Once Upon A Time, When This Gay Guy Went To A Bike Rally, He Stuck Out His Tongue And Said...

"F*ck you fear!" This post is about taking my power back from past fears to have present and very queer fun... at a bike rally.

The judy(s) At a Motorcycle Thingy In Deland FL.

So, interesting fact. I not only married into a Scottish tribe, but they also love motorcycles. A lovely lesbian couple in our chosen family are also avid bikers and have beautiful bikes. Plus, “V’s” 60th birthday was yesterday. She and her wife live in Deland Florida and it was the Deland Bike Rally yesterday. V wanted to go to start off celebrating her birthday.

We went and had a great time.

As someone who has survived the trauma of being attacked for being gay more than a few times in my life, I did have a couple of WTF am I thinking of going to this thing moments. Deland is a somewhat small town with lots of ‘Murica! merch around, and I am sure there are plenty of little orange Donnie Chump supporters.

In other words, I was being a judgmental pooh-pooh head.

Getting dressed to go out there, I almost decided to wear clothes I don’t usually wear to public events to purposefully “disappear” into the background if I don’t feel entirely safe. But yesterday, I put those boring clothes away and wore my super sparkly black skull t-shirt. It met the occasion that fit the biker vibe (in my opinion) but also stayed true to how my personality wanted to express itself yesterday.

This T-shirt is designer and was a gift from Dan. It’s badass as all get out. Throughout our time there, several people in the crowd complimented me. In other words, it stood out, and instead of being afraid, I enjoyed wearing it and felt comfortable meeting new friends along the way!

In a sea of denim, black leather, and LOUD motorcycles, I felt like a tropical fish in the middle of a salmon farm. ← I know…Judgy McJudgerson again. Sorry! In a super small way, by wearing this shirt, I removed a fear based barrier of caring what others thought about what I was wearing, to fully enjoying the festivities and fun.

And if they were to snicker and scoff, so what, family surrounds me and we can take care of ourselves.

You want to know how many hate crimes and physcial assaults happened yesterday at the Deland Bike Rally? Zero.

We had a great time. We might have had an extra cocktail, or two+, which uncorked the super-gay in some of us (like me) and completely forgot about all of my prejudgments. Plus, I took a selfie with a gorgeous woman (her request because of my t-shirt) who looks exactly like Wynona Judd. We also flirted/had fun with the gay bartender we found out on the curb outside the bar he worked at. A lot of bars set up outside bars to snag the foot traffic. This bartender was throwing all the sass…. I mean, ALL the sass right back at us.

So fun!

And we were loud. We were not trying to be troublesome at all. It’s just how we talk in our party mode around a bunch of motorcycles. Well to be truthful we are always loud.

Plus, our sense of humor holds nothing back. Anyone who was around us after about ten seconds probably did not doubt that we are gay. They likely overheard me when I nominated the gay bartender for The Best Bubble Butt on the Block Award!

It was like a shelf, y’all. A shelf! Made me wanna play the bongo drums for some reason…

Just kidding. Or am I?

And guess how many scoffs, stares, and hurled insults we got from the bikers walking by us being sassy with the bubble-butt bartender?

Zero

Plus, if there were any snickers or eyes rolled, I didn’t notice or care. Once my head was in the right space to put things in proper perspective, I had fun celebrating V, being stupid with Dan and the family, and enjoying the splendor of the Deland Bike Rally.

I have good reasons to be hyper-aware of potential danger in any crowd. However, when it threatens to steal anything from me, including small things like what I wear to a bike rally, it’s nice to be at a place to say, “F*ck you fear. If I wanna be sparkly and sassy with my fam, husband, and a cute bartender, surrounded by bikers, I can.”

In other words, in this very small way, I took my power back that past trauma still had an inordinate hold on.

And that’s important to me.

Now, if anyone has a spare $22k to $44k and wants to wire that money to me, I want a Polaris Slingshot…

I promise to put a pride bumper sticker on it.

Disclaimer: Trauma survivors should *always* do their own assessment of how they handle events that may cause old fears and defense mechanisms to pop up. It’s up to the individual how they want to respond to their legitimate fear.

Fear as an enemy wants us to make irrational or destructive decisions that shut us down without knowing why. Once a survivor knows the why, how, and what to do about a situation that’s in their best interest, fear loses, and a trauma survivor takes another positive step (decision) in their healing journey.

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