Speaker 1: Straight people get to hold hands with the person that
Speaker 1: they love on the street. If I want to hold
Speaker 1: my boyfriend's hand on the street, it is almost like
Speaker 1: an act of revolution. You know. She was like, you know,
Speaker 1: if you want to be gay, if you want to
Speaker 1: be with this girl, then you need to move out,
Speaker 1: and you lose all benefits. As my daughter, black and
Speaker 1: brown folks are sometimes not allowed to be soft. We're
Speaker 1: not given the same grace to be tender. What up, y'all?
Speaker 1: Welcome to Cheeks and Chill. I'm your host cheek Ease,
Speaker 1: and I'm here today with a very very special and
Speaker 1: sexy guest. Okay, you know what, go on, go on
Speaker 1: and introduce yourself. You check what. I'm so happy to
Speaker 1: be here with you. It is truly an honor, and
Speaker 1: you are like Latino royalty. So I'm so excited to
Speaker 1: hang with you and chat with you. But for those
Speaker 1: of you who don't know me, my name is Curly Velasquez.
Speaker 1: I am a writer, active personality. UM. I was kind
Speaker 1: of discovered in the kitchen at BuzzFeed. I used to
Speaker 1: serve their lunches and I worked my way up into
Speaker 1: creating content for them. Um and you know, we started
Speaker 1: the Latino vertical called Fedle Like, which has opened the
Speaker 1: doors for me in so many different ways, which has
Speaker 1: led me to play myself on the show called Viva
Speaker 1: on Stars and also comment on a documentary about Walter
Speaker 1: Medicago on Netflix with me and my boy lad talking
Speaker 1: about the impact that he had on the culture. And
Speaker 1: you know, and now I get to hang with you.
Speaker 1: We've actually hung out before. I interviewed you a long
Speaker 1: time ago at BuzzFeed. Yes, several hairstyles ago and several
Speaker 1: Oh and how are you, babe, how are you? I'm good.
Speaker 1: I wanted to tell you right now in this moment,
Speaker 1: In this moment. Leg day at the gym was on Tuesday,
Speaker 1: So I am sore as hell, but I'm so excited.
Speaker 1: I wanted to tell you too, because there's so you
Speaker 1: know Latina mom. Latina moms are always like they are impressed,
Speaker 1: but not easily impressed. And I told my mom like,
Speaker 1: I'm going to hang out with cheeks and she was like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, like so excited. She loves you and
Speaker 1: your family. I'm constantly getting like updates on how the
Speaker 1: family is doing. Um, your sister and Jenica are friends
Speaker 1: on Insta, Yes, and in Yes, I love her, I
Speaker 1: love you all fabulous. She's fabulous. But and so my
Speaker 1: mom is a huge fans shout out if she's probably
Speaker 1: gonna be listening. And what's your mama's name? Merna sending
Speaker 1: you a big old kids mom. Are you close to
Speaker 1: your mom? Oh? I'm tired with all my family like
Speaker 1: super tight. We weren't always really tight specifically because like
Speaker 1: growing up as a young queer kid, a lot of
Speaker 1: parents in general, but I feel like Lettin parents or
Speaker 1: Lettino or latin X have you identified, they sometimes will
Speaker 1: inflict their own generational trauma on their own kids and
Speaker 1: without knowing it. So they weren't always necessarily the best parents.
Speaker 1: But I think that they also weren't the worst. But
Speaker 1: growing up and being able to look back and be like, damn,
Speaker 1: you were twenty how old when you had me? Like
Speaker 1: you were just exactly things have changed and my mom,
Speaker 1: believe it or not, was very also very traditional. I
Speaker 1: mean it just I mean they're so young when they
Speaker 1: have us, you know what I mean. So they're growing
Speaker 1: up or we're growing up together. You feel me. I'm glad.
Speaker 1: I'm glad everything is good with your family. So in
Speaker 1: today's episode, Curly and I are going to talk about
Speaker 1: his coming out story and the spectrum of identifying as
Speaker 1: gay or queer in the Latin X community. I happen
Speaker 1: to think that people are born gay. I don't know
Speaker 1: what you would think. I want us to have a
Speaker 1: very open conversation. I feel that there's usually I talked
Speaker 1: to I talk about this with a lot of my friends,
Speaker 1: that there's a gauging either on your mom's side, your
Speaker 1: dad's side. But I really feel that that exists. You
Speaker 1: know what, I actually identify as queer, and a lot
Speaker 1: more people are identifying more as queer. Queer kind of
Speaker 1: gives you the space to not just live in this
Speaker 1: one box of being gay, right like, okay, you'll put below.
Speaker 1: I used to hook up with girls when I was
Speaker 1: younger and boys identified as bisexual for a really long time,
Speaker 1: and then I started to skew more into boys, and
Speaker 1: now that I'm older, I don't know that I would
Speaker 1: necessarily rule it out that I would hook up with
Speaker 1: the girl. Um. And I also find that I don't
Speaker 1: really care what somebody's working with between their legs. If
Speaker 1: you have a cute fade and a nice bicep, I'm down,
Speaker 1: you know. So, yeah, I'm so glad you're explaining this
Speaker 1: because again, this is a topic that is still very
Speaker 1: taboo in our culture unfortunately. UM, but this is why
Speaker 1: we're having this conversation, because now that you're saying, I'm
Speaker 1: glad that I'm that we're talking about it, you know, queer.
