Under One Roof
(One Roof Chicago Winter 2023 Fundraiser Speech)

Every community needs their elders. 

…The folks who have been around the block a time or ten, who made certain mistakes so we wouldn’t have to….

…who blazed a trail, cutting through opposition, bias, and prejudice in the name of all who come after…

…who share the outside perspectives we so desperately need, to grow into a larger, kinder, wiser version of ourselves. 

Any community needs their elders and their youth to have a strong connection, but especially ours. When you live on the outside, in one way or another, finding guidance can make a world of difference. 

The difference between community, and isolation. Between growth, and atrophy. Between housing, and homelessness. 

But sometimes, we don’t have access to those elders. Sometimes, we lose them before they have they have the chance to share their experience. 

…for those of you who don’t really know me, I’m a storyteller. And while , yes, that means I tell my own stories, it also means I collect them. Taking disparate narratives and thoughts, stitching them together until we can see the threads that tie us all together. And make no mistake, there is always a narrative. there is always a story. But sometimes, those stories are buried. And sometimes, we have to write them together.

We’ll get back to that. 

For Lesbians, Gay, Trans, and Queer folks, our identities used to be seen as justification for abandonment. Or at the very least, as an excuse to ‘other’ us until we’re forgotten. I’d like to think that’s changed somewhat in recent years, but the necessity of One Roof Chicago implies it hasn’t. The fact that we, as queer people, have to empower ourselves and each other to create a safe space, fills me with both joy and sadness. Joy, because it’s amazing to see us care for ourselves. As a trans teen, and later a young adult, I didn’t necessarily think I’d ever find a community. I didn’t bother coming up with mid-life plans, because I’d never met a trans person over 25.  

And sadness, because, while I’m glad we’re doing this now, I know there are countless queer folks who never got to benefit from this type of initiative. Who we never heard from, because health crises or hate crimes took them from us too soon. 

Sometimes, a community loses the vital people who would have filled in that story quilt, and we find ourselves floundering, looking for support that we intuit should be there…but isn’t. 

I know it would have made a world of difference in my childhood if I’d met trans adults, and had models to build my hope around. And now that I do- that I’ve met folks who have been activists since the AIDS crisis, who haven’t put down their passion since they first picked it up, I have more hope for myself and my community than I ever thought I would. 

Now, Lots talk about what happens when we win. I have a feeling that’s a story you’d really like to hear. 

After all, storytelling isn’t just about what we’ve seen already. It’s about imagination, and conceiving of a better world. 

So let’s imagine…

 A space where older queer folks can pass along their stories.

Where younger people can share how things have progress, enjoying a broader perspective thanks to their older peers. 

Let’s look to the ORC site plans we have printed here, and imagine indoor and outdoor recreation areas , where we can school eachother on the basketball court, or across a chessboard. 

Imagine the meals we could cook together, the intergenerational friendships we could foster…heck, the makeup tutorials we could give eachother. 

Imagine the frigid sense of isolation melting, bit by bit, because found family, and love, and hope, were able to shed warmth on those waiting for so long. 

 There’s a whole world of connection waiting for us. A chance for all of us to finally have the community we never thought we could. 

For countless people, they have family waiting, they have a future they could never imagine. And they’ll find it all….

Under One Roof.