Letting Myself be known

Coming out for trans people is different. I don’t even know if I would describe it as a coming out. More of a coming in. And that coming in part is when you begin your transition. Transition never stops, it isn’t even one thing. It is everything , all the time, in all the ways. Letting yourself be known is how I would describe trans people who inform someone they are trans.

Letting yourself be known more clearly. Letting yourself be known by history, letting the other person know that it wasn’t a 1+1 situation that produced the marvelous being in front of you, it was a complex equation that led to a sum of one. It was the unicorn amongst the horses. The outlier that blends in.

I feel and I know that when trans people let themselves be known, they risk the other person negating the entirety of their identity. The trans person is saying I’m a transwoman or I’m a trans man. The person hearing this is translating that to this is really a man dressed like a woman. This is a woman dressed like a man. The simple beings that most people are compute it this way. In an instant it puts you in the realm of costume artist, drag queen, drag king, fallacy, a freak, a liar, a fraud, a threat.

Coming out as a descriptor works better for gender normative performing cis people who identify as LGB. In those cases because the default person is cisgender and heterosexual, LGB people who are on sight seemingly cis and het “come out” as lesbian, gay or bisexual. For trans people come out has a tread of reveal one’s self, one gender as not true. Instead , I think letting one’s self be known is a better way of phrasing it. I am a woman of trans experience. I am still a woman but I happen to also be trans.

The nuance of it all is probably why I don’t lead with my trans identity. Meaning I don’t introduce myself and let someone know right away that I am trans. I don’t actually tell everybody . You will get to know me as I present myself, you will get to know me for me. And if I deem you someone who won’t switch up on me because you learn my history, I’ll let you in to me letting myself be known as a fuller fleshed out human.

Black Hipster

Lying down on her thigh side

In the bachelorette pad

Youtube blasting Indie mix oct 22

thinking of nothing and everything.

Sipping a cold brew

the sky a turquoise in the dimmed room

the sun setting and the meal is made

steak, chuck with fat

yellow rice gotta have that

the candle, balsam im talking christmas smell

the indie sets the mood in a ghetto building filled with dummies and fools

Add the shininess, the novel, the bruise in a silent movement

the ex uncool kids, nerds, life burnouts, chronic medicators, dark room meditators

imitators, drag wearers, never fitting in to introverts who meet up in the oddest of places

in bars, on the train at 2 am, the same shade of fucked up on silent city nights waiting

for an uber.,

You won’t always feel good

I realize more and more that being good, loving life, smiling at the sun shining and the kids laughing won’t always come how I would like . I find sometimes that I’ll be feeling so good and the threat of something eroding that good feeling, that peace will be lurking just around the corner. And that is a hurting ass predicament to be in. Cause I want to enjoy the good days, enjoy the good news, enjoy the good vibes but I look up trauma responding, expecting the shoe to drop.

I’m working on this profusely. I’m challenging myself when I’m hearing those bad thoughts, when I’m having those reflexes that accompany the messaging in my mind, to grit through the moment. Feel all of it, savor its’ intensity , clench my asshole cause I know that it too will pass. It’ll be another moment , in a series of moments, in this game of debts needing paid called my life.

The waiting keeps me on my toes. I have to blow on my messages like the heat of a too hot soup. Cool it down to enjoy the moment. Enjoy all of the bloody moments. So much of it is so petty and truly not worth the time of the thought given to it. I won’t always be okay but It won’t always be so bad either.

Wellness

Aspiring to be the bad assed bitch who says whatever I want. I want it always unfiltered and unapologetic. Not trying to win fans or converts, just listeners. I have the tendency to blurt out things and regret what I said. But I realize that actually what was blurted out was at the top of my brain. It wanted to come out. I can’t control how it may be perceived.

Healing by getting high on my own supply . Antidotes and potions, balms and spreads healing my head. My broken-in brain, that drain from constant, unsoothed pain. I’d be a liar if I said I wasn’t used to and accepted this game. This game that burns my eyes, that blurts out lies and burns inside from ugly truths.

Finishing all the food on my plate. Every grain of rice, all shreds of the meat that caked the bone. Plate licking, broth slurping, farting and belching. It was a good ass meal. The kind in some places they’d beat up, rob and steal, in desperation. In keeping it real. The pig is king and that’s why he is so disgusting. A survivor, a scavenger by any means. Deliciousness enhanced by wild , wretchedry, unfathomable gluttony. Like the slut in me imagining bukakke sessions, making out and bases, different ugly sexy faces, usually stagnant, don’t run in other races.