Speaker 1: Now I know what it is. So because my brother Johnny,
Speaker 1: he's gonna be twenty one, he has had a hard
Speaker 1: time accepting it. At first he thought he was gay.
Speaker 1: Then he's like, you know what he told me something else.
Speaker 1: I don't remember what it was called. But he's like,
Speaker 1: I just it doesn't matter. Like you just said, if
Speaker 1: you have a penister of vagina, if I'm connected to
Speaker 1: your soul, then I want to be with you. There's
Speaker 1: sabeo sexual, there's a lot of different things. I think queerness.
Speaker 1: By the way, I sent your brother a message, I
Speaker 1: was like, if you need to talk, if you just
Speaker 1: need a friend, like anything, anything, anything. He probably didn't
Speaker 1: see it in the d M s or he probably
Speaker 1: was like I don't know him, but I was like,
Speaker 1: if you ever need to talk, right, because like there's
Speaker 1: no right way and there's no wrong way, like to
Speaker 1: be who you are. So for me, it's like, I
Speaker 1: do believe that people are born a certain type of
Speaker 1: way right and they can uh. I believe that as well.
Speaker 1: But I think of queerness and I think of sexuality
Speaker 1: and gender as a spectrum. Look, I think people can
Speaker 1: be born this way. I think I was born this way.
Speaker 1: I came out really young, even as a little kid,
Speaker 1: I didn't really know how to hide it. I didn't
Speaker 1: know what I identified as um. But I think everybody, everybody,
Speaker 1: if they left themselves, if they really were like you
Speaker 1: know what, like I funk with this person so much
Speaker 1: like we could have a relationship. I might not want
Speaker 1: to fuck you, I might not want to have sex
Speaker 1: with you, but do you want to be like a
Speaker 1: life partner of mine? Do you want to be like
Speaker 1: with me? And it could be like best friends. It
Speaker 1: can look so many like so many different ways. I
Speaker 1: have a question, Curly, and I feel like you are
Speaker 1: the person I can ask this like too, and You're
Speaker 1: not gonna get offended or anything. Because I've always wondered
Speaker 1: the word fag. How do you think about honestly? I
Speaker 1: just god, dude, I think I mean I was, like,
Speaker 1: you know, I want to ask curly because there's certain
Speaker 1: people that are like, don't call me that, Like, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean. I get that, I mean I
Speaker 1: would never, but you know what I mean, Like, what
Speaker 1: do you feel about the word fact? Again, it's a
Speaker 1: nuanced conversation, right, Like it's very it's interesting on one side.
Speaker 1: Can we use it to be empowering? Like me personally? Um,
Speaker 1: I heard Margaret Chow said Margaret Show years ago said
Speaker 1: I love the word faggot because it describes my kind
Speaker 1: of guy, like my kind of person. And I remember
Speaker 1: growing up and being like, oh my god, I love
Speaker 1: that too. On the flip my favorite area so I've
Speaker 1: ever existed, perhaps maybe my favorite human. My Angelo would
Speaker 1: consistently quoth the Bible and say, like in the beginning
Speaker 1: there was the word, and the word was God, and
Speaker 1: the word was with God. And she would say there
Speaker 1: is power that you can measure in words. So when
Speaker 1: you use words like fag and fag, it like you
Speaker 1: have to really understand the type of energy that you
Speaker 1: are really birthing through the divinity within you, right, so
Speaker 1: like there was power in your words. So, um, personally
Speaker 1: like me, I mean, but to other people like who
Speaker 1: are who are still being killed across the world, who
Speaker 1: still don't have laws, who still can't get married, no
Speaker 1: laws of protection, who are literally being murdered globally. Those
Speaker 1: words and maybe the use of them there, you know,
Speaker 1: you should be mindful of that, that you are kind
Speaker 1: of essentially perpetuating a word that is rooted in hate
Speaker 1: and rooted in bigotry. Right, Okay, perfect. I needed to
Speaker 1: ask that because again, I want everyone that's listening to
Speaker 1: understand I'm a huge advocate for the LBG community, um
Speaker 1: Q community, you know. So I'm just like, I wanted
Speaker 1: to to have this conversation with someone like you, especially
Speaker 1: with coming out, and I just saw this post yesterday.
Speaker 1: How or what do you do when someone comes to
Speaker 1: you and comes out? What are the actions? You give
Speaker 1: them a hug if you have no words, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean? So when you came out, how was that?
Speaker 1: How old were you when you came out? Um? I
Speaker 1: was very young. I was the first time I ever
Speaker 1: vocalized it to anybody. I was eleven, and then by
Speaker 1: the time I came out to my family, I was
Speaker 1: like twelve thirteen. But that's kind of a weird. I
Speaker 1: just shared this story with like Hulu uh and attention.
