On August 1 of this year, I finally reached Colorado, having driven from the East Coast for six days, to move into my new apartment in Fort Collins, CO. On August 2, I went to my community’s food co-op, Mountain Avenue Market.
It was the first place I visited upon getting here; I’d always wanted to join a food co-op, but I never lived in an area where one was available. But, having researched Fort Collins before moving, I discovered its existence, and knew that I wanted to see what it was like.
I had visited with the intention of becoming a member, but when I walked in, a basket near the front caught my eye:
“Free Pronoun Buttons! Don’t see your pronoun(s)? Let us know and we will make em!”
I was shocked.
I know, to most of OFM’s readers, this probably seems like an everyday affair, but I had spent the last decade living in places where this was not the norm, where even just seeing a pride flag in someone’s window felt like something to write home about.
But in that moment, I was more than just shocked. I also felt an urgency to work there. My moving to Colorado was not just a choice I made on a whim. I moved out here because I knew I was trans, and I wanted to be able to come out of the closet in a state where it was safe to do so, where—once I was fortunate enough to start hormones, once I was able to get top surgery—the state’s healthcare would be on my side.
It felt serendipitous, that the first place I visited upon moving here had this basket of pronoun buttons, a sign from the universe saying, You made the right decision.
After applying, an interview, and a couple of followups, I began working at the food co-op in early September of this year. It is, without question, my favorite place I’ve ever worked. I actually like going into my job. I genuinely enjoy working alongside my co-workers. My managers see me as a person, not a number, and the customers genuinely care about the survival of their community’s co-op.
But we need help.
Right now, Mountain Avenue Market is the last of three food co-ops in the state of Colorado, and we’re struggling. On top of living in the hellscape that is late stage-capitalism, an America slowly being taken over by wanna-be astronaut Jeff Bezos, the food co-op is still playing catch up from COVID-19, a year that wreaked havoc on small businesses. On top of that, we’ve had to replace a lot of our equipment—an extraordinarily expensive need—and are desperately trying to help this place survive.
Because for many of us, the food co-op is more than our place of work. It is more than our grocery store. It’s a place where we feel safe, where we can be our authentic selves without judgment. It’s a progressive, deeply radical place that lives by what it preaches, filled with progressive, beautiful people that care about what they do.
As we approach the holiday season, it would mean so much to us if you were able to help by donating to our GoFundMe. Mountain Avenue Market is approaching it’s 50 birthday, and we’d love nothing more than to see this beautifully radical place go on for another 50 years.
Earlier this month, as I was washing dishes in the co-op’s kitchen, a co-worker of mine asked what day I first got into Colorado. “August 1,” I told him, and he looked at me, surprised.
“August 1? Really?”
“Yeah,” I said, curious. “Why?”
“August 1 is when Colorado first became a state. Did you know that?”
I hadn’t.
“That’s the universe letting you know you made the right decision,” he said, unknowingly echoing the exact same thought I had upon first visiting the co-op and finding that basket of pronoun buttons.
I couldn’t agree with him more.
