Well we had our first Pride here in Fayetteville, NC and I think for first timers we did an okay job. I am going to write more about that in my column on here. For now I just want to introduce to you a young woman in our community. Her name is Erica C. Ware and she is a writer. She is currently going to college to get that expensive piece of paper to tell everyone she is a writer. While she does that however she has decided she wanted to do an internship with The Alliance. So since her line of studies is in journalism and social media she will be doing a bit of writing for the newsletter and the blog for The Alliance.
She sent me her first piece a few days back and I am going to post it here for the moment. She may end up with her own column here in the newsletter.
Speaking of, in case some of you have not noticed, Angel has been posting on here a bit more for us. I tend to get bogged down so she has really been stepping it up in the information lane for everyone. As soon as I figure it all out, she will be having her own space as well here in the newsletter. But for now. Erica's piece
I asked her to write a personal view on the first pride in Fayetteville.
Thanks for reading
Storm
Fayetteville
Pride is a Life Saver
Fayetteville,
North Carolina FIRST PRIDE FESTIVAL…. Has come and gone and if you missed it,
why?? Has anyone ever heard of that slogan, “You miss a day, you miss a lot”?
Well in this case, you miss a day, you miss a fabulous gay! I’m just saying. I’m
pretty tough on a city that’s not my own when it comes to pride festivals. With
that being said, allow me to introduce myself.
My name is Erica Ware, I’m 22 years old and I just moved into North Carolina
from Cleveland, Ohio with my girlfriend. Cleveland has a pretty big LGBT
community and the festival is pretty amazing every year. It is awesome to be
able to go to a festival and celebrate what you are! You see people who are
like you; flamboyantly gay guys, the really attractive tomboy lesbian, the gay
guy that looks straight, and the lesbians that always wear cargo shorts with
the thick headband LOL. If North Carolina has not been introduced to the
lesbian headband, don’t worry, you will extremely soon. As I said above, I am 22 years old. I came out to my mother, family, and friends
about 3 months ago and anyone who has come out of the closet knows that it’s a
pretty tough thing to go through. I decided it would be a good idea to come out
before I moved to North Carolina. It’s only respectful.
So
there I was in North Carolina having support from my girlfriend and best
friend, they’re awesome. However, I was still feeling like I wasn’t accepted
and had no one else to go to. If I were in Cleveland, I would have just gone
out with my gay friends to a LGBT bar/club and hung out with people in the
community. Then I heard about the Fayetteville Pride Festival and I decided to
attend and see how that would turn out for me. So I was getting ready for pride,
looking in the mirror practicing what I would say if someone came up to me (Oh
come on, we all do it!). “How you doin ;).” Or “Hey… want to see my pride flag”
(WTF does that even mean?? LOL).
Anyways, I get to the pride festival and although Fayetteville LGBT community
is smaller than Cleveland, (because they’re a small town) it was pretty
awesome. The food was amazing, vendors were cool, entertainment was over the
top awesome, and everyone was friendly. I mean, if you’re born gay then you’re
practically born friendly and awesome. Everyone I talked to was full of
excitement and had all smiles on their faces. What I’m trying to say is,
Fayetteville pride gave me what I was looking for; which was acceptance, the
ability to feel comfortable and new friends in the LGBT community. I was seeing
people there with their partners not being afraid to show their love because
they were comfortable and also felt acceptance. It was amazing and the pride
was too fun. When I saw all of those
people come together, I was thinking, Okay this is cool I kind of feel like I’m
back in Cleveland. When I walked through the doors and saw people with their
pride flags on and saw drag queens… I wanted to scream, “I missed my Gays!!
You’re here!” Then I went through the door doing the fist pump to the fast pace
dance music, oh yeah that’s right; best dance ever!
Fayetteville
Pride was cool, I can’t repeat myself enough. It was smaller than what I was
used to but it was amazing and gave me acceptance. It can
only get better as the years go by. Remember, “If you miss a day, you miss a
fabulous gay.”
EricaCW
