With pride

In which I demonstrate the Lesbian Nod

Hello – and Happy Pride Month, to all who celebrate, and all who don’t.

In a minute I’ll tell you what prideful things I’ve been doing this month, but first of all here are some upcoming events that I think you might be interested in.

• I’ll be interviewing Olympic medallist Emma Pooley at The Trades Club in Hebden Bridge on the 13^th July – you can buy tickets here. Emma will be on a mini-tour to promote her new book, Oat To Joy, and is also making appearances in London, Bristol and York (details here).

• There’s also (unrelatedly) a Pride-themed bike ride happening that afternoon (along the canal to Todmorden), which I will try to join – give me a shout if you’ll also be there.

• And I’ll be speaking to the great Michael Hutchinson at this year’s Edinburgh International Book Festival on the 13^thAugust – about Further, his new book on the subject of ultra-distance racing (tickets here). I’m really looking forward to this conversation, as Michael and I are at opposite ends of the spectrum in our approach to cycling: he covers a lot of ground I missed in Where There’s A Will – and, I hope, vice versa. I am also looking forward to seeing an auditorium full of all the many long-distance cycling fans I know live in Edinburgh, and perhaps having a drink with some of them afterwards.

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And now, on to Pride Month – which I consider a great improvement on just having a one-day Pride March (as was the case when I first came out), because these days Pride means so many things to so many people, there’s no way you could squeeze them all into Soho on a hot Saturday afternoon.

As I wrote a couple of years ago, a single day of celebration, where extroverted people cover themselves in glitter and dance in the streets, just can’t serve the entire community. As Hannah Gadsby asks in Nanette, “where do quiet gays go?”

I love the visuals of a Pride March (bearded men flouncing around in false eyelashes, gay firefighters in uniform, families with pushchairs and rainbow flags, and all the rest of it), but I’m less keen on the reality – I don’t like crowds, and I’ve already spent enough of my life getting sweaty in Central London. Every year I feel a tremor of guilt over not being there in person, and have to remind myself that there are all sorts of other ways of celebrating the extremely rich culture and history that we LGBTQ+ people (and our allies) are part of.

Here are some of the queer things I’ve been up to over the last few weeks. And I’d love to hear about yours.

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