Late Bloomer: Building Community
How to Find Queer Friends Later in Life
This is Late Bloomer, an essay series about coming out later in life and the issues around it. This is not an academic dissection. This is a pig farmer talking about how long it took me to catch up, and what that experience has taught me. I hope writing this series helps build allyship and understanding and saves some of you the time I lost.
This essay is about making friendships and connections when you’re in the process of coming out or newly accepting of your sexuality. How our platonic friendships, community, and connections create a better world for all of us. But cultivating it from scratch is some of the hardest farming anyone can do. Coming out later in life can feel so overwhelming and this is one journey you should not travel alone if you can help it. This essay is advice for the new kids, hard chargers, and indoor cats alike. Your people are out there.
Reminder to anyone reading this, if you don’t like consuming essays this way, there is always the option to listen instead. Hit play on the player embedded in this post above, or click the podcast link at the top of this substack. You can listen anywhere, anytime, right from your browser without having to download or subscribe.
Disclaimer: I am not an expert in sexuality or psychology. I am a memoirist sharing experiences and opinions. Do not read this post if sexuality is challenging for you to think about or question at this time.
New to this series? Here are the archives so far:
Part 1: Lesbian Coyotes Mugged Me at a Waterfall (When I realized I was gay)
Part 2: Why Women Take So Long To Realize They’re Queer (Comphet is hell)
Part 3: Fear of Change & Moving Past It (Being brave for yourself & others)
Part 4: Body Issues (Getting over ourselves so we can be happy)
Part 5: Building Community (How to make queer friends)
Part 6: Coming Out (The work of changing identity in adulthood)
Out In The Wild
I’m in the process of getting a bunch of queer friends together for a campfire here at the farm. I started a group chat and we’re trying to figure out a date everyone can make it. Right now plans are up in the air while gals juggle kids, pets, plans, and travel, but everyone seems excited to be included and eager to hang out if they can make it work.
I hope we can pull it off. If we can’t, I hope at least a few of us can share an evening by the fire. I want to show this group of women and nonbinary friends how magical my forest is at night. I want to hear about how they realized who they were with music and fire’s crackle. I want them to talk about their exes while horses sigh near camp and lambs bleat in the distance. I want to laugh and feel that weight off an entire coven of women’s shoulders while fireflies swirl so high in the locust canopy it looks like stars dancing. I want to make s’mores and talk about girls and hear about all the bad dates and great sex and breakups and weddings. I want to laugh about the heartbreak and the hilarious alike. Because when you get a pack of coyotes together in the wild, they tend to howl.
But even if it doesn’t happen, how amazing it is that as woman living alone on a mountain—miles from the closest rural town of 2,000 residents—that I have found this community of a dozen platonic queer friends to host a night like that for?!
Had you told me ten years ago that not only would I be out and proud, but trying to figure out how to herd a dozen lesbians I’d already met/dated/or befriended before to hang out, I don’t think I would have believed you. I mean, I wouldn’t even believe I had managed to keep the farm a decade, much less dealt with coming out. Darling, I wasn’t even capable of considering it.
A decade ago, in my early thirties, I wouldn’t even be able to read this essay. So if you’re questioning anything and able to read this, you’re lightyears ahead of me then. Anything that made me think I wasn’t straight, or might make me feel anything about women beyond friendship, was avoided at all costs.
But today, at 41, I am planning this campfire. Later this afternoon I’m going fly fishing with a queer friend. All of this is happening because I asked. Because I reached out. Because I made the choice that I didn’t want to be alone anymore.
It was the hardest thing I ever did. A lot harder than running a farm and business alone without a plan b. A lot harder than falconry or fishing. Because unlike hobbies and lifestyle and work, sexuality isn’t something you can take a break from. It’s who you are. You can trot along side it and trust yourself, or you can keep pushing it down until it swallows everything, until you can’t even remember what sunlight felt like. I wouldn’t wish that feeling on anyone.
Folks, you can rebuild your life at any point. You can heal from trauma and fear. You can find your people, even if you live alone on a mountain as an eccentric weirdo with a pet goat. I mean holy shit people, Mad Max Fury Road has been out longer than I have—yet, despite the odds and circumstances—I have found an amazing group of queer friends.
It didn’t happen fast and it wasn’t easy, but if a hermit falconer who can’t travel more than a few miles from her yard can host a packed lesbian bonfire, anyone can.
Here’s how I found my people.
