Sticking a toe out of the closet

I take a significant amount of pride in being a robust, well balanced individual with a broadly trustworthy moral compass and little fear of consequences because of all of the above. I’m out as queer to my partner and a circle of friends (and you lot, obvs.). I’m not out at work, although I’m a reasonably prominent ally.

Today I outed myself to a colleague. She is absolutely the safest person in the building to out myself to – she’s prominent in the Pride network of her company. Here’s the thing though.

I didn’t intend to do that.

I mean, it wasn’t an inadvertent disclosure. We were talking about the Pride network and allies, and I thought clearly for about a quarter second before before I said,

“I’m not out at work yet.”

And then there was a sphincter tightening moment, and a brief wave of nausea. She, of course, accepted it without comment or judgement and a few minutes later asked “Poly?”, to which I replied “Kind of, but pan mostly”

It wasn’t a thing, except that it really, really, was a thing.

I’m glad that I did it, I don’t think I overshared because it was in the context of the conversation, but I’m going to need to have a bit of a reflect on how I’m going to manage this stuff going forward.

I’ve got a post sketched out for later on the weird intersection of white cismale privilege and queerness. I’ve got a feeling that there’s a fuck load more intersection than is generally discussed, but in the field I work in, it’s absolutely a vanishingly tiny thing, like homosexuality in professional footballers.

Question for later reflection. Do I have the minerals to be the first to stand at that intersection in my company? To stick a fuck off huge rainbow flag into the ground and say ‘Here I am. This is me. Be the real you.’ I mean, I know I’m capable of it, but am I willing to live with the consequences? What are the consequences?