I’m From North Platte, NE.

by Bill R.

State Satellite overhead image from Google Earth 2022

I’m from North Platte, Nebraska. Home of “Nebraskaland Days”, Buffalo Bill’s “Wild West Show”, and … well … cowboys. My family lived out in the country, several miles from the nearest family with kids my age. I attended country school, where I had a huge crush on one of my classmates that lasted from kindergarten all the way through high school.

I was a pretty huge nerd growing up; I was the kid who was into science, loved to read, and knew a little bit about everything. I was once referred to as “a pansy” by my 7th-grade teacher because another boy and I chose to stay inside and try to figure out how to build our own radio rather than go outside and run around in the dirt.

I was always attracted to butch girls and less-than-macho boys, so I knew there was something a little different about me, but it wasn’t until I was about 20 that I decided I must be what people referred to as “bisexual”. In North Platte, Nebraska, you might as well have replaced the word “bisexual” with “radioactive” because that’s how people would have reacted had they known.

As it is, I was able to avoid any serious unpleasantness and escape to college in a much larger city (still in Nebraska) where I found that I wasn’t the only one of “my kind” in the state after all.

I still live in the city where I went to college, with my male partner of 18 years. We are fortunate to be allowed to live in a house owned by six cats, with a big attached workshop where we dabble in metalworking, woodworking, and electronics. Life is good.

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