For many young people, going to college presents a series of challenges; moving out, making new friends and finding your place in the world. For others it’s a chance to radically reinvent themselves, to try a new style or push their own boundaries. For me, it presented an opportunity, not to change who I was but to be who I was my whole life.

by Emmet King

Coming from the tiny village of Rooskey in the famed ’No’ county of Roscommon, it was scary being an outsider. I remember the marriage referendum being made into a class discussion in school and the embarrassment I felt hearing the stifled laughs at the mention of the word ‘gay’. I remember how I felt at a public speaking competition when a friend of mine spoke against marriage equality. I wasn’t brave enough to speak in favour.