Oral History Program Pat Tie Interviewed by Sarah Langsdon 24 May 2022 Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Pat Tie Interviewed by Sarah Langsdon 24 May 2022 Copyright © 2023 by Weber State University, Stewart Library Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. The reviewed and corrected transcripts are indexed, printed, and bound with photographs and illustrative materials as available. The working files, original recording, and archival copies are housed in the University Archives. Project Description Queering the Archives oral history project is a series of oral histories from the LGBTQ+ communities of Weber, Davis and Morgan Counties of Northern Utah. Each interview is a life interview, documenting the interviewee’s unique experiences growing up queer. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. It reflects personal opinion offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ____________________________________ Rights Management This work is the property of the Weber State University, Stewart Library Oral History Program. It may be used freely by individuals for research, teaching and personal use as long as this statement of availability is included in the text. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Tie, Pat, an oral history by Sarah Langsdon, 24 May 2022, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, Special Collections & University Archives (SCUA), Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. iii Abstract: The following is an oral history interview with Pat Tie conducted on May 24, 2022 by Sarah Langsdon. Pat shares her childhood experiences growing up half-Asian and bisexual in Utah. She talks about her schooling, military experiences, and the impact of sexual assault on her queerness. Also present is Raegan Baird. SL: It is May 24, 2022. It is almost 1:30. We are in the Stewart Library interviewing Pat Tie. I am Sarah Langsdon interviewing, and on camera is Raegan Baird. My pronouns are she/her and I identify as a cis heterosexual woman. RB: My pronouns are she/her, and I'm the same thing. SL: So the first question is, what are your pronouns and how do you identify, Pat? PT: My pronouns are she/her and I identify as bisexual. SL: Okay, so now the first real question: where and when were you born? PT: How specific do I need to be with where? I don't know the hospital by name. SL: You don't need to be telling the hospital. PT: I was gonna say, exactly at [checks watch]. Okay, February 22nd, 2002. All twos, which is fun, and then, Utah. SL: In Utah. Yeah, that's fine. You could tell us the city, but... PT: I don't know, honestly. I mean, I grew up in Syracuse, but I don't know where I was born technically. I know nothing. SL: That's interesting. So why do you know nothing? PT: My memory is terrible. I'm sure my mother has told me when I needed to fill out paperwork, but I was like, “This is inconsequential information.” SL: Okay. I just didn't know if there was some deep family secret. PT: Oh, for sure. I was actually switched, you know. They stole me off someone else's porch. SL: Okay. So tell us a little bit about your family. PT: Oh, so there's that loaded question. 1 SL: It’s okay if you don't want to. PT: Oh, no, I'm good. It's just a lot. My mom's from Thailand. My dad's from Idaho. So you got, like, Asian, white potato, right? Mixy-mixy. Most of my dad's side is still in Idaho and most of my mom's side is still in Thailand. We're like the only ones that are in Utah besides his brother. So her side's Buddhist, and then his side is Christian and LDS. SL: Okay. Interesting dynamics. PT: Yeah, they're divorced now. No one saw it coming at all. It's just me and my sister and my mom that live at the house now. SL: I was going to ask if you had any siblings. PT: Yeah, I got a little sister, A, she's the cutest little thing ever. She'll always be 12 to me, even though she's like a year younger than me. Like, “You're 12, good talk.” SL: So you just live with your mom and your sister? PT: Yes. SL: You said you grew up in Syracuse? PT: That's where we still are. SL: Okay. What do you remember about growing up? Anything? PT: Syracuse is a fun place. It seems nice, but it's kind of not. I don't know. My dad left the church when we were in Syracuse pretty early on, so I remember not being able to play with any of the kids because we were ‘devil children’. I'd go over to my next door-neighbors like a tiny little child does and get like, “Oh, we can't talk to you because you're going to Hell.” I was like, “Oh, okay, cool.” It was like that for the whole neighborhood of kids and school. It's like the first question you get asked, too, like, “What are you… you LDS?” “No.” 2 “We can't talk to you.” I was like, “Oh, okay, that narrows down the pool very much.” Then our truck got keyed a couple of times and I had little pebbles and eggs thrown at my window all the time that we always had to wash off. That eventually went away, I think, when all the kids grew up and realized that that was stupid and then that didn't happen anymore. I still don't talk to any of the neighborhood, really. We had this really cute old couple that was next door and it was Grandma and Grandpa A, and they were like our second grandparents when we were growing up. Super cute. We'd bring them cookies and bread and they'd always pick us up from school if our parents couldn't. But he just passed away, and she also. It was like right after because you know how it is. “We can't live without