Late Bloomer: Rural Queer Survival Guide
Tips For the Questioning, Newly-Out, & Homos Home for the Holidays
This is Late Bloomer, an essay series about coming out later in life. This is not an academic dissection. This is a 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.
Last post in this series I talked about subtle homophobia and how coming out later in life can change how people see you. This post is about what it’s like being a queer woman in the country. Rural living has it’s advantages and disadvantages—but home, like sexuality—is a feeling that can’t be helped.
Are you a cowboy like me? Saddle up, let’s talk about it.
Disclaimer: I am not an expert in sexuality or psychology. I am a lesbian memoirist sharing experiences and opinions. Do not read or listen to 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)
Part 7: Subtle Homophobia (You’re different now, pay attention)
I Came Out Here
I grew up in a small town. I went to college in a small town. With the exception of 18 months in Knoxville after graduation; I have only lived and worked in rural areas my whole life. I love it out here.
This is the pace and lifestyle I want. I want to wake up to roosters and fall asleep to owls. I want to tend land, hike forests, ride horses, and dig gardens. For some of us the country is simply where we belong, regardless of our gender, profession, or tax bracket. But what if you’re queer? And what if you realized this later in life?
It’s not an uncommon occurrence these days, especially now that women are more aware of comphet than ever before. But that doesn’t help us country mice that already have marriages, kids, mortgages, and (in my case) whole freaking farms before we even considered kissing girls. And sadly, the majority of kissable girls are far away in coastal cities and college towns. What is a coyote to do?
Take heart, I’m here to speak the truth darlin’.
Being gay is hard everywhere so you might as well live where you can afford a pony.
My entire queer experience—from questioning to first kisses and dates to a partner moving in with me all happened in the outskirts of a town of 2,000 residents. To some people that sounds horrific, isolating, perhaps even dangerous. It has been nothing of the sort. This past decade has been the best of my life and it’s only getting better.
I thought being late to the party on a farm meant a life sentence of loneliness, but that turned out to be false. Being gay out here has been lovely, even though it took me so long to catch up. I was 35 before I started dealing with my sexuality, and certain it was too late for me to ever actually find romance. Yet two years after sapphic acceptance I was kissing girls in thunderstorms.
Ever since my first date with a woman, intimacy finally made sense. It has been magical. Truly, breathlessly, ferociously, magical.
All of that was waiting for me the whole time. I just needed to work up the courage to accept it. You can, too. Your timing is perfect, actually…
The Internet Changed Everything
There’s a reason you think “city” when you think about gay people. Historically, they had to relocate to where they could live in peace, often that’s cities.
It’s a statistics game. We’re a minority, and lesbians are an ever smaller subset of that minority. So if you ever wanted to meet anyone besides the two other gal pals in your zip code, you’d have to pack your bags and head for the big town.
But not anymore! It’s no longer 1982. You don’t have to escape your hometown to feel safe enough to kiss a girl. There are thousands of thriving queer communities in rural America, including in places you would never suspect.
Queer people are everywhere and you’ve got the internet. You can download dating apps, set it to women and a perimeter as far as you’re willing to drive for coffee, and start swiping. There is a queer community in your phone waiting right now.
Dating Apps Are Your Friend
20 years ago if I wanted to meet queer women I’d have drive into the city, find the right bar, have awkward conversations, and then either make a hasty alcohol-fueled choice with a stranger or go back to my hotel sad and disappointed. High risk, low reward.
Things are so different now. Dating apps brought us cowgirls mid-sized city hopes. If it wasn’t for Lex, HER, Hinge, and Instagram I probably wouldn’t have a sex life, much less a shot at a relationship. But we live in the future and I can login anywhere with a hotspot and start talking to girls.
On the apps you can sort through every preference from kids and education to politics and smoking habits. You can match with other queer women from your hay loft, and with women you know share the same values and interests as you. Say whatever you want about the coldness of online dating, it’s really nice being able to set some dealbreakers and avoid them.
Online dating’s worth a shot if you live anywhere you have to drive to a pharmacy. Don’t be shy. Especially if you’re new to dating women. I can speak from experience as a woman looking for someone to date, it is a quiet thrill seeing a new face show up on the apps that isn’t a couple looking for a third, ENM, or a married woman looking for a girl on the side.