Off College Ave

Keep pushing baby, keep pushing hard

You gon fall real hard and bump your head

You gon be dry fucked without a sheet to bite

You gon freeze and burn up without a coat

You gon contemplate on empty days picking up trash

And putting it in your mouth

You gon know dirty train seats and bed bug cots

You gon know turning tricks and catching licks

going thru wallets and dressers and running from the law

You gon know welfare case workers, assessments and recerts

Long ass lines, not seen all day, a fight will break out and the stank

staleness of the poor air will not be smelt

The phone gon stop, laptop will be no more, there will be no doors to knock on anymore

Paddling without an arm. Ducking punches and running from shots

Following crazies and getting bent and wavy

All shitty and gravy

It’s a stagnant culture and the language is always changing

The cast is older, graying, multiplying and straying

Remembering water bugs and apartments in damp basements

Happy 100th post

I started this blog on July 16,2021. This was a big leap for me to put my words out in the world. To discuss my trauma, my transition, my sexuality, my views on race and culture, being taboo and just the myriad of ways, things and thoughts that make me so beautifully complicated and whole. I appreciate using this platform for practice and for actually getting off my chest so many things that I am often unable to discuss in real life.

Any writer knows how tough it is to really feel enough and be brave enough to share. Every writer knows about the struggle to say what you mean and mean what you say. Writing forces you to excrete the muck in your brain. To construct your inner thoughts, ramblings ,statements and make it make sense for other people. But I’ve recently felt that maybe it’s not always supposed to make sense for others. That whatever you say, is said for a reason. And that reason alone just may be to get it off your chest.

I come from people who were silenced for much of our history and in many ways , we still are. Our lives, beliefs and stories were interpreted and made palatable by and for others to dissect and – re assemble. Being a Black transwoman in America, I owe it to all those before me and all those being born , to speak my truths, to fashion my fantasies and challenge the world. You will hear me and you will respect what I said because I said it.

I hope to write 1000 more posts if I get the chance and continue to grow ,nourish and heal through telling my tales. I wish well for all my readers.

Being woman enough

A hang -up of mine that I try to work on is the persistent feeling of being inadequate as a woman. Of not having certain attributes, life-experiences or enough validation as a woman. This hang up is present the most on days when I feel low and I see a woman , most likely cis , seemingly so damn unbothered about her presentation and her acceptance in the world as a woman. It’s when crossing paths with the 5’2 petite women who happen to end up beside me or in front of me outta nowhere. I either fall back or speed up but either way I get away from her. I can’t help but feel like I will be contrasted against this woman, this unbothered, cis woman living her best life. I am more comfortable on planes by myself , doing my own strut, not feeling too tall, too black, too strong. On those moments , the prototypes are irrelevant. I too can damn my own feminine song.

It’s funny cause a few of those women have commented about my size or my legs. Some seemingly expressed admiration or wishing they were taller. I find it funny because they have no idea the struggles of being a big woman. How the dominance of ‘ women being small and tiny” makes bigger women feel inadequate and manly. They don’t know about the clothing and shoe struggles and the constant struggle to want to appear feminine enough in spite of your height and your physical strength.

Lately I been resisting. I have been rediscovering the bad assed attitude I used to have when I was younger. That attitude had at a cornerstone,” you’re a sexy bitch” and you better know it. It’s been reflecting on times when I actually appreciate and love how I look. When I appreciate looking different and loving it. I’ll never be forgettable, there will rarely be a copy of the Queen.

It’s bigger than physical. Sometimes I reflect on more liberal ideals if you will that I possess about sex and romance. The cis normative standards about sexuality that I don’t possess. The desire for freedom of expression and a taste for unquenched carnal tastes. It can be hard to reckon with that with making a man be my man and maybe marriage and kids one day. It’s hard to talk to girlfriends about being different in that respect. It feels like going against the covenant of the Good girls guide to life. It feels too risky, too careless, too male-like in origin.

Merriam- Webster defines woman as ;

Definition of woman

1a: an adult female person

b: a woman belonging to a particular category (as by birth, residence, membership, or occupation) —usually used in combinationcouncilwoman

2: WOMANKIND

3: distinctively feminine nature : WOMANLINESS

4: a woman who is a servant or personal attendant

I think woman means softer one. I think woman is about possessing a proximity to spirit, emotion, tenderness and attention to beauty. It is very cis patriarchy sounding, can even be read as that stereotypical 1920’s dogma that women fight against to this day. But still and all I believe for the greater majority of woman and feminine identified individuals, it is true. It is not a bad thing and it is a strength. I was too soft and too sweet to be a man. That’s one of the reasons I know that I’m a woman. Woman is connected to the earth, woman is connected to the fire, the passion, the motions that shake up and keep this life shit going. And I’m not speaking just on that superpower of giving birth but in giving life, in creating a vibrancy that specializes in emotion and beauty.