each other.” So they just got new people in their house. SL: So were you raised obviously not raised LDS. PT: No, but my dad's still Christian. I like to say like my mom was Buddhist, my dad was Christian [points to her right to signify her father's side] so therefore I'm confused, not to be confused with Confucianism. We just didn't have religion in our house, besides the occasional remarks that my mom would make about going to the Sunday Temple, but for us, it was more about food. We would just go to see all of our Thai friends and eat a lot of really good food. Then we never went to like that [points right] side of the church just ‘cause our neighborhood wasn't really nice to us. So it's like, why go anyways? I know we experimented a little bit when I was in high school and we went to a couple and I was like, “No,” but [points right] he definitely makes comments about his stuff, which is fine. I mean, it's what he practices. Whenever I'd go to my grandma's house, we were required to go to church and she put us in the Sunday school thing. Oh, we hated it. We hated it, but it's what you do. 3 SL: So did your mom teach you Thai traditions as you were growing up? PT: We didn't learn a lot. When we were younger, there was a lot of that Asian mom presence, for sure, but not as much as the other communities in Utah. We didn't have to play three musical instruments and speak five languages. One language is enough. But we visited her family in Thailand a lot, which was fun because they always felt more like family than [points] that side, like super welcoming. They were always super sweet. So we didn't learn a lot. I wish I knew more, but it's Utah, so it's kind of hard to get a lot of that. You know what I mean? Like, there's nothing here besides going to the temple, but we'd have Thai food like every night, and now we have Thai food every night cause my dad's not here. So we're just like Asians all the way. Like I said, we go to the Thai temple a lot. I have the dress, like the old-timey one and like the new versions too. We used to do a lot. We don't do a lot anymore, besides just know with the community and stuff like that. SL: So did you have a best friend growing up? PT: Oh, Lord. Did I? I don't think I did. I mean, I had one in elementary school, but she was like one of those kids that would hang out with me to, like, steal. The one time we brought her to our house, she stole like half of my things, and then they were pawned off to the other girls in school to make fun of me. Then she became friends with them, and then it was like, whatever you could do to chase the skinny little Asian around. I was like, “No, no.” SL: So was there a lot of bullying then? PT: Oh, for sure. I had a lot of bullying all the way up until past high school. I went to Bluff Ridge and I got it from the teachers too, which like, it doesn't make sense for Syracuse because they're just like, “Oh, cute little Syracuse.” They were rude because my mom's Thai, right, so she doesn't understand the LDS Christian 4 customs, and so she put me in a spaghetti-strap dress. She's like, “It's hot outside. My kid's a kid, not a big deal.” Then the lunch ladies would refuse to serve me because they're like, “We don't serve tramps here.” So my shoulders were showing as a five year old. I was like, “Okay, yeah.” I got chased a lot and pushed and shoved. There's this one time where I was walking in class and they all came up, like five kids, shoved me on the concrete and my face slid like this, and the whole side of my face was all scraped and stuff. The teacher was like, “No, I saw it out the window. You slipped.” I was like, “I did, didn't I.” Then I think it got so bad that I didn't want to go to school anymore. My parents found out that the lunch ladies weren't serving me, and then there was a conniption and a half, which is fair. My dad has OCD and bipolar disorder, so he can get pretty angry, so he went in and shouted the whole school up. I don’t know which it was, but they didn't want me there anymore, or we weren't welcome back anymore. Either one. We moved to a charter school or something like that. I went to Good Foundations Academy in Riverdale. I had really good teachers. I met one of my favorite teachers there that I still talk to to this day. But kids still weren't that nice, so I kind of just sat in the corner and made friends with all the other people that didn't have friends. I watched people play Yu-Gi-Oh, and my favorite sport was tetherball because I could just stand there, do it with myself for hours. I didn't have to interact with anyone because I wasn't allowed in foursquare. I was allowed in soccer for the first couple of times, but my favorite shoes were cowboy boots and I never took them off. You can't play soccer with cowboy boots. I kicked way too many kids in the shins and I was no longer allowed to play. They're like, “We don't want you and your 5 cowboy boots anymore,” which is fair. I made really, really good friends with the lunch ladies and the library teacher, and I spent most of my recesses inside. SL: Okay, so you went to Good Foundations. Did you continue in charter schools? PT: Yeah, I followed that teacher because she was my sixth grade teacher and she was going to the new school that they were building, Utah Military Academy, which is now right next door. I just followed her because I liked her so much, and then we helped build the school. Oh it was nasty, before we painted it all and everything. I went there until halfway