Kate: Hello and welcome to Called to Queer, where we hold space for the queer Mormon women, genderqueer, and intersex experiences. I’m Kate, and my pronouns are they/them.
Colette: And I’m Colette, and my pronouns are she/her.
Kate: Today we’re talking with Alice Abrams Pritchett, and we’re so excited for this conversation. But before we jump into that, we wanna start off by seeing what brought us queer joy this week. So, Colette, what brought you queer Joy?
Colette: I am really excited about this one. I picked up a book that sounded intriguing. It’s called Hench and it’s about this temp worker and she’s a temp worker for villains instead of, you know, there are superheroes and villains and she’s a temp worker for villains. And so it’s really kind of, you know, monotonous temp work, tied in with villainy.
And it’s really pretty funny and amusing. But what really brought me queer joy is how [00:01:00] casually queerness is just part of the world without anyone reacting in like, oh my gosh. Like, did you know that they’re queer? Like at one point, one of the characters, this big burly security guy is like, yeah, my husband and I was like, wait, what? Like you have a husband and everyone treated it normally.
Or there’s another character. And they were using they/them pronouns without making any big deal about it. And it was just referring to this character with they/them pronouns. And it was awesome and it just brought me a lot of queer joy.
So if anyone wants a fun book to read with some casual queerness topped in, I recommend it.
Kate: That’s so nice. It’s so refreshing just to have things be normalized like that.
Colette: Right? It was really, really nice. I was glad the author just included that so easily. So what about you, Kate? What was your queer joy?
Kate: Yeah. I feel like I’ve had a lot of queer joy recently just speaking with queer people because , I [00:02:00] don’t know, the past few days have been rough with the Utah state legislature opening, and it’s been very anxiety producing for me even far away. And Utah isn’t even my state of residence. California is, but somehow I like feel this like deep affinity to Utah and just having queer people on the ground doing the work and wanting to organize and wanting to be part of a community and figuring out how to do that despite things being really difficult and challenging is really actually quite empowering. it feels like our destinies aren’t up to people in who are, you know, politically leaning so far, super majority one way that is ultimately, often antique. But to have queer people who are like, no, we’re gonna exist and we’re gonna do it joyfully anyway, is just very profound for me.
Colette: I love that. [00:03:00] Thank you so much for sharing. It’s definitely been hard and I think that’s when I especially try to lean into queer joy is when I’m seeing all the queer frustration and queer pain, and it’s nice to still see queer joy exists.
Kate: And, and queer organizing. Like Colette was on it last night. Last night Colette was my queer joy cause Colette like was on it getting people together and I really appreciated that.
Colette: Well, I appreciate you starting it, so I, I can connect people sometimes, but you were organizing, so that was great. But how about you, Alice? We’d love to hear your queer joy.
Alice: So actually you guys are my queer joy. in our conversations with Colette, I was telling her I am an awful podcast listener. I listen to like maybe one regularly and it’s not because like I hear about all these really great podcasts, like I’ve heard about your podcast. no offense that I haven’t listened to it, I just, I am not a great, I can only listen when I’m in the car shuttling kids around and things like that.
And so I took some [00:04:00] time this last week to like research your podcast and I listened to Maddison Tenney’s and Amelia Bingham and then I started Laurie Lee Hall. And I. . Gosh, I wish I had started doing it sooner. It sounds so cliche for me to say that, but, Maddison Tenney and Amelia Bingham are two people that I really look up to. They are incredible. Just, Emilia was actually my roommate right before I married Zach, and she’s one of the best roommates in the world.
Colette: I didn’t know that.
Alice: Yeah. Shout out to Amelia if you’re listening. I love you. I miss you. She actually gave me the best wedding gift ever. when I served my mission, there’s cement geese that people put on their porches, and I was telling her and my other roommates, Jen and Eulalia, I was just, I just like referenced it one day that on my mission people would take these cement geese and they’d dress ’em up for football games and for holidays and things like that, and just how much I love them.
And they went online. I couldn’t, I searched, I tried to see if I could find where to ship a cement goose to me, [00:05:00] and I turned up nothing. They found one and sent it to me and it was decapitated, its head had fallen off in shipping. And so I like epoxied the head on and it’s sitting in my living room right now.
And it just like that is the kind of person Amelia is like just so thoughtful in everything. And, yeah, it just made me so happy and hearing her experience with being in the Ace community, that’s something that I very much identify with too, is not necessarily ace, but probably more demisexual. but it was just so confirming to hear that so many other people that I love and admire are going through parallel similar experiences to me.
and it’s normal growing up, I, I felt like my experience wasn’t necessarily the normal one and now I’m just learning that it’s a variation of normal and it’s so nice to hear that from people that I love. And Maddison Tenney is just incredible the way that she’s able to organize and, you know, get people on the ground and [00:06:00] get people working. Like she’s inspiring. She’s gonna go out and do like crazy things. And, uh, I’m very much looking forward to seeing what happens to her post BYU and we need, we need people like that. She’s the person that I wish that I had been in my former college life and I wasn’t at all like, but yeah, it was just so amazing. And then Laurie Lee Hall is a legend in of herself with, you know, designing temples and I didn’t get very far into her episode.
But I feel like when I came out publicly, I think in like October or something, maybe November, I can’t remember. Um, I feel like I. The weight lifted off my shoulders and then I like stopped thinking about it. Not that I stopped thinking about it, but the weight was gone. Like the constant anxiety was gone. And so I just wasn’t, you know, I was actively like on the Instagram space, you know, with my friends who were queer and identify in that range.
And, but I [00:07:00] wasn’t like actively seeking it out because I was just taking a little like mental health break from it. And this was like the best way to get back into it, I feel like was listening to the stories of people who I admire, who I love, who have incredible stories and are doing amazing work, in queer spaces. So that’s my queer joy is thanks guys.
Kate: And you’re among them. You’re doing all, you’re doing the work too. So we’re excited to have you. I’m very honored to have you here and be part of this episode or be part of the long list of people who are doing amazing work in this space. Maybe we could start with your queer in 60 seconds, which is however long you want it to be.
Alice: Yeah. so my queer in 60 seconds, where do I even start? Like, I feel like so much of my queer consciousness started just in the last year. And so like pegging down a timeline for when [00:08:00] things started to happen. Like I could start with my very first experience of even knowing what any of that was. And that was probably when I was like my daughter’s age, who is four or five.
I remember being in the car with an adult in my life and I was just, you know, thinking and asking questions and stuff, and I thought about my friend Lauren and I said could I marry Lauren someday? And that person turned around and said, no, that is very naughty. Only girls, only married boys. And I was like, whoa, okay. Like, all right. Didn’t know where to go for that. So it, but it was just so abrupt. And I was like, woof. All right. And so I just dropped it. I didn’t even think about it. I don’t even remember thinking about anything having to do with queerness or even knowing what it was until I was probably in junior high.
And, when the Prop 8 stuff came out, that’s when most of my queer consciousness starts is just hearing about, you know, what was going on in [00:09:00] California, what’s going on in Hawaii, family proclamation stuff, and, not really knowing the scope of sexuality and things like that. Not having any background. I didn’t even know my own sexuality at that point. And so like coming into a, um, A pretty, homophobic background, not really knowing up from down or right from left when it comes to that kind of stuff, really, um, did not start me off in a great place and I was sympathetic to it because I didn’t know any better.
And that’s not an excuse. I, you know, when you’re young, you have lots of opportunities to learn from peers and I’ve been taking private art lessons since I was six years old and my art teacher, her name’s Sydney Bowman, she is incredible. She is the embodiment of someone who loves everyone. And she had so many different kinds of students come through her doors, and every single one of them had a place at her table and, some of her students were queer or [00:10:00] had two dads or two moms. And, uh, that was my first like, real life exposure to queerness. And, it felt really icky to me because I had been taught my whole life that this was wrong. This was a sin.
And, uh, I didn’t really know how to cope with it. And uh, you know, so I coped the way that my parents coped. I said all of the things that, you know, that people say in the church, like, they’ll be fixed in the next life, which is total BS thinking about it now. And, you know, all of those things.
