“Awareness? I think everyone knows gay people exist…” Sure, you’re right, but I’m talking about self-awareness both for closeted LGBTQ people and those who don’t support us. Seven years later and it’s still important. At the time there wasn’t another LGBTQ family travel blog and we had questions about safety and finding welcoming places. Note : this is actually why started 2TravelDads. Pride matters because being present and active in your own life is the only way to become comfortable with who you are and living your best life. It could very well be that nobody cares, but I have been conditioned my whole life to be disgusted by gay people and breaking that frame of mind is difficult. Why would I care about this? Because nobody likes to be stared at, and no matter how long I’ve been out or how long we’ve been married, I feel like there are always eyes. I had a lot of anxiety the first time I took the kids to a school event knowing that Chris would arrive late and our secret would be out. The first reason why Pride matters is because everybody should feel comfortable and safe being themselves wherever they are.įor us, that means going to our kids’ school functions as a family. And it feels like we’re the only family like ours. Since starting our kids in public school we’ve started having activities that are for the whole family. Add to that the pandemic and people not being as active publicly and are rather alone. We aren’t often all seen together in our town because our schedules function half on east coast time and half on west coast time. Our old home was a smaller town and we didn’t know any other LGBTQ families like ours. We live in a small town in North Florida and don’t know very many people despite having lived here for a while.
I’m starting here for a huge and very present reason in my life.
Pride matters for many reasons beyond this, is much more than a few events in summer. Pride Month and celebrations aren’t just about watching drag queens throw t-shirts from a float or buying items with a rainbow on them. While we stand by watching corporations selectively jump on the bandwagon for a few weeks, the LGBTQ community has to live our truth and support each other all year long. This is wonderful, but also presents a few problems. Over the years, celebrating Pride has grown, not just in numbers within the LGBTQ community, but in popularity. Why Pride and LGBTQ Celebrations are Important