Atlanta Pride Parade: Meet some faces in the crowd
An estimated 100,000 people lined the sides of Peachtree Street in Midtown Atlanta at noon Sunday, setting up lawn chairs next to coolers of cold drinks, dressing in colorful garb and piling into bars and restaurants to watch the annual Atlanta Pride Parade.
Ever-changing music played from parade floats, cars and marcher’s Bluetooth speakers, elevating the mood as companies, political organizations, nonprofit organizations, marching bands and clubs paraded, group by group, down the street for roughly three hours of festive spectacle.
The parade gathered a wide array of people from close and far to celebrate Pride.
Meet some faces from the crowd:
Rachel and Anna Blake
When Rachel Blake, 27, from Dalton came out as a lesbian at the age of 12, she had little community support. Her mother, who had been supportive, died when she was 15. Her father has never fully understood or accepted her.
“There weren’t spaces for me,” she said.
When, at 16, she came to her first Atlanta Pride Parade, she was “shell-shocked.”
“I remember this feeling of so much acceptance,” she recalled. “Seeing so much representation and feeling so welcome was so nice. I really wanted to come back to get that experience again.”
This year she brought her fiancee, Anna Blake, 26. The couple drove two hours from Dalton to spend the weekend in Atlanta and celebrate Pride.
Anna Blake grew up attending a private Christian school. It wasn’t easy for her to navigate her sexuality, she said. But when her younger brother, now a recent graduate from the Atlanta Institute of Music, came out as queer, it gave her the courage to express her own authenticity.
“We both got to go to our first gay bar together,” she recalled. “Being able to have those formative experiences with somebody was wonderful. And my father has been a queer ally for decades.”
Her father used to play in a rock ‘n’ roll band at Atlanta’s Otherside Lounge, a queer club that got bombed in 1997. Anna’s mother, a religious woman, took a little longer to understand but found happiness for her children, Anna Blake said.
When Rachel proposed marriage over the serenading sounds of a violinist playing a Taylor Swift song on a beach in Malibu, Anna said yes. Pride this year has been a celebration of their identities and their engagement.
Tiffany Marie Bradley
Tiffany Marie Bradley, 38, from Brookhaven was at the parade with their husband Nick.
Bradley’s eyes became watery as they recounted how, after much struggle in their youth, they came to identify themselves proudly as nonbinary and pansexual.
“My family very much pushed me to be a girly girl and to be straight and that gay is wrong. I came from a religious background,” Bradley said.
Finding a supportive community and a loving partner in Nick taught Bradley to love themselves.
“Having true, good friends there for you helps a lot,” Bradley said. “And now I just want to keep giving back to other people.”
Bradley came to support their co-workers from Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta who were marching in the parade. Bradley, who has fibromyalgia, cheered them on from the sidewalk.
Jason and Faraz Ahmed
Jason Ahmed, 44, and his husband, Faraz, 38, from West Midtown, were at the parade with their two daughters, Rumi, 3, and Aamal, 1.
The Ahmeds have been married for seven years. Three years ago, they decided to build a family through a surrogate in Virginia they met through a friend.
Before finding their surrogate, they began their family-building journey with the help of Men Having Babies, a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping gay men become fathers.
The couple has been to 15 consecutive Atlanta Pride Parades.
“It’s very different now with children,” Jason Ahmed said as his 1-year-old toddled off wearing a string of rainbow beads dangling around her neck.
“We live our lives in a judgment free zone in the sense that we just live our life out loud and we don’t make apologies for it,” Jason Ahmed said.
Faraz Ahmed’s family, originally from Pakistan, had a learning curve to understand his identity as a gay man, but their love has always been present.
“For them, love triumphs all,” Faraz Ahmed said.
Jethro Elistin and Mariah Moise
Jethro Elistin, 39, recently moved to Atlanta from Cape Cod, Massachusetts, to find a place he could feel more accepted.
“(Atlanta) has a lot of diversity. You’re allowed to be Black and free and gay here,” he said. “I wanted to be a part of it.”
Elistin’s niece, Mariah Moise, 20, originally from Miami, followed Elistin in moving to Atlanta. Her uncle inspired her.
“To see he’s able to be free with himself and his partner really gave me courage. Its already hard enough being black, but now we’ve had to add gay or bi,” she said. “I’m really excited to be here (at her first Atlanta Pride). I love seeing the people, the outfits, the joy.”
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