What to know
- Dane Bland, 33, says growing up with two Queer mothers gave him a strong sense of safety and acceptance when he came out as a teenager.
- His mother, Normanne Bland, came out when he was 13, while his stepmother Maureen Adamson brought her own decades of Queer history and experience to his childhood.
- Bland says having Queer elders in his life helped him understand his identity and connect with generations of 2SLGBTQIA+ people who came before him.
- As a young person, Bland found community through Toronto’s Church and Wellesley Village, The 519, drag, theatre and Queer-affirming spaces.
- As The 519 celebrates its 50th anniversary, Bland is encouraging Queer people to share their own stories through the organization’s anniversary story collection.
When Dane Bland came out at 13, he didn’t have to wonder what a Queer life could look like. He’d been watching one unfold around him for years. His mother had already come out as Queer, his stepmother had deep roots in Toronto’s Church and Wellesley Village, and together, they gave Bland something many Queer young people don’t get: a front-row seat to the generations of people who came before him.
For Bland, now 33, coming out as a young teenager wasn’t the dramatic experience that many Queer youth experience. He shared that in the summer of 2009, while staying with his father, Bland realized that his attraction to men wasn’t “just a phase.” The next morning, he called his mother.
“She knew,” he told Queer & Now. “As moms do.”
Bland shared that coming out to his mother as Gay was not exactly a daunting process. The teen knew he had a safe place to land because his mom had already done the work of coming out herself.
Growing up Queer with two moms
Bland’s mother, Normanne Bland, came out as Queer when he was 13, about two and a half years before he himself began his coming out journey. She soon married his stepmother, Maureen Adamson, and together, the two women became the Queer elders their son could look to as he navigated exploring his own identity.
He explained that part of many Queer people’s story is the process of coming out repeatedly.
“My coming out story is not complete,” he shared. “I’m coming out every day to different people that I meet.”
But Bland’s first coming out was met with the kind of acceptance that allowed him to move forward rather than brace himself for rejection. Even before his mother came out, she had subtly prepared her children for the possibility of queerness.
Bland remembers being around 10 or 11 years old and hearing his mother talk about whoever he might bring home as a future partner, whether that was a boyfriend or a girlfriend. Looking back, he suspects his mother may have been preparing her children for her own coming out while also making sure they understood that their identities would be accepted.
“That was really helpful,” he explained.
Finding a Queer community
But Bland’s education on Queer history and culture extended beyond his immediate family. As a young Queer person, he was introduced to The Village at Church and Wellesley. This included the world of drag shows, Queer-affirming religious spaces and The 519, where he now works as the head of development. He shared memories of going for brunch at Church and Wellesley, visiting now-closed 2SLGBTQIA+ institutions like Zelda’s and Maison, and being encouraged to explore his identity through theatre and Queer media.
Bland says his mothers’ social circle also became an informal classroom, providing him an education on 2SLGBTQIA+ culture not afforded to most youth. His stepmother, who came out in the 1980s/90s and had grown up in and around The Village, offered the Queer teenager a connection to a generation of 2SLGBTQIA+ adults who had lived through a very different era than the one he was finding his footing in.
“I had Queer elders to learn from, which I don’t think a lot of Queer young folks have the benefit of,” he says. “I had the opportunity to reflect on that shared Queer history with Queer elders living in my house.”
That intergenerational connection is something Bland has been thinking about even more as The 519 approaches its 50th anniversary.
Working at the iconic Church and Wellesley-based community centre has allowed him to reflect on the history embedded in the building and the people who have passed through it. For Bland, 2SLGBTQIA+ elders provide something that can be difficult for younger generations to find: a sense of where they came from.
“When you are a part of the Queer community, you also have this sort of… desire to understand the fabric of that shared history that you and all Queer folks share, because it’s something that brings you all together,” he explained.
“The activism, the protest, the mourning, the anger, the grief, the loss, the feelings of isolation — all of these things are things that we as Queer folks experience in one way or another.”
But Queer elders can also show younger people how much has changed.
Bland points to the people who were young 50 years ago and helped found The 519, noting that many of their experiences can still resonate with 2SLGBTQIA+ communities today while also recognizing that younger generations are living in a world shaped by the work of those who came before them.
It’s a reminder that Queer history isn’t simply a collection of dates and political milestones, but something living in the people who shape it.
Your story matters, too
This idea is at the heart of The 519’s 50th-anniversary story collection, which invites 2SLGBTQIA+ community members to share their memories and experiences with the Toronto landmark institution.
Bland contributed his own story after a staff email encouraged employees to participate. What started as a simple submission eventually led to this conversation.
“My first time at The 519 was, funnily enough, to vote,” Bland’s story reads.
“My second time was at Green Space Festival during World Pride, the first year I was old enough to really remember enjoying Pride as an out, Queer, and single man. I got to march in the parade with my moms that year.”
He shared with Queer & Now that he initially wondered what he could have to say that was particularly interesting. But in hindsight, he says this is precisely the point.
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“Storytelling in general is like a really weird and healing kind of thing,” Bland says.
He encourages other Queer people to resist the idea that their stories are too ordinary to be worth sharing.
“We so often think of our own stories as banal or uninteresting,” he says. “Tell your story. Be loud and proud about your story.”
The 519’s story collection allows people to submit written stories and photos or share a video profile reflecting on what the organization has meant to them. Submissions can capture anything from a small memory or fragmented moment to a major, life-changing experience and can be shared on The 519’s website.
For an institution that has reached its 50-year mark, Bland says that every story shared matters.
“There’s no such thing as a story that isn’t interesting, powerful, or potent, when a Queer institution like The 519 celebrates 50 years,” he shared. “This is 1976 that we’re talking about, the founding of The 519. That’s radical and awesome, and people’s experiences with a space like this are radical and awesome, and people’s Queer journeys are radical and awesome, too.”
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And so are the stories of the people who have made that history what it is.
“All of that sort of conflating and joining together is part of what makes this initiative about the 519 story collection so so so beautiful,” the organization’s head of development shared.
A story hinging on Queer community
For Bland, his own Queer story is inseparable from the people who came before him: a mother who came out first, a stepmother who had her own history in The Village, 2SLGBTQIA+ friends gathered around the dinner table, and a community that gave him opportunities as a young person to see his identity reflected back at him.
Growing up with 2SLGBTQIA+ elders for mothers meant Bland didn’t have to imagine what a successful, happy future might look like for him as a Queer man; he got to see it at home, modelled by his mothers and their friends.
And now, as The 519 celebrates five decades of community, he hopes more Queer people will recognize that their everyday stories of growing up, coming out, falling in love, and living life as a member of the 2SLGBTQIA+ community are part of that history, too.