through eighth grade and then things there got fun. My favorite teacher went away at that point and I wanted to stay, but then they got a new dean and the dean was like, “I hate kids.” They were just terrible and weren't teaching anything at that point. So I left and went to Legacy, but because at that school they didn't know how to school, they let me take 11th grade science and like all my classes were like in the 11th grade. I was like, “Eighth grade science is boring to me.” But they forget that in the eighth grade, you have to do eighth grade science. I didn't know that; I'm a kid. I'm like, “Yeah, do whatever you want, you know?” So when I went to Legacy I had to restart, which wasn't fun, and then I did Legacy until the end, because it was like a junior high. Then I went to NUAMES and NUAMES is awesome. SL: Did you do NUAMES Davis, since there's now a Davis and an Ogden one? PT: Yeah. I did it at Davis and all the teachers were so nice and sweet. Definitely a totally different environment, because Legacy was, and I say this lightly, a bunch of really rich white kids, like they take hoverboards to their classes. But NUAMES was like, we were all gay. It was awesome. Everyone was so welcoming and sweet and extra. It was fun. SL: So when did you notice you were different? PT: I don't know if I ever did. Well, besides being Asian. 6 SL: Yes, which automatically puts you in another category. PT: Well, I don't know. I used to look a lot more Asian than I do, so when I got to high school, I kind of got away with no one really asking, because I look really Eurocentric compared to my sister, who is a lot darker because my mom's darker. I got a lot of my dad's, and my sister got a lot of my mom's. But I don't know. I mean, as far as being gay, I kind of grew up always being like, “I don't care. Like, if I love them, I love them. It's not going to matter. Shouldn't matter.” I kind of had that mindset until high school where I was like, “Yeah, everything's good. I can just be whatever I want to be because if I love them, I love them.” So I was pretty open. SL: Did you talk to your parents about that? PT: No, not really. I found out this year that my mom had wanted to have a girlfriend because in Asia they're really open about it, especially Thailand. We have one of the most open and strong trans communities out there. We have full pageants and you wouldn't be able to tell. They're smoking. Our faces are just better for transitioning, I think. But we're really, really open over in Asia, so she never talked about it as if it was a big deal. She kind of would be like, “Well, I mean, you love who you love,” when things would come up. I think my dad was always kind of like that. He was like, “I mean, you love who you love. But if we keep legalizing things, people are going to marry their dogs.” It was like, “Oh, okay, interesting.” So he was open, but then not at the same time. He would say things and you could just tell it made him uncomfortable. I know that his mom was totally not, both his mom and his dad. My grandpa's pretty sweet, but because he's LDS, he's like, “Oh, since you guys aren't going to church, I know you guys are going to Hell,” but he's nice enough to keep it to himself. My grandma is not the same way. She's very Christian. She's like, “You 7 can't watch Harry Potter because you'll go to hell because it's wizardry, witchcraft, kind of Christian.” One of her family relatives was lesbian and they had a wedding and they invited them to it. I was at their house when it happened, and I just remember how big of a deal it was. She was livid that they invited her, so pissed off, they ripped up the invitation and called to be like, “How dare you bring me into your sin,” and stuff like that? I was like, “Cool, cool.” SL: Have you officially come out to your parents? PT: I don't think I'll ever come out to my dad just because it's uncomfortable and weird. But I think I told my mom and she was like, “Okay.” My sister’s very openly bi because she really wanted to date her best friend. My mom was like, “Ooh, do it,” so I know my mom's fine with it, especially after hearing all of her stories. She's like, “Well, let me tell you about this girl that I wanted to date.” SL: But less so with your dad? PT: Yeah, it just seems like a really awkward conversation. I mean, I don't have a good relationship with my dad, so we can start off with that because I don't think I'd be willing to talk to him about a lot in general. SL: So you're involved in the military, or you have been? PT: Civil Air Patrol. It was the Airforce Auxiliary. It's like a nonprofit volunteer organization from ages 12 to 21. It's like JROTC, but with piloting and aerospace and some fun activities. I did that for eight years. That was my whole identity growing up, was Civil Air Patrol, and a lot of it was just wanting to get out of the house and never wanting to be home, and it allowed me a great way of doing that. SL: So when did you get involved in that? When you were twelve? 