Speaker 1: And it's kind of a story because it was kind
Speaker 1: of the beginning of the Internet craze where a O
Speaker 1: well was popping off and chat rooms and being able
Speaker 1: to search for things that you didn't have access to before. Right,
Speaker 1: So I got caught because I was looking at dicks
Speaker 1: on the Internet and I didn't know. Nobody told me
Speaker 1: this that there was a thing called your Internet search history, right,
Speaker 1: I guess. And so when my parents went in, they
Speaker 1: were like, what the fund are you looking at? And
Speaker 1: I was like, what do you mean? And they were like, well,
Speaker 1: are you gay? Like what are you? And it was
Speaker 1: a whole big thing. It was a lot more dramatic
Speaker 1: than that, of course, right, Like I was crying and
Speaker 1: my dad I thought, you know, my dad was My
Speaker 1: dad was a marine. He we grew up kind of
Speaker 1: an abusive household. Like my dad is very MUCHO like
Speaker 1: the type to be like I'm ana build that. I
Speaker 1: don't need it, I don't need to Anybody'm gonna build
Speaker 1: this ship. I don't need to like hire something to
Speaker 1: fix up. Doesn't ask for directions. No, he is like
Speaker 1: a man's man, which is dope, by the way, because
Speaker 1: if I'm walking with him at night. He gets in
Speaker 1: front of us, He's like, what, like, he's ready, right,
Speaker 1: Marines man. Okay. So then UM, I ended up coming out,
Speaker 1: and it was rough in the beginning. It was really tough.
Speaker 1: The way that they started to um come around was
Speaker 1: when I got my heart broken for the first time. UM.
Speaker 1: And when you are depressed and in love and you
Speaker 1: get your heartbroken, like you don't that's something that you
Speaker 1: know people who have been older, like people who have
Speaker 1: been alive, that they're the ones that can help you
Speaker 1: and be like, I promise you will make it feel
Speaker 1: like you're going to feel like you're gonna die. And
Speaker 1: so I remember putting my head on my mom's shoulder
Speaker 1: and being like, I'm just so sad. I was heartbroken
Speaker 1: over somebody that I loved and his family didn't accept him,
Speaker 1: and he became um we were Catholic, and he became
Speaker 1: like even more Christian, and he died. He dove deeper
Speaker 1: into his faith and kind of abandoned everything that I
Speaker 1: had known about him um because of his faith, and
Speaker 1: I just felt like I wanted to help him get
Speaker 1: to a point where he could understand that the creator
Speaker 1: loved him exactly as he was, um, and so it's
Speaker 1: really hard, and so that's when we started to kind
Speaker 1: of get closer to one another. Um. But you know,
Speaker 1: one of the things that I always say bot him
Speaker 1: blows that when somebody comes out to you, or somebody says, um,
Speaker 1: oh I'm queer or I'm this or whatever. I don't
Speaker 1: really like when people say I accept you, Like, that's great,
Speaker 1: but it's good. But I always say like, okay, because
Speaker 1: because I always say, um, you know, when you order
Speaker 1: something like that online, like on eBay or something, and
Speaker 1: you get it in the mail or on Amazon. You
Speaker 1: get in the mail and you're like, well, it doesn't
Speaker 1: look the way that I wanted it to look, but
Speaker 1: it's fine. I accepted. I'm too lazy to send it back.
Speaker 1: It's fine. But I prefer when somebody says that's amazing, cheekies.
Speaker 1: I celebrate you because when you order something on Amazon
Speaker 1: and it is exactly what you wanted, you're like, oh
Speaker 1: my god, this is exactly what I wanted. This is
Speaker 1: exactly what I needed. So we would do that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So when you do that for somebody in your life,
Speaker 1: where you go cheekies, you are exactly who I wanted.
Speaker 1: In my life. You were exactly who I needed. I
Speaker 1: prayed for God for you, I thought of you, and
Speaker 1: you got here and here you are and I love
Speaker 1: you and I celebrate you. You knows that to me
Speaker 1: is better than I accept you because you're like whatever,
Speaker 1: It's fine, you don't really are relutely No, I'm so glad, yeah,
Speaker 1: because those these are all things that we all need
Speaker 1: to know. You feel me. I mean, I don't know
Speaker 1: if you know, but I had I had Like I
Speaker 1: always say this, I think I'm like lesbian. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: get a little vodka and me and I'm just I
Speaker 1: want to kiss girls. You know what what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Everybody's on the spectru every year, you know, true, I
Speaker 1: had a friend. You know what kind of girls are
Speaker 1: you gonna do when you have a little vodka, like
Speaker 1: a more fam a little bit more mask, more mask
Speaker 1: to be honest and sometimes listen, it just it just depends,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. I haven't done it a lot.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be honest, but there are times when I'm
Speaker 1: just saying I just want to kiss. I'm all about
Speaker 1: the anatomy of a woman. I think every woman is
Speaker 1: so beautiful and I love looking at their bodies and
Speaker 1: like the whole thing like and not in a sexual way,
Speaker 1: just like I appreciate and you know the woman you
Speaker 1: know the body of a woman you too, that's being queer, right,
Speaker 1: Like you're like I identified predominantly as a straight woman,
Speaker 1: and I'm assuming like you would say that your sis
Speaker 1: and at um sis like sus gendered and heterosexual um.
Speaker 1: And but you have like your little like you know,
Speaker 1: every now and then you're like a little which is
Speaker 1: so cool because I think, there you go, there you go.
