Fort Wayne Pride and Observations from a Newcomer

Last Saturday, I had the pleasure to join Lori, Bruce, and Bryan at Fort Wayne Pride. For those of you who don't remember last Saturday, let me jog your memory by letting you know the second I stepped out of the car in Fort Wayne my glasses instantly fogged up (never a good sign).

Despite the intense heat, Fort Wayne Pride turned out to be quite an enjoyable and worthwhile experience. Cianan and Neil met us in Fort Wayne adding to our INTRAA contingent. Not being an INTRAA board member or officer my experience at Fort Wayne Pride was a little different than that of Lori, Bruce and Bryan. It became pretty evident that this was no social outing - this was WORK!

What very interesting about GLBT events like this is that for organizations this is a crucial time for networking and exchanging information in hopes of bettering each other. INTRAA fully understand this important principle. INTRAA's most exciting connection made was a group called Trans Fort Wayne. Everytime I wondered where Lori, Bruce, Bryan or Cianan were all I had to do was look over at the Trans Fort Wayne booth. It was a very successful day and great connections were made with this group and INTRAA is better for it.

For my part I manned the INTRAA booth and met a bunch of interesting people doing it. The highlights include talking to a lesbian couple manning the Allstate Insurance booth next to us (who had the cutest son who managed to have something spilled on his shirt at all times -frustrating his moms to no end), dancing to music with Neil and talking with the interesting and fun people who came to the booth interested in INTRAA.

Before this post becomes too long (I tend to ramble) I'd like to leave you with some general observations that I have since becoming apart of INTRAA. To be completely honest growing up I never fully understood transexuality. Admittedly, I had a very black and white view of sexuality and identity that I fully understand now as just plain ignorance. Consistently attending INTRAA events and meeting most of INTRAA, one word has commonly popped in my mind to describe it all - BEAUTIFUL.

Throughout my life I've always responded to people who "bravely follow their personal constitution" and I can't think of a better example of that than the transgender community. Meeting everyone and experiencing the kindness and inclusivity I've felt has felt so wonderful and has meant alot.

To end this post (for real this time) I'd like to leave you with a quote that reminds me of what I've seen and the bravery I've observed. I have to warn you first though that I'm a quote whore and have collected quotes that moved me and kept them in an my computer library for quite some time now. This quote comes from singer/songwriter Lauryn Hill and it reminds of the events and bravery I've seen so far through INTRAA. I hope you enjoy it.

"Fantasy is what people want, but reality is what people need. i retired from the fantasy part. i was just out, just gone. i had created this public persona, this public illusion. it held me hostage, like i couldn't be a real person bcuz you're too afraid of what your public will say so i had to do some dying and really accept the fact that LOOK: this is who i am and i have to be who i am and all of us have a right to be who we are and whenever we submit our will to someone elses opinion a part of us dies."

Thank you again!