Elicia Gonzales is the Executive Director of the Women’s Medical Fund, and co-founder of SEXx Interactive, and former Executive Director of GALAEI.

 

Ok. So I am from Colorado – a littllish town called Broomfield – which is exactly how it sounds. I really didn’t start to question my sexuality until I moved away to Hawaii in 1994 with my then boyfriend. I attribute this to the fact that the only gay/lesbian women I knew about were a certain type – they wore Birkenstocks, listened to Indigo Girls, drove pick-up trucks, and had bad hair. (NOT that there is anything wrong with all of that! Just not my stilo.) I moved to NYC in 2001 (right before 9/11 happened) and had the great fortune of going to places like Escuelita and Lovergirl. I saw people who looked like me, danced like me, and like the kinda people I wanted to get to know better (wink wink). My internalized homophobia was pretty deep though – I recall telling a friend that no way in hell would I end up with a girlfriend, it would strictly just be a sexual thing.

About a year after I got to NYC, that all changed. A friend and I became girlfriends (though we both acknowledge we should have stayed friends.) I knew that I needed to tell my parents. So one night while I was home visiting, I said “So, I have something to tell you guys. I have a girlfriend.” And one of them said “Well with that thing on your arm (I have a vagina tattoo) you were bound to get someone.” (As though my tattoo were some batman signal in the sky or something.) I didn’t label myself – though eventually told them I am “queer.” Cut to me 17 years later – married for 3 years to my best friend. I love being queer.