Speaker 1: There's the beauty of the spectrum, which I hope that
Speaker 1: more people are willing to tap into. It doesn't mean
Speaker 1: and that's the thing too write like, it doesn't mean
Speaker 1: like something's like well then you're by or you're a
Speaker 1: lesbian and you're like, well not really, I don't really
Speaker 1: find that in those spaces, but I can identify over here,
Speaker 1: you know. I also have a question for you Chiakis too, like,
Speaker 1: and I don't know if it's too deep or if
Speaker 1: it's anything. Nothing is too deep because you mentioned like
Speaker 1: your mom, right and your mom is this icon that
Speaker 1: everybody knows, and you mentioned that you think that she
Speaker 1: may have had an issue with your brother. Um, and
Speaker 1: we were also talking about like growth. Do you think
Speaker 1: that you know in any one that there would have
Speaker 1: been some level of like growth and that she may
Speaker 1: have actually been like, you know what, I celebrate you,
Speaker 1: you know what, curly, Um, I I've never talked about
Speaker 1: this anywhere, but I feel comfortable with you and this
Speaker 1: is a space to do it. Um. My mom was
Speaker 1: a very open woman and very very raw in certain
Speaker 1: areas of her life. When I went through my I
Speaker 1: had a girlfriend at twenty three. I talked about it
Speaker 1: in my book Forgiveness, and um, she found out because
Speaker 1: she was looking through my stuff. Actually my sister told
Speaker 1: her so. She was looking through my stuff and she
Speaker 1: she told me, you know, um, and here's the thing.
Speaker 1: She's not here anymore because I'm gonna you know, I
Speaker 1: just want to clear that up. But you know, she
Speaker 1: was like, you know, if you want to be gay,
Speaker 1: if you want to be with this girl, then you
Speaker 1: need to move out and you lose all benefits as
Speaker 1: my daughter. And I'll never forget I was in the
Speaker 1: rest of my but I love this girl, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. And and the crazy thing is it
Speaker 1: wasn't even a sexual thing with this girl. It was
Speaker 1: all mental and I felt different and I didn't feel
Speaker 1: the pressure because I was sexually abused of having to
Speaker 1: have sex. It was just it was it was non
Speaker 1: existent in the sex. It was just kissing and holding hands.
Speaker 1: And I just felt, Oh, someone loves me without wanting
Speaker 1: to touch me, you know, sexually. So I tried to
Speaker 1: explain it to her and she didn't understand it. And
Speaker 1: I told her, I'm like, you have a lot of
Speaker 1: gay friends, and your fans are gay, and you have
Speaker 1: employees that her gay. She's like, yeah, but not in
Speaker 1: my household. And I think it was just because of
Speaker 1: how she grew up now, mind you. I think if
Speaker 1: she was here now and how things out are and
Speaker 1: how she knows and she loves Johnny, her youngest, it
Speaker 1: would have been difficult for her. She probably wouldn't have
Speaker 1: talked to him for a little bit, but she would
Speaker 1: have come around. I know it for a fact, because
Speaker 1: she loves her children more than anything, you know. But
Speaker 1: it I it's it's tough because I've never said that
Speaker 1: out loud, you know. I never want to make my
Speaker 1: mom look bad. But that's we all have to respect
Speaker 1: everyone's thoughts and their feelings and how she was raised
Speaker 1: in reality, because still in our family, it's not necessarily okay,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean to be gay, to be queer,
Speaker 1: but it's kind of like, don't talk about it. Let's
Speaker 1: just out of sight, out of mind sort of thing. Um.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I think she she would have come along.
Speaker 1: And but more than anything, I think my mom was
Speaker 1: more like, what am I doing wrong as a parent?
Speaker 1: I wasn't here. She would blame herself a lot, like
Speaker 1: it's because I'm working, It's because I chose the wrong
Speaker 1: men to have kids with and they're not here to
Speaker 1: help me, and that would have gotten in her mind,
Speaker 1: like what did I do wrong as a parent? And
Speaker 1: in reality, it's not about the parent, you know, it's not.
Speaker 1: And I understand that, and I'm really thankful. Thank you
Speaker 1: for opening up in that way, um, and thank you
Speaker 1: for sharing that part. It actually moved me to emotion
Speaker 1: and I was getting chills because you know, that goes
Speaker 1: back to the trauma of our family and the way
Speaker 1: that what they inflict on us and what they put
Speaker 1: on us. Um. I am giving you so much love
Speaker 1: and so much energy that you, yes, I feel that
Speaker 1: that you just want to be loved and hugged and
Speaker 1: and you know, not have to do that other thing, right, Um,
Speaker 1: we haven't. We don't really know each other outside of this,
Speaker 1: but I love you. You are so loved. You are amazing.
Speaker 1: Thank you for sharing that. Um, it is really powerful,
Speaker 1: and you know, I do hope that I do think
Speaker 1: as well that hopefully they would have been like a
Speaker 1: movement into understanding, like I'm sure I do with her
Speaker 1: and everything. I think she would have understood it, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean. And and then my sister went
Speaker 1: through that, and then she went through through she she
Speaker 1: calls it a phase. Now it's part of her testimony.
Speaker 1: And my mom thought it was because of me. She's like,
Speaker 1: she saw you do it, and it's because now she
Speaker 1: wants to do it. And I really think that there's
Speaker 1: a gay ging in her family, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: I haven't a lesbian aunt. I have a gay uncle,
Speaker 1: you know, and it's just something. Don't talk about it,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. But it's like, it's the true, dude,
Speaker 1: is this this is the life that we live. And
Speaker 1: there's nothing wrong with loving whoever you love. And back
Speaker 1: then I was scared and I was young, and I
Speaker 1: did choose my mom and my family over this girl.
