#HappyPrideMonth! Every day this June, I’ll be revealing a different story from my childhood that made me the Gayest Kid Ever.

Day 1: When I was 10, I wore the bottoms of my yellow pajamas on my head and pretended I was Kim Basinger as Vicki Vale in Batman.

Day 2: I made my parents buy me my first Barbie when I was 8 and we were on a family vacation in Australia. She wore a pearlescent jump suit and had a rod shooting out of the top of her head around which you could arrange her hair. I made everyone call her Tiffany.

Day 3: The summer after second grade, I choreographed a solo dance to Paula Abdul’s “Cold-Hearted” and performed it, unbidden, at a friend’s birthday party (I was the only boy in attendance).

Day 4: When I was 10, I saw Troop Beverly Hills and created my own cake recipe, inspired by the movie, that used Girl Scout cookies as a key ingredient. Oh, also, I dressed like Shelley Long.

Day 5: When I was 11, I sat on our driveway and blasted Mariah Carey’s “Emotions” from my cassette player to see if the frequency of her whistle register would open our garage door.

Day 6: When I was 5, I begged my mom to buy a cabbage at the grocery store so that we could plant it in the backyard and see if it would grow into a Cabbage Patch Kid.

Day 7: I wrote AT LEAST three Sweet Valley High-inspired novellas by the age of 11.

Day 8: In 6th grade, I started dipping my hand into my mom’s mini-tubs of cold cream and smearing the cream on half of my face to simulate the Phantom of the Opera’s mask.

Day 9: When I was 12, I rewrote the lyrics to “Escapade” by Janet Jackson as “Est-Ce Que Pade,” to teach people how to pose questions in French class.

Day 10: For a brief period during my early high school theater career, I spelled my stage name “Rakésh.”

Day 11: When I was 7, I spent an entire summer designing alternate castles for She-Ra out of repurposed Kleenex boxes.

Day 12: In 3rd grade, I fought to be the only boy let into an after-school class simply called “Doll Clothes,” in which we.....sewed clothes for our dolls.

Day 13: When I was 12, I painted a portrait of Princess Jasmine, then had it framed and hung it in my bedroom.

Day 14: When I was 9, I dressed up in pink short-shorts and a T-shirt and sandals and sunglasses and a baseball cap and did a solo dance onstage to “Kokomo” by the Beach Boys at our Indian community’s annual Diwali celebration.

Day 15: I owned three Rose Petal dolls. (If you don’t know what they are, for the love of Kenner, look them up.)

Day 16: When I was 10, I made this doll out of a mini soda bottle and named it Christine Daaé.

Day 17: I drew this when I was 13.

Day 18: Like clockwork, I would call my local McDonald’s to verify that the week’s shipment of the new Happy Meal toy had been delivered so that we could drive there, procure it, and add it to my collection.

Day 19: When I was 8, I held an Anne of Green Gables-themed party for my dolls around our dining table, on which I set “cherry cordial” that I made out of a combination of fruit cocktail and grape juice. Each doll got its own special doily — that I sewed.

Day 20: I mean, this painting I did based on The Piano when I was 13.

Day 21: In fourth grade, I took one of my Precious Moments figurines (plural) to Show and Tell. It was of a ballerina and was called “In the Spotlight of His Grace.” I thought “His” referred to me. (Day 21.5: I evidently had a gay god complex.) This is what it looked like.

Day 22: For my mom’s birthday in 1994, I bought her the CD of Barbra Streisand’s The Concert “as a gift,” then proceeded to take it to my bedroom, which it has never left.

Day 23: In middle school, my go-to song for doing ballet exercises in the family room was “You Give Good Love” by Whitney Houston.

Day 24: I sang “Circle in the Sand” by Belinda Carlisle a cappella at my 3rd grade talent show.

Day 25: Magica De Spell was (and is) my favorite DuckTales character.

Day 26: This was absolutely my favorite Little Golden Book when I was a toddler.

Day 27: In 4th grade, when we made sock puppets in class, I created this princess-like one that used tons of the nicest pink beads on the craft table; later, I’d pluck a particularly fabulous spare bead from the sock puppet when I needed it for yet another craft project at home.

Day 28: When I was in 5th grade, my aunt, a painter, asked me what I wanted to paint, and I replied, “A portrait of Strawberry Shortcake on this egg I hollowed out.” I held up the eggshell. And we did the portrait.

Day 28.5: I just stopped at a pizza place so my husband could get a solitary cheese slice and sang One. Singular. Slice-sation

Day 29: This photo of me on a Wheaties box.

Day 30: That kid grew up to be this guy singing “Over the Rainbow” in front of this framed cover of one of his books at his parents’ house. #HappyPrideMonth, all. Much love to you.

THIS WAS ALL VERY ON BRAND, BTW