I’m in love with this issue. Look at it. The people, the places, the pictures, the people, the people, the people. But, I have terrible timing. Just as we wrapped up the voting for the Lavender 100 and scheduled photo sessions with the Community Members, I went on vacation. Big mistake on my part as I missed seeing—and meeting—some of these wonderful people in our pages.
I love people. As the editor, my priorities are clear: the Editorial Calendar reigns supreme, then the columns, then the stories that we find as we live our lives. Most of the people fall into the third wave of coverage—our lives. This time, though, when my Editorial Calendar gives me the FAB 50, I made some choices. I decided to give us more categories, more winners, more people…100 of them, to be exactish. More lives, more conversations, more people.
But, what I missed while I was gone were the conversations. No, I don’t personally do our interviews on a regular basis, but I do personally talk to people. That’s my favorite part of this job. And Kathleen told me exactly what I missed while I was gone.
Hope. She told me that of all the people she met, the most common theme was the hope they had that the community can look past its differences and become more unified. What? In a year when “Minnesotans United” has taken such a prominent role as an organization and as a theme? Yes.
We need to own that. Unity.
This is a community that has been tied together by rather disparate similarities. The requirements for membership are more conceptual than actual, being based on sexual orientation and gender identity (and more…or less, depending on who you talk to). What we face on a day-to-day basis is different from person to person. And, getting to know each other is how we begin to understand how we’re actually similar from person to person. Circumstances may not be the same, but struggles and triumphs can be. So, in this issue, these people are just the tip of the iceberg for who we can look to as role models in seeing not only how we are all so different, but also how we can find pride in our unity.
We want that, right?
With hope and thanks,
Andy