Speaker 1: Her and I are still friends. She's beautiful. I love
Speaker 1: her so much and she has a girlfriend, and but
Speaker 1: she taught me so much. Now I'm like, okay, I
Speaker 1: learned what I had to learn from her, and I'm grateful,
Speaker 1: you know, And I don't I don't judge my mom
Speaker 1: because I get it, you know, and she was born
Speaker 1: in a different time. You feel absolutely And that's the
Speaker 1: thing till you want to get to a place where
Speaker 1: you're not judging anybody. And I think I'm just about
Speaker 1: I'm about live and let live. You feel me, yes,
Speaker 1: and then and then there and then you know now
Speaker 1: in different terms that people use that they're like, you know,
Speaker 1: sabeo sexual. That's when you like your You don't care
Speaker 1: what they're working with. You just like their mind, right, Like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's my brother. I'm I just found out that I
Speaker 1: can identify as andro sexual, and that means that I
Speaker 1: don't care what you're working with. As long as you
Speaker 1: are of masculine presenting individual, I'll probably be attracted to you.
Speaker 1: It's what what what did you say? That was called
Speaker 1: andro sexual? Andro sexual? And you know what, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: be real, honest with you right now, because now that
Speaker 1: you're bringing that up. A few years back, I I
Speaker 1: thought either you're gay, queer or straight, and I didn't
Speaker 1: really believe in bisexuality. And through Johnny, I was all
Speaker 1: open about you know, gay people in Queer, you know
Speaker 1: the community, but I didn't understand bi sexuality or what
Speaker 1: we're talking about until like a few years back. With Johnny,
Speaker 1: he's like, no, he made me understand, and he's like, genuinely,
Speaker 1: I wish in my heart for a long time. It
Speaker 1: took him a while to just accept himself. Now he's
Speaker 1: more open about it, but he's like, I don't want
Speaker 1: to feel this way. I can't help that I am
Speaker 1: falling in love with this girl. But I was in
Speaker 1: love with the boy last year, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, he's like, I swear to you,
Speaker 1: like and he made me understand, And now I'm like, damn,
Speaker 1: And I think everything happens for a reason. He's like
Speaker 1: my he's my brother. Obviously he's my son. And I
Speaker 1: know it would have been very hard for my mom
Speaker 1: to accept it. She's very traditional, and it's just because
Speaker 1: I think of how she was raised and I don't
Speaker 1: blame her as far as your brother goes. UM. You know,
Speaker 1: having dealing with your identity, your queer identity, whether that's
Speaker 1: queerness within your gender or your sexuality. UM, and the
Speaker 1: guilt that sometimes we feel like we're different or we're
Speaker 1: hurting people, or the need to live within like a
Speaker 1: heteronormative life. When you it can get daunting, and it
Speaker 1: can get scary, and it can get sad, and you know,
Speaker 1: sometimes you're like, I want to be um like them.
Speaker 1: I want to be where the people are right. And
Speaker 1: when I look at nature, I look at all the
Speaker 1: fish in the sea, the insects crawling around, the different
Speaker 1: types of flowers and trees, and I think, I always say,
Speaker 1: the Creator loves and honors diversity. It honors difference, right,
Speaker 1: And so humans tend to be like, Nope, we gotta
Speaker 1: stay in line, and we gotta do this. We're gonna
Speaker 1: be one way you can express yourself for all that
Speaker 1: you are, for all that you were created to be.
Speaker 1: Don't hurt nobody, don't be narcissistic intentions with good intentions.
Speaker 1: But if being you it makes you feel good. Where
Speaker 1: would you want to wear? Wear a little makeup though,
Speaker 1: hat on like, then you are absolutely honoring that which
Speaker 1: created you and the place from which you came from. Yes,
Speaker 1: I completely agree with you, and that's something that I'm
Speaker 1: all about. Live and let live. I love you. You
Speaker 1: don't hurt me. I don't you do whatever you want
Speaker 1: as long as you're not hurting anyone. I always say that,
Speaker 1: And that's something that I told Johnny, my brother. I'm like,
Speaker 1: you know what, because of the Christianity. You know, my
Speaker 1: family's Christian and my mom wouldn't be okay with them,
Speaker 1: Like this is your life. Though you have a testimony,
Speaker 1: you're gonna be able to share like you can't help
Speaker 1: what you are. You know what I mean, and you
Speaker 1: have to embrace it and now it's better. But but
Speaker 1: absolutely all right. Currently, So in the black and Latino culture,
Speaker 1: how do you feel like coming out? Do you think
Speaker 1: it's less or more accepted? Then let's say you know Anglo, Like,
Speaker 1: what do you think about that? UM? I always say
Speaker 1: that I can only speak from experiences that I come from,
Speaker 1: So I like, I can't uh necessarily speak on Black experience,
Speaker 1: but I can speak on like mesty so Latino experience, UM,
Speaker 1: and what I find from having conversations with a lot
Speaker 1: of amazing uh black folk in academia, in entertainment and
Speaker 1: brown folk in the same communities as well. Is that
Speaker 1: machismo is really like a currency. It's a currency globally, right,
Speaker 1: like being even sometimes fans and women think like they
Speaker 1: got to act a certain type of way to be
Speaker 1: seen to be taken seriously. Um. And and this is
Speaker 1: kind of a debate that I've gotten into before, is
Speaker 1: that I think that like black and brown folks are
Speaker 1: sometimes not allowed to be soft, We're not given the
Speaker 1: same grace to be tender. Um. Those things can be
Speaker 1: seen as white. They can be seen as weak. They
Speaker 1: can be seen as like, um, boys don't cry, you know,
Speaker 1: like tapping up da like you know, back in the
Speaker 1: day would always call me, which is true. And yeah,
Speaker 1: I agree, I think it is sad. And there's also
Speaker 1: there's always going to be a conversation about um queerness,
Speaker 1: especially when it comes to the spectrum of racial identity
Speaker 1: and kind of like um racial politics, skin tone, colorism
Speaker 1: specifically I think within the United States. But absolutely, oh yeah,
Speaker 1: I actually I actually have never dated a white person.
