Hey, everybody. Welcome to Coming Out Pod. That is the name of this podcast now. And I still have a, I have an

urge to say the Coming Out Pod, but we're not doing that. We're just calling

it coming out pod. Um, this is Lauren. This is the very first flagship episode, uh, Sanz, Nicole,

my work wife. Um, I'm very much fumbling through it, as you can tell.

So, okay, so for my very first episode on my own, I wanted to have on a guest who felt like home to me, who gives me a sense of comfort and confidence. Now, it's a little outside

the box, uh, because this guest is not going to be telling, well, she's not going to be telling

her coming out story because there, there is, there isn't one. She's, we're going to be talking

kind of about my coming out story and, and we're going to, we're going to be talking about me a little bit on this episode.

This felt like a good way to ease into the new format of the podcast.

I am here with my dear, dear friend, Brooke Barry.

Hi, Brooke.

It's such a pleasure to be back in your closet. And really, it is kind of

in the box if we think about it. But continue. Is it? Yeah. Okay. Thank you. I will. Well, we'll get

it. Yeah, we'll get into all the box specifics. Um, Brooke is one of my oldest friends, uh, we go way back to college, Northwestern

University, go wildcats. Go cats. We are both, go cats. We are both former old school

Thespians. We were in the same acting class. Um, so we've seen each other have very dramatic emotional moments.

We're very, very close at school.

We've seen each other in all states of disarray, intoxication, chaos, etc.

And we have remained friends all these years. We're not going to say how many years,

because I will continue the tradition of Nicole and I being really shady about ever revealing

our ages. But suffice to say, Brooke has been in my life for a very, very long time. And I wanted to have her on,

specifically because back at the beginning of Pride Month, I did, you know, a little pride post.

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