It was really, you know, thinking back on that time in my life, I feel a lot of shame knowing that I contributed to, I don’t wanna say harassment cuz I didn’t tell it to anyone’s faces, but I contribute to that vacuum where theology gets mixed up with, all of the negative things that people say about queerness.
And, it’s been a lot of unpacking since 2020. 2020 is when I had the realization that maybe a little bit before that, [00:11:00] actually it was around the time that I became a parent when I was pregnant with my first child. Zach has always been really open and he’s just loving of everyone. And we went and saw the movie Hearts Beat Loud. Have you seen that one? It’s like a No, you haven’t. Oh, it’s an indie film. It’s got. Uh, what’s his name? Ron Swanson. He’s the dad in it. And it’s about his daughter. They’re both into music. They’re both musicians. And the mother died in a bike accident. And it’s just like this kind of process, story of this girl coming into womanhood. And, it very casually brings up that, you know, she. Is in the course of the relationship, she’s starting to see someone that she meets on her college campus. And it’s very clear that she has romantic feelings for this woman.
And, you know, the way that it was introduced to me was just so casual and loving. And the way that her dad responded, was just such a [00:12:00] beautiful thing to me that it just wasn’t even a, it wasn’t even a surprise to him. He was just like, she’s like, I’m dating someone and it’s a girl. And he is like, oh, that’s exciting. I’m so happy for you. And it was just like, whoa. In my life, that never would’ve happened, you know? And, with my family, people would’ve had a real conniption.
But this movie, really afterwards, Zach and I went and talked about it and I was like, gosh, Zach, I hope my kids would feel that open with me. You know, that they would feel like their parent loved them no matter who they brought home and who they loved. And I, I like resolved that day. I was like, I want my girls, I want my daughters, my sons, my who, my, any of my children. I want them all to feel like mom gets me, mom loves me and I feel safe bringing the people I love around my mom because that was something that like I, I did not grow up with, [00:13:00] you know?
And so I feel like that movie really kind of kickstarted this realization of the parent I want to be. And the person, just the person I want to be to other people is the affirming person. And that’s kind of, that was probably in 2019. And then 2020 happened when, you know, everything happened. And we had the opportunity to listen to lots of different stories from lots of different people.
And I really tried to lean into that. I am not, I mean, sometimes I still feel really uncomfortable learning other people’s experiences, but I’m getting a lot better at it. And I’m trying really hard to leave space and just remind myself that if I truly believe in Jesus Christ, then I truly have to believe that he loves and is affirming of every single person’s journey because he is been on those journeys, with every single person. And he hasn’t just like seen it. He’s lived it.
And if I truly believe that, then I need to be an embodiment of that. that Christianity, that’s the Christianity I want in my life, is the [00:14:00] one that is Christ centered, not centered on anyone else’s opinion of who Christ was, but who Christ actually was. So that was kind of a whew all over the place story, but I feel like it’s still very much something that I’m trying to sort out in my mind. So hopefully that kind of made sense.
Colette: Yeah, that’s great. And I, I think that is common for a lot of queer stories is we’re still living it. We’re still figuring it out. And so, I mean, I’ve been aware of you for a couple of years. We’ve followed each other on Instagram, and I love all the memes you post in your stories all the time, and they just make me very happy.
And then, so I was, and I, your art is so beautiful and very Christ-centered and rainbows. And it, it’s beautiful art, but I had no idea that you were queer, and it sounds like you didn’t either, necessarily. So what was that process like in discovering this side of yourself?
Alice: Yeah. So I feel [00:15:00] like, I feel like moving to Washington. So I’m not in Utah. grew up in Utah. Born and raised in Utah. Husband born and raised in Utah. Coming outta BYU, he got a job, at Fisher Investments and so we moved out to Vancouver, Washington, and this is where we live and we love it. And it’s very different from the little Mormon bubble that we both grew up in. And so it’s opened us up to a lot of opportunities to get to know different types of people. Lots of. Lots of opinion, so many opinions, like we’ve got the whole spectrum of opinions going on out here, and it is bonkers sometimes.
but I feel like, if I hadn’t moved out here, I wouldn’t have ever really been in a mental place where I could process my queerness, and it’s kind of started in 2020. I have a good friend. Our daughters are the same age, and we had gotten together for a little play date for the girls. It was a normal thing. We saw each other probably at least once a week. And, I was sitting in that room, we were having a really deep, [00:16:00] awesome conversation, and all of a sudden I had this weird, weird, well, it’s not weird now, I’ve, but at the time it was just so alarming, this desire to, you know, to kiss her.
And I was like, whoa, what? Like, where did that come from? Like, I’m not sexually attracted to this friend. Like, not, it was the weirdest thing to me. I did not expect it. It came out of left field, it came out of nowhere. And I don’t think I was, you know, visibly alarmed by it or anything, but it was something that, like, I packed it away in my little brain and packed up my little child and in her car seat and went out to the car and I was like, what the actual F Alice? Like, what was that? And it was like, I just kind of sat there and processed it for a second and I was like, what does that mean? And I had only ever felt that desire with one other person. And this is where that demisexual comes in, [00:17:00] is I have only ever been sexually attracted to Zach. And that was because we spent so much, like we really, really worked on our friendship before we got married.
And so, it was so alarming to me, and I just remember thinking I didn’t act on it so I didn’t do anything wrong. But just still feeling so much guilt and shame over it, being a married woman and having that feeling. And we’re taught in the church that those feelings are not normal and they’re not good, and you should wipe them clean and wipe them away.
And uh, it took me a long time to realize that that was just part of the normal human experience. And, uh, I didn’t do anything to compromise my relationship with my husband. It was just a fleeting thought that I had. I never had that thought with that person again, even. but it was something that I packed away and I just thought about periodically over the course of the last what, two years or something.
And[00:18:00] it kind of went into a dip and I tried not to think about it and I tried to suppress it and I just tried to take in stories and listen to others and their experiences, especially in the lgbtq plus space. And I started to realize that a lot of my growing up experiences were very similar in some ways to what I was hearing.
Like for example, I think it was Amelia, in her story, she was talking about how, her experience was, she never really felt, she felt like she had to like, make up a crush in her mind to, to appease her friends and be like, oh yeah, I, I love, I, I have a crush on this person. I have a crush on this person. And she kind of felt like I guess I maybe like them. I don’t know.
And I feel like that was very much my experience was like all of my friends were boy crazy and you know, looking for seeking attention from them. And I was just trying to seek attention from my friends. Like I had really [00:19:00] strong feminine relationships and I loved them and I loved them to the point that sometimes with some people, I romanticized them a little bit.
And I started to realize that, looking back now, I realize looking back that a lot of those relationships that I romanticized were probably fell into that crush category and they were all with women. I think maybe once it happened with another boy and, uh, that was it. And, uh, that’s just over the course of my whole life.
And, that’s kind of helped me. Like looking at those relationships made me realize I think I’m bisexual. I don’t know what that means. And so I spent a lot of time on Google. I did like the Buzzfeed quizzes. Could I be bisexual? It, it’s like, which is like, I don’t know, I guess it kind of helped, but like, or I like started looking up demisexual first I was like, am I demisexual? And it kind of like listed a bunch of experiences [00:20:00] that a demisexual person could have. And I was like, check, check, check. Yeah. All right. I guess that makes sense. But I felt like that didn’t necessarily mean I was in that LGBTQ+ family. That just means that, you know, I’m selective about who I build sexual rela, like who I build a sexual desire towards, I guess.
But then I started thinking about those past experiences with my, with my girlfriends that I would, you know, romanticize those relationships and want to be close with them. And I thought, hmm, I really romanticize a lot of things. And so that’s kind of made me realize that I’m like probably more biromantic in a lot of ways when it comes to that.
Like on the bi, if I were to put it on a, on a sliding chart, which I know isn’t like necessarily the thing, I would say that probably biomantically I very much lean more towards women and bisexually, I lean more towards men. And a lot of that leaning towards men on the bisexual part [00:21:00] is probably due to socialization. Growing up being told when I was very young that that was naughty to be attracted to anyone other than men.