8 PT: When I was 12, when I went to UMA, and then they started the program, so I immediately went into CAP through there and just always stayed. We had a couple really crappy commanders that left, and so I was kind of like, “Oh no, I'm going to stay and make it work,” after watching everyone else leave. There was me, B, and G, three people that kind of stayed and rebuilt it all. Then I had one of my cadets at the time, because I was a Sergeant, DS, who killed himself when he was 14. That shook my world, and so I was like, “I'm never leaving these kids.” CAP was a big program for all of us to just go and escape from reality, if that makes sense, just not have to deal with the world. So now I was like, “I'm never leaving these kids again,” and that was that. SL: So you did that clear until you couldn't be any more, right? You said you did it for eight years, so up to 20. PT: Yeah, I did it until I was cadet commander. Then after cadet commander, I just had college and school. There was a couple of things that happened to me in CAP and I was like, “I can't stay here anymore.” SL: You said that was a good escape for you. What are some of the things you learned? PT: Geez. Everything. I mean, that's why I love the program so much is because after I learned, I got to teach everyone, right? So you learn a lot of things, like how to dress professionally through a uniform, but also just how to dress professionally in general, how to speak professionally. Through the different leadership positions, I, of course, learned leadership, but I also got really good at talking to parents and adults through communication as well as planning events and all of the extra random skills I learned, like search and rescue and teaching. I think time management was a huge thing that I learned because while I was at UMA, I was doing UMA Choir and we traveled for choir. I was also in Cyber Patriots and CAP, 9 so I'd show up to school at like six, do my homework, because I was like, “This is when school starts. Totally,” to just never be home. I would go to school, and then we'd have team time, and then I'd leave early from team time, go to Cyber Patriots, which I had my own team, so I was like a deputy commander. Then I'd leave early to go to a staff meeting for CAP, and then I'd go to a CAP event. On a weekend, there'd either be a UMA event, choir event or a CAP event. Never home. That became a problem. Eventually they noticed and were like, “You're never home.” My dad would just show up with the trailer. He'd be like, “Mandatory camping trip right now,” whether I had already said yes to an obligation or not. I didn't like that very much, but I think my mom got really depressed about it. Which is fair, I mean, she never saw her daughter for a couple of years. I just didn't want to be home, didn't want to see my dad. SL: So when did your parents divorce? PT: That was new, actually. Couple of years ago. It's still pretty fresh, I guess. My mom was like, “I mean, will you guys be okay if we get a divorce?” We're like, “Oh, thank God. Yeah. Can we speed this up for you? We already printed out the paperwork. Here you go.” She was like, “Oh, okay.” We were like, “Yeah, it's going to be fun,” cause he left first, actually, which is funny. He left first because he was like, “I just can't handle this family anymore,” and he just left. He used to do that all the time. He would get really, really upset and go on like screaming rampages a couple of times, but I was really the only one that got it. He would wait until on the way to school. He would drop off my sister, then I was in Riverdale, so he had all that time to yell at me. So he'd drop off my sister, lock the doors and then just go off on me. I was always losing things as a kid, which didn't help either, and I was super like klutzy and forgetful about a lot of things. So he 10 could just very easily yell at me, and my sister was always home, so she was always helping out with chores and doing all those things. She later on saw that I would get yelled at, so her response to that was like, “Oh, I'm just going to be perfect so I don't get yelled at,” which I mean, everyone has their own coping mechanism. I don't blame her for it now, but back then it was like, “Ugh, you little shit.” Which, of course, only made me look worse. It would be silly things. I'd leave a candy wrapper on a table and he'd be like, “You're worthless and pathetic. You can't do anything right,” and push me against a wall, scream in my face. So of course, I just never wanted to be home. I think that was obviously a huge reason why they got divorced, because he started to get really nasty with my mom and do all those things. After the divorce was terrible, the worst I've ever seen him. He did like a lot of the “Oh, I'll get help, go to therapy,” then yell at us again, and be like, “Oh, I love you.” You know the cycle. Fun stuff. I just never wanted to be home. SL: I understand. So then you graduated from NUAMES and immediately started at Weber? PT: Yeah, because I got my associates at NUAMES, so I was already doing Weber, and it just seemed easier to do that way. I actually tried to go to USU because I really liked it. I wanted to get out, like, “I want to go have a college experience instead of just staying home.” But Weber State's the only one that has zoology. There's animal ecology at USU and then Agriculture, and that's it. WSU is the only one that has Zoo, so I stayed at WSU for Zoo. SL: Yeah, ‘cause USU is the agricultural college, you would think they would have it. PT: Well, they have agriculture, so if you want to learn about animals, you can learn about cows and ducks and chickens. But that's it. SL: Doesn't go beyond farm animals. 