Aurora Pride Performer Spotlight: Shirley Delta Blow

by Denny Patterson

Whenever Shirley Delta Blow enters a room, she makes sure to stand out for all the right reasons—It’s not just because of her six-foot-three stature and hot pink foam wig.

A staple within Denver’s drag community, Shirley Delta Blow is anything but boring. For her, drag is an outlet to explore an alternative persona, and she describes herself as a big city girl with small town dreams, who is positive and uplifting. She also doesn’t mind telling a fun dad joke from time to time.

In addition to entertaining and lip syncing for audiences on stage, Shirley Delta Blow is a resident bingo host at X Denver, and she conducts drag queen story time, reading some of her favorite children’s books at local bookstores and libraries. She is a third-grade teacher outside of drag and believes it is important for children to understand diversity in the world.

Shirley Delta Blow will be a headlining performer at this year’s Aurora Pride on August 5, and OFM caught up with the performer to talk more about the event, drag queen story time, and future goals.

How excited are you to perform at this year’s Aurora Pride?

Oh, I love Aurora Pride! Pride festivals are usually held in the city, where everything is tight and smashed together, but with Aurora Pride, you're on this reservoir, and it feels like you're at the beach. It feels tropical, and it's just a lot of fun. It’s a unique venue, so I think it lends itself to making it a unique event as well.

Can you give us a hint as to what we can expect from your set at Aurora Pride?

I’m hoping to do a fun Broadway mix, and then I would love to do a little story time. I love reading books to kids. For my day job, I'm an elementary school teacher, so I do that on a regular basis, and I just really want to welcome kids and families with children to our event. For those youth who are questioning, letting them know that Pride is a celebration, a protest, and a safe place for people anywhere along that spectrum.

You have become well-known for your drag queen story hours. How did you get involved with that?

I was in a show at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts, and a local bookstore said, “We want to do drag queen story time. We heard that this is very popular, and we want to bring it.” They didn’t know who to hire, so they looked at the Denver Center, which was doing a show called DragOn, a drag mashup for Comic Con, so they hired us to come and do this drag queen story time.

It was funny because the rest of the cast are actors, but they were like, “How comfortable do you feel reading for kids?” They got to me, and I was like, "I'm an elementary school teacher. I literally do this every day. I'm going to be fine." It’s been great, and I love telling the stories. I pick really good books about identity and supporting diversity, and it's just so much fun to do.

Unfortunately, drag queen story hour, and drag shows in general, have been under attack by farright conservatism. What are your thoughts on the anti-drag sentiment?

If you're against drag queens, then you probably haven't been to a drag show. If you're against drag queens reading books to kids, you probably haven't been to drag queen story hour. A lot of these conservatives, they're the same people who are banning books, and most of them will say, “Oh, I just heard that this book is terrible. I haven't actually read it yet.” That would be the same as me saying, "Your church is full of sexism, racism, and homophobia, but I haven't even been there yet. That's just what I heard. I read it somewhere, or I heard about it from somebody." It’s an unfair judgment of an entire group of people, trying to demonize them and making them into the villains of the story. Drag queens are not the people who are harming your kids. Clean up your own house before you come sweeping mine.

What are some future goals you hope to accomplish with your drag career and platform?

Wow, that’s a good question. I’ve auditioned for RuPaul’s Drag Race a bunch of times, and I've never even gotten a thank you for auditioning email, so I guess I’m not quite what they're looking for. However, if I were to get on the national stage, I wouldn't do the lip syncing at bars, the fashion, or the red carpets. I would take story time all around the country. I would love to read these wonderful stories to little kids in Kansas, Michigan, Montana, wherever they need us to be. I think that would be such a fun opportunity.

I've got a couple picture books of my own in my head, and I would love to film a drag queen story time TV show for a network like PBS. Get some of these stories to kids and libraries in places where they don't have access to them. Stories about being yourself and loving your kids. There's one story that I read called My Shadow Is Pink by Scott Stuart, and at the end, the dad says, ‘Shout with your voice that this is me, and some, they will love you, and some, they will not. Those that do love you, will love you a lot.’ Kids need to know that it's OK to be yourself, and even though some people are not going to like you for that, that's fine. They're not your people. You don't have to like them back.

Stay up-to-date and connect with Delta Blow by following her on Instagram @shirleydeltablow, or visit shirleydeltablow.com. For more information on Aurora Pride, visit aurorapride.com.