But if you’re seriously doubtful you’ll pull anything from the internet living so far away from the city, I’ll go on. I’m hell at going on.
Put Yourself Out There
Get over yourself and live today. Do not feel like you need to lose 20lbs or get a haircut or new clothes to launch a dating profile. You are dating women, and dating women is nothing like dating men, even in places where tractors pull up to drive-thru windows.
I am speaking in generalizations here: but on the whole, straight dating culture (and gay mens’ dating culture) is based entirely on what appeals to the Male Gaze™. Straight women want to look sexy the way they were taught sexy looks to powerful men.
Generally, if men are involved anyway in the equation, a lot of attraction is based on looks. Women are worried they don’t look good enough to be considered. Men feel the same way, and are watching videos on how to gain muscle and dress better. All with the hope you look good enough for a chance at love. I think to a lot of people that is the dating game, regardless of sexuality.
It’s not like that in wlw spaces.
You’re Hotter Than You Realize
When I started dating women I thought I was attracted to what I was told was attractive my whole life. Almost like I was trying to date women I wished I looked like. But it turns out, it doesn’t stick once men are out of the picture.
The best way I can describe it is this: what makes me carnally attracted to another woman isn’t how she looks, it’s if she wants me back. It’s the being NEEDED that turns me on, that invitation. Without that reciprocated desire, I could care less what the woman looks like, she’s not going to turn me on. She’s not even interesting to date.
In practice, most queer women aren’t as focused on physicality. With the exception of women *just* coming out—most of us are looking past what you may worry are flaws. We don’t even see them.
We worship round bellies and kiss stretch marks. We love curves and warmth and how jeans slide down the hip. We aren’t forced to see women as an object of male desire, and without that constant reminder you’re not worthy of sex unless you look like Megan Fox, you stop caring about it. For most lesbians, what we were told was “hot” fades into the white noise of our 11th orgasm on a first-date weekend.
I love women. And the more time I spend with queer women, the more about them I’m attracted to. I love athletic women and soft women. I love serious women and goofy women. I love wild body hair or none at all. I love short gals and towering mansions with legs… And the coolest part?
I love myself more now, too.
Create Community From Scratch
Don’t know a single other queer woman in your town? Fake it till you make it.
You can start creating a more comfortably queer life right, alone, in your living room. There are always the voices of queer women emanating from my domain. LGBT podcasts, movies, shows, and music are often on while I clean or work.
Besides media, there are online communities too. Subreddits, discords, facebook groups, and Youtube channels dedicated entirely to women in the same situation as you right now. It feels pretty gay in this house when I’m reading the day’s newest posts on r/latebloomerlesbians and Las Culturistas is playing softly in the background.
And don’t forget, there are ways to connect with women IRL that aren’t dating apps. You may only be looking for friends and community, not a date. Sites like Meetup.com have queer clubs and events near you. Your local Pride Center, or the closest one to you, may also have resources, clubs, and groups listed. Do some research 90’s style. Start typing into search bars. Sometimes just asking in black and white makes the impossible seem real.
If you’re feeling depressed and alone out in the country, watch Somebody Somewhere on HBO. It’s a show about a straight woman who moves back to her family’s farm during a grieving midlife crisis and is adopted by the local underground queer community. Everyone looks like a regular person, which I love. It is the most heart-warming goddamn show on television and Bridget is incredible.
What About Personal Safety?
It is sadly true that you need to be more careful out here. There are some precautions I take in public, but they are the kind of precautions anyone would take if they were uncertain of the folks around them.
If I’m in a situation where I don’t know if the people behind me in the checkout line think I’m a colorful eccentric, gritty farm girl, or threat to common decency, I act accordingly.
I don’t look at my feet and cower. I hold my head high, but never make eye contact with anyone in particular. I lay low (for me) and only interact cheerfully with people I know or initiate conversation with me. I’m always polite, but not necessarily inviting. It helps me feel safe when I don’t know how people feel about me as a concept.
If someone makes a rude comment or says something homophobic, I don’t call them on it like I used to. I have learned there are people in these farm towns that believe demons are real and I’m broken and dangerous, an actual social threat. Other people don’t care about religion at all, but see any lesbian with a rainbow sticker on her Subaru as a soldier of the Woke Agenda, the political enemy.
