Hiking for The Trevor Project

I recently signed up to participate in a 50 Mile Challenge fundraising event for The Trevor Project. It's a group that aims to prevent suicide in the LGBTQ+ youth community. If you know anyone in any part of that community chances are very good that they've been at risk themselves or know someone who is or has been. 

One of the things that upsets me most are the fucking christo-nazis who go on about how queer people have made the "choice" to be gay/bi/trans or whatever, is the absolute absurdity of the idea that someone would choose something that completely isolates themselves and causes them to be ostracized, ridiculed, and rejected by family, friends, and much of society. It's fucking stupid and if you ever hear that drivel come out of someone's mouth you should just step up and slap the shit of them, metaphorically, of course.

A lot of progress has been made, that is true, but as a society we still have a long way to go. I just saw a statistic from The Trevor Project saying:  "When an LGBTQ young person has at least one accepting adult in their life, they are 40% less likely to attempt suicide."  

I think about my own life and the difficulty I had coming to terms with who I am even in a very supporting, accepting, and progressive family environment. I felt that my only choice was to get out of where I grew up, and that's one choice I did make and I was very lucky to have had the opportunity to do so. I had the opportunity to go away to college with no expectation that I had to return home. Although I went to college in Kansas it was a still a step away the wicked little town I grew up in, and I had the further opportunity move far away for law school, and I took it. It's a common joke, but absolutely true, that the biggest exports from states like Kansas, Oklahoma, Nebraska, are steers and queers. 

Now, I don't want to paint a tragic picture of my own youth. I was happy enough, I had friends, including gay friends, although none of us had figured ourselves out at that time. I guess we gravitated to each other because we didn't fit in elsewhere. But the idea of coming out as a teenager, in a small town in Kansas, in the 1970s, it was unthinkable. I am amazed that so many young kids can do so now, if they are fortunate enough to live in the right place, with the right parents, etc. 

I was particularly lucky in the parental department. My biggest fear was never for myself, but for the shame I felt that I would cause my family to suffer. My father died before I came out and to this day I don't really know what he knew or suspected about me. I regret that, but to be honest, I'd have to admit to feeling a bit relieved knowing that he never had to come to terms with it. But I know he would have. After all, the gay gene came from my father's side of the family and my parents played bridge with two guys who were the only gay couple I knew of anywhere when I was in high school. 

 I was fortunate to have had the opportunity to develop an adult relationship with my mother. When she visited me in D.C., I took her to the museums and monuments and such, but for happy hour we went to gay bars, because those were the only places I knew. Not the sleazier ones, but nice gay bars where you could take your mother for happy hour at least. It never failed that we'd be sitting there talking and at some point someone would ask if she was my mother and tell me how happy they were that she was there with me, how lucky I was, how they wished that their own mother was as accepting, etc. Tears and hugs all around. 

I was very lucky, but I am hiking to raise money for the many queer kids who are not, (and because I need to lose weight.)

Here's a link to the fundraiser:  https://www.facebook.com/donate/560166621817777/

Della was with me today, wearing pride colors, 

out there representing for her family (and maybe for herself too).

4.25 miles, a good start