twenty-something

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July 9 -- the day I got my new car -- was also Vermont's Pride celebration in Burlington. I don't know why I didn't post about it sooner. This was the first year I marched in a Pride parade and I didn't do it alone. My mom, my aunt, my fifteen-year-old brother, and my thirteen-year-old sister ended up marching with me. Despite miscommunications and rain (lots of rain on our parade), it turned out to be a most excellent experience and one of the highlights of not only my summer, but my year.

Today I was send the photo above (and this story) from the parade. The photo had also been published on the cover of Vermont's little-gay-paper-that-couldn't, Out in the Mountains. If you care to play "Where's Waldo?" for a moment, you'll notice that hidden in the picture is not only a soaking-wet and frumpy-looking me, but my soaked-and-skinny teenage brother.

The kid ended up on the front of the gay newspaper just weeks before he began his freshman year of high school at a private Catholic academy, weeks before he began football practice, and he was completely unfazed. My family also, apparently, appeared in footage on the news that night, and my sister was very upset that she didn't get to see herself marching in the gay parade. But she told all her friends.

I love those kids. I think overall I'm proudest to be related to them.