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'I'm a loved person'
Blacksburg teen-ager has come out, and with the help of her supportive family, she's going on -- confidently
By KATHY LU
The Roanoke Times
BLACKSBURG Looking back, Christina Longobardi can't pinpoint the moment when she realized she was gay.
But she always knew what it meant. It meant love, because her mother's lesbian sister had a long-time partner, and Christina called them her "two aunts." And it meant acceptance, because Christina's mother never chided her sister for being gay.
"I never thought of it as something bad until I moved to Virginia," Christina, 16, said. "I found out it was wrong here."
Christina and her family moved to Blacksburg from Boca Raton, Fla., about six years ago. In school, she heard classmates say things like, "Bet you she's a lesbian," as an insult.
Still, two years ago, Christina came out to her family and friends. She was a freshman at Blacksburg High School and wrote a letter to her mother, Leslie, saying that she was dating a girl.
"My mom was surprised at first, but it wasn't something she could really get upset about," said Christina, now a junior. "We're not people who discriminate. It's just accepted."
"I told her it's not important, whatever she chooses," her mother recalled. "If she's happy, that's fine."
The last boy Christina dated was in the seventh grade. He broke her heart, she said.
"I was sad for a long time," she recalled, "but so what? I've got girls."
Now, being gay is just part of who she is -- like her curly black hair, soprano voice and 4-foot-10 frame. She won't flaunt it, but she doesn't hide it.
"People who don't like it don't really talk to me," she said. "But I've also earned a lot of respect from people who don't agree with it but see that I'm working and trying to have a lot of friends."
She admits, however, that she hasn't completely ruled out dating guys.
"I'm not closing all my doors," she said.
Leslie, who married Christina's stepfather about 10 years ago, asked that her last name not be used in this story. It's not that she doesn't support Christina, she said, it's that she's afraid Christina's 6-year-old brother might be taunted by playmates once they find out his sister is gay.
Parents of openly gay high schoolers in Roanoke were even more wary. They weren't willing to let their children tell their stories in the newspaper for fear of what classmates or maybe strangers might do to them once their sexual orientation was revealed.
But Leslie has faith in her daughter's strength even though she knows that Blacksburg High -- like many high schools -- is not an easy place to be gay.
It is a place where Christina has been called a "dyke" before and where some students, when they get an assignment they don't like, will say derisively, "Oh, that is so gay."
For Christina, this is the type of hostility that stings.
"It doesn't hurt when it's directed at me," she said. "It hurts when it's directed as a whole to the gay and lesbian community or to my friends."
Knowing there were others who felt as she did, Christina and two fellow students founded the Gay Straight Awareness Organization at the school, the first club of its kind in the Roanoke and New River valleys. She wanted the after-school club to be a place where students, regardless of their sexual orientation, can discuss tolerance and education. Several teachers declined to be the club sponsor before Mark Freeman, a science teacher, accepted.
The club began meeting in September and has about 30 members, Christina said. The group discusses everything from homophobia to the Roanoke 7, a reference to the victims of a September shooting at Roanoke's Backstreet Cafe in which one man was killed and six other patrons were injured.
Christina finds support in her friends.
"I'm a loved person," she said one afternoon after school, sitting on her bed with her legs crossed. "I get so many hugs a day it keeps me pumping."
One of her best friends is Stephanie Elvey, who is 17 and a senior. They've known each other for three years and are in a few classes together, including drama. Christina calls Stephanie her "advice buddy," and there's rarely a quiet moment between the two.
"I love Christina very much," Stephanie said one morning, as she threw her arm around Christina's shoulders outside the school's chorus room. Christina had just finished performing in a concert with the Blacksburg High School Madrigals.
Christina's coming out didn't affect their friendship, said Stephanie, who is straight.
"It didn't change Christina at all, she's still the same person," she said. "When she started dating people, I was giving her advice sort of like her giving me advice for a guy."
To understand Christina's confidence, one needs only look at her mother.
Leslie, 40, is a petite, energetic woman with thick, shoulder-length black hair and hazel green eyes. She owns and runs a Christiansburg restaurant where she takes pains to accommodate her regulars -- like the guy who likes water out of the tap instead of the soda machines.
Christina helps her mom at the restaurant when needed but has a part-time job at a store in the New River Valley Mall.
After Leslie read Christina's coming-out letter, she simply accepted it and moved on.
"I think it's important for parents not to get so freaked out," Leslie said. "Kids are going to throw you curves in life, and you're going to have to accept them and help them."
Plus, she added jokingly, she knows that Christina's "not coming home pregnant."
When Christina brought home her first girlfriend, Leslie asked that they not kiss or cuddle in front of the family.
"But I wouldn't want her kissing or hugging with a guy, either," she explained. "I'm her mother!"
Leslie doesn't believe in problems without solutions or in worrying about what other people think.
"I refuse to live my life that way," she said. "I tell my kids that no matter what the problem is, they can always come to me and we'll work through it."
Christina's other brother, Matt Longobardi, said he was teased at school after Christina came out but it didn't faze him. The 15-year-old Blacksburg High freshman still admires his sister.
"I think it's good that she's comfortable with it and doesn't hide it," Matt said.
But being out, it seems, is only half the battle. Christina has had only one serious girlfriend in the past two years and that relationship ended badly.
"I think Blacksburg has a huge gay and lesbian community, but I don't know where they are," she said.
Because she doesn't like to meet people online, Christina turns to Virginia Tech, where she has made friends through the university's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Alliance. On Dec. 1, Christina and her friend, Aarin Haga, went to a dance sponsored by the LGBTA. It was held at Squires Student Center and all proceeds were to be donated to the AIDS Council of Western Virginia.
Christina and Aarin got there a little before 9, which left Christina about three hours to party before her curfew. Within five minutes of arriving, Christina and Aarin took to the dance floor. A fog machine made the room hazy while yellow, blue and pink lights danced off the smoke.
By the time the drag show started around 10:30, the audience numbered about 70 people.
"I think they're incredibly beautiful," Christina said of the drag queens.
Christina said she felt comforted to be at an event like this, to see that gays and lesbians were celebrated.
Christina plans to be a musical theater major and currently sings soprano in choir and with the Madrigals. She has been in six school plays and has competed in state and international Thespian conferences. She'd like to go to college in Chicago or New York, but only if she gets a scholarship.
"If I'm good at something, it'll get me somewhere," she said.
According to her drama teacher, Christina is "very, very good" in theater. "She's an amazingly talented singer, actor and artist," said J. Nick Dickert, who has taught Christina for two years.
When she came out, Dickert said, it wasn't a big deal because most of his students are liberal and open-minded. In fact, he said, being gay may actually be considered "passe."
"The most important thing for me as an educator is to make everyone feel safe," Dickert, 27, said. "If she doesn't leave here feeling safe and supported, then she's not going to be effective in the real world."
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