And I just think, man, I wonder how my life would be different if I had been exposed to knowing that these are all part of, like, these are all valid feelings in the human experience and not just valid, they’re beautiful parts of the human experience. And people should be allowed to love who they wanna love and build relationships and families with people that they love. And, uh, I wouldn’t change anything now, obviously I feel very affirmed in my relationship and with the family that Zach and I have built together, but I still sometimes wonder like, what would dating have been like? What would you know my relationships have been like if I hadn’t been socially conditioned to defy all of those queer feelings, you know.
Colette: [00:22:00] And I, I think I wanna validate that and say, I think that is such a common queer experience to when you grow up in a very heteronormative, cisgender worldview religion, that to then wonder the what ifs and to be happy with where you’re at and still wonder the what if and maybe have some grief and mourning around like what could I have experienced? And so I just wanna point that out and say, welcome to the Queer Experience,
Alice: Thank you. I’m so happy to be here now. And it, it was a long time coming, but I mean, I mean, you always look, you hear that you would never pick anyone else’s problems. You know, if you were to pull ’em out of a hat, you, you never would want anyone else’s problems with your own. I feel like that’s very much my case. Like I’m very happy with where I’m at now but I’m still trying to unpack what that means, like, cuz I am in a heteronormative relationship. [00:23:00] Some people might call it a, a queer relationship or what’s the, what’s the term where one person is queer identifying and the other is hetero
Colette: Mixed orientation.
Alice: Mixed orientation.
Yeah. I feel like being in a mixed orientation marriage comes with a lot of privilege and that’s something that I’m realizing so much privilege and especially in my relationship with the church. We look like just the normal hunky dory Mormon family in our congregation. And that is not how I feel in my heart so much anymore because I know that they really only welcome me there because Zach and I are in a heteronormative relationship.
And that’s something that really breaks my heart that I wouldn’t be considered. I, and this is me processing these feelings, like right now, in real time like that, I feel like I wouldn’t be accepted. I wouldn’t be loved in the church if I was with anyone else because anyone else would probably be a woman at this point, you know?[00:24:00]
but at the same time I realized that it is a privilege, but it’s also a duty to me and Zach to be the affirming, loving people that our congregation needs. And right now we feel very called to stay in the church and to show up and be in the pews and be in the primary classes. And Zach serves in the bishopric as he’s executive secretary, and you know, to be voices for people who do not have voices in our church and who have been silenced and who have been kicked out because of who they choose to love, love, like that is all that, that’s the frustrating part to me, is Jesus only commanded us to love. He did not tell us to judge anyone. He did not tell us to turn people away. The only people he turned away are the people who were gatekeeping. Who would going to the temple, who was, you know, welcome into the church. That’s who he, you know, made the, he braided the leather of whip and cast people out. And that’s the, that’s the [00:25:00] irony to me is that we are being the money changers sometimes in the church.
We are the gatekeepers. And I don’t think, I think that is the exact opposite of everything Christ Ministry was about, was love and letting people come into like Christ. I feel like Christ’s whole experience was very queer. You know, he spent all of his time with men. They were his best friends. He spent, you know, and with women and, you know, they, I just feel like the way that he loved everyone was a very beautiful queer sort of way. Was, you know, he just showed the same kind of love to every single person that we, as far as we know. And I feel like, I don’t feel that here sometimes, most times, all times. I don’t feel that here. And it’s very frustrating and it’s something that in the past few months has been really eye-opening that there are people that have it a lot worse than I do, and that, you know, have been pushed out and pushed into the margins.
[00:26:00] And I don’t want, I want to be in the pews for the youth and for the, you know, the people who choose to come and feel like that’s their home and that’s the only home that they have and that they need someone to sit with and to be affirming of them because I can’t imagine being in that situation and being pushed out by everyone that you love. It’s heartbreaking.
Kate: Wow. Thank you for that. That is really powerful. And I think both Colette and I were, we were both like, yes, preach the whole time that you’re speaking. first of all, I just wanna say like, this is a very brave thing to do to come out and talk about these things when they’re still kind of new and fresh. And while you’re trying to unpack all of this in real time, that’s hard. And I wanna commend you for that, but also thank you for that because I know that there are a lot of women in particular since 2020 who have experienced what you’ve experienced. And there are lots of people in [00:27:00] marriages that are now struggling to figure out what these things mean. and to have somebody who people look up to already say these things, I think is really validating and comforting for them. So thank you for, for doing that.
I’m interested though you, the first time that you had any sort of, like, I would classify as sexual feelings towards a woman wanting to kiss a woman was after the birth of your child. Is that right?
Alice: Mm-hmm. Yeah, postpartum probably. I mean, I don’t even think my kid was a year old, so.
Kate: really, we, we have an episode, I just wanna throw this out there. We have an episode with Lisa Diamond to talk about sexual fluidity and, and how there we, we don’t even know all of the different things that go into sexuality and what plays into all of that.
But to me that seems, [00:28:00] seems very interesting that that’s the moment that you noticed at least sexual feelings. It’s interesting that you’ve noticed your romantic feelings previous, and then you had this moment where you noticed your sexual, feelings later. do you have any insight into that?
Alice: honestly doesn’t surprise me. Postpartum does a number on you. Like you are in a completely, even up to a year after having a baby. You are in a completely different head space. And that is where I am right now. Like, it’s the lack of sleep. It’s the wonky hormones, it’s falling in love with this little person that you made in your body, and all of a sudden you’ve got this emotional high. And also you can’t, you can’t deal with anything because you were so sleep deprived. so it does not surprise me actually that that is when that sexual awakening happened was after the birth of my daughter.
I mean, I’m trying to think. Faye [00:29:00] was probably nine months old, I would guess so the same age as my second child now, Winnie. thinking about comparing that time in my life with the time I’m currently in, postpartum wise, like I am waking up six to eight times a night with this child, like I am so sleep deprived that it does not surprise me that my hormones are all over the place. My emotions are all over the place. I am eating like crazy because I’m starving at 10 o’clock at night, even after eating a full dinner. I feel like so many changes happen to your body and to your mind when you’re building a human in your body. and then continuing to nourish that human with your body afterwards, it takes so much energy and brain power that it doesn’t surprise me that things kind of just get a little jumbled up in there.
And maybe, you know, I didn’t feel those sexual feelings towards women before, but [00:30:00] felt them after. Like, I don’t know. And I think that’s just part of the human experience. You know, we go through all these different phases in our life. Yeah. You don’t even have to have a baby. You could go through trauma of some other sort to have something awaken inside of your mind, and all of a sudden you feel things that you’d never felt before.
And it’s kind of scary to already be dealing with all of these changes going on in your body and mentally and emotionally and spiritually. every facet of your life has changed, through trauma or through having a child. And so, I don’t know, guess kind of makes sense, at least that’s from what I hear. I’m not a scholar on this, but, Colette, you’re a therapist and so what, what’s your take on that?
Colette: Well, I, I would just refer people back to Lisa Diamond’s episode or her book about sexual fluidity that I think it is really common and I think we, it’s hard when we live in a very binary society and we put ourselves in a box and then things happen and we don’t fit in the box anymore. And I think it’s very normal for [00:31:00] hormones, you know, I’m not a doctor and things, but to have physical thi changes change our emotions and our life situations, I think that would, that makes a lot of sense for me, that as you’re going through this experience, you’re changing as a person, which can change your emotions and attractions or just have you notice them differently.
you know, I think, and this might be a hot take that maybe not everyone will agree with or that maybe we’ll even keep in, but the whole Born This Way argument, I think has done a lot of good. And I think it’s also hurt people too, because does that make someone’s experience less valid if they chose queerness? Right? If they maybe don’t feel like they were born this way, but then, oh, but I’m attracted to someone who’s of my same gender. Like, does that make me less valid? And I don’t think so. I don’t think that makes you any less valid for not realizing that, oh, I’m attract to women, or not being attracted to women until some of these changes.
I think, [00:32:00] again, I’m processing this a little bit in real time because I’ve been thinking about this, but I’m trying to struggle to put into words and I’m like, how? So that’s kind of where I’m at as you’re telling your story, so thank you.
