Mis raíces son de aquí y de allá.
My roots are from here and there.
But not literally here. By “here,” I mean Mexico—that’s where my “here” stayed.
Me and my family come from a long line of immigrants who arrived from northern Spain and Italy, eventually mixing with Indigenous people and mestizxs in Mexico. And no, I didn’t spit into a tube for Google to find this out.
I know, because where I come from, that kind of knowledge is passed down, close to the heart. Being of European descent still carries a kind of social value—less weight, more pride—even if it was five or seven generations ago.
Having that said, my gay genes are from all over the world!!
I only dare say genes because science hasn’t settled on it—it’s a mix of hormonal, genetic, and environmental factors. And I plan to tell my family that. So they can start taking responsibility for some of the emotional baggage they’ve passed down.
Yes, I’m from Mexico—from a city surrounded by three volcanoes.
Since I was little, my horizon has always been populated. It was hard to pick a favourite volcano, so I just decided to love them all. Which… maybe explains a lot.
I’m pansexual. And my volcano city was named Puebla by colonizers. Puebla doesn’t mean anything, but it sounds close to Pueblo—”town” in Spanish—just sapphic.
The city is colourful, artsy, painfully colonial. The population is mixed—Indigenous communities that still hold on to language and tradition, and whitexicans who think they’re more European than they actually are. There’s pride in food (rightfully so—don’t @ me!), but the snobbery doesn’t come from that. It comes from whiteness and class.
And even though we are all mixed, with Asian, Indigenous, European, black, over and over again, mestizaje didn’t mean equality. Now, Indigenous communities are a little better preserved, but that’s only because they have been pushed out to the peripheries—margins of the capital city.
In Puebla, waves of immigrants were welcomed: Lebanese people escaping the Ottoman Empire, Spaniards fleeing civil war, Germans leaving post-Nazi trauma behind. These communities were—and still are—respected, owning businesses, having their own schools, social clubs, factories. And indeed, in private schools in Puebla, you’re taught German, English, and French.
But not Nahuatl. Not Otomí.
Close to my hometown is a valley called Cholollan—renamed Cholula. Please, add it to your bucket list. This city was once a spiritual hub for many Indigenous communities, all praising different deities, but gathered in the same land.
Not only pan, but poly.
The first time I lived alone was in Cholula. Mi Cholu. Colourful, bike town, full of markets and fields of flowers, maiz, and so many fireworks, like crazy, every single day there’s a saint’s celebration. Because colonialism ensured Catholicism wasn’t just adopted in Mexico — it was absorbed, so now there aren’t temples — called calpullis— for different deities; now they are churches.
Puebla and Cholula are only 20 minutes apart: the whitewashed “we’re still European” city, and the cempasúchil lands that bloom every September.
I never really felt the need to come out to my family. I’d already come out as “the artist,” the cycle-breaker, the one who says no más to abuse and misogyny.
And as JuanGa said—and if you don’t know who Juan Gabriel is, how are you even here? Juan Gabriel was our Mexican Elton John, but gayer and way more legendary. He, maybe they, said “What is obvious doesn’t need to be asked”
I don’t know if I had any queer relatives, I never saw anyone in my family that could have been.
What I did see were women who got shit done and men who “worked all day” but had mini-golf in their offices and collectible toys in their meeting rooms.
The women had strong hands that braided my hair so tightly it would probably qualify as child abuse today. But then they’d hand me a tortilla con aguacate y sal before dinner, and my favourite agua fresca—papaya…
Maybe they knew I was queer before I did.
But don’t get me wrong—I’ve known for a while. I just did gay stuff before I said I was gay. Like kissing my girlfriends at parties (with consent, always). I also shared my first orgasm with a girl.
It’s funny how we think we have “first times,” and then someone reminds us: “Didn’t that happen… back in the day?”
I thought my first time having sex was with my middle school boyfriend—he told everyone. I didn’t even come. Double asshole.
Later in life, I wanted to leave Mexico, but my Saturn return aligned with the pandemic, and I ended up living in San Francisco. There one day, I was with friends and playing Never Have I Ever, and someone said, “Never had sex with a woman.”
I didn’t put a finger down. But a friend said, “Wait—you told me a story from when you were 13.”
And I said, “We didn’t have sex. We just touched each other… and came.”
(Everyone laughed. I didn’t.)
It took my poly, demi, pan, ADD, PTSD brain a hot minute, but I finally connected the dots… My first time had been with a girl. YAY!!!!!!
By 28, I started calling myself bi. I didn’t need to come out dramatically. I just accepted it, named it, and started dating a woman.
We met on an app—because, of course. It was late 2020. She was beautiful—blue eyes, ballerina body, smile that could heal your inner child. It was sweet and short. I had to return to the U.S. We still orbit each other’s socials. A win.
Especially since my relationships with men tend to end with full drama:
The “never speak to me again” kind… or worse.
In 2021, I finally moved to Vancouver.
Why did I leave Mexico in the first place? Because I was afraid. Afraid to walk free. To wear something tight. To show my breasts.
I had experienced too much violence. Misogyny lived too comfortably in my home, in the media, in our streets. So I leapt. I trusted myself—and my craft as an artist.
Living outside of Mexico gave me perspective.
In Mexico, I’m not considered a person of colour. I had white privilege—despite my mom calling me the N-word for being “the darkest one.”
But here? I’m not white. I’m brown. More than anyone in my family would ever admit. And I embrace it.
I have an accent. YES.
I wear colours. YES.
I cook amazingly. I dance badly. I sing, not so bad.
I’m loud. My eyebrows speak before I do.
At a staff party for an immersive theatre company I worked at, I realized I was the only non-Canadian, non-white person there. We were drinking, joking, talking about patriarchy (as you do). Then this guy—let’s call him Hunter, because that’s his name—says: “You’re not like the other girls. You’ve got Big Dick Energy.”
I was like… “WHAT?”
And the guys were nodding. “Yeah, like you’re confident, you speak your mind…” One added, “All the women at work are into you. It’s like they see the big dick.”
Then someone else chimed in: “Or maybe… they’re into her because she doesn’t have a dick at all—but treats them as if she did.”
I didn’t know what to do with that info. Still don’t.
But I did find out later, at a New Year’s party, that they weren’t wrong. I made a move on one of the women—she said yes… until she didn’t. She ghosted me when I got COVID. Then asked me out again. So… not a total loss. Not a total win, either.
As I’ve grown, I’ve realized I don’t just love femme femmes or masc boys.
I love people across the spectrum. Masc femmes, femme boys. I love trans folks. I love queers. I love sapphics. I love love—as long as they’re not assholes or racist.
And the biggest victory, I love me. All my spectrum. All my mixed, from all around, magical self.
Even my lows. ‘Cause nobody gets depressed like I do. And most certainly nobody binges peanut butter at midnight like I do. And if someone does, I hope we can be friends.
My hope here is that younger people out there get to see more of us queers. Because we are not going anywhere, and they don’t have to wait 28 years to name themselves.
You don’t need to come out perfectly formed.
Just come out… as you.
vancouverqueerstories.com 