Dear someone,

When I was fourteen, my family moved from a large city in Southern California to a tiny Midwestern community, population 2337. Having spent most of my life living in large cities, I was in for a severe case of culture shock. I went from surfing and skyscrapers to miles and miles of corn and cows. And they didn't have any of my favorite stores in the entire state! I also found myself struggling to fit in. I've never been one to make friends easily, but I soon found myself surrounded by people who viewed me as an alien. The town being predominantly conservative and made up of farmers, the liberal, vegetarian girl wasn't well received.

There's another quality about me that made me stand out so much: I'm a lesbian. In case you don't know, that means that I'm a girl who is attracted to other girls. Being a town with no restaurants but six churches, people there were extremely against homosexuality, openly protesting it and saying that God hates gays. Being a Christian, it really hurt to hear that coming from members of my own church. I wasn't open about my sexuality, though, so they would talk directly to me about how disgusting they found the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) community. I tried to reassure myself that the God I believe in is loving and accepting, but it was still hard to hear so much hatred from the people around me.

I thought that things would get easier once school started, but I was horribly mistaken. My school maintaining the general political views of the area, I found myself in what was by far the most prejudiced school I'd ever attended. Aside from hearing people use gay slurs in every other sentence, I also heard racism, sexism, and prejudiced comments against Jews, Muslims, Atheists, and even vegetarians. I couldn't be myself for fear of judgement, and so I put up walls between me and my classmates. I spent my entire freshman year eating lunch by myself and rarely speaking.

I am now preparing for my sophomore year at a new school, in a new town that I'm moving to. My hopes are to find some like minded people, and maybe even some other members of the LGBT community. But until then, here's my message: be kind. Speak up for those who are being isolated and alienated for who they are. Be their friend. It would mean the world to any of us who feel unaccepted. I challenge you to make a difference, and I thank you for it.

Sincerely,
The lesbian, vegetarian, Christian, Midwestern, shy girl