American Ron Abram, who lives part-time in Berlin, tries to gather optimism following the Orlando massacre

June. 18 – For almost the past six years, I’ve been living half my life here in Berlin and the other half in the United States, in Ohio to be exact. With my partner and a creative life together here but a good job and my son back in the States, I often feel that I’m existing in parallel universes, or like Alice, always traveling between either side of the mirror. But when tragedy happens, the two realities are fractured and the mirror gets distorted. It's happened with personal events – the loss of a friend and of my mother – and international ones that seep into my sense of identity of who I am and where I am, how to express grief, how not to feel helpless on either side of the Atlantic and how to deal with fears of the unknown. This happened for me last weekend with the news of the tragedy at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando.

Whether here or there, it's difficult to mourn without depending on the Internet or social media. I’ve been glued to Facebook and my newsfeed this past week. From friends in the States and those here in Germany, the news of the Pulse massacre has shocked us all as we project our own identities and pain. I went to college in Orlando in the early 80s. Raised a strict Catholic in a Puerto Rican household during the AIDS crisis, I was fearful of my own sexuality and repressed it for along time. Decades later and as an out gay man, I was back in Orlando in 2010 as a visiting artist at my old college – and went out to dance in queer spaces where I hadn’t in my youth. This included Pulse, which like the night last weekend, was filled with all ranges of people – mostly Puerto Rican, queer/trans youth – celebrating the freedom and safety of the dance floor. As a man in his forties, I thought back on my own life and choices made that were so different from the fearless younger generation moving and shaking alongside me at Pulse. They weren’t born in the 80s, but I know they overcame their own internalized fears growing up in a more tolerant but still hateful society. But to the dance floor that night at Pulse, there was only celebration and the collective joy of community dancing to pop music and salsa. Two months later in 2010, I came to Berlin and subsequently met my partner and discovered a much more expansive queer life here. Like many fellow travelers, It’s a level of freedom to be myself here and exist in queer spaces I’ve always perceived as much safer and numerous than back in Midwest Ohio.

When the terrorist attacks occurred last fall throughout Europe and the Middle East, my stateside friends would worry about me here. And now after this stateside horror, some still express the same sentiment. But I’ve always been more fearful of the combination of hatred and violence brewed in the U.S. Even last year after the incredible victory of the Supreme Court’s ruling on same-sex marriage, I worried about any hate backlash that could occur as my boyfriend, my 13-year-old son and I drove cross-country on a big road trip last summer. Ours is a history of religious judgment, racism and violence that dates back to our puritanical origins as a country.

The National Rifle Association has a grip on American lives that is sometimes inescapable – a grip that exaggerates hatred and gives it a dangerous power over everyone. I’ve made art about it and have probably always been scared of the undercurrent of violence in our culture. I suspect those of us who felt different growing up, always knew the capacity for violence was there. It’s a sad irony that following these recent violent events (from Blacks being killed in churches to now queers being killed in nightclubs), most Americans are able to see past the hatred and differences to empathize with the victims.

What happens? With the complexities of the issues here in Europe centered around the Syrian refugee crisis and the presidential debate in the U.S., I’m afraid of the level of fear-mongering from politicians on either side of the pond. With Trump’s popularity still what it is, there’s a lot of reason to despair. This past week in fact, Republicans in the House of Representatives defeated a Bill to protect LGBTQ against discrimination in federal jobs. But I guess I still possess too much of that typical American characteristic of tenacious optimism. Gun control (most notably, a ban on assault weapons) has got to become a central issue for the upcoming election. This latest and largest mass shooting of these 49 queer Americans will surely lead many to understand this as the real issue, and not to project blame of internal American problems on to other outside forces. However hopeless it seems at times, many of us are already contributing to gun-control reform groups, writing representatives and finding which political candidates are supportive to effect change.

As I’m here in Berlin, I’m watching from a distance as friends are about to celebrate Gay Pride in Columbus, Ohio, this weekend. I see the strength of character and tenacity in queer people and organizations to not cower, but to mobilize against hatred and violence. One of the largest in the country, the Columbus parade happens on this first weekend after the massacre, with additional police security and coverage by the news. Already, the event is bringing people to participate that have never attended. This includes not only representation from the small college I teach at, but also churches and groups who wish to show their solidarity that never did before. Sadly, perhaps now with gun control a central issue for queer Americans, the Gay Prides throughout the U.S. (and likely the world) will become more political in nature, in order to bring about social change.

This moment of horror has transcended international boundaries and time zones to affect the trajectory of our collective and individual queer selves. Technology and social media allows us to show grief, express our outrage and political opinions, but in the end, human touch and contact give meaning in ways words cannot. I’m at a loss being away from the States at this time, but while I can’t be at the Columbus Pride Parade on Saturday, by coincidence, I’ll be at Brandenburger Tor for the Berlin LGBTQ memorial vigil and a reading of the names of those killed. Perhaps these two simultaneous queer gatherings of solidarity, and others to follow, will allow us all to not only mourn the individual identities of those lost but also create catalysts for systematic social change – and those timely moments where the indelible queer spirit of defiance is revealed.

Ron Abram is Associate Professor of Art and Queer Studies at Denison University in Ohio