Cringe along at this Mortified live "Coming Out" edition, featuring CPR's Ryan Warner
Oct. 13—Writing in a journal (or if you're like this writer, a hot pink Lisa Frank diary) has been an age-old way for teenagers and adolescents to make sense of their ever-changing emotions, bodies and developing frontal cortexes.
If you shared in the journal-keeping practice as a young adult, then you know that having your diary discovered and subsequently read was pure nightmare fuel.
However, at 8 p.m. Saturday several brave adults will take the stage at the Dairy Arts Center, 2590 Walnut St., Boulder, and — willingly — read from their diaries, live, on stage, to a captive audience as a part of "Mortified: Coming Out" edition.
Mortified, described as "a cultural phenomenon" by Newsweek, is not your typical live event — It's an emotional rollercoaster of laughter, embarrassment and occasionally sobering moments. At its core, Mortified is all about celebrating the awkward, relatable, raw, painful and hilarious experiences we go through during our formative years.
This special edition, which takes place during LGBT History Month, delves even deeper into the past, with a spotlight on "coming out" stories — a theme that holds tremendous significance for many.
Ryan Warner, the acclaimed journalist and radio host of "Colorado Matters" on Colorado Public Radio, knows a thing or two about keeping secrets tucked between the pages of a diary.
In fact, as a gay teenager growing up in Palm Springs, California, Warner went so far as to create his own language to protect his innermost adolescent thoughts and feelings from prying eyes.
"I was living in one of the gayest places on earth," Warner said. "And I think a lot of people would assume that I had a very affirming childhood as a result. But at the time in the late '80s or early '90s, if you were a gay kid in a place that was known to be gay, it was actually worse. At that point, there was a little bit of a resistance to the fact that this was a gay epicenter.
"I think I wanted to write in code because it was a manifestation of my generalized shame. It was a reflection of a fact that I didn't think society, as a whole, would accept me, let alone my family."
On Saturday, Warner will treat guests to a live decryption of this secret language — called "Communicatia" — when he reads his journals on stage at the Dairy.
"I was kind of linguistically inclined as a kid," Warner said. "I studied Japanese, I studied Hebrew as a Jewish kid, I studied a little bit of Greek; this language was a constellation of all of these languages that I had been exposed to, and a few symbols that I made up myself."
Warner said that he hopes that the experience is as cathartic for audiences as it has been for him.
"It's almost like I get to give a hug to little Ryan," Warner said. "It's like bringing my inner child out of the shadows and telling him that everything is going to be OK."
Tickets for the event, which is slated for audiences ages 18 and older, cost $25-$40 and can be purchased at getmortified.com.
"I think it would be really lovely if parents of queer children who were really worried about their kids walked away with the sense that, despite bullying, their children can succeed and thrive," Warner said. "And maybe that is coming from a place of some privilege because we know that the suicide rates tend to be higher among LBGTQ+ youth, and are especially high for trans children. I would hope that someone would walk away with the sense that there is gay grit."
Warner will be joined by a diverse array of LGBTQIA+ speakers, bringing stories of ill-conceived childhood writing projects, overly dramatic teenage diaries, painfully earnest love letters and more.
Proceeds of ticket sales will be donated to Camp Indigo, a summer camp for transgender and gender-diverse youth in Boulder.
