IN A sea of wood chips, two leaves happen to be next to each other. They are not alone, however. There are many more leaves scattered about, and one of them can be seen faintly in the background of this photo.

These two leaves reminded me of how I met one of my friends. Much like how these two leaves landed next to each other by sheer chance, me and that friend met by chance. It is by some unknown factor of the universe that we happened to sit next to each other on the first day of class. Anyway, the funny thing is that the first time we met, we both instantly had a feeling that the other was also queer. And later when we were able to bond over the fact that we both identify as part of the LGBT community, one of the most prominent emotions I felt was joy.

The leaves represent queer people who are out. It always brightens my mood a little bit whenever I see a little rainbow sticker on someone’s water bottle or a pride pin on their backpack. When I was talking with that friend about Queer Things, we were in a public space. And in the back of my mind, there’s a *small* part of me that didn’t feel particularly safe/comfortable. I hope our world can be a little more understanding and accepting, and more queer people can feel safe being out.