(I am a young woman looking for skinny jeans in the mens section of a popular department store. I’m straight but want jeans with actual pockets for work. Everything goes well until a middle ages woman starts talking to me)

Woman: Honey I know what you’re going through. I’ve had to buy my husband pants for the last 20 years. The things we do for our men.

Me: Actually I’m buying them for me

(Instantly starts scowling at me and before I can explain myself just starts going off)

Woman: People like you are the reason so many bad things are happening to this country. It’s your perversion that has caused all these recent hurricanes. If you don’t find Jesus and accept yourself as a woman you will burn!

Me: *trying not to be speechless* I’m just trying to find jeans with real pockets so I can keep my phone in them while I work.

Woman: *starts eyeing me up and down* You better be, no one wants to burn!

(In Grade 12 Social Studies discussing the implications of World War II)

Girl: So, like, the Germans and the Japanese won the war, right?

(I am getting my nails done for the first time at a friend’s salon. I was thinking about asking her about doing a pedicure.)

Friend: “Okay, how do you want your nails filed, oval or straight?”

Me: “Straight’s fine. I was thinking about getting a pedifile—oops I mean Pedicure done.”

(My friend’s husband sticks his head in the room.)

Husband: “What the h*** did I just hear? We don’t do those here, weirdo.”

Me: “I knew how bad it was going to be, but I just couldn’t stop it.”

(It’s one of the last days of sixth grade for me and I’m in the bus on the way home. My stop is one of the last stops so there aren’t many people still on board and I’m in the back by myself. I decide to be “rebellious” in a very 11-year-old way and slouch in the rear seat and, while the bus is stopped at a long light, I press my hand against the rear window with my middle finger fully extended. After a couple seconds I start to wonder if there’s actually anybody there, so I look and there’s a guy, probably in his late 20’s, sitting in the driver’s seat of the car directly behind us absolutely losing his mind, screaming and shouting and gesturing at me/the bus. Sitting next to him is a woman with her face buried in her hands, completely withdrawn. Since I was 11 and *all adults* were still authority figures to me in my mind, I was mortified. I moved up to the front half of the bus and hid in a seat. I was right in front of a friend, now, and told him what happened. The bus started to move again and we were driving down a long, 4-lane boulevard for well over a mile. I looked out the side of the bus and saw the guy who had been behind us leaning out the side of his car as he sped along side the bus, screaming at the bus driver to pull over. Again, I was mortified. Eventually we turned off the main road into my neighborhood and the guy in the car kept going straight, never to be seen again. It was at this point the bus driver spoke up.)

Driver: “Does anybody know what that guy was screaming about next to us back there?”

Friend: “YEAH! [My name] GAVE HIM THE FINGER!”

Me: “NO I DIDN’T!”

Friend: “YOU JUST TOLD ME YOU DID!”

Me: “I WAS JUST KIDDING!”

(It was dropped after that and never came up again. It’s been over 25 years since that happened and to this day I wish I could know what the heck that guy’s problem was. No one likes to be tossed the bird, but I feel like most people can also take the source into consideration when it’s coming from a 60-pound weasel on a yellow school bus.)

A group of my friends and I plan a trip to visit Six Flags. We spend weeks getting excited about it and the day finally arrives. We park in the parking lot and as we walk to the gates, I notice an unusually high number of rainbow stickers on cars. Then when we get into the park, we notice a lot of groups of scantily-clad effeminate men, and a lot of groups of butch women, lots of people of the same gender doing things out in the open that would get a straight couple kicked out of a public place, and more double entendres in conversations with strangers while standing in line than you could wave a rainbow flag at. Within an hour, everyone else in my group figured it out, too. Turns out there was a pride event in St. Louis the day before and it was agreed upon that everyone attending would go to Six Flags the next day, though it was apparently never officially sponsored by Six Flags. Gotta say I’m kinda glad we skipped the water park.

Also that day I ran into some people I went to high school with (who I know for sure weren’t there for the events, for the record). It was nice to say hi to them and then we went about our day.

Several weeks later I ran into one of those people from high school and we talked about our respective amusement park visits.

Me: “Yeah, that was a fun day. Especially amusing because it was gay day,” I said.

Friend: *confused* “Gay day?”

Me: “Yeah . . . did . . . did you not notice that well over half the people there were homosexual? They weren’t exactly being discreet about it. There was a pride event in St. Louis that weekend.”

Friend: *the lights suddenly turning on* “Oh my gosh! That explains so much!”