Thursday Ramble: LGBTQI Pride Month 2024

Happy LGBTQI+ Pride month 2024. 

I read someplace recently that we will mark Gay Pride Month, as long as there is someone who thinks being dead, would be better than being LGBTQI+ (anything in the alphabet soup of gender identity.)  A lot of progress has happened in my lifetime, since I was that freighted teen who had no role models, knew of no-one who felt the things that are my reality.  

I lived the first 30+ years of my life deep in the closet of denial and self-hate.  And I have had 30-odd years of happiness with my sweet bear.  We are married, a reality that took decades to realize.  

If you know it or not, there are LGBTQI+ people in your life.  Many live without mention from day to day, of their life.  In many ways we are the elephant in the room - everyone knows we are here, but no one wants to talk about it.  Yet others all around us talk about family, biological family and chosen family (who you chose to have in your life,) about who they find attractive, who they love.  Just let me do the same, we have had 30-odd years together - some of them odder than others.  

I dream of a world where everyone can be true to thine own self.  Without fear of shunning or isolation.  

Squeeze a fruit for Anita (if you know what that means you are a baby boomer or older.) 

The photos, a drag bar in Tenerife, in the Canary Islands. We are everywhere - the Mistress Maddie would have loved it.