By Jeff Walsh

To this writer, gay pride always seemed an uneven mix of sex and politics. But that all changed when I went to the 1994 Pride Parade in New York City. I had written against gay pride parades before attending that event, but my viewpoint changed when I saw the school bus come down the street.

It's all kind of surreal now, so I don't know if it was a real school bus. For some reason, I think it was a fake float made to look like a school bus. In any event, the float was sponsored by the Hetrick-Martin Institute, a gay city high school.

from The Advocate, Issue #666, October 18, 1994, page 6

By Jeff Walsh

I was 23 when I accepted that I was gay. I remember it being such a rush to finally talk to other gay people on my home computer. At that point I thought falling in love and living a happy life were things I could never have. I'll also never forget how alone I used to feel after I shut off my computer because that was the only place my gay community existed.