11 PT: I was like, “I'll pass,” and ecology is a lot different, so I was like, “I don't want that.” Plus, Weber was cheaper, so I got to save money and I got to stay at home, so I didn't have to spend money on housing either. SL: So being a half-Asian bisexual—you're half and half on everything—have you found a community here? PT: Oh, I wish. SL: Are you still looking? PT: I mean, I made a couple of friends this year. I haven't had friends in a long time. I haven't had anything remotely like a friend in a long time. I'm pretty sure 90% of them are either gay, lesbian, or bi because it's just who I attract, so that's been really nice. The Asian community, I think, is becoming a little bit more accepting. It's always been like, “Oh, you're not Asian enough to be with the Asians, you're not white enough to be with the whites either.” But I think we're all just old enough now. It's like, “Obviously I'm not going anywhere.” So they're like, “Okay, I guess you can stay.” I used to work at a restaurant, and that's fun. That was fun. You get all the Asian comments when you're in a restaurant. I worked at a Thai restaurant, and it was a nicer restaurant, so I liked to dress up because it was nicer. I don't want to come and wear jeans because it's not a diner, but we'd get comments all the time. “Oh my god, you're so exotic,” or just as a woman, like, “You're so attentive. I'd love for you to be attentive to me like that.” I was like, “Dude, that's nasty.” I was really young when I was doing it, but I've always looked like this. Even in junior high, I've always been this tall and looked this old, so they put me with the teachers. So I was working at the restaurant, I was really young and totally underage. But of course, that never stopped like the 40-year-old men who be like, “Oooh.” 12 Then you get, “Oh, this cute little Asian’s trying to talk to me.” We actually had a lot of like missionaries that would come in that went to Thailand and therefore knew more about Thailand than we did and had to fix our pronunciation, even though they're just terrible. They're like, “Don't worry, I'll order for all of us. Can I get... [Heavy American accent] Khanom pla.” I'm like, “Stop, please stop.” So that was fun. I think that's the most discrimination I've ever gotten. Blunt and obvious, like, “Oh, you're so exotic.” I was like, “Okay, I'll pass.” SL: Do you feel like your identity as a person is based on your sexuality? Is that a big part of who you are? PT: I feel like in my day-to-day life, no, but like in my interactions with people, yes, I guess. I mean, like I said, I've always been really open to it. But I kind of went through this phase in high school where I was like, “I'm like not a woman,” because I was having a really hard time. What is it called? You just don't want to be a woman, ‘cause you're just like, “I'm not like you guys.” SL: The dysphoria. PT: I guess. I was in an all-male, pretty much, organization, so the only way that I could get anything or succeed was for me to be one of the guys and take my entire womanhood, just shove it in a box, and throw it away. Because emotion is not a thing, and caring is not a thing, you just had to be one of the guys, otherwise you're too emotional for the job or you're too girly to do this hardworking job. So I was like, “Oh, okay, so let me just put it away.” I think in high school I had a really hard time being like, “Oh, I'm proud to be a woman,” kind of a thing or just like, “Oh, I'm not like you. I'm like one of the boys,” which is terrible. I look back at it now like, “Oh, you're gross.” 13 Because of that, I also didn't really like girls that much and I didn't want to hang out with girls. To be fair, I also had a lot of really bad experiences with girls up to that point because all of them had backstabbed me. I had that one friend in elementary school, and then when I went to GFA I got a [air quotes] best friend that of course, turned out not to be one. We were vicious to each other, so at least it wasn't just her. We went back and forth. She's like, "Well, at least my dad doesn't fucking hate me." I was like, "Well, at least my dad's not in jail." We were terrible, but she would hit and kick me all the time, and then she followed me to UMA. Then when I finally had friends at UMA, she became friends with my friends, and then she was like, "Oh, choose, me or them," like stupid high school drama. Then it got bad because she wasn't mentally her best, and then she convinced my friends to cut themselves and do a bunch of terrible things and then be like, "Pat, you're the reason why we're doing this." I was like, "Oh, okay, my bad." So I just didn't have a really good relationship with girls, and so I was like, “I don't want anything to do with girls because they're not trustworthy.” I think at that point, I kind of took my bisexuality and shoved it in the closet because I was like, “I don't want anything to do with women.” Then in CAP, I had a really bad experience- well, that's one way to say itwith my coach and the coach's wife, so I was like, “I don't want anything to do with anyone.” My coach was my color guard coach. In CAP, I also was doing color guard, and he did things. It's what you do in a youth organization. But his wife was in on it and would push me to do things and then push me towards him, and then, at the same time, turn around, be like, “Oh, you're ruining my marriage because my husband's raping you.” I was like, “Oh.” 14 In high school, I had terrible mental health. I just didn't want to be there anymore, which is fair. Then he found another girl who was severely abused, so it was really easy for him to just be like [grabs]. Then he kind of convinced her that, like, “We should share Pat.” So he set up this whole thing, and I wasn't aware of it. I was