To our friends and partners across the CIS Abroad community, Happy Pride! Each of us carries stories shaped by identity, experience, and courage. Whether your stories are easy to share or hard to say aloud, they matter. They have the power to connect, to build understanding, and to affirm that we are never alone in who we are. Below is one of mine.
Working in international education, I have the ultimate pleasure of traveling the world. With each trip comes new opportunities to engage with colleagues and partners abroad. Immediately upon meeting anyone new, the questioning always begins. So, when did you get in, how was your flight, where are you from, what do you do in your role, etc. As we get to know each other, I always find that one of my answers always prompts a curious look and a secondary question.
The question I’m referring to – where do you live?
The answer to this question – Florida.
The secondary question – so what’s it like to live there these days?
I can’t say I’m surprised by the reaction. After all, I am a proud gay man with adopted children. So it can seem odd that my family chooses to call Florida home, the state that coined the phrase Don’t Say Gay. While today we call it home, we did leave many years ago. Ran away actually. When you take your husband to the doctor’s office and the doctor asks you to wait in the lobby, or the restaurant hosting your bachelor party asks you to “keep it quiet so no one knows it’s a wedding for two guys,” you begin to question your own home. We often felt unwelcome, and instead of embracing the discomfort and using it as a powerful means for change, we packed up and simply ran away.
And we ran. If y’all know Interstate 10, it runs 3,000 miles from Jacksonville, Florida to Los Angeles, California. For those who know me, yes I’m a runner, but I didn’t actually run 3,000 miles to LA. I drove. But I digress. About a decade ago, this is in fact where we ran off to. My husband and I decided to call this new place home, along with our 1-year-old baby boy. Life had to be different and easier there for us, right? Not so fast.
It was in LA that we found ourselves at our local coffee shop every Saturday morning. One morning while my husband Josh was getting our coffees and I was standing by our son’s stroller, I felt eyes on me. I turned and saw a priest and four older gentlemen staring at me. I awkwardly smiled. Then one of the men came over to me. They looked at Hayden, looked at me and Josh and said, “I’m so sorry to ask this but my friends and I have seen you guys coming in here recently. Is this your son? “Yes,” I said. “How did you get him?” they asked.
At that moment I had a flashback to living in Florida. I could get angry. I could run again. But instead something came over me and I said, “It’s actually a beautiful story, would you like to hear it?” I then took a seat with them, introduced myself and began to share our adoption journey. I’ll never forget the look on my quiet, timid husband when he turned holding our coffees and saw me sitting at a table with a priest and his group of elderly friends. He looked at me like “what are you doing??”
Over the course of the next year every Saturday we would go to that same coffee shop. Eventually, we got to know that group of men. Hayden would fist bump them and our friendship grew. A year after meeting, as we found ourselves heading home they stopped us and handed us a card. They said to open it later. We got home and as we opened it, tears rolled down our eyes.
The Supreme Court had legalized same sex marriage the day before. These guys, along with the Priest, had gotten us a Happy Wedding card and all signed it, congratulating us on officially being married. Even in LA county, we were the first gay couple this conservative group of friends had ever met who were married and had kids.
That day we decided to move home to Florida. For over a decade I had been going to work telling students to be comfortable with discomfort. To push through those moments that felt different than what they’re used to. To engage with someone that challenged their beliefs. It’s those moments that ultimately will be their biggest moments of growth, even if they may not immediately see it. Sadly I had this opportunity many years earlier, but I chose to run.
So here we are back in Florida, celebrating Pride Month. I can’t say it’s easier than it was many years ago. While we are legally married and now have two kids, the uncomfortable moments continue to happen. However, the difference this time around - we don’t run. If we can’t set that example, how can we expect our students to study abroad and do the same?
This may be my story, but everyone has their own. It's in the telling and the listening to each of our stories that we find common ground. So here’s to the stories that bring us together, and to the Pride we take in living and sharing them!
Happy Pride, y'all!
Scott Tayloe, COO
