To the man who called me a faggot on the way home:
thank you for your honesty.
There is something validating about being harassed during Pride weekend in New York City.
Thank you for making explicit what they won’t say tomorrow.
Tomorrow these streets will be filled with thousands of people celebrating big words like “victory” and “equality,”
and other words that eventually lose their meaning
when you hear them on repeat like a radio anthem struggling to remain relevant.
I understand:
in a world where we are told that we have everything
but still feel like we have nothing,
words take on the gravity of incantations.
Maybe if we say “love wins” over and over again we will get over our last ex.
Maybe if we say “proud” over and over again we will forget the loneliness tattooed on the back of our throats, the aftertaste burning like mouthwash for years.
Maybe if you say “faggot” over and over again you will make yourself a man.
Did you know man — I mean, puddle of words on the street I almost slipped on the way home — that Pride was started by trans people?
Did you know man — I mean, fairytale told so many times it became history — that they will tell me tomorrow that I am more equal than ever before?
There are few things I am proud of these days,
but I have to say I am proud of you for saying what they won’t admit:
that you are afraid of me,
that you will spend the rest of your life marching away from the me inside you,
that you’d rather I disappear like the setting sun in your voice,
that I do not belong.
There is something validating about being trans and harassed during Pride weekend in New York City.
This is a historic tradition.
Every day is a fucking march.
support the author