I don’t know how long this post is going to be. Originally I thought I’d do it as a twitter thread, but I actually have an app that limits how much time I can spend on that hellsite.

Detroit City kicks off its first game in the second tier of American soccer in roughly two hours as I finish this up. Founded in 2012, Detroit City has consistently pushed what it meant to be a community-led capital-C Club, one invested in the community, not one invested into by the ultra-wealthy as a form of bread and circuses. Owing the idea of a “zeroth” anniversary, this is actually our eleventh season, but a decade of City is worth talking about.

It’s particularly worth talking about for me because I have built a weird parallel with Detroit City since the first season. I graduated on an off semester from Purdue University at the very end of 2011 and soon after got a job that moved me to Detroit working on the edges of the automotive industry. My first day at work, if I recall correctly, was the 28th of January, 2012, months before Detroit City kicked off.

I found Detroit City searching for MLS in Detroit, as I had read that there was interest in bringing a club here at the time. At Purdue I mostly just followed EPL and when I didn’t it was because I was following Newcastle down into the Championship. My roommate had an MLS team, Chicago, and I vaguely followed the Seattle Sounders because as an aerospace engineer, I assumed I’d be moving to Seattle sooner than later.

My first game was the 16th of June, 2012. According to Detroit City historian Michael Kitchen, that was a three to nil win over FC Buffalo. I have two pictures from that game, one taken by Brigid of my friend Zak and I. We showed up with some shoddy flags and custom t-shirts, driven by my own need to recreate what I had seen elsewhere. To build.

It’s not quite ten years later. But it’s getting there. Brigid and Zak didn’t catch the bug the way I did. I started going to games alone, which for an extrovert like me means I started talking to people, which meant I soon got caught up in the nascent Northern Guard Supporters.

City means something in particular to me because it has become so intertwined with me over the last ten years. I’ve been to secret meetings. Sold Darren McCarty a scarf after drinking a pint of whiskey. Met countless people from all over the world. Carried a drunken footballer out of a bathroom. Invested in two major campaigns to grow the club. Lit more smoke bombs than I think most people ever even see. Traveled to states I wouldn’t’ve otherwise. My first tattoo was for Detroit City. And City got me interested in playing, so much so I helped re-found a beer-league team that is playing an international friendly in a little more than a week!

Detroit City has impacted a lot of who I am, is what I am saying. And the big this is that the community around City has greatly enabled the biggest change of my life.

I’ve talked at length about being trans, I’m not going to rehash too much of that here, but as the meme says, there is a direct line between fatefully looking up MLS expansion on wikipedia to searching on google to learn more about potential teams and finding Detroit City to joining the NGS, to meeting amazing people and building a support structure, to getting involved with more LGBT+ folks, to eventually my coming out as trans back in 2020.

Isn’t that crazy? Like if I were to go back in time and be able to pull ten years younger me aside and point out onto the pitch and up at the smoke and go “That. That is what enables you to finally come out.” I don’t think twenty-three year old me would’ve been able to grasp it, even fully understand the enormity and the utter correctness of that statement.

Detroit City means a lot to a lot of people, and like a fractal faceted diamond, it reflects and refracts all of us at once, and the sparkles dance in our eyes forever. Over the next few months and years and decades I expect we’ll see a lot of emotional posts like this. Of people who found City because of some cheap tickets or a quick blurb in ESPN and in doing so find a life-changing community. They, like me, will find themselves swept up in something amazing.

Here’s to many, many more years of Detroit City Football Club!