Speaker 1: That's only, um, not because I don't want to, but
Speaker 1: I find that white queer folk in l a sometimes
Speaker 1: tend to date other white queer folk in l A UM.
Speaker 1: And this is kind of like based on my own
Speaker 1: limited experience. I'm not trying to generalize anybody in it,
Speaker 1: and I'm not saying everybody does this, but I find
Speaker 1: that when sometimes when white queer folks want to date
Speaker 1: me or some of my friends, they expect us to
Speaker 1: be kind of like hyper versions of what they expect
Speaker 1: a Latino, a black American or a black Latino or
Speaker 1: mestizo to be like a little bit rougher, a little
Speaker 1: bit more hood. They want us to be the top
Speaker 1: all the time. Okay, have you been unfaithful before? Like
Speaker 1: you know, never in in any of my Actually, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna I'm gonna keep it real with you, because I
Speaker 1: always keep it real. I actually had different ideas of
Speaker 1: what unfaithful meant for a very long time, like I
Speaker 1: didn't understand. So for me, I always thought that unfaithful
Speaker 1: meant an affair like having an affair with somebody, um,
Speaker 1: like an emotional affair, like an emotional physical affair like
Speaker 1: I was going to the same person. I always thought
Speaker 1: of that as being unfaithful. I never thought like kissing
Speaker 1: someone else was unfaithful. I never thought that like engaging
Speaker 1: sexually with some of the person one time was being unfaithful,
Speaker 1: and like flirting, texting and stuff, well even like even
Speaker 1: like oral, like I never thought that that was like cheating.
Speaker 1: I was like, well, I'm going to go back to
Speaker 1: my boyfriend and I'm never going to see this person again,
Speaker 1: So how is that being unfaithful? But now as an adult,
Speaker 1: and of course three years of therapy and kind of
Speaker 1: you know, understanding and by years, I mean like a
Speaker 1: year and a half and two the years, Um it's years.
Speaker 1: I need six months. I love it. But like no,
Speaker 1: but you know, after therapy, like I'm like, oh, I
Speaker 1: was kidding myself, Like I was like not being honest
Speaker 1: with myself. And sometimes you don't even know that you're
Speaker 1: not being honest with yourself. You start to believe what
Speaker 1: you believe. And yeah, So to answer your question, and yes,
Speaker 1: did I think that that's what I was doing at
Speaker 1: the time, No, but yeah, you had to go through
Speaker 1: that in order to figure out, Okay, this is what's wrong,
Speaker 1: this is what's right, or whatever. Absolutely clearly. So I
Speaker 1: have a question in regards to social anxiety and I'm
Speaker 1: going to tell you because again I always go back
Speaker 1: to my brother Johnny, because that's like the closest thing
Speaker 1: I have, like to the lgbt Q community. So he
Speaker 1: has a lot of social anxiety. You know, he'd rather
Speaker 1: stay at home. He rarely likes going out to parties.
Speaker 1: His friends invite him. And I have to tell Johnny, like,
Speaker 1: you gotta go and explore and meet new people. And
Speaker 1: does that is that a thing like for you or
Speaker 1: you just never experienced that? My god, I'm very open
Speaker 1: about it. And I think that a lot of people,
Speaker 1: you know, they consider me an extrovert, and and I'm like,
Speaker 1: I am a very very, very friendly and loving introvert.
Speaker 1: Like I love people. I love to make jokes. But like,
Speaker 1: if you tell me, like, give you curly come to
Speaker 1: the house, I'm making dinner. It's just me and two
Speaker 1: other people. Done. If you tell me Curly coming to
Speaker 1: the house, I'm having a party, I'm there, Like fuck,
Speaker 1: Like what do I know? I will say that There's
Speaker 1: several things I'm like, we have to grow up in
Speaker 1: the closet, we have to grow up in the dark.
Speaker 1: We have to learn how to move in the world
Speaker 1: without being able to do the same things that a
Speaker 1: lot of straight people, specifically straight passing people as well
Speaker 1: can do. Like you can have a crush on the
Speaker 1: boy and flirt when you're like in the sixth grade
Speaker 1: and be like I like him or whatever. I couldn't
Speaker 1: do that. I mean, I still did it because I
Speaker 1: was like the funk, but like a lot of us
Speaker 1: couldn't do that, right, So we're not given the same
Speaker 1: grace or the same time to really grow in the
Speaker 1: same way that a lot of people get to spec
Speaker 1: typically since hat people get to um. My anxiety also
Speaker 1: comes from the fact that I present as a queer person.