Kate: Can I interrupt really quick because I think that’s a big deal. I’ve been waiting for Colette to like say these things. So excited. because that’s a little bit where, where I’m at and I feel too, I think it’s being non-binary. You just never, you’re just always like in and out and flowing and fluid, all sorts of things.
So, I think what you’re both saying is really crucial and really important. We have this tendency to say, when did I become gay? When did I notice that I was gay? Or when did I notice that I was bisexual? When did I notice that I was non-binary? All these things. as if that moment is supposed to be some sort of aha thing and we’re supposed to detect like that moment and, and exactly what, what moment everything is going on in that.
[00:33:00] And I don’t think that’s the way that we should go about it. We should notice when things happen and we should be curious about those things and we should examine those, those parts of our lives. But we don’t have to have it be this like really definitive moment of, oh aha, this moment was the moment I knew.
but being curious, approaching those times with curiosity. I think it’s very interesting the things that stuck with you. The first thing that stuck with you was this moment when you were very young and recognizing that queerness was bad because an adult told you it was bad. And then this other moment later on when you were like, when you had a very clear distinction of I want to kiss this person.
something happened in between those times. And we don’t have to know what exactly happened in between those times, but those two moments we can approach with curiosity and examine a little bit more and think about what those things mean.
Alice: yeah, I think it leaves a lot more room for authenticity when we [00:34:00] open ourselves to realize, I mean, we say that gender is a spectrum, and we say that sexuality is a spectrum. Well, those experiences are all part of the spectrum too. And some of them might be a little higher and some might be a little lower and more to the left and more that are right.
And I, as you guys were saying that, I was just thinking about how we have the same conversation in the church about testimonies. You know, when did you know the church was true? When did you know Jesus was your savior? And it’s like, I don’t know. When you’re born and blessed into the church, you don’t really have an opportunity to think otherwise, you know?
And so it’s like, when did I build a testimony? I don’t know. When I was born through my mother’s womb and they gave me a name and a blessing in a sacrament meeting surrounded by a bunch of old men. You know, it’s like, that’s when my testimony started. When they started telling me that was my testimony.
And but at the same time it’s like, when did I become conscious of my testimony of Jesus Christ? Well, that was [00:35:00] probably when I was a youth or when I was in primary singing. I am a child of God. You know, it’s like there’s, it’s hard to, unless you were like maybe a con, maybe a convert to the church and you know, feeling like, this is the day I was baptized, this was the day I was converted.
I, I, I mean, I could even say the day I was baptized was the day I was converted. You know, it’s just like what you guys were saying, it’s hard to pinpoint because I don’t think it’s necessarily meant to be pinpointed. Everything that like comes to when it get, once you get to the realization, the exclamation mark, there’s still so many periods before that exclamation mark that like lead you up to that realization, you know?
And so I think the fluidity is, I think it’s a beautiful thing and I think we don’t, we shouldn’t have to necessarily know when something happened, because I’m still very much trying to decide and figure out when it happened for me.
Colette: And, and I appreciate your vulnerability in talking [00:36:00] about that cuz I feel the same way sometimes. Like I look back and I don’t have clear, like, oh, you know, sometimes when people come out as queer or lesbian, they’re like, oh, there are all these signs of me being queer. Like I, I’ve talked to a lot of people, it’s like, I always felt really awkward in the girls’ locker room, or I always felt really jealous of my friend’s boyfriends or, you know, things like that, that they’re like, there, there were clear signs.
I look back and I don’t really have them, so is my queerness less valid that I’m in a relationship with a woman that I really love and wanna be with? And so that’s kind of where I’m coming from that I don’t think it’s any less valid. But that is kind of the interesting narrative of, I think people use the born this way argument to further make queer people valid and it was needed. And now it’s like, maybe we need to take that away. Like people can be valid without feeling they were born this way, what [00:37:00] they can still, their queerness is still valid if they decided to choose to be queer. And I don’t know if I love the language of choosing to be queer right now. I’m still kind of wrestling with it.
And again, processing a little bit in real time as I’ve been wrestling with it for a while. But I don’t know. I don’t, no, there’s, there’s some random Colette thoughts that I’m still sitting with.
So, one question I had moving forward, you mentioned earlier you have a lot of privilege. You are in a mixed orientation marriage if you wanna classify it that way. You’re in a straight passing marriage. Why come out a few months ago on social media? Like, I saw that and I’m like, we need to have her on the podcast now, and so I’m glad we’re finally having it. But why, why come out so publicly?
Alice: So I think a lot of it was because I knew that there were other people like me and I didn’t know it. And they didn’t know it. And when I came out to my husband, so I’m actually, I’m gonna pull up my notes section [00:38:00] because I took notes later that week of that very specific day when I came out to my husband and just how I was feeling and you know how that conversation kind of went.
But it’s like something you guys need to know about Zach is that he does not have a mean bone in his body. Like I have had, I post on Instagram about him occasionally and I have my friends like, tell me your husband is a unicorn. Like people don’t, men, in my experience, men don’t act like that. And it’s very true. He is very. Very just, you know, loving and accepting. And I did not worry when I was deal. The day I came out to myself was the day I came out to Zach. Like almost the exact moment that I came out to Zach was the moment I came out to myself because I had never said it out loud.
And okay, here it is. We had spent that day together just kind of working side by side with each other on different chores throughout the day. and actually earlier that day, Zach had [00:39:00] been weeding in the garden and that was something that he did to clear his mind.
He usually listened to a book with his headphones on and he was weeding and in the, in the pause between chapters, he had a passing thought and the thought was, Alice might be bi. And he was like, Hmm. and he went on reading and his book started back up and he just like went on with his day. But he had a very clear, distinct thought Alice might be bi and that’s all it said. And he was chill with that. Like he didn’t like go into an existential crisis. He was like, maybe she is. And like just kept going.
And I didn’t know about that until later that day when I was sitting on the couch. Faye was taking a bath and Zach was bouncing Winnie on the, we call it lovingly the vasectomy ball. It’s the giant exercise ball that we have to bounce Winnie on to get her to fall asleep. And he was just sitting across from me. I was on the couch working on a project and I just remember feeling this tension, like this really, really deep, [00:40:00] painful tension of feeling like I needed to tell Zach something, but not knowing how to say it and not wanting to, I didn’t want anything to change.
We have a great relationship and I love how much he loves me and I love how much I love him. but it just, this pulling, like it is just pulling inside of me. I needed to tell him. And I finally just like looked at him and I said, can I tell you something? And he looked straight at me and was like, it was like almost like he knew what I was going to say because he had had that impression earlier that day.
And I said, I think I might be bi. And I don’t know what that means. I don’t think, I don’t want anything about our relationship now to change because I love you and I choose you every single day. But I think it has more to do with who. Like just my life experiences growing up. And I said that and out loud and in that moment, like it set, like, it just settled in my soul.
It was like, that is the [00:41:00] word I have been trying to look for. I had spent weeks and all that day online looking up the definition of bi and what does it mean to be bi and what does it mean to be, you know, just sexuality as a spectrum. I was doing so much research and I was like, I think that might, I think that maybe might be what I’m experiencing. But it didn’t all settle and feel peaceful with me until I said it out loud to him.
And he just said, I love you, Alice. That’s, that’s never a question. And I love you for who you are and I love you for, everything about you. And, uh, it was in that moment that like, I was never scared of coming out to Zach because I was scared of like what would happen to our relationship. I was scared of coming out to Zach because I didn’t want him to feel like he was less important to me sexually or in our relationship at all. Because like I said, I really love what we have and took him a cut. Like I was like, we can talk about it. Like I am open to talk about it with you whenever [00:42:00] you’re ready. I know that that’s kind of a big thing to say, especially with all this time thinking that I’m, you know, totally straight. And he is like, yeah, I’m gonna, I’m just gonna think about it for a few days, but I love you.
And he’s like, do you feel better now? And uh, I was like, yeah, I feel a lot better actually. like, it just feels good to have that out there. And the next day he approached me while we were getting ready to get ready for church, and he was like, how are you feeling after yesterday? And I was like, I feel like it still stands, like, yeah, I think I’m, I think I’m bisexual and I still very much love you. And he was like, good cuz I still very much love you too. And then I went to church that day and I felt a lot of despair sitting in church, real, uh, coming to that realization that if I am bisexual, I would not be welcome here if I was in a relationship with a woman.
