A large, comfy armchair, a trinket-covered desk, and a basket of yarn are featured in Justin Zeigler’s office, with photos of family in Iowa and personal notes filling empty spaces. It’s an inviting room, and a space in his home where he spends a considerable amount of time — aside from his day job working for social services in a small Connecticut town, he works multiple side hustles that he often manages from home.
“I get up at five, five-thirty depending on the side hustle project that needs my time and attention,” said Justin. That side hustle project could consist of anything from designing a new product for his queer merchandise business, Very Gay, Very Busy, managing spreadsheets as a freelance data consultant, or organizing his next shift as a fill-in preacher in church. This is why the office also holds boxes of tote bags in the corner and an ordination certificate on the wall.
Soon enough, though, the room is set to transform into a brand new space: a nursery.
“When I was in sixth grade, we had to do 'What do you want to do when you grow up?' projects. And I did my project about wanting to be a dad,” he said. “I think I'll be a good dad. I hope I'll be a good dad. I'm married to a brilliant, kind, sweet person [who] I have no doubt will be an amazing partner as we figure it out together.”
Justin and his husband are in the middle of the surrogacy process. He described the journey as incredibly educational — learning how birth actually works, everything that it takes to support a pregnancy — and one that is arduous, confusing and costly.
“Saving for surrogacy has been like an eight-year process because it's expensive, soup to nuts,” he said. “It is a house, paying for this process. It is not a small commitment to making sure that everybody is treated equitably and fairly. Insurance doesn't cover the costs of the surrogate, and it doesn't cover the birthing costs.”
According to Justin, navigating the surrogacy process while also working and maintaining side hustles has been a lot to juggle. He’s had to learn how and when to pull back from a project, and how to let some passions lie latent without disappearing completely. And, Justin thinks he’s learned valuable fatherly wisdom along the way.
The Very Gay, Very Busy brand
Even before starting the surrogacy process, Justin has always been one to keep busy – so much so that the lifestyle inspired his merch business. The idea was born in the middle of one of the classes he was taking to get a certificate in management skills.
“I was sitting there, and I couldn't pay attention. And I was like, I'll make some knitting tote bags,” Justin explained he had long been an avid knitter. “ I came up with the idea of putting 'Very Gay, Very Busy' on a tote bag because, at that time, I was working two jobs… and I felt very gay and very busy.”
He decided to make more than one tote bag, because buying in bulk was cheaper, and he sold the rest on Facebook for five bucks a pop.
“And they went. And I was like, 'Oh, that's super fun, super crazy.' So I'll make some more.”
Since its middle-of-class inception, Very Gay, Very Busy has taken off as an online retail market, with tote bags, t-shirts, journals and more sold across different platforms. When he has the time, Justin attends pride festivities around the state to sell the merch in person.
“When I'm at pride events, I work with a lot of parents that are like, 'I want something for my queer kid, but I don't know what is good for them,'" he explained. “Getting to know just a smidgen about their kid, and picking the right design and saying, This is a comfortable and appropriate gift for them – Are they a little more private? Are they a little more silly? That's what I do professionally. I want to make sure people are okay.”
It’s in the face-to-face interactions with customers that Justin knows he’s making a difference in the lives of those in the queer community, young and old.
Hustling… to church
If he’s not selling Very Gay, Very Busy merch at a pride festival on a Saturday, Justin’s working again on Sunday – as a preacher in church.
“I do what's called pulpit supply. So when clergy folk go on vacation and they need somebody to preach for them, I'm there,” he said. Growing up in a rural part of Iowa, a major component of Justin’s community was church.
“It has been a good place for me, and it's been a place where I find myself and where I can lead and where I can serve my fellow human.”
Alongside theater and dance, Justin studied religion as a part of his bachelor's degree and later earned a master's in divinity. Now, he’s ordained in the Christian church Disciples of Christ. Far more than just a side hustle, the church is a major part of his life – which, as a queer person, comes with its own challenges.
“I just painted a very rosy picture of me in church,” he chuckled. He explained that he began his ordination process in a Christian denomination that, at the time, did not ordain openly queer people, so he was removed.
“One of the more painful moments of my life was being told that I didn't belong in a place that I had spent my entire life knowing I belonged. That's a really weird thing, when you're told you don't belong somewhere where you just fully know you do.”
But it wasn’t long until he found somewhere that worked for him. He found a group that welcomed him with open arms.
“I can never pay back what it means to be told, 'You are a person of sacred worth, that you, in fact, do belong, that you are loved, that you are cared for, and that your voice does matter,'” he said. “And I will spend my entire life trying to pay that back.”
The next big hustle
According to Justin, the feeling of finding a group that accepted him after a difficult and personal rejection from the clergy is a major motivator for him to continue building community relationships through the work he juggles today—from his merch business and fill-in preaching to his full-time job in social work.
“If I can sit with a client and find every resource to make sure that they can live the life that they are supposed to be living. I want to do that,” he said. “If I can make sure that mom can tell her kid that she doesn't know how to say it, but she loves them, but she can give them a tote bag, great. That's what I'll do.”
Each of Justin’s side hustles is incredibly meaningful to him. At the same time, he said he doesn’t doesn’t take any given gig too seriously.
“I'm not trying to be out here, you know, making this my life work, necessarily,” he laughed. “My life's work is too big for one thing.”
Besides, he’s on the precipice of snagging the dream role he set as a tween: dad. Social work, running a business, navigating the pulpit – all of the things that have composed his life’s work up until now – has helped him prepare for the newest hustle of building a family.
Thinking of the lessons his jobs have taught him, Justin shared what he wants to pass down to his child.
“They will always be enough. There's nothing they could do that wouldn't be enough. They are smart enough, they are talented enough, and I'm pretty sure they won't be perfect, because nobody is, obviously,” he said. “But they will always be enough.”