at one of these CAP functions where you stayed there. I was in Colorado for a conference or something, and he convinced her to come into my room, and then she got, like, completely undressed, was, like, “Do things.” Then, of course, he was on the phone because they're disgusting, and I went into complete panic. After that, I think I was just like, “I'm done with women.” I didn't want anything to do with women. After that experience, I was like, “No, I'm so straight.” I convinced myself of that for a really long time, so much, I was like telling people. No one cares. But I needed to say that out loud and say it to myself, all the time. I was like, “No no no, I'm so straight. I want nothing to do with women.” It wasn't until after I started to kind of decompress from everything that happened and I left camp and wasn't stuck in that environment anymore. He got what he deserved. I reported him and all that stuff. It was four years of grooming, so I wasn't even me anymore, so it took a long time, and Lord knows I'm not anywhere near where I need to be. But after I kind of got out of life and was on my own to college and stuff, I was like, “Wait a second, why do I think that?” I started hanging out with more people from the community and they're like, “Well, the things that you say, like straight people don't say that. They don't walk down the hall and be like, ‘Oh damn, she's really cute.’ Or like, ‘Ooh, I really like that about women.’” “Oh, but everyone loves this about women.” 15 “Actually, not really. You just like that about women because you like women.” I was like, “Oh, that makes sense.” I kind of had to rediscover it. Looking back, I never really had a problem with it before, until things happened and then I was like, “That makes sense.” Sorry. That was a rabbit hole and a half. SL: That's okay. Thank you for sharing. First off, what were you taught about sexuality growing up? Was that a taboo topic with your dad? PT: Oh, he never talked about anything at all. It was like, “That's your mother's job,” kind of thing. Yeah, fun stuff. My mom, I don't remember her ever giving me the talk or anything like that. I think at most it was like, “Just do it safely.” I was like, “Sure, I know what that means.” I don't think school taught a lot about it either. They're like, “Well, here's an STD, but we're not going to tell you how not to get it. Just don't do it at all,” because it's Utah, just that's the answer to everything. It's just, don’t do anything at all. Then there was a lot of like, “This is a women's topic, so the guys gotta leave this.” At the same time, my mom was pretty open about, “Oh, if you ever have any questions, you can always come and ask.” Then I started dating my boyfriend, and I just went to her and I was like, “So… birth control.” She was like, [gasp], and I was like, “Oh, no.” She was like, “It's fine. We'll go get you one.” That's pretty much the most of it because I knew enough to be safe for myself. But that was after everything happened too, so I knew sex safety, but I didn't know consent. SL: Which is a big deal. [Responding to Pat pinching her fingers in a 'little bit' gesture, sarcastically.] Yeah, just a little bit. PT: Yeah. Which, talking to a lot of people, it's a big thing for girls in Utah because it's just not taught in school. I feel like it should be. It's really important. 16 SL: What was your first exposure to queerness that you can remember? PT: Oh, Lord. SL: I mean, you said that there was a family member in the community. PT: I didn't know them though. SL: Then I was like, was it something on TV? PT: I don't know what my first would ever be. I mean, I always had a gay friend. Well, no, actually, not really. I didn't have a gay friend ‘til high school, but he was like, the bomb. I loved him. We're still friends. He's super cool. So I think it was probably just meeting people, I guess. I mean, can't not mention RuPaul. We love RuPaul. I don't know. I think just as I got older, I watched more films and I was like, “Okay, that's cool.” And a lot of musical artists like Ashnikko, she was huge. I was like, “Oh, you're hot. Your music videos are hot.” That was pretty much it. SL: Okay. Well, since you mentioned RuPaul, this was a question I asked Ian, do you have a queer icon or a role model? PT: Oh, jeez. No. I've never really thought about it in that way. I mean, I'm still kind of new, pretty much. Just a new little gay baby. I have a friend that I met while I was working at the restaurant that was a friend of a friend. She's a pretty good role model. I just look up to her for everything, she’s just a bi queen. But I know some, I just can't think of any. That's a good one. They're probably some singer, but I can't remember their name. So I know I have them, they're just somewhere in my mind. SL: That’s okay. I just find it interesting to see what people gravitate towards, whether it's more music artists or drag queens or the big activists. PT: Music is definitely one for me. I've always been really connected to music. Music was the one thing that got me through everything; just zone out to the world, listen 17 to music. So I think I've always just connected more with musical artists that always send a good message or are very gay. I was like, “I like you.” SL: So how has your queerness changed the way you interact with people in the world around you? Or does it? PT: I mean, I think me just being more accepting with women in general changed a lot of things because I wasn't scared of girls