![]() The two have seen how food can help people unwind. “Food brings everyone to the party!” Snyder says. Foreman and Jodi Snyder, Uplift’s program director, say the snacks are a necessary component of all their programming. The Spartanburg, South Carolina, center’s drop-in space also includes a full kitchen where young people can bake, heat up meals, or even make themselves pancakes for dinner - a recent favorite. Packets of Ritz Bits, Oreos, and pretzels are carefully tucked into plastic bins family-size boxes of Takis and Tostitos are perched on top. And her parental impulse is apparent in the snack closet she maintains. Originally working from the basement of her local church, Deb Foreman co-founded Uplift Outreach Center in order to create a space where her trans son, who is now an adult, could have thrived in his adolescence. Uplift Outreach Center: Spartanburg, South Carolina These are a few of the organizations addressing food insecurity and providing havens for LGBTQ youth across the country. ![]() They show that it’s okay to lounge and get comfortable. Such comfort also distinguishes these snack closets from other spaces like shelters. Or, similar to my own high school experience, they can use the space to journal and ask questions beyond adults’ prying eyes and ears. Teens can simply walk in, grab a handful of Oreos, and flop down on a nearby couch to nap or cry. Unlike community fridges, which have also emerged to address rising food insecurity across the country, snack closets and drop-in spaces afford those who use them a higher degree of privacy. This is particularly important for unhoused queer and trans youth, who experience food insecurity at almost three times the rate of their housed LGBTQ peers. ![]() From the Harlem neighborhood in New York to Spartanburg, South Carolina, snack closets provide a longed-for moment of safety, exploration, and rest. They are often tied to free “drop-in spaces,” where teens can nap or wash their clothes. Snack closets have emerged across the country to support LGBTQ youth by operating as sites where young people can grab their favorite foods, free of charge or judgment. As laws sweep across the country targeting queer and trans youth, spaces in which young people can eat and explore the map of their identities are essential. That afternoon ritual taught me how much the context in which we eat matters and how having a safe environment to ask questions and explore our desires can be the difference between self-acceptance and lifelong feelings of shame. ![]() I watched YouTube videos of Beth Ditto tearing up the stage as the lead singer of Gossip and read Tumblr quotes from bell hooks’s writing and live talks that I pinned to my wall.īite by bite, I began to understand who I was: someone following in the footsteps of Ditto and hooks, creating a life rooted in self-love, radicalism, and a deep sense of collective care. It felt lavish to boil water and mix the pasta with butter, milk, and powdered cheese, creating a simple but luxurious feast for one.Īs I ate, I spent hours writing in my journal, connecting the dots between my hunger for sex and my hunger for food and questioning who had made me feel humiliated for desiring either. The moment I walked through the front door, desperate for quiet and my stomach rumbling, I beelined for the kitchen and made Annie’s mac and cheese. My parents worked full time, and my sibling is five years older than me, which meant that for most of high school, I had space to be home alone with my thoughts. rolled around, I was able to escape into a world of my own making. This feeling was exacerbated by the fact that I often experienced a voracious, pubescent hunger that transformed each hour into a series of question marks: Was lunch soon? Did I have enough food in my bag? Would I get punished for eating chips in class?īut when 3:10 p.m. As we moved, each person’s sweaty insecurities knocked against my own, making it difficult to think. For eight hours, we shuffled between geometry and physical education classes, colliding against one another in a tidal wave of hormones that no one seemed willing to acknowledge or address. My large public high school had almost 4,000 students. As a teenager, I yearned for one moment above all others: 3:10 p.m., when the school bell would ring, sharp and clear, signaling the end of the day.
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