I love how Pride isn’t a fixed date. It’s a special time—a day or a week or a month, depending on where you are—but not a holiday, which I think makes it feel more like part of life’s regular programming, rather than an intermission, if that makes any sense. Somehow this way it doesn’t feel as constructed or artificial. And the same way people say it’s always 5:00 somewhere (even if that somewhere is the uninhabited UTC-12 time zone), I guess this way it can also always be Pride Week somewhere. How great is it to be able to think, almost no matter when you’re reading this, that right now, somewhere, some community is celebrating Pride? One of these years I should do a a Pride tour and plot out a grand summer road trip to visit different towns’ celebrations every week for a month or two. (Then again, I’ve been planning a Canada-wide chess-playing road show for decades, and still haven’t made that happen yet.)

All this preamble to say that next week is Pride Week in Happy Valley-Goose Bay. I was too involved with the Words of Warmth Literary Festival this year to be super active in the Pride planning, but I’m really proud of the gang at Safe Alliance (as always) for the slate they’ve put together. The main and iconic event is of course the Pride March, ending with Pride in the Park. That’s always a great day, and even the weather normally cooperates. At core, it’s really about hanging out with friends outdoors in the park. The best events are often that simple: getting people together in one place, dressing the scene a little bit for context, and letting the vibes ensue.

Personally, I am especially anticipating the Pride Coffee House. I can’t remember if there’s been any coffee involved in the past (probably?!), but in essence, what you get is a pretty modest turnout of super supportive, positive queer and queer-adjacent folks, and whoever wants to can stand up and read or perform things, thereby enacting one of my favourite theorems: Creativity + Pride = Yes. Last year, I went a bit overboard with my first-ever attempt at a stand-up routine, mainly about medical transition. It was fantastic fun, and a full and firm embrace of cringe humour. This year, we’ll have to see!

Safe Alliance poster for Pride Week 2024.