Speaker 1: You look at me, I got a little sway in
Speaker 1: my hip, I moved my hand a certain type of way,
Speaker 1: you know, I wear makeup, and when you when I
Speaker 1: opened my mouth, I'm like, hey, what up? You know
Speaker 1: what I mean? I'm not like, I'm not what's good?
Speaker 1: I'm like, what up? What's good? You know? So I
Speaker 1: feel like I always talk about I have moved through
Speaker 1: the world as a queer person, and it is scary,
Speaker 1: Like toxic masculinity seeks to destroy a lot of things
Speaker 1: that aren't masculine, and whether that's a woman, then somebody
Speaker 1: who's queer. It's scary I have to worry about if
Speaker 1: I want to go out, but the hand while I
Speaker 1: was wearing I just went to a fashion show and
Speaker 1: I was wearing a small ballero naked and just jeans.
Speaker 1: I would never go into like, uh gas station like
Speaker 1: that by myself. I'd be scared because what would happen, Like,
Speaker 1: what's going to happen? So it's the outside world, right
Speaker 1: and what they put on that causes it. It's a
Speaker 1: safety thing. And I find that a lot of weird
Speaker 1: people were just afraid for our lives. We're afraid of
Speaker 1: like getting made fun of. We're afraid of like people
Speaker 1: instigating a situation. You know, some straight people get to
Speaker 1: hold hands with the person that they love on the street.
Speaker 1: If I want to hold my boyfriend's hand on the street,
Speaker 1: it is almost like an act of like revolution. It's
Speaker 1: like I'm being like, here we are, I'm fucking queer,
Speaker 1: and we're going to hold hands down the street. But
Speaker 1: I don't want to be a revolutionary cheekys. I want
Speaker 1: to be puld my man's hand. Yeah. Always kind of
Speaker 1: like what the heck you know, hasn't gotten has a
Speaker 1: social anxiety gotten? Better throughout the years you feel after
Speaker 1: well because oh yeah, has it because the pandemic is
Speaker 1: one thing. But anyways, with the pandemic, it has you
Speaker 1: know what, Um, it always changes. I always say there's
Speaker 1: no right answer and there's no wrong answer, and the
Speaker 1: right answer always changes. Right. So like some days I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: I'm looking good, I'm doing so good and this is
Speaker 1: what works for me. And other days I'm like, no,
Speaker 1: I'm but I'm very like the way that I was raising,
Speaker 1: a lot of people are raising, like I'm not going
Speaker 1: to back down. So like you have anxiety, I gotta
Speaker 1: fight it. I'm not gonna sit there and be like,
Speaker 1: oh no, I can't do it. And some people do
Speaker 1: and that's okay, and we're all in different places in
Speaker 1: our life. But I will say I do this thing, um,
Speaker 1: like I hate going to the supermarket. I get anxiety
Speaker 1: about going to the supermarket. And I know a lot
Speaker 1: of people do as well. Um, but I do this
Speaker 1: thing where I'm like, curly, if you go to the
Speaker 1: supermarket right now, you're going to meet a fine ace
Speaker 1: guy and he's gonna be so like you want to
Speaker 1: meet to find a guy you want to meet, let's
Speaker 1: go and so I go. I'm all excited. I'm like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, I'm gonna meet my husband, I say,
Speaker 1: in that zone. And so I get there and keep
Speaker 1: that for a while. That used to It's so crazy.
Speaker 1: I used to do that to go to the gym. Bitch, Yeah,
Speaker 1: get cute girl, put on those I go work out
Speaker 1: because you know there's gonna be a hot guy there. That. Yes,
Speaker 1: that's how you trick yourself and you do those things.
Speaker 1: I mean anxiety. I think that it's like it's a
Speaker 1: big thing, even like you know, she's like, oh, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, of course I've I've lived with anxiety. I am.
Speaker 1: I know her. She lives in my house too. She
Speaker 1: never lives in my house. Yeah, And I'm like, but
Speaker 1: if you're barely learning that language, you know, my dad
Speaker 1: put learning about the word trauma. He didn't know, and
Speaker 1: so now he's more open. He's like, I think that
Speaker 1: was traumatizing to me as a kid. I think I
Speaker 1: have trauma. Yeah, it's because I think they grew up
Speaker 1: not believing in anxiety or depression and no, you know
Speaker 1: and and no, dude, that ship exists and it's real.
Speaker 1: And I think after the pandemic. That's when it really
Speaker 1: hit me where I'm like, damn, what is going to happen?
Speaker 1: And sometimes you think twice three times to go out, now,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean? So and you hit that,
Speaker 1: you hit that rock bottom where you're I did you
Speaker 1: know I was going through a lot during the pandemic
Speaker 1: or should I say the quarantine? And I started feeling
Speaker 1: all that the depression and everything. You know, like the
Speaker 1: unknown you feel me? Yeah, I mean a lot of people,
Speaker 1: a lot of us, like the unknown is kind of
Speaker 1: what scares us all the time. Um. It was something
Speaker 1: I saw something that said, if you're feeling depressed, it's
Speaker 1: because you're thinking about the past too much. And if
Speaker 1: you're feeling anxious, it's because you're thinking about the future
Speaker 1: too much. So if you can find a way to
Speaker 1: stay in the present, it helps. I mean, look, it's
Speaker 1: so hard because I'm always especially like we're in entertainment too, right, Like,
Speaker 1: and I started in the kitchen, so I feel like
Speaker 1: I got kind of discovered in a way, and I'm like,
Speaker 1: what happens with us in entertainment? We gotta keep ustling,
Speaker 1: We gotta keep singing and dancing and making jokes. Making
Speaker 1: jokes until I'm eighty. Now I gotta get on TikTok
Speaker 1: and learn a hold routine. Yeah, some serious pressure. Yeah yeah,
Speaker 1: I just put something on my Instagram about that too,
Speaker 1: About you live in the moment. Don't worry about what
Speaker 1: hasn't even happened. Do you feel me? We stress ourselves out.