anymore. It stopped being like, “Oh, I'm competing against you,” or like, “You're going to turn your back against me,” to be like, “Oh, you, I could be friends with you. We could compete against the men together, or I could date you.” So it kind of opened my world to a whole other side instead of being like [shifts to her left], you know? SL: Did you have or see representation when you were growing up? PT: Asian side or gay side? Because Lord knows, it was always a side character. It’s always a side character that helped the main character and it was kind of like, they could be thrown out of the plot and you wouldn't notice, kind of a thing. It was always funny because there was never a gay Asian, unless it was like flamboyantly gay, and then it was never a girl. You don't see bisexual girls ever, and you never see bisexual guys because if you're a bisexual guy, then you're gay, ‘cause that's just what the world tells them, which is so stupid. I mean, I watch Modern Family a lot, and I watched Cam. I loved him. He was adorable, and I loved their relationship, but there was never a bi girl. I don't think I can go back in my memory and ever find a bi girl, let alone a bi girl that happened to be Asian. I think Asian representation is getting better, but I mean, we're still put in these really weird roles sometimes. I'm still yet to see a bi girl though. [Quiet, thinking] Oh no, she was lesbian, but that was awesome. The “Prom” musical that came out on Netflix. That was beautiful. I love that one. SL: I don't know that I've seen that one. 18 PT: Oh, it's super cute. She's like, [sings] “Note to self, don't be gay in Indiana. That's a really stupid plan.” SL: I mean, I never asked, but you answered that question about how your relationship has changed with your family. PT: I mean, I think it just changed with the divorce because I barely see him anymore. I get bugged every now and again by like, he sounds like wine mom texts. I'm like, “What the heck?” But that's about it. We really don't communicate that much, but I've gotten a lot closer with my mom. SL: That's good. You've always lived in Utah? PT: Yeah. Sadly. I mean, we've visited a lot of places, so I'm definitely not like one of the people that was like, “I've never left Utah.” Like, I have cultural experience, but I have always lived here. SL: You've talked a little bit about that cultural difference that you've seen between Utah and your mom's family in Thailand. PT: Oh, it’s huge. I think Utah, it's very clique-y. You're either Mormon or you're not Mormon, and if you're not Mormon, you have to dislike the Mormons. Does that make sense? Like you can't be not Mormon and be like, “Oh, they're not that bad.” It's like, “No, they're bad. You have to either choose one or the other.” It's kind of the same thing. If you're gay, then obviously you're not on that side, you can't mingle. I think that makes a lot of problems with the Mormon community and a lot of the people who are very closeted because they know that if they go to the gay side, then obviously they can't be a Mormon anymore. There's like a huge distinction. In Thailand it's just like, “Do what you want to do, as long as you're not harming anyone, no one really cares.” Buddhism, I think, is really nice in the way that it's not like Christianity where it's like, you can only practice me, right? If you practice me, then you can't practice anything else. Whereas Buddhism isn't a 19 religion, it's just a teaching, per se. You can be Buddhist and Christian. Buddhism doesn't care as long as you're a good person. Honestly, Buddhism says, “Well, I mean, you can choose not to be a good person too, that's fine too, just know that there will be consequences.” A lot, like 90%, of Asia is Buddhism or some form of Buddhism; Thailand specifically is huge. We have the most statues for sure in Buddhism. Everyone kind of just goes with that thinking of like, “Well, as long as you're not harming anyone, it should be okay.” We're really open about a lot of things and there's not a lot of cliques. I think there's a clique between like, “Oh, you're working and you're not working,” but that's the Asian side, being like, “If you're not working, you're useless. You have to be doing something.” My cousin just barely came out as gay and the whole family was like, “First of all, we knew, but like, what did you think was going to happen? Did you think we weren't going to love you, dummy, we still love you.” I don't know if all the families in Thailand are like that, I just know my family from my experience. But I've never gone to Thailand and never felt not accepted, even being the obvious white foreigner. They'll definitely try and get more money out of me, but I see right through it. That’s about it. They'll never be rude or anything. SL: Do you think you had a different time growing up, even though you may not have fully understood your sexuality, versus kids today? I mean, you're not that far off from them. Let's be honest. PT: Just barely born yesterday, came out of the womb. B’s little sister, AL, is growing up in this generation, and it's really cool to see her growing up versus me growing up and all of her friends. She's definitely in a clique, for sure, she's definitely a TikTok child. I look at her, I go, “Oh, they did a little bit of damage there,” but they're so open, way more open than we could ever be. I know it was okay to be the gay friend, but you had to be [emphasis] the gay friend. There was never like, you can 20 dress