The Horrible Irony
I was chatting with my teenage falconry apprentice this past fall while out hawk trapping. I asked her what she did for fun and what the other kids were like? She told me that high school wasn’t the same for her as it was for me. She said it was nothing like the old movies with parties and dances and intense cliques like in Mean Girls.
Maybe this was just her experience, but she said teen lives were very insular and online now. That a young person’s social life has been forever changed (ironically) by social media. After school, everyone retreats to their own online worlds of personal interest, entertainment, sports, fandoms, and communities. There are real-life sports and clubs and friends, but the bulk of the interaction outside of school happens on phones.
And I don’t think that this shift has only affected teenagers…
If you’ve been having a rough time dating, making friends, or finding the energy to meet new people: you are not alone. Humanity has never been more connected while simultaneously feeling so isolated. We have access to limitless information, travel, and the ability to text Japan whenever we want, yet feel more alone than our parent’s generation could possibly fathom.
We don’t have to leave our apartments to get dinner, groceries, or cat litter. Most of us are so tired after work the idea of washing our faces and reapplying eyeliner feels more like drudgery than possibility. I get it. But if you want new people, and you want your life to change, it isn’t coming to you.
There are people reading this that are active on several subreddits and substacks, have group text with family and friends, go to work, come home, and the entire time they are are at work or online, connected to family and friends, they are still alone. It makes us yearn for something more. For another set of eyes that can look into our own and understand those best-friend crushes in middle school and laugh at bad sex stories from our bumbling pasts. We want people that understand us, that care about us, that are going through the same metamorphosis and you can have it, too.
But holy shit do you ever have to work for it.
I’m not scolding you. I’m inviting you.
What Kind of Community Are You Looking For?
When you’re newly out and don’t even know another queer person that isn’t online, it’s hard to know where to start. Here’s my advice: Ask yourself what you want first.
It can be so frustrating trying to find your people by casting a wide a net. Just because your city needs volunteers for the Pride parade doesn’t mean you’ll have anything in common with them besides having already memorized the words to Good Luck, Babe!
If you want a rock climbing buddy, a fellow board game nerd, political activist, interior-design girlie, or teammate; those women are hanging out in different places and circles. So narrow your search to places where the people you want to be around already are.
Knowing what kind of queer friends you want before you look makes it a lot easier to find them. It’s true about romantic prospects and it’s true about platonic ones. So start looking for friends with people you already have something in common with.
Seek them out by interest, passion, and activism. You’ll have to start with organized, public, events, practices, or meetings, but with a growing number of women realizing they’re queer more than ever before, so have the opportunities to find each other!
I think a lot of fresh gays think there will be this instant connection with anyone else that identifies as queer, and to some extent that is true. Yesterday the gas station was packed with dozens of people. The lesbians behind me and I clocked each other instantly and just started gabbing. We were a port in a storm of men in wrap-around sunglasses and pickup trucks, and instantly felt a sense of kinship, but that doesn’t mean we’d make fast friends. People are all different people.
So, if you’re more of an indoor cat, look to join a local queer book club. If you can’t sit still, there’s definitely queer women rock climbing, birding, and hiking in your area. You probably already know if you’re going to hit it off more with the girls at roller derby practice than the girls at the Phoebe Bridgers concert. So start looking for public queer groups that share your interests, even if they’re a farther drive.
I mean, distance means nothing to lesbians. Nothing.
That said! As much as we like to stereotype, your best gay friend may be your polar opposite. I’m a country gal. I raise pigs and hunt rabbits. I fish and garden and apologize to spiders when I run into their webs. And you know who my closest lesbian friend is? A woman that mostly eats vegetation with her wife near a large coastal city and is terrified of spiders to the point where I do a perimeter sweep before she visits.
That’s how it works sometimes. On paper we don’t make any sense. In life, I’d take a bullet for her. And we didn’t meet setting up decorations for queer prom, we met on a dating app. We dated for a summer and she ended it in the fall. Then we didn’t talk for years.
When my last LTR ended, she was the first person to reach out and console me. She was exactly what I needed in that moment, a queer friend. Someone who had felt and experienced heartbreak with a woman and was not there as a rebound, but as a shoulder.
I never thought I’d ever talk to that woman again. But that year I was so heartbroken and alone, and she traveled 3+ hours (each way) to visit and stay with me spring, summer, and fall. No family, distant friends, or anyone outside the queer community moved in for a few days at at time and shared meals and farm work and tears like that. I realized how lucky I was to have someone in my life that knew me, my experiences, so well. Last summer we went to the Eras Tour and this morning we were talking about her recent wedding like giddy middle schoolers.
