Inkmarks On Empty Dreams

Angela's story “When I was growing up my parents fought a lot so I spent a lot of time at my best friend’s house. Her family was very evangelical and I remember her dad coming into the room and telling us it was ‘not right and not normal’ for us to be sleeping so close together. When her mom told us we had to stop spending too much time together it broke my heart. They would tell us that homosexuality is unnatural and sinful and even though I’m not a Christian I feel like their words got engrained inside of me for quite a number of years because I felt a deep sense of shame about myself for being attracted to women. As I got older I had other friends who were straight, or mostly straight, and we often found ourselves sleeping in the same bed. On multiple occasions I was told by them to ‘give them some more space.’ That would always hurt a lot. Looking back, I understand now that I had crushes on all these friends, but at the time I was deeply embarrassed to admit it and fearf...

Jenny's Story “In the early 1980’s a beautiful charismatic Somali girl met a hard working British/South African man traveling and working around East and Southern Africa. By 1994 I had arrived into the world. Due to my father’s work commitments, they had chosen to raise myself and my sibling in Malawi. The city of Lilongwe is filled with vibrant people and culture, my childhood was filled with nothing but wonderful adventures because of this. I pretty much knew from the get go that I was somewhat different. The word ‘gay’ to me was completely unknown, totally alien. My first experience of this word came from hearing various stories about how disgusting and criminal gays were to society. At the time, homosexual acts were illegal. Witnessing a man taunted and beaten in the street validated the fact that in no way would I ever express my sexuality in this country, the thought was completely terrifying. -When my parents decided that that we would be making the permanent move to...

“I grew up in a series of small military towns. I came out at 11 years old. By the time I turned 19 I lost three friends to LGBT related hate violence. My story is the unconventional casualty of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. In the mid 90s the military was a culture of fear for LGBT service members, but many people don’t realize the DADT culture of fear was also handed down to the LGBT family members of service people. I was the oldest daughter of a teenage mother. My family had no idea what to do with a prepubescent queer kid. This isn’t an uncommon occurrence. 40% of homeless youth identify as LGBTQ. Those figures are pretty remarkable when you realize that LGBTQ youth only make up 3-5% of the general population. Many homeless LGBTQ young people cite family rejection as the cause of their homelessness. I was homeless through out college. It’s an untraditional form of homelessness and very common with college students. I had room and board provided through my scholarship but it only covered t...