Speaker 1: My therapist calls it catastrophizing. Oh, you're catastrophizing. You're creating
Speaker 1: a scenario that hasn't even happened yet, You're thinking of
Speaker 1: a catastrophe that hasn't even happened, and so I'm like
Speaker 1: my therapist calls it future tripping, future tripping. I've heard
Speaker 1: that one too, Yes, yeah, trip right now, hold up,
Speaker 1: I'm always future tripping always. Honestly, Curly, this has been
Speaker 1: such a beautiful, open, honest relationship, relationship conversation. Could be
Speaker 1: a relationship to now that I know you know we're
Speaker 1: both could work. Yes, I just want to say thank you. Honestly,
Speaker 1: you are a beautiful human being. You have such a
Speaker 1: beautiful light and this mind that I'm just like, so
Speaker 1: you're intriguing, So thank you, And I think that you
Speaker 1: are a wonderful role model, a person that people can
Speaker 1: look up to, and which is why I wanted to
Speaker 1: talk to you. And I don't know, do you have
Speaker 1: some type of advice something that you would want to
Speaker 1: tell someone that's coming out and they don't know what
Speaker 1: to do or how to do it. Um, thank you
Speaker 1: so much for your words. And I really feel like
Speaker 1: this is a really beautiful conversation as well. So the
Speaker 1: feeling is absolutely mutual advice. You know. Um, there's no
Speaker 1: wrong way, there's no right way, and the answer always changes.
Speaker 1: If you are in a safe space, if you're in
Speaker 1: a space where you can come out do it. You're
Speaker 1: gonna love it. If you can't, that's also okay, Like
Speaker 1: do what feels right for you, do it the best
Speaker 1: way that you can. At the end of the day,
Speaker 1: we're all going to go back to the source. We're
Speaker 1: all little cups of water going to get to get
Speaker 1: thrown back into the ocean. And you know, live it
Speaker 1: up as best as you can. Um, love as hard
Speaker 1: as you can, laugh, as hard as you can, masturbate,
Speaker 1: do the things stick something in your day, explore, you know,
Speaker 1: and you know, talking about this subject, that's what I
Speaker 1: told Johnny when you wanted to come out, I'm like, dude,
Speaker 1: if it makes you feel worse keeping it inside, then
Speaker 1: bring it out. If it's gonna if it's scary to
Speaker 1: bring it out, keep it in for a little bit,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean? And I just want you
Speaker 1: to be happy. And once you're happy and you don't,
Speaker 1: you don't have that weight on you and you're like,
Speaker 1: this is who I am, and you you completely accept
Speaker 1: yourself first. Everyone else is going to feel that and
Speaker 1: accept you have no other choice but accept you, and
Speaker 1: then you're gonna be able to really just fly. You
Speaker 1: feel me, and he did. Now he feels I've seen
Speaker 1: since he's talked about it, you know, publicly, he's definitely radiating.
Speaker 1: He's better. He's just in a different place, you know.
Speaker 1: So that's just my little two cents on it, but
Speaker 1: you know, absolutely, Curly, thank you again. It has been
Speaker 1: a wonderful conversation. We have to do it again for sure,
Speaker 1: and I want. I'm sure a lot of people know
Speaker 1: who you are, but just in case they may not
Speaker 1: know and they just put on game today. Let them
Speaker 1: know your social where they can find you are your
Speaker 1: phone one, accept your address. You can find me on
Speaker 1: Instagram and TikTok at the Curly b Show, Vias in
Speaker 1: Victor Um and I'm just there. I basically just show
Speaker 1: me in my family all the time. UM. And we
Speaker 1: also would love to have you on our podcast. I
Speaker 1: was going to tell you about that. Yes, we are
Speaker 1: called the Super Secret Bestie Club. It's me and my
Speaker 1: best friend, um Maya Moyo who uh you know we have.
Speaker 1: We give advice on topics that are very normal crushes, boyfriends, love.
Speaker 1: I'm always giving like the kind of problematic advice and
Speaker 1: she's more like, I love it. I would love to.
Speaker 1: I would love to be honest, it would be so amazing.
Speaker 1: We'd love to have you. Um. Please check us out.
Speaker 1: Oh thank you, and don't forget to listen to Cheeks
Speaker 1: and Chill every Monday on the I Heart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple podcast or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts.
Speaker 1: This is a production of I Heart Radio and podcast Network.
Speaker 1: Follow us on Instagram at Michael Podcasts and follow me
Speaker 1: Cheeks on Instagram at cheek Kee's and I'll see you
Speaker 1: guys next week. Les nombezzo and remember condos too. See
Speaker 1: Nana h