappropriate for children. This crowd was proof of that. *
Off and on throughout the day, one drag queen and a drag king each read stories to a large group of adorable, happy children. They read about standing up to racism and about body positivity. It was heartening to see so many happy queer families with children sitting with the families of supporters from outside our communities. They all just wanted their children to learn about the world around them: a world that includes people of a wide variety of genders.
Seeing this gave me hope for the future.
Maybe someday we can build a family like this. If not, it’s still nice to see that families with children exist for queer people. Being queer and trans doesn’t make us inherently inappropriate for children. This crowd was proof of that.
As one of the story sessions was finishing up, an older lady walked up to my wife and me at the edge of the crowd. She told us she wasn’t part of our community directly but had come in support of a close friend who she had lost many years ago to AIDS. My wife complimented her on her pin, asking where we could purchase one. She said, “You can’t buy this anymore.” It was a vintage pin from another time. She said she didn’t have children to pass this on to, so she wanted to give it to my wife. Grateful, my wife added it to their belt. The pink pin said “LABEL JARS NOT PEOPLE”.
I’ve been to many Pride Events, so I’m used to the hecklers
I’m accustomed to having strangers scream all of the details of what hell will be like for us when we get there. I’m used to hearing slurs and hate speech thrown at us. When I say “hate speech,” I’m not talking about something as mild or polite as the word “bigot.” I wish my threshold for hate speech was the word “bigot.” That would be really nice.
Anyway, we had our fans with us, so the we could drown out the threats by loudly opening and closing them. We were ready to give our usual response: to be very affectionate, cuddly, and well…gay right in front of them.
This year, we struggled to find the hecklers. The closest to one we could find was a polite man near the exit asking us quietly about our relationship to God. He seemed to mostly be talking to himself, so we just kept walking. There were several booths welcoming us to different religions, so we were covered on that front, if in need of spiritual services that gladly accepted us as LGBTQIA+ people.
As the day wore on, my style became more and more gay
I started off with a simple green shirt and vest, along with jeans, a belt, and the comfortable black shoes I wear everywhere. People gave me stickers that began to decorate my vest. We bought a handful of different pins to support the event, so I added each of those to my vest. Then, I found and purchased the rainbow shoelaces that have now become a permanent part of my queer trans masculine aesthetic.
We stopped at a food truck labeled simply “Empanadas” and tried to order some but they’d run out. Instead, they gave us a fantastic giant Colombian lunch that we ate far too quickly to photograph. There were sandwiches with mashed plantains instead of bread, along with arepas filled with cheese that we could dip in creamy cilantro sauce. Ridiculously delicious! They packed up and left after giving us our meals, so I think the Pride attendees ate all of their food. We’re a hungry bunch!
We ran into old friends and met new people
We got caught up on some of the details of what happened to friends we hadn’t seen since the beginning of the Pandemic. We got lots of hugs. We talked to strangers and shared stories. We spent time talking to a dear friend, her family, and the other volunteers and organizers from Apex Pride and Equality NC, who made all of this happen in spite of the challenges. Their hard work paid off and I’m so grateful to all of them for standing up for us!
This may have just been a small town Pride event in a Southern state in the United States that you may or may not have ever even heard of, but it was the best Pride event I’ve ever experienced. It was also my first Pride event that I went to dressed as and looking like myself: a non-binary queer trans man. I could feel the love of my people and their families, friends, and supporters all around me. It was wonderful!
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