If a gay person was in the news, it was likely about how they’d been harassed, bullied, beaten up, or murdered. All the horror stories traumatized me, but I was especially affected when I learned about what happened to Matthew Shepard, the college student who was brutally murdered in Laramie, Wyoming, in 1998. His story wasn’t exactly familiar, but it approached the edges of reality for me—it seemed like it could happen to someone like me in Northern Michigan. I had nightmares about him. As a result, I never would have suggested that I was gay—or even broached the subject of anyone else being
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