Member-only story
A Homophobic Friend Changed My Mind on My Queerness
Queer people want friends, too
I sat inside my closet while wearing my pink smiley-face PJs to tell you a hopeful story — one of my deepest fears came true. For dramatic effect, I have a kombucha bottle beside me as a stand-in for a glass of wine.
I Leaped Into Making Friends
I had just moved to a suburb in Silicon Valley for my first job out of college. I didn’t know anyone. My work was remote. It was the tail end of COVID. Making friends in the adult world of calendar invites was difficult. But I wanted friends. So much so that I read a book titled, “Find Your People,” and I rode the train to another city for a tech happy hour.
People stood in circles at the mixer, floating from one group to another like bees. And when I say people, I mean men with very few women in the crowd. They were all wearing more or less the same thing: a tech-branded hoodie and jeans.
“You got this,” I whispered to myself by the entrance. With the same strategy I used before jumping into freezing water, I took a few deep breaths and counted down from three. “Here goes nothing,” I told myself as I plunged into the crowd.
I switched on my Meeting-New-People persona or my sunshine and rainbows, as a friend jokingly…