Life may surprise you.
How To Build Community From Scratch
You’re going to hate this, but it’s by being vulnerable and open. You don’t have to share every thought and feeling on a blog for 20+ years like I did, but it does help.
Being an open book means people can get a real taste of my vibe, personality, and values without ever having to speak a word to me. This is the greatest pro of social media and you should be taking advantage of it, too.
Start With Social Media
If you’re reading this, you’ve got the internet. Great start. Now use it. Create a space online where queer strangers can preview your vibe and decide if you’re a good fit.
I think women I reach out to are comforted by how much they can learn about me without having to ask. It feels safe, confident, and friendly. My instagram, substack, website, books - all of it is already out there. It is intentional. I want you to see me. I want you to reach out and talk to me. I want to be regarded by my people.
What kind of message are you sending by trying to meet people from a private social media or reddit account that tells other women nothing about you?
Now, everything I am about to share is from the perspective of a public figure. I know I am the weird one sharing my thoughts and feelings online for decades. But you must understand why I physically cringe when someone messages me from a private account, especially if they aren’t using their real name or picture. The person messaging me from a cat avatar could be the love of my life, a stalker, a man, or a 14-year-old Irish Setter… but I’ll never know because there is zero way for me to learn anything about her, or even if she really IS a her, when her life online is hidden at first glance.
I strongly suggest making your socials public so women can learn more about you before having to work up the courage to talk to you, even as friends. You don’t have to share anything private. You can even make a second public IG burner account only for the purpose of making friends or dating. Use your real first name, you don’t have to use your last. Show yourself doing the things you love that doesn’t give away anything too personal.
For example: you hiking with your back to the camera, your pet curled in your lap with a book, your favorite baked goods you decorated for the PTA meeting… It serves the same purpose as a dating profile does, only with more context and for platonic intentions.
Do you have to do this? Of course not. Will it help make other queer women and nonbinary pals more comfortable and expedite connections. Yes.
Find Real Life Gays & Go To Them
If there’s no way you’re ever using social media, much less doing so publicly, then you gotta suck it up and meet your new gay friends the old fashioned way: in the wild.
Here’s something to take comfort in: we’re all isolated and too online. We all have some level of anxiety meeting new people, especially as adults, ESPECIALLY when your life has changed so much in the last few years you might still feel whiplash. But darling, this is exactly when you need queer friendships and community the most.
These women will understand, trust me. And through all the chaos of marriages ending, confusion over newly-discovered sexuality, first queer experiences, crushes, politics… queer people are life vests. You have no idea how much.
As scary as it is going out to make friends, please know that no one is judging you nearly as hard as you judge yourself. Don’t overthink it. Make some plans, get a shower, put on clean clothes you feel confident in, and go meet somewhere public and neutral. Maybe you won’t like anyone in your cooking class, but maybe there’s a girl across the hall in creative writing you had a feeling about, so you say hi in the lobby.
Join Up!
I just went to Meetup.com and set my local city as Omaha Nebraska (I figure if you’re an hour away from a city in a red state, it’s not that different than me being 3.5 hours from NYC in conservative part of upstate) and there were SO MANY queer social groups, speed dating events, clubs and pride events it put my blue state area to shame. We’re out here folks, including places you may have never even considered. But you only find out if you look.
Make the effort and reach out, even if all you can do is manage to talk to the group’s organizer online and ask a few questions. You never know where an email can lead. You could be helping that woman set up for her backyard wedding in six months. It all starts with an email.
Oh, and if your area doesn’t have any queer book clubs, or lesbian nights at the axe-throwing bar, or queer hikes… start one. You can start a queer meetup group online right now in under 3 minutes. You aren’t going to catch anything if you never cast your line, darling.
Don’t Discount Dating Apps
If you want to meet queer women, the apps aren’t a bad idea. There are plenty that have settings for people looking for friends or allow you to make that the focus of your profile.
There are several women I have met on Hinge, Lex, HER, and Bumble that may have started as a romantic shot in the dark but turned into friendships. And if the idea of swiping on an app, hell, even downloading one is too much - let that shit go and start looking with the intention of friendship.
