Day 29: Favorite Pride Memory
It’s not exactly the best memory, but it’s really a great story to tell…
When I came out as bi on my LiveJournal in 2004, the process of stalking someone on the internet and revealing personal information was basically in its infancy. I thought that my LJ was a safe space and only the people that knew about it were going to discover my revelation. Little did I know that my dad’s friend (drummer in their band) was going to reverse search me after I sent him an email about bastardizing the logo I made for the band on their website.
So at this point I have already married my high school sweetheart (a boy) and I’m not handling my orientation awakening very well to begin with since I feel a little stuck. I get a random call from my dad and he’s stumbling with his words more than usual. He eventually gets to the reason behind the call.
You know, it’s ok if you like girls too. I mean, we’re not going to be mad or anything and your mom and I just want you to be happy.
I tell him thanks and that’s pretty much the end of the conversation. Thanks now that I’m married to a boy and feeling awkward? I immediately marked all my posts as friends only moving forward.
The wild part is that my parents got mad and grounded me when I was trying to go to a potential lady friend’s hot tub party in high school. They also were indirect proponents of the whole get married and have babies gimmick but then told me that I couldn’t just move back home when things got sketchy with the husband (ex-husband shortly after).
Curiously, my dad does not respect the trans or non-binary identifying people and has been quite verbal in his opinions on the matter. I have had to give my daughter the “please don’t continue this line of conversation” eyeball glare several times since we are staying here. Not that I don’t think the conversation shouldn’t be had, just that my dad is a stubborn jackass that thinks he is right and will argue with a wall if someone told him the wall had a contrary opinion to his. He’s probably going to be messed up if he ever sees my she/they.