So much Pride poured through the streets of NYC yesterday.

NYC Pride Parade 2016

I’ve never seen so many rainbow flags and I’m from San Francisco.

This 2016 Pride Parade was important in the wake of the Orlando massacre. Love, support, and PRIDE rise above all else. You can say the words, “Love conquers Hate” and believe it’s true. Hope it’s true. Standing in the throngs of Pride, I saw it with my own two eyes.

Love conquers Hate.

Love wins.

Pride Prevails. 

To stand on a New York City street and feel nothing but Love and Pride? For eight hours? That’s an astoundingly powerful force.

I said eight hours. That’s not an exaggeration. The parade started at 12PM. I showed up at 12:40, watched and cheered for a short while, then went to brunch in Brooklyn. I got back to the parade at 5PM and it was still going strong when I left at 7:30PM. NYC Pride is EPIC.

The energy was so similar to Pride 2015 and yet markedly different. Last year NYC Pride happened just days after the Supreme Court ruled on marriage equality. That parade was all joy, all celebration, and pride. The atmosphere of NYC Pride 2016 was much more complicated. Joy and celebration and saying FUCK YOU to fear, sadness, and anger. NOT TODAY, SATAN. Still, every time we heard a siren, decidedly common in New York City, we felt a pang of worry. Were strength and bravery requirements just to show up?

Not really. This was a giant city-wide event on 5th Avenue, there was police presence everywhere.

It definitely does take strength and bravery to be unabashedly yourself.

It takes strength and bravery to love some one. Especially yourself.

That’s what makes Pride beautiful AF.

You can’t stop love. To think otherwise is moronic!!!!

And you can’t stop NYC Pride, not for over EIGHT hours.

Tens of thousands (edit: more like millions!!) of people cheering and waving flags, lining the 5th Avenue in love and support. That’s an unstoppable force.

 

 

I pulled up my Pride socks, put on my rainbow, heart-shaped sunglasses and cheered and waved at Pride.

Because I’m a straight ally. Or straight enough, anyway. I’m not personally enthusiastic about labels.

Because love is love is love.

Because:

HAPPY PRIDE!