Out of the closet and into my truth
A small slice of my journey along the way…
In hindsight, some of my most visceral memories stem from moments that seem quite mundane from a distance. Flashes of the girls locker room are still as sharp as they were twenty years ago. Somehow echoey and sterile while also oppressive and confined; I can still feel the intensity of my stare, boring straight ahead, into my locker, bare feet on rough gray tile, panicked that an accidental glance would betray my terrible, shameful secret. A furtive peek, or just a friendly smile that lingered too long could be my teenage undoing. Every microsecond of my attention was a risk. And just like our breath becomes strange and unnatural when examined too closely, I felt every calculated movement and gesture in that locker room as awkwardly performative and mechanical. When we zoom out from this panicked, anxious teen, we’ll see the joy and laughter of high school girls, teammates exchanging banter and connecting over the drama of teenage life, creating bonds and forming community during those daunting years where identity and independence begin to coalesce. The carelessness of how they’d shed clothes without breaking the cadence of conversation was just further evidence of their comfort and trust in that locker room. The ease with which they took showers, not a flicker of dread or shame in sight, was a bold display of their confidence and security in the naturalness of it all. And me? I listened from the outside, feeling none of that warmth. Feeling exposed and vulnerable standing on that cold tile floor, wishing I could disappear into the locker in front of me. At least that’s how I remember it.
One might rightly wonder why I was even in that locker room. Why on earth did this introvert sign up for team sports when I’d never enjoyed sports, or even participating in teams for that matter? At the time, I probably thought that I was just trying to be normal, to fit in. In hindsight, I suspect it had a lot to do with a schoolgirl crush signing up for field hockey and me following suit so that I didn’t disappear from her life.
So I endured the locker room, and the bus rides to and from games, always trying to avoid the attention of the older girls whose banter could take a decidedly edgier tone. I feared they could smell the queerness on me like blood in the water. That the words d*ke or lesbo, thrown around so casually on that bus, would one day come hurtling toward me, and my guilty face would betray my reality. It’s no wonder that I eventually found my way to cross country running. There were still locker rooms to be navigated, sure, but there was a comforting solidarity in the silence. I thrived in the isolation of the trails, just me and my breath, worried more about a sneaky tree root or branch taking me down rather than a excruciating outing as a *gasp* lesbian.
I managed to escape that high school alive. I dated a big, tall, masculine basketball player with an anxious attachment style from a neighboring town. He gave me a pager to keep track of me, which I wore like a badge of heterosexuality. I shocked everyone when I decided to go to college out of state, eschewing the potential for in-state scholarships or guaranteed husbands. In reality, I counted the days until freedom. Freedom from the harrowing halls of high school, the suffocating, orchestrated relationship, the Catholic guilt, and the explosive household dynamics. Yet even then, when I’d discovered my own agnosticism and began questioning the church’s teachings, I still prayed with all my heart for that familiar Catholic God to correct this mistake he’d made and turn me straight.
Fast forward a couple years and it’s autumn of 2001, my sophomore year of college. The air is crisp and bright. I’m standing on the grounds of my out-of-state school, huddled amongst a group of queer women, my pledge class, as we await our sorority initiation. We were all dressed in fatigues, bandanas tied around our heads, looking much more like a band of misfits than young women on the brink of joining the Hellenic community. The “big sisters,” the elders of this young organization, looked on with pride and support. We relied on each other, trusted each other, carried each other during those days and weeks. We were vulnerable, sharing our pain, our past traumas, our insecurities and our joy in finding our fellow weirdos. I stepped out of my dark, lonely closet that year, and into the warmth of the queer community. This girl that swore she’d never join a sorority was happy to eat her words. And despite me previously thinking my gayness stood out like a flashing beacon, it turned out that I was pretty straight-passing. I ended up representing us at the Panhellenic Council, openly advocating for this group of nonconforming queer and trans women amidst the very representation of restrictive cis-het femininity. I’d later become the Vice President of that sorority and be quoted in the local newspaper, sharing how we were inclusive of lesbian, bisexual, transgender and even straight ally women. I’d successfully run for our student government senate, openly out and proud of my queerness and my community. Perhaps most importantly, relationships with other women stopped being a source of anxiety and instead became a source of support.
While pledging that sorority, I was also interviewing for summer internships and I’d go on to accept one with an oil and gas company — an industry not known for its embrace of progressive values. But hey, this company was refashioning themselves as an “energy company” and so this queer Yankee girl from Connecticut took her shot and was headed to Texas! Just after arriving, Pride month kicked off, and my company’s queer pride was on full display. These days, we see rainbows everywhere, but in 2001, there were still no gay couples in commercials, and I didn’t take the rainbow flags for granted. In fact, certain companies in the industry still didn’t include sexuality or gender identity in their non-discrimination policies, so domestic partner benefits were pretty differentiating. I helped out with the company parade float that summer and found community within community — layers of support and connectedness amongst the pomps and puffs of tissue paper. I invited my summer roommates to the parade and into my world. The evening of the parade was oppressively hot and humid but there was a buzz of energy in the air and a freedom in embracing that infamous Houston humidity. In those days, the parade was still in (what was) the gayborhood of Montrose, with its crumbling sidewalks along a winding stretch of Westheimer, messy, sweaty, and teeming with celebration. I felt a flood of emotion as my company’s float passed by; relief, or pride, or joy perhaps? It was intoxicating and indelible. That summer experience convinced me that I belonged at that company, and I went on to have a successful two decade career with them, spanning countries and continents. And they, in turn, received my efforts, my brain power, and my devotion. I still joke that my relationship with that company was the longest and most sustained of my life. It took precedence over all others (until it didn’t). While I wish I could say it was all roses and rainbows, the journey of coming out is truly never ending. I found myself having to speak up on behalf of my queer community time and again, challenging slurs and stereotypes until my very last months in the company, sometimes with my direct reports, sometimes to the faces of very senior leadership and often, implicitly or explicitly outing myself in the process. In the end, the dissonance between what was said and what was done became harder to accept. Rainbow flags and queer-friendly LinkedIn posts don’t speak as loudly as policy, funding, and the tacit acceptance of homophobia amongst leaders.
College marked the true start of my advocacy, over twenty years ago. I learned the sheer power in shedding a shame that was not mine to carry. I’ve brought that power with me through all of my endeavors. These days, I’m married to a man (for love), and I consistently get mistaken for straight, but now I share my queerness with greater ease, with less need to define and defend. I’ve had twenty years of practice and times have changed. I’ve been able to use my straight-passing privilege to enter spaces I otherwise couldn’t, and to advocate for those who can’t. I’m still close with many of my sorority sisters, and from what I can tell, several of my former field hockey teammates are happily settled down with their wives.
These lessons underpin the very mission of my company, Two Piers. I believe deeply in the power of inclusivity and equality to unlock potential and allow access to the fullest versions of our lives. And I believe we still have a long way to go in embedding those values into the structures and cultures of our workplaces. But I’m here for it, now, as I was twenty years ago.
Happy Pride Y’all 🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️