When I feel less than woman. When I feel insecure around ” normative looking” women. I need to remember that there are countless ways to be woman and none of them are wrong. Woman is one who knows herself as such. Woman is one who feels herself as such. I love being my own special woman.

Work woes

Has it always been like this or did the pandemic just change things? I envy the seemingly much more balanced work life systems that are present in Europe. These European countries seem to really care about their people with their mandated month long vacations, paid maternal and paternal leave and there always seems to be some perk or another for European workers. I may wax prophetically as an American looking in on another European progression. I can’t help but feel like they have it better.

The standard work day for full time workers is 8 hours a day. This does not include the times many Americans use for commuting. It is fair to say half of one’s day is devoted to a job. This is a lot of time when you really start to add up the math. As an American worker ,you likely spend way more time with your boss and coworkers than you do a spouse or your family. There’s something about that equation that feels wrong as hell. The fearful, insecure worker in me struggles to write this out because it is not attack on my job but the system that encourages and demands what it does from workers. It is not surprising then the failures of the American family to stay a cohesive unit, it does not surprise me all the marriages that end in breakups and divorces, it does not surprise me that we have a loneliness epidemic in this country.

That Protestant work ethic from the 1600s is fucking us up hard. It comes from a time when the whole world was a whole other world. In 2022, when we have supposedly made so many advancements in life, work has to be reconfigured. Happiness needs to be somewhere in the equation, worker security needs to be somewhere in the equation and the whole system needs to truly be dissected. It’s interesting how much talk is done about that controlling , nefarious 1% power class and yet so few avenues to dismantle its’ hold. What would it take for them to share a little more and still retain what they have ?

Burn out and dis-satisfaction is to be expected in systems that posit profits over people. These ugly systems that one must claw through just to survive are not designed with wellness in mind. It should be no wonder when we all get sick.

Fried Chicken Lover

Fried chicken feels like home

Fried hard and crispy,

a mess and twisty , the seasonings burst in my mouth

as the crunch massages my ear. My teeth come down and meet

the sweetest cooked flesh of that blessed chicken

And Im grinning and Im winning

and Im finning and im sinning , my gluttony holds no limit

for my fried chicken

Chicken take me back to coming in from down the block,

take me back to dirty hood streets full of love , with people wearing

gloves ready to knuckle up and hug and laugh and cut ass

Chicken take me back to Church and Jesus and sweet perfumes and choirs

giving the devil hell with their skills of praise

Chicken take me back to the days before Harlem was invaded, when 125th had bootleg cd’s, when taste of seafood line stretched the whole block

Chicken take me back to cold Kool-aid and freezing pepsi

between white bread doused with hot sauce and ketchup,

next to some macaroni and cheese burned edges and collard greens

and hot grease popping and delicious aroma wafting

Fried chicken take me home and never leave

Fuck ya haters and ya sugar and ya whole foods

fuck ya jokes and i hope you choke on your kale

for giving me hell about my little deliciousness

in your fight to keep upheld this fairytale land of

milk and honey

Shout out to The Chi

I love The Chi ,Lena Waithe’s showtime show. This show always has the most realistic characters and storylines that center the Black experience and nuances of life in a major metropolis for Black people. I love the wide array of different kinds of characters we get to see from smart, sensitive super teen Kevin, from try hard but still fuck up, lover of many girls Emmett, the beauty and complexity of Ms. Keisha and all the rest of these characters are mad dope. I haven’t yet traveled to Chicago but I can’t help but feel like the show just exudes a Chicago spirit; gritty, cold yet soulful and esoteric. I love that Waithe and her team doesn’t shy away from the ugliness, doesn’t hide the contradictions and yet always keeps a spin that promotes a Black positivity that isn’t corny. Like everybody doesn’t have to be like Cosby’s family to be wholesome. I love that, as of writing the Chi is sticking with an all Black cast which is so refreshing, so 90’s even. Nowadays too many shows that are about Black people seem to always have others randomly put in the story line that doesn’t add to the show at all. It starts to lose or neglect its’ base, its’ message, the optics are diluted to appease others’ gaze, to explain things that typically don’t need being explained to its’ core audience.

And I must finally give a notable mention to the inclusion these last two seasons of Black transwomen. OMG. Like there have been so, so, so few depictions of us anywhere least of all as whole, fleshed out characters and to have a storyline that centers a relationship with a Black man from the hood. Thank you Lena Waithe and team for this. The reality is that we do exist and we do have love and I daresay many of us even have presences in our communities like the two transwomen in the show have. So thanks to them for showing all that and then some.