My gut instinct when people were shitty in public was to humiliate them. I used to call people out on a slur by talking to them like a child that pulled down his pants at daycare, explaining that other people can hear them, and they’re embarrassing themselves. It’s a tough needle to thread, but I got good at it. My best weapon in a tight spot is my wit, comebacks are easy; but as I’ve gotten older I genuinely worry if I do this to someone who can’t handle shame I will be met with violence. I have seen it happen to others.
I feel 6’7” and 300lbs of solid badass, but in reality I’m a 5’2” and three and a half stacked feed bags top my weight class. I have a black belt in Tae Kwon Do and can do more pushups than most of your husbands, but I’m still always going to be a little tiny woman to most people. I piss off the wrong guy on a bad day it doesn’t change the fact I live alone in the woods.
So I own guns.
It’s not for everyone and I am not suggesting you get one yourself. But as a hunter, farmer, and my only protector; I am armed. I sleep with a shotgun within arm’s reach and have others around the house. I am not expecting danger—and I have yet to have anyone follow me home after saying or doing something homophobic—but I refuse to live in fear of it.
I don’t want you confusing my situational awareness with shame. I’m not hiding in corner—I’m yapping so much locals hear me coming before they see me—but I am also not looking to start any conversations. I stay quiet in the laundromat and read in my car during the cycles. I appear less approachable, headphones on or I’ll take out my phone and have a loud fake conversation if a guy makes me feel uncomfortable alone in a parking garage.
Sometimes being safe is being aware. Govern yourself accordingly.
Emotional Gaydar Is All You’ve Got
When I was coming out NO ONE should have been surprised based on my wardrobe alone. But I live in an area where straight women unironically wear Carhartt, beanies, and hiking boots to the bar on Friday night. Everyone looks like a lesbian around here.
It’s not because they are cosplaying or sexually confused. It’s because they are farmers and welders and farriers and gardeners. Clothing is about utility, not identity. Arguably, urban queer women wearing spiffy workwear to their program management jobs are appropriating us.
That doesn’t mean it isn’t confusing as hell for us sapphics. The general vibe is this: everyone looks gay, very few are actually are.
I remember bringing a date from Massachusetts to our local brewery and she looked around stunned. She commented on how amazing it was seeing all theses queer women around us in a small-town bar?! I had to explain they’re all straight. There’s maybe four out-and-proud wlw couples in town that aren’t in high school or retired. She argued with me for a bit because she insisted no one dresses that gay who is straight. I assured her they do. Wait til you see a horse girl*
Emotional gaydar is all you got. There aren’t many queer spaces to mingle and fashion is clearly useless, so trust your gut. When you meet her, you’ll know. If you like someone and they seem into you in more-than-friendly way, don’t be afraid to ask a leading question. Fortune favors the brave and you have no reason to be afraid.
*I refuse to believe all horse girls aren’t at least bi. I am 67% kidding.
Happy Trails
When I came out (back during the late 1989/early rep CE), I didn’t have a single close lesbian friend. Now I have mornings filled with voice messages from exes turned besties on their way to work and gay friends just a few towns away.
I have women in my life now that checked in at 3am after a tragic election or would drive 3+ hours to sit with me when my dog died. It’s my queer friends that make birthdays and holidays special, my chosen family. The more queers I met through friends and dating, the more I felt a part of something warm and good.
And I found that out here, alone. Yes, it did take me 37 years to catch up, but I made it out. And even hours away from the closest lesbian bar I have a whole community that happened to me, because of me.
When you’re ready, you’ll get there, too. For now, be grateful you can look up and see stars. Live for the moment, as queer people it’s all we’ve got, and stay alert and prepared. There’s no reason to be alone, lots of coyotes out there.
We get the lives we feel we deserve. If you’re reading this closeted, stuck, questioning, or hopeless - choose to *try* imagining a better life. You may be spending these holidays in places and with people that don’t see the beauty in your true self, but I promise, there are women out there who do. They just can’t wait.
Have a safe and warm Thanksgiving, folks.
I’m grateful for you.
Be Part Of The Farm
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Holy crow, do I hope that was the safe bet.
Love all this, and you!