in a different way, you still had to maintain the constraints of Utah, whereas I think now people are just being like, “Oh, you can be whatever you want to be.” It's not just gay, like you can be non-binary. They will still accept you, will actually respect you, no matter what you want to be and how you want to be called. We'll respect that. It's not just like, “Well, I mean, as long as you do your own thing with your own people,” which is I feel like what I had growing up, where it's like, “Well, I mean, it's fine. Just do it with the people that accept that. People that don't accept that, you better hide it away because it's not for them.” Whereas now they're like, “Well, I don't have to hide anything. This is just who I am.” They're just so open about it. I think it's so cool and it's encouraged too. I look at schools now and I'm like, “It'd be weird to be straight.” You would not have as many friends if you were straight, or very in-your-face, “I'm straight.” SL: So what are some of the challenges you think LGBTQ youth, young adults, adults face today? PT: Yeah, it's just the same as everything else where you're other, you always have to explain that you're other if you're other. Just the fact that they're other in general is stupid. But I think whenever you're in a different category, you always have to explain to the broad category why you are the way that you are, or somehow have to have a way to explain yourself or work really hard to prove yourself, to be as competent as the majority. I know that just as a woman and as a gay woman, it's just like, “Well, I'm constantly having to prove that, I can do what you do.” It's going to be okay. I think the old generation is starting to go away. That sounds terrible, but they are, and so we're getting a lot less of the obvious harsh feedback that came from their generations. I mean, it's all taught, you can't really blame them either because it's what was taught and ingrained into them. I mean, do 21 you have to be rude about it? No. You can believe what you believe and still be a decent human being. That's a different thing. But I think as new generations come up, there should be a little bit less of a problem. We always say that. We're like, “It'll be better.” It is. Yes, it's getting there. I think there's a lot more advocacy and a lot more like, “Go for it, just do what you want to do, and don't let anyone stop you,” which is really nice. SL: Do you think politically we're going that way? I know that's such a loaded question right now. PT: Oh, I don't know. Honestly, I think real world and politics world have always been two very separate things, sadly, and I think they've never been more separate. I think the real world is very accepting right now and politics just remains to beat their head in the sand. That's sad because you can't do anything without politics and without money, so it's just going to take a lot of push from the real world to be like, “Hey, by the way, this is happening and your head's in the sand. You gotta actually do something.” I don't really follow politics as much as I should. It just exhausts me. My boyfriend's in the military, so the most that I look at is like, “Is he going to war?” and that's about it. But that's enough for me to be like, “Ooh, things aren't the greatest right now.” I don't know. I think things might change if we can ever not get a white male president, but that's going to be years, because it's president. It's like king in our country. We were close for a second there. Still scary. But that's from what I know. He’s still as white, right? SL: What advice would you give to your younger self? PT: Learn consent, be more afraid of men and less afraid of women, but also just be you. I think “It's okay to be half,” is a really big thing that I really needed to hear 22 growing up. Yeah, the same for bisexuality, too. You don't have to choose one. It's okay to be half. SL: Let's call you half-and-half. PT: Yeah. Pretty much. SL: Is there anything you would want to say to someone in the future? Let's say, ten years down the road, there is a little half-Asian bisexual girl who stumbles across your interview. PT: Terrifying. SL: I know. She looks up to you and she sees you and sees herself. What would you want her to know? PT: If you want to see yourself out there in the narrative, you have to put yourself in the narrative. I think if you want representation, you're going to have to do it yourself. Sadly. But we can do it. We're Asian. SL: Is there anything you want to add? Anything that we didn't cover? PT: Oh, we went in loop-de-loops, I don't even know. So many loop-de-loops. It's weird because I can't tell one side without telling the other. Utah needs to get with the times. There's just so many other states that are just doing so much better. I think a large reason why Utah's so far behind is because we're so cliquey. I think if we can just accept the Mormons and the Mormons can be a little bit more accepting of the other side, it would solve a lot of problems. We just gotta stop separating everyone into these stupid little categories and going, "I don't talk to you because you're gross," but I also understand why they exist, because you gotta protect yourself. For a lot of people, the experiences are so bad that they have to put themselves in a box and put the others in a box and separate. People can just be nice and decent human beings and nothing will be a problem. But we're human, so there we are. SL: Well, thank you Pat. 23