 I have found that my involvement in queer youth programming has had a really positive impact on my peers. They are opening their minds to things they haven't thought about before. Truth is most of my peers would do this themselves if they had the time. I think that my organization, if it had the space and had the ability, could create a safer environment for queer youth by having a dedicated space for queer youth. Be it a room or a portable building or something that could be just for them so that they knew every time they walked into that room it was kind of like Vegas. What happens here stays here so they could feel they had the freedom to say what they want when they want and be who they need to be. My father is gay and when I was a little girl my mother took me to a family friend's drag show. We were backstage after the show and I was very little. I was about four years old and we walked in and there were feather boas and tiaras and wigs and costumes and sequins and glitter and as my mother tells me, I don't remember doing this part, but she said I looked around and I said, oh it's just like fairyland and my mother raised me knowing my father was gay after their divorce raised me specifically telling me when people that I love, respected and admired were gay to make sure I would not have a bias. So I was raised by my mother to be gay friendly. People ask me a lot about having favorites. I don't have favorites. It's a running joke at work with the kids, at the club with the kids in our rainbow alliance with the kids because the kids like to say, oh hey I'm Jennifer's favorite. I don't have favorites because one day I'm in the mood for blue and one day I'm in the mood for red and one day I'm in the mood for peaches and one day I'm in the mood for apples. I feel like every person and everything has value and that value has its time and place for everyone. Be courageous and pick your own color. I think for me the colors of courage are the colors of the ocean and I feel this way I surf. I'm not an avid surfer because I'm 51 and I've only been surfing for a year but to be in the ocean is where I find centering, it's where I find calm but it took a lot of courage for me to paddle out the very first time. It was one of the scariest things I'd ever done. So I think that my color of courage would have to be the blues and greens of our ocean.