Taking Queer Joy to Prom

Sometimes, healing looks like a dance floor.

On May 30, more than 60 queer and transgender youth and their allies walked through the doors of A Knight to Remember: Queer Youth Prom. There were lights, music, mocktails, photo opportunities, activity stations, and plenty of laughter. 

But what filled the room most wasn’t the decorations or the music. It was joy.

The kind of joy that arrives when people feel safe enough to be fully themselves.

As I stood in the room watching young people dance, laugh, and connect with one another, I found myself thinking about what many of us never had. Growing up as a queer and trans person, I longed for spaces like this. 

A place I didn’t have to think about whether I was too much, too different, or too visible. Somewhere I could simply exist and be carefree alongside my friends.

Many queer and trans adults carry a quiet grief for milestones that never quite belonged to us. We learned to survive. We found our people. We built beautiful lives. But there are moments from adolescence that many of us never got to experience in the way we deserved.

When Compton’s Table partnered with Free Mom Hugs, and a group of incredible community advocates to create this prom, our goal was never simply to throw a dance. It was to create a memory. To create a space where young people could take a deep breath and know they belonged.

And they did.

They arrived dressed to impress. They greeted old friends and made new ones. They danced. They laughed. They took photos. They made bracelets and wands. They enjoyed specialty mocktails provided by Ties & Toasts. They were welcomed by volunteers from Free Mom Hugs and Aging with Pride. For a few hours, they got to be exactly what they are: young people having fun.

There is something profoundly healing about witnessing queer joy.

Not because joy erases hardship. It doesn’t. Our young people still navigate a world that too often questions their worth, their identities, and their right to belong. But joy reminds us that those challenges are not the whole story. Joy reminds us what we are fighting for.

“There is something profoundly healing about witnessing queer joy.”

As the evening unfolded, I found myself less focused on the event itself and more focused on the future. What happens when a young person grows up knowing they are loved? What happens when they have community? What happens when they don’t have to spend years recovering from shame that never should have been placed on them in the first place?

I think the answer was dancing right in front of us.

At Compton’s Table, we often talk about building the world we wish had existed when we were younger. On May 30, we got to see a glimpse of that world. It looked like friendship. It looked like belonging. It looked like young people laughing without hesitation.

It looked like hope.

And for those of us who spent our younger years wishing for a night like this, it was a gift to finally witness it.