So he knows to some extent how hard that is for me to, you know, be processing all these feelings and to be going to church where it’s not a very affirming space when it comes to that. [00:43:00] There are affirming people there. I have some amazing friends in our ward who have just been so loving and accepting and excited for me in this journey.
But he holds a lot of space for me in that way and it helped me get the courage to finally answer your question. After that long backstory, it helped me get the courage to realize that if I’m going through this, there have to be so many more women who are also going through it. And so I, I told Zach, I was like, I’m going to come out publicly someday, and I need to do it, but I don’t wanna do it until you are ready for some potential repercussions in our family.
And he is like, well, I don’t know if I’ll ever be like a hundred percent ready, but if you’re ready, like, we’re doing this together. Like, this is, this is very much something that we did together. And I had him, like, I mentally prepped him the day that, uh, it was kind of like one of those things. I told him, well, I’m not gonna come out until my art tells me to come out. And he’s like, that seems like appropriate. That seems like your vibe because I am on [00:44:00] Instagram for my art business a lot. You guys know that. Like I live in my stories and I was like, I feel like my art is gonna tell me when I need to come out. And I don’t know if it’s gonna be creating a new piece in that process.
And then one day I was, I was packing an order and it was my little gutter puddle. The title is You Are Lovely- said the gutter puddle. And it’s an image of me looking into a puddle on the side of the road with the oil slick. And the oil slick is a rainbow around my reflection.
And it’s kind of supposed to be a gritty scene, you know, like a city street with a big old. It’s probably a sewage drain that hasn’t drained all the way after a rainstorm, which is pretty common out here. And I saw that and I was like, it would be so easy to just make that the bi flag because it just has three little stripes.
And so I painted it and I painted it all the way out. I never do that. I usually just paint my rainbows on my pieces cuz I want the rainbow to stand out. But Faye was sitting at the countertop [00:45:00] with me when I was painting it and she’s like, you need to paint the person and you need to paint the sky and you, so I went ahead and did that and I love how it came together, but that was kind of that moment I didn’t realize that the piece that I had carved when I was still pregnant with my second daughter, and this wasn’t even on my radar. That piece was my coming out piece that happened so much later. Like that must have been, I think that was kind of tied into my pregnant subconscious while I was carving it. Like, this is gonna be an important piece for you someday and it’s because you’re going to learn something new about yourself. that you’re, that isn’t even on your radar right now cuz you’re just working on having a baby after a rough couple years of trying to have a baby.
And so I did the piece and I held onto it for a while. I held onto it for probably a month before I finally felt like, I just woke up one day and I was like, I think today is the day that I need to tell people about this.
And so I texted Zach and I was like, I’m not gonna tell people until you’re ready. And so I wanna, I wanna hear [00:46:00] I’m, here’s my story that I’m gonna post, and what do you feel? And he’s like, looks great babe. Like, if you’re ready to do this and if you’re ready to, you know, hear from some members of our family about this, then yeah, I’m ready too and we can do it. We’ll do it all together and it’ll be fine. And that was something that he really hit home with me is that we’re doing it together and I’m gonna back you up on this. And I, he knows that I need the backup when it comes to some members of our family.
And so I posted it to my art account that night and the response was overwhelming. Not even so much from family, just from like, the community that I’ve been able to build from my Instagram account was incredibly overwhelming and just so full of love. Not a single negative comment from anyone that has been following me. it just completely blew our minds. It blew my mind. And not only that, but I posted a little bit of my story. I posted the day that I came out with Zach. And [00:47:00] then just a little disclaimer, you know, like, I’m gonna delete negative comments. this is something that’s really hard for me to come out and say. Don’t drag Zach into this. If you’re a family member, don’t go and text him and ask if he’s okay. That’s not, you can ask me if you’re really worried about it. You know, that kind of a thing.
And then I posted it and then I had so many women in my dms, so many, like probably 30 or 40 women like Alice, I think I’m going through this. I think this is, I think I might be bi, and I haven’t told anyone yet because I, you’re like, cause I don’t even know if I am. And I, they’re like, thank you so much for sharing your experience because that is what I’m feeling right now. And it was so incredibly astonishing to me just how many people felt comfortable enough to reach out to me and tell me, I think I might also be bi, what was your experience like? Realizing that and then describing my experience and having them be like, oh yeah, I’ve got [00:48:00] some things I need to think about now. Cause it’s just, you know, it was so crazy and so full of love.
And in that whole process, I really only had like two, maybe negative one, one negative comment from a family member. And then one, not negative comment, but just like an ignorant comment from a friend. It was like, did you have a crush on this person in high school? And I was like, girl, I don’t know. I’m still unpacking that. No idea. So I did, I gave him like a roundabout response, like maybe I did. you know, it was just like one of those awkward situations where it was like, I’m damned if I do and I’m damned if I don’t. So I don’t know.
But I feel like for coming from an ultra-conservative family with so many people being conservative, that’s part of the reason why I posted on my art account. I have not actually come out on my personal Instagram account cuz I’m a coward, but also because I know that there are people who, might be a little bit [00:49:00] more touchy and they don’t all follow my art account. And so I was like, if I post my art account, I know that there will be people who love me and back me up. And if I post my family account, I know that there will be people who will be very surprised and maybe caught off guard.
But if the people that love me follow my art account, they love me for my opinions, they already know what I believe. They already know my morals and my values like, and so, but I can guarantee you all those people, I am probably the talk of the group chats in some of those family circles. It’s probably really interesting, but I don’t have to be a part of that. That’s not my responsibility.
And so it’s been overwhelmingly positive and I couldn’t have asked for a better experience. And so much of that was because of my Instagram friends who have been so affirming and just great from the start. You know, I knew that I was gonna be safe with them.
Kate: thank you. That’s a really [00:50:00] remarkable and beautiful story. thank you for being so open about it. I don’t think it’s cowardice at all to not share on the other account. In fact, I think that it is understanding boundaries. It’s understanding who can, and can’t handle that information. We don’t owe anybody our coming out stories. And if there are people who could not handle our coming out stories, then they don’t get to experience our queerness. They don’t get to experience our queer joy. So Yeah, I think that that was what was safe for you and incredible.
Your husband also does sound pretty incredible. He re handled it really well. Colette knows that I am all about asking about the husbands. I think the husbands in these stories because there are so many women that are approaching both of us as well um, Colette and to come out who are in marriages. There’s so many men who need [00:51:00] models of how to handle this, and it sounds like Zach is an excellent model of just being so secure in yourself and not having to worry about what that means. And so secure in your relationship, you trust the person and you trust that they know themselves and that they know their love. So I love that not only do you offer an excellent, validating, beautiful story for people to emulate, but also he does too.
Alice: I, yeah, I, I agree. And we don’t often hear the male perspective when the wife or the o maybe the opposite perspective, not male necessarily, but just that we don’t often hear the other spouse’s point of view. And Zach, he’s, he’s not one for the limelight. I don’t think he’s posted on his Instagram account since he announced that we were engaged, which was like, is six years ago.
So he is not like actively on Instagram, but he is very much a part of my art Instagram, my personal Instagram. He’s in [00:52:00] my stories. I, I try to post him occasionally. I feel like whenever I post about Zach, I’m bragging at how great my husband is. I’m not trying to, he just comes at it so naturally that like I said, people think he’s a unicorn.
I agree with them because he is the example that I needed to be loving and accepting and open. I don’t think I ever would’ve come to terms with my queerness if I hadn’t been married to Zach and hadn’t had his example in my life of what being an open loving person and an affirming person is, and I definitely, he is a big part of my queer story because he is the person that made me feel safe in my relationship.
And I sure hope that every single one of those women that, you know, posted that commented or messaged me and said, I think I’m going through something similar, I sure hope and pray that they have an affirming person like that as their partner. Because it is, it’s a really, [00:53:00] it’s, even if you trust your partner, it’s a scary thing because you don’t want your relationship to change. You know? Or maybe you do, I don’t know. But you don’t, you have no control over how they’re going to react and how they’re gonna respond to that big, groundbreaking news about who their partner is that they married and who they think they know everything about, you know?
