I'm going to be mighty prideful

Oh Pride...

The last weekend I spent up in good ol' Salty Lake City to celebrate the...pridefulness (?) that is pride.  Yes, gay Pride.  Because I'm gay...I hope most people get that by now.  Not enough? Gay gay gay gay gay.  Ah, I think that's enough or do I need to insert pictures or rainbows and unicorns in here?  Here you go.

Golly that's majestic

All jokes aside, I really did enjoy all the shenanigans that my friends did get me involved in which included:

-Making shirts that said, "Baby, I was Born This GAY"  Where the gay was in big glitter letters.  Mine were pink.  I didn't pick the color although I have nothing against pink, just not my first choice.

-A plethora of pool parties which resulted in my shoulders being gnarily (like gnarly, but more so) sunburned and me wanting to die.

-Hearing WAY too much club music for a good year or so.  Oh Regina Spektor, you're going to be playing while my ears recover...

-Attending the pride parade and receiving a whole bag of things thrown at me (including the bag), most of which were condoms and candy.  Of course, my friends stole all the candy so now I just have a big bag of plastic *ba dum tss* Any takers?

-Attending pride festival after said parade which resulted in more sunburns, more strangers I had to meet, more free stuff, pictures taken with different booths (such as the Trevor Project cause they're awesome), and listening to even more club music.

I'm going to relate this to Christmas for a sec guys, k?  Christmas you say...what?

Yeah, I'm confusing myself too but I'm going to attribute it to all the terrible action movies I've seen lately.  I DON'T HAVE TO MAKE SENSE EVER.

A lot of the time people get caught up with the festivities and start to forget what the whole point of the festivities are (there, do you get the Christmas connection now? No?  Well keep reading and if you don't you can call me and complain.  Of course, I'm going to ignore your call because I know why you're calling...*sigh* You know what?  Just...just go away).  Anyways, the point of it all, what is it?

Look, it's Ryan. (Literally what came
 up when I google'd 'rainbow')

A whole bunch of the crowd gets caught up in the parties and takes for granted something that is pretty special.

Here we have a weekend where a bunch of people get to get together and celebrate togetherness.

Equality.

Pride in all that we were born into.

Whatever it is you are, you're special and appreciated.

Acceptance.

I honestly haven't ever been to such an event where I can be proud of who I am and celebrate that fact with other people who are proud to be who they are.  Gays, Bisexuals, Transgender, Drag Queens, Cyber Sluts (don't google that), people with fetishes, people without fetishes, people who like glitter, people who don't, people who are religious*, people who aren't, and straight people.  Literally, a celebration of differences about being together--if that makes any sense.

Our culture already has such a hard time with accepting itself with things like weight and appearance so I see only good things come from people who are able to accept themselves and happy to share it with others.

I'm going to get all sappy with you guys for a second if you guys can take that.

When I first came out as a gay teenager in suburbian Utah, I wasn't ok with myself.  I had put so much weight on myself on something that I had deemed wrong and not ok that it started getting to me.  Many a late night were devoted to self-loathing and wishing I was different.  Of course, here I am now.

I've been asked before if I ever regretted coming out.  I'm sure if you had asked me that right after I had, I would have said yes.  Yes, this is scary and I would rather going back to being unnoticed and "normal."  Of course, now I've seen what it has done for me.  It's made me a stronger person, more aware of who I am and who I want to be, brave, and more willing to accept others.  I took all the differences that brought me down and used them to build me into something better.

So no, no I do not regret coming out at all, I'm very proud I did it and now don't regret it for a second.

I'm sincerely glad I was able to participate in something so centered around with truly being who you are.  That it is okay to be "different" than the masses.  That it is okay to stand out and speak out.

 That it is okay to shout at people passing by as your glitter shirt sparkles in the sun.

Happy Pride.



Sidenote: I have a friend who put this experience into words quite more eloquently than I have and it's by far something that is worth reading.  A tad nerdy with some Matrix references, but I like it.  With his permission, here you go kiddos: http://kylecranney.blogspot.com/2012/06/glitch-in-matrix-pride_04.html

*On the note of religious people, seeing the group 'Mormons Building Bridges' march in the parade made my day.  It's always great to see those reaching out to try and make better a community.