I’m only speaking for myself here, but I bet a lot of you can relate. As queer women what we find attractive in people - regardless if it’s friends or dates, probably isn’t that different. When I am swiping through the apps all I am looking at is her eyes 99% of the time. Meaning, is this person looking directly at the camera without a filter with a face that feels “good” and by that, I mean that unspeakable attractiveness and comfort you feel based on how someone presents themselves to the world. This has nothing to do with sexual attraction, I am talking about the person in a crowded room you know would hand you toilet paper from their stall if you were out. I’m talking about a connection you can already imagine.
Go with your gut when it comes to platonic friendships too.
Don’t Give Up
There are queer women in this town and online that I have tried to date or befriend, and they weren’t interested in either. I’m embarrassed how long it took me to take the hint in some cases, but that’s how it goes. You can like someone, want to spend time around them, respect and care about them, but they don’t owe you a second of their time or internal world if you aren’t right for them, even platonically. If someone makes that clear, respect it.
But there are also neighbors, farmers, and friends within a few miles of me that DID work out! I have a queer friends with kids, married and single. I have other childless friends and friends whose children are grown. I know local trans men, cis gay men, lesbians, and PLENTY of straight allies. All of these people create a loving and vibrant community I never expected to come out of the woodwork in rural America. And the only reason I have them is because I went out and found them.
I messaged them on dating apps or went to their poetry readings. I put myself out there without any expectations, just hope it works out. There have been bad attempts, awful first dates, stressful conversations, embarrassing awkward moments, ghosting, and being left on read a disturbing amount of times, but that comes with the territory. Take NOTHING personal.
Don’t waste any time being hurt or upset about things not working out. What other queer women are looking for may not be what you have to offer. That doesn’t mean the next woman you sit next to at Lesbian Cinema Night at your local library won’t be just as thrilled as you are to talk about Dakota Johnson’s new lesbian late-bloomer movie for three hours during coffee after.
If You Want It, Make it Happen
I get it. Life is busy, careers, family, everyday errands and responsibilities make even gathering the energy to do anything but swipe TikToks from bed feel impossible, but if you’re newly out, it’s worth the time and effort.
There are other women in your exact situation. So many. Some of you aren’t there yet. Some of you are reading this deep in the closet, your husband or boyfriend in the next room, unable to even imagine being single, out, and planning to attend a lesbian campfire.
But that was also true of mostly everyone invited to this event I’m hosting. Most of us denied who we were, dated dudes, and instead of pretending or pushing things down we made it out and started living our real lives. And I think once you manage to do all that, actually bloom into who you were meant to be, meeting another lesbian in the wild isn’t something to be nervous about, it’s just coming home.
If you can’t even imagine this yet, it’s okay. I know what it feels like to be where you are now. I was so lonely, even surrounded by straight friends. And let me be clear, there is nothing wrong with having straight friends, holy crow nothing wrong at all! But being around queer women is different. It’s warriors and mothers and lovers and wise friends. It’s a level of comfortably and belonging I never had before, and it was my own cage I kept myself in because I was too afraid to change.
Don’t be afraid of who you are. Go out and make some friends this Pride. There’s definitely something going on within an hour of you, wherever you are. Even if all you do is show up and say hi to the person behind you in line for iced coffee, it’s something to be proud of. That’s the whole point darling.
Now go find your pack.
Reply With Q&A Questions Please!
Friends! I would like to include another bonus podcast where I answer your questions, but I need you to hit reply to this email, or open up IG, or however you want to holler at me and send me a question about sexuality, gay sex, dating, coming out, anything. If you’re straight and curious about something, ASK. If you’re daughter or cousin is gay and you don’t understand something, ASK! I need at least five and it’s entirely anonymous. I really want to sit outside on the farm and walk around talking to animals and answering your questions. Got a bad date you want to hash out, spill. Nervous your teenager is a lesbian and not sure how to address it, talk to me. Send that email I want to hear from you! Maybe you’ll be at next year’s gay campfire!
Thank you for reading Late Bloomer here on Cold Antler Farm. This content for the queer community will always be free to read and listen, but I encourage you to upgrade your subscription to paid if you can afford it without hindrance and find value in it.
This farm is currently 2 months behind on the mortgage and barely making it by, and the entire point of this substack is to earn a living writing again.
If you can’t swing it, then by all means, ask for a comped subscription and I will give it to you. If you can afford it and feel this work has value, please pay for it. This farm needs your support, you have no idea how much.
I love these stories.
Actually, I love everything you write, so that follows.