But I just hope that people have that person in their life. Everyone deserves that. Everyone des no matter what their gender is or what their sexuality is, everybody deserves that person in their life that loves them unconditionally and who is on that journey with them. And I hope that when people see Zach in my stories, they see him as a light to others because he doesn’t even have to try hard at it. He just loves people. And there’s not a conflicting bone in his body. He just does not fight with anyone. And sometimes it’s annoying, but it’s usually really great. And so, I don’t know. We need more, we need more people who are just willing to, to [00:54:00] love like that.
And I think if that was the case, there would be more people who felt comfortable with their sexuality, especially within the church. It’s sad that so many people in our church don’t. It’s so binary in our church of right and wrong, choose the right, you know? And it’s like, okay, but how about just choose love? Choose to love, not choose the right when a choice is placed before you. How about just choose to love when a choice is placed before you? That’s the only, let’s see who cares about right and wrong at this point. You know, it’s just, do we love the people around us, the way the savior loved them?
Kate: Yeah, absolutely. one more point I want to, to emphasize with this, is that, I’m constantly trying to think about or look for s something that looks to me like healthy masculinity. As a trans-masculine person, I try to like find what healthy masculinity is and looks like for me. And I do want to just make this point and emphasize this point [00:55:00] that this is not Zach being feminine or anything like that. This is a man exhibiting healthy masculinity. And so making those distinctions, I think is, is important for us going forward in the way that we think about men and their emotions and their abilities to cope with news and things like that.
Having said that, the other thing I wanted to talk to you about is that you said when you were thinking about coming out you were in the process of this art piece and rainbows are significant for you for two reasons at that moment. You have a coming out journey at the same time that you’re trying to also process other really difficult and, and traumatic things that were happening in your life. Are you comfortable talking about that?
Alice: Absolutely. it’s something I talk about a lot and, and have processed a lot, on my Instagram account. And, to start, in 2020 is a rough year for everyone.[00:56:00] I experienced my first unexpected. Yeah, I’m gonna, I’m gonna mark it as my first. Um, I lost my great-grandmother when I was 14. She was 79. Like, that was just like, you know, that’s just getting old and dying. it was still very poignant to me. It was still very traumatic for me just because I had never dealt with death before.
But in 2020 Zach and I lost our first baby, our puppy Noah, and she died at two and a half, it was, we found out what killed her the day she died. It was an unexpected blood issue that, when she had gotten a cytopoint shot, somehow it started this reaction. The disease came to surface and it just killed, it killed her in the course of a weekend. I had just gotten back in town. She was happy the day that I came back. And then the next day she took a nose dive and that by the next day she was on her deathbed and we had to put her down the next day. And that was very unexpected. She was, you know, as soon as we [00:57:00] moved out to Washington, I told Zach when we were talking about possibly getting married, I said, if you’re gonna move me out of state, we’re getting a dog. And he was like, all right, we can make that happen.
And so when we moved out of state, that was the first thing. That was the first order of business was we got this puppy, we had her for two and a half beautiful years, and then she unexpectedly passed away. And, uh, that was like, that was hard. And then around that same time, Zach and I were starting to try to bring the second child into our family and we had two mis miscarriages in a row.
So, got pregnant around the time we got our new puppy. And then experienced a miscarriage at nine weeks in October, and we got pregnant again and then experienced another mis miscarriage at technically 13 weeks. The second time around in, around April, and that was back to back and it sucked. It was the worst. It, it took so much out of me.[00:58:00] And that was hard, just like emotionally, spiritually, so much of my spiritual journey and so much of my queerness is wrapped up in that trauma. And I think that’s probably a little bit what started all of those feelings was having that trauma going on at the same time and questioning who I was and was I meant to be a mother to more children and you know, why am I experiencing so much loss all at once and back to back to back, that’s three in a row.
And then we got pregnant with Winnie and that was, that was just a rough pregnancy. I was Mentally spent after worrying so much about the past two pregnancies, constantly worrying that this pregnancy was going to stick and that I wasn’t gonna have complications. I had so many complications, the previous two pregnancies with the aftermath of miscarrying that it was just a really dark time in my life.
I don’t know if you would necessarily notice that in my art though, [00:59:00] because I was painting a lot of rainbows. I was trying to find the light in my life, and art was very much my way of coping. when I paint those rainbows, I, I started painting my, I painted my very first rainbow. It’s a piece titled it rains a lot here, but we are happy anyways. And it’s a little house with a little red orange yellow rainbow over it, and it’s raining in the background. And that was the first piece I carved, I think it was in 2019, with a rainbow.
And it kind of encapsulated, it rains a lot here. Like there are so many hard things going on in our life, but we are happy anyways, despite the fact we find reasons to find joy. And at first, like I did this rainbow and this was before 2020 before I came to that full realization that queerness is beautiful and lovely and belongs in this world. And I carved the rainbow and I thought, hmm. This is interesting, like just thinking about what rainbows meant in our pop [01:00:00] culture and, and you know, just in history and stuff. And, but I wanted something that encapsulated peace and a home and that people looked at and saw promise. You know, we think about the rainbow and the Bible and how it symbolizes promise. And not only that, but a future to look forward to, and a covenant with God. And then we think about what the rainbow means in the queer community, and it means love and acceptance and hope. And it means that there’s been some hell of a time getting to that peace and continuing to try and find it. But under the rainbow, we all feel safe and everyone is welcome.
And I, I carved that rainbow. And at first I thought, is this really what I believe? And then I thought about it and I was like, yes, this is what I actually believe and I feel confident putting this piece out there. And then I started putting rainbows on temple pieces because I was like, rainbows are cute. And everyone deserves to feel [01:01:00] like the temple is their home, even if the church says it isn’t. And the, so I had a couple people message me and be like, so the temple with the rainbow thing, is that like an act of defiance? And I was like, initially it wasn’t, it was like a design choice. But now it is, it’s very much an act of defiance.
I hope people look at the temples someday and see queerness and loveliness and just all of the good things that we believe temples are, and we should extend those blessings to everyone.
but then rainbows started to come up in, in all of my different kinds of art with Jesus, I started to do Jesus with rainbows. And that’s probably what put me on a lot of people’s radar was Jesus holding the rainbow. It’s just a really little guy. It’s like a four by six and it’s Jesus with his arms out and he’s got a big old rainbow looped in between his hands.
And when I did that piece, I just wanted a piece that people could look at and go, that’s my Jesus, that’s the kind of Jesus that I want in my life, is a Jesus that loves and that isn’t [01:02:00] loving on conditions either, that this Jesus loves unconditionally. And sometimes we don’t see that in LDS art or in just Christ, in Christian art in general.
And so, I did that one and I was like, I really like rainbow Jesus. I’m gonna do lots more rainbow Jesus. And I started making Jesus stickers. And at the same time I was like, I wasn’t queer yet, or I was, I was queer. I wasn’t identifying as queer yet. I didn’t see myself in that community yet. And so I thought, if I’m going to do this, I need to do it right.
And so I, worked with Lift and Love and any stickers that I sell in my shop, proceeds of that go to Lift and Love, which is a cause that I very much believe in, especially at the intersection of, of LGBTQ things and the church. it offers families, um, group therapy, who have LGBTQ individuals, children, parents, trans children, parents. It just offers resources to them. group therapy, group meetups to, you know, find community and it’s what [01:03:00] I wish I had been exposed to growing up in the church is building those bridges between the church and the queer community.
And so a lot of the proceeds of those Rainbow Jesus stickers go to Lift and Love. They sell some of those stickers in their shop. and working with Lift and Love was a big part of my coming out story, I think. Alison is just so incredible and affirming and she is trying really hard to do really good work. And she’s just another example in my life of someone who is working really hard to make the church a better place. And to show that there’s potential for everyone to be welcome in our pews. Everyone needs to feel like they’re welcome and deserve to sit in our pews because they do. If we really are a church based on the teachings of Jesus Christ, It should be a no-brainer. and we need more people that are speaking up about that.
And I’ve also been trying to look for other LGBTQ organizations that for future stickers I can donate proceeds to. and I felt like if I was going to [01:04:00] make these inclusive Jesus stickers, I needed to show inclusivity in where I was put, I needed to put my money where my mouth was.
And even to this day, with the privilege that I hold, I very much feel that way. I feel like because I have so much hetero passings privilege, I need to, and cis cis hetero passings privileges, I feel like I need to be that voice in the church for people to know that, it’s not okay how we treat people and we need to let everyone in to sit next to us.
We have, we’ve had an experience this past few months, where a transgender woman has been coming to our chapel. The sisters have been bringing, Shauna and her daughter Shauna, and it has been a beautiful experience. She, her daughter is, my daughter’s just a little bit older than my daughter, but she comes to our primary class.
And I, ever since Shauna walked through the door, she’s just a beautiful, happy parent. Mother to her daughter, to her [01:05:00] son. And she has been coming and sitting in, in my primary class, at least before the holidays. We, Zach and I were out of town for a lot of months. I haven’t seen Shauna, uh, since in the last time that we were able to make it back to church. But, she came and sat in her primary class and she would rather sit in our primary class than gospel doctrine and that saying something, because we literally just sit and color with crayons the entire 20 minutes.
but there were, there have been a few experiences where I just, I came home and I just prayed so hard that Shauna felt loved because I know that there’s a lot of opportunity for things to go south with how people choose to treat, especially transgender people in our church.
And I haven’t seen her in a week or two since coming back to church. And it makes me really worried and really sad and, I really hope that it’s just that she’s busy. I’ve seen her kids, her kids have been in my primary class, at least one of those weeks. And so, I hope that she keeps coming back because [01:06:00] even just her presence is teaching, is being a light, she’s being a light to the people around us. And we need more of that in our pews. We need that diversity of thought and of just living. We need to show that there’s more than one right way to live and be happy. and yeah, I don’t know where I was going with that, but I really hope that my art shows that I, I hope it inspires people to feel like they can be more loving and accepting of those people in our life that live on the margins, especially within the LGBTQ community.
Kate: You were doing your art and going through this whole process and working with Lift and Love and doing all of this at the same time that, a big news story was Kit Connor for Heart Stopper, who was kind of being forced out of the closet for playing a bisexual character and him not, not having said he was queer in [01:07:00] any way.
And to me that seems like it lines up kind of similarly with your story, and maybe you were paying attention to that and had feelings about that,
Alice: Okay. Can you, um, go back a second? I don’t know if I remember this. Tell me a little bit more about this, if you don’t mind.
Kate: He might be somebody you’d be interested in. Do you watch the show Heart Stopper?
Alice: No. I’ll have to look it up though now.
Kate: it’s worth it. I think it, it will resonate. I think it’ll resonate a lot with you.
Alice: That’s gives me something else to, to research about. I feel like around that time that I was coming out, there was so much, I mean, watching your stories, there was something new every single day of just like, what is, what are you doing? Stop talking like church, you are not doing yourself any favors saying these awful things. Like there was the Jeffrey R. Holland thing and then there was Charlie Bird coming out with his relationship and the possible repercussions of [01:08:00] that. And then there was, you know, all these sorts of things. I feel like that was kind of like an explosion of queerness that the church was not ready for, but that was building and building and building for a long time.
And then the musket fire thing with Jeffrey R. Holland, it was just like, so much of that I think, really propelled me to really think about my own sexuality and be like, where do I, where am I, where do I fall in this? And why do, why do I feel so angry about it when I don’t even identify as queer at this point? You know, like it just made me so mad.
And actually I kind of have a funny story about that. It has to do with you, Kate. around that time you mentioned something about lift and love and you said something about, um, it was like along the lines of this organization, like you were, you were trying to obviously do some research on this organization. You’re like, as far as I can tell, there aren’t any queer artists go that are putting art towards this. And you said that and I was like, why do I feel so mad about [01:09:00] this? But why do I feel so attacked by this? And I, and I’m very glad that you, that you brought that up because that was a big kickstarter for me to be like, I think the reason why I feel so defensive about this is because it’s, it’s possible that there’s something in my sexuality that I don’t realize about myself.
And it opened my eyes and I was like, there’s a reason why I feel so defensive about this. And then I looked back on all these other things going on at the same time when the church, um, coming out about queer things. And I was like, there’s a reason why I feel so defensive about all this, and it’s because it feels like a personal attack on me and how, and my lived experience growing up and, you know, trying to figure this stuff out.
So thank you for that. Like, thank you. Obviously you were doing so much work on your stories, trying to sift through what is genuine and what is, um, what’s the word I’m looking for? What’s genuine and what is,
Colette: performative.
Alice: Yeah, performative. And I think it, it caused me [01:10:00] to be like, what about what am I doing about my art that is performative? And what am I doing about my art that is genuine and that is putting good out into the world? What good am I putting out into the world talking about this? And that kind of narrowed my search in on who am I and what is my relationship with queerness and where does it fit in my life?
Kate: Well, first off, I’m sorry that you felt offended by
Alice: it was a good thing. I mean, it made me think, Kate, it was a good thing. I think it was really important that you did that because it made us think about. You know, what kind of stu, what, is it just allies that are filling this space? Or are we actually allowing room for queer artists to talk about it? And I think it was really important that you bring that up, those kinds of things up on your stories.
Kate: Well, and to be clear, I don’t think that anybody should be forced to be out. N if, if [01:11:00] somebody is making queer art or whatever, art, they should not be forced to explain whether the they are part of the queer community or, or not. I don’t, I just don’t believe that. I do believe, however, that if organizations are working with a group of artists or a group of people and they are doing queer, queer art that that, or it’s on the organization or on the TV show, or on somebody who’s not the queer person or not the artist to also involve people who are to make sure that they’re involving people who are queer. And so just, just to clear the air, I was not pointing any fingers at you.
Alice: No, and I know, and as I like, I went back through your stories a few times and I was like, Kate only does things because they have so much love for the people around them. they only want to better these spaces and to make us aware of our privilege and to make us [01:12:00] aware of, you know, what’s going on.
And as I went through your stories a few times, I was like, this is only coming from a place of love. I don’t need to feel attacked by this. And if I do feel attacked by this, this is on me because I, there’s obviously something I need to work through. And it really was actually a big part. I, you are actually one of the first people I came out to, after I came out to Zach. And I sent you that message, and I think you were the first person, honestly. And it, because I knew that you were a safe person. I knew that you were going to be affirming and you weren’t gonna push anything on me or, you know, make me approach anything that I wasn’t ready to.
But I think that the work that you’re doing is paramount to, I think everyone should follow you because it’s, it’s paramount to that intersection of BIPOC and LGBTQ and, you know, our troubling history and Mormonism. It’s just, it, you cover so much ground and it’s all so important [01:13:00] to, to sit with and to, to learn more about yourself and about the church that you belong to with. So thank you for that and thank you for being a part of my story too.
Kate: I was so excited. I cannot explain to you when I got that message. You know, I do. I get a lot of, I think all of us at this point get a lot of messages of people coming out and you coming to me, I was like, this is so fun, . I was so excited to, to have you be part of this community because I do feel like it’s like, let’s like welcome this person. Let’s serve them a party. I think that we should have coming out parties and just really celebrate that because I think it’s, first of all scary but also a really exciting time. And so I hope you felt that that excitement as well as all of that stuff. And it sounds like you did, it sounds like you had a really great coming out story.
Alice: Yeah, it was really nerve wracking. And sometimes I still wonder, like in the [01:14:00] future when, when things, I really thought shit was gonna hit the fan when I came out, especially in my family. I haven’t talked to any of my siblings about it. I don’t know how much they know. I know at least one of my sister-in-laws and my brother know cuz she personally reached out to me.
I don’t know about my other siblings. and I know that my parents know and that is just not something that I want to talk about so much with them because I want them to kind of sit with it a little bit cuz they were raised the same way I was. It’s very much complicated but every, every other person has just been so excited and welcoming.
And that was the affirming thing to me is even if I couldn’t, even if I didn’t necessarily feel like I could talk about this with my family, at least I could talk about it with my friends and that so many of my friends are actually in this community and it’s a beautiful place to be. It’s so much fun. It is a party [01:15:00] and it’s also really like sometimes very messy just with all of the mudslinging that people throw our direction. It’s, yeah, I don’t know. It’s just really sad. I, I wish that other people realized that they could be in on the party too. They could, if they were just nice, they could come and celebrate with us and we would love to have them.
And cuz it is, it’s, it’s an open community. It’s not a closed community, it’s for anyone. Who feels like they want to be a part of it and want to show the love to other people and do the work to, to help other people feel that love.
Colette: I love that. Thank you so much. And I, I think that is really interesting cuz I know Kate and I have talked about the idea of like supporting organizations that aren’t queer led, that are helping queer people. Like where is that line? But do we want to force people out? Like, cause there are people who, oh, I’m, I’m just an ally.
I was in that space for a few years of, I’m just a really good ally [01:16:00] when I wasn’t really ready to face my awareness yet. And so it is kind of that tricky thing of there’s so many great organizations doing great work, but are they queer led? Do they need to be queer led? Like, anyways, so thank you for all the work you’re doing and sharing your story and having the proceeds of your stickers help people in so many ways.
And I mean, you coming out to your 4,000 followers and already getting inundated with all these messages of people saying, your story resonates with me. This is why people come out. I think a lot of times we get the question, why come out? Why come out? You’re in a straight passing marriage. There’s no need to come out. And it’s like, no, you, I mean, you don’t have to come out if you don’t want to. But I think there’s such power in coming out and helping people recognize their own stories in our stories, and that’s why we love this podcast is people sharing stories that really resonate.
Kate: Absolutely, and I don’t think that you’ll even ever know all of the people that you touched by coming out.
Colette: Oh, a hundred percent. No.[01:17:00]
Kate: Yeah. I think that there are so many people that saw that and got so much validation and won’t even be able to express that to you, so thank you.
Alice: Well, I feel like I’ve done very little like. I, I always wonder, you know, you, I, I feel like everyone goes to this imposter syndrome thing, like, it is my story actually worth telling. And I hope that people feel like their stories are worth telling. And I still, I, I don’t know how much good I’m actually doing with my little band of 4,000, I do hope that at least one person feels loved and sees my art and feels accepted and sees, or even just sees the rainbow in it, makes them feel happy because it reminded them of a time where they’ve felt loved.
And I feel like I’m in a dip right now. I’m in a creative lull, just, I think it’s the sleep thing again. I’m not getting the sleep and I’m having a hard time processing a lot of creative block energy. You know, [01:18:00] it’s kind of all beating up against each other. And so I’m hoping that I can start. I, I hope that this conversation that we’ve had, really stimulates that. because ever since coming out, my creativity has kind of dipped where I’ve just kind of been trying to hold on for dear life a little bit when it comes to my spirituality. And so hopefully it spikes again soon and I find more, more reasons to spread rainbows around. But thank you guys so much.
Kate: I hope you feel compassion for yourself though, because you, because having a baby is hard work. You called it trauma earlier and I was like, oh my gosh. Having a baby is totally trauma. It really is. And taking that time to take care of yourself as much as taking care of a little new kid as well as another kid. While processing all of these things is a lot, but I doubt that those creative processes have stopped for you. I’m sure that they’re just shifting and, and [01:19:00] creating something new with all of this new information. And so I’m really excited and looking forward to what comes next because I’m sure that all of that is working through you right now.
Alice: I sure hope so. I feel the itch, I feel the desire degree. I’m just ready to, I did, uh, something really small this weekend and it felt good, and so I just, sometimes I have to push through the tired and just do it and. . Yeah, I, I hope that, I hope that you’re right. I know you’re right. I’m just waiting. And sometimes waiting with creative processes is the hardest part because you’re just waiting for that one piece to fall into place and that it won’t come until you’ve allowed yourself the time to have inspiration.
And I’m just kind of waiting for all the inspiration to come my direction. So maybe the sun will come out sometime in the next few days. Haven’t seen the sun in like a couple weeks, and so maybe that will help a little bit too.
Kate: I [01:20:00] hope so,
Colette: Well, we, we just so appreciate you and your art. I hope people who aren’t aware of you go and check out your Etsy shop or your Instagram. It’s very unique. Like, I think when people think art, they sometimes have a very specific idea in their mind. They don’t think printmaking and your prints are so beautiful and so unique, and I can’t, I’ve seen some of your process of how you make a print, like you don’t think about the art and the talent that that requires to do your work. And so I hope people go check you out cuz and I know your creativity will come back, but I’m so glad Kate pointed out you used the word trauma. Yep. I’ve never thought of it that way, but having a baby is a trauma.
Alice: The past, the past three years have been nonstop trauma too. And so, yeah, and I honestly, I feel like that trauma created some of the most poignant art that I. have ever done. I So if you don’t know, I mean, a lot of people don’t know probably, but I’m originally a watercolorist. [01:21:00] I, like I said, I’ve been taking private art lessons since I was six years old.
And I was trained heavily in watercolor and colored pencil, really realistic life-like stuff. And then, I got burnt out in college and I graduated and I was like, Zach, I don’t know if I ever wanna do art again. And he was like, you can’t think like that because you, not just because you just went to school and spent decades of your life dedicated to art, but because I know it’s what you love, you need to figure out something that you love.
And I found printmaking by chance. it was obviously sent to my life. It was something I had never done before and I had the opportunity to teach a bunch of five year olds while I was student teach, or not five year olds, uh, fifth graders while I was student teaching a printmaking project. And I thought, you know, I’m just gonna buy the kit. I’m just gonna try it. watercolor’s not doing it for me, so maybe I’ll just try something new. And I’ve been hooked ever since. And it’s, it’s been my life for five years now. That’s crazy to think about. I’ve been printmaking for five [01:22:00] years and, it’s, which is still very baby, like, that is still very early, I feel like in compared to the 15 or so years that I spent doing watercolor, color pencil, stuff like that.
And so, but it is a completely different process and, it’s a creative process that is really fun and exciting to me every single time I do it. And so, I’m glad you enjoy it. I’m, I’m glad that it speaks to people. I feel like sometimes fine art is Kind of unapproachable a little bit. Like it’s difficult for people to feel like they buying your first art piece is really like, especially your first original is really like nerve-wracking a little bit cuz it’s expensive.
Art is really expensive and I wanted to create art that people related to and was simple and that people could afford. I want people to be able to afford original art and printmaking allows me to be able to meet all of those goals and, uh, because it is very affordable. And so when people tell me that my art is like one [01:23:00] of their first originals, like, it just makes me so happy inside because it’s like people, like people can afford art. Like it’s art is not unapproachable and it can be so simple in, in meaning and in process and, it’s, it’s beautiful. So thank you. And it makes me happy that it speaks to so many people.
Colette: It really does. And I didn’t know that, that you were that new to printmaking cuz that’s what I know you as is like, oh yeah. She does all the prints and they’re beautiful. That’s really cool. And I’m excited to see where your art continues to take you.
Alice: Thank you.
Colette: is there anything else you wanted to talk about that we haven’t asked you about?
Alice: I love you guys. I’m so grateful for all of the work that you’re both doing in this field for what you’re doing to educate people. And I’m really looking forward to listening to your podcast more. I’m especially need to finish the one I’m working on. Laurie Lee Hall is someone that I’ve heard so many amazing things about. So, thank you and thank you for [01:24:00] trusting me to come on here and share my story a little bit, and I’m excited to see where the next few years takes all of us in all of our respective Instagram spaces.
Colette: For sure.
Kate: Absolutely, and thank you. Thank you for all of the work that you’re doing and for coming on. We’re so honored to have you.
Thanks for listening. We appreciate you joining us today. If you’re liking these episodes, we’d love it if you would rate and review Called to Queer on the podcast player of your choice so that other people are more likely to find us. We’d also love it if you’d share the podcast with a friend who could benefit from hearing these stories. If you’d like to donate to support the ongoing costs of the podcast, you can do that by clicking the donate button at the top of our homepage. If you want to contact us, you can reach us at hello@calledtoqueer.com. You can also follow us on Facebook and Instagram @CalledToQueer. See you next time. [01:25:00]