Sunday, January 31, 2016

Fellowship of Familiar

Just after 10 am, Sunday morning. I have already had a house guest, gotten coffee, ran into a friend, and ran into an ex that is one of two people who live in this city that I used to date who I am actually not on good terms with.


Quite a bit for pre-10 am on a Sunday, but, at least I'm waking up.

(An aside: Lately I've felt proud of being on good terms with the majority of my exes. Some people don't understand how this is possible.  I don't understand how it could not be.  The people I've dated are fucking AWESOME.)

***

I'm diving back into my studies today.  It will feel good. Nourishing.  If there is one thing I have never felt ashamed of, it is learning and attempting to better my understanding of the world. I prefer it to loud parties, by far, but it is also something that makes me feel engaged in life in a larger sense.  To learn by the words people have written and have it inform how you interact with life without it having to be at the expense of someone.  Not that reading replaces human interaction.  Of course not. But I do think it valuable to school yourself on shit before you open your mouth and start talking like you know some shit.

Read some histories. Some ideas. Some struggles. Some lives.

Then get out there and let it inform all of it.

(pause)

I have a new friend crush.  I'm determined to make him my friend.  He's smart, funny, and dresses like a Discord kid but is from Santiago, and not D.C.


More soon.

k.

(photo: rockbandinsidemyheart tumblr)

I Want You All To Myself

Tonight was incredible, and ended up in a Sorprano's type bar with two beautiful boys and me sitting in between them talking academia and library specializations. All of this after almost an hour and a half of Godspeed! You Black Emperor, live.  Films of beautiful wires and buildings and water and trees.

But let's cut real life, and get to the story for tonight.

****

I want you all to myself.

It's what I couldn't bring myself to tell you.

I want your hands and your fingers to be mine, and mine alone.

I want our kisses to be only ours.  The way you kiss is so perfect for me. I don't want it to go away.

That I want your eyes (those eyes), your neck, your knees as you kneel on the wood floor of yours to be mine, and mine alone.

That I want your sadness to be placed in my hands, so that I can salve it, or, at least, walk with you through it.

I want your desire whispered into my ear, again.

I want you to hold me while we sleep.

I know you want that, too.

(pause)

I met someone with your name tonight.

We instantly liked each other, again.

I left to go be with my friends.



k.




Saturday, January 30, 2016

Confetti as Snow as Rain

Suppose I wrote, in detail, what has happened in the past two weeks.  Then, when I placed my pen down, I decided to snip the entire tale up in to sentences.  Pick up the scraps of paper.  Throw them into the air.  Let their importance and stupidity float down upon my face and  hair.   One by one, I pick a handful of them up:

A rev of an engine outside my window.

I have returned home.

There is a silence here that I will both enjoy and miss in the next few weeks.

The kiss against the closet yesterday was nice.

I've been picking up more of the words that I hear.

Soon, I will be standing in front of a thousand or so and, while it makes me nervous, I am ready for it. 

Tonight will be music and images and two beautiful men accompanying me.

A package full of witchcraft that a lad on the other side of the country has sent to me is being held hostage by the post office.

I suppose it's not just me that is in between steps.

"When is the last time you chased someone?", I was recently asked.



I keep thinking of this question.

k.


Thursday, January 28, 2016

Give Me Everything, Tonight.

I'm excited.

I've been reading a ton of theater in Spanish, getting asked out on dates, asking people out on dates, and donning a new orangish-red lipstick (which one would think wouldn't work, but, it does).

One thing is true:

No matter how new or how old a love  has been in your life, there is always excitement in romance.

As the era from which I have been reading Spanish theater is the Romance era and then the Anti-Romance/response to Romance era, what could be more fitting?

Soon,

k.

(photo: Amal/Paris 2015 via Roserum tumblr)
(title: lyrics to a fucking Pitbull song that I overheard and can't get out of my fucking head)

Tuesday, January 26, 2016

"I Ain't Nothin Like Your Last Dude, What's His Name? Not Important." : The Honesty of Game




One of the more hilarious conversations I've been in lately had to do with a stripped and blunt conversation about game.

Some people have it.

Some people do not.

The conversation ended with my friend, who is also an ex of mine, saying simply:

You and I have game.

Some people do not.

(pause)

A point of pride is that I can say, without question, that every single one of my friends has game.  It is quite incredible and, at times, blows my mind with their honest suaveness and intelligence.

(pause)

It doesn't matter how much you know about books, how much you know about music, what you can or cannot do with your hands, if you cook well or if you don't:

If you don't have game, (here meaning the ability to be creative, loving, smart, and secure in yourself), I will get bored of you.

And when I get bored of you, I may start to bat you around because it's more entertaining than your insufferable plans that you found in the "Things To Do This Weekend" section of the newspaper.

I will get bored when you don't recognize your class- and race- and gender- and citizenship- and language- and educational background- privilege.  I will listen to you talk about the "injustices" that you experience and think of you as a miniature Donald Trump and his puckered asshole of a mouth pulsating and complaining about all of the things that have done him wrong.

So please:

If you are going to approach me, on any level:

Be intelligent. Be aware. Be critical. Be non-abusive. Be fabulous.

And for fuck's sake:

Have some game.



be well; be loved,


k.

(title: Lyrics from Truffle Butter)
(image: Kate Moss by Craig McDean, W Magazine, May 2001 via deshistoriesdemode tumblr)


Monday, January 25, 2016

The Trinity of Roulette Honesty: I Play Fair Until I Do Not.

Let me tell you about the beauty of baths, and of the actual incredible nature of eating a mango in bed while mostly nude.  It’s weird, but it actually *is* incredible. I highly suggest it.

One of the reasons I love Zeb:  He knows and notices and connects things that actually makes things different/better. It’s great to be close with your exes. It’s even better when they are creative genius emotional psychic builder carpenter artist weirdos. 

 We had a great conversation about secure vs. insecure people and the huge ass difference in street harassment when I am walking with someone who is secure in themselves vs someone who is mostly insecure.

For the record: Holy SHIT does it make a difference. 

It feels good to feel that, again.

(Pause)

I have this rule about confessions.  Real confessions.

When I’ve done something really bad- I mean, really, really bad- almost unspeakable- I tell myself that I have to try, at least three times, to confess to the person who was the "victim" of it. Because although I can do bad shit, I can't actually go about it like a bad person.

I'll clarify, here: This has happened probably three times in my life. It’s not like I’m running around doing horrible things to people, and this never includes people actively in my life.  It’s with good reason when it happens, but, I know better than to think “good reason” is actually and fully justification for it.

The truth of the matter is: There are very rare occasions and circumstances that I allow myself to be completely and purely vengeful. It is nothing more (or less?) respectable than that. 

In any case, I continue:

But after the third time, if I have no success in making the connection to tell the person, I am, officially, off the hook for it.  

Not to myself, of course-it’s serious stuff to step outside of my own integrity- but in relation to the other person.

(And I know, I know: Magical thinking and the numerology of “3”.)

But last night I tried to connect with the person for the third, and final time. 

I was afraid that the connection might actually happen. That the plan might work out,  that they might just show up to that meeting they considered, that a response might come.

But it didn’t.

I would like to say that the remnants of guilt are still on my hands.

But they aren’t. 

Instead, a childlike freedom envelopes and excites me. 

Oh, I know it is terrible. 

To make up such arbitrary rules around guilt and accountability. We all do it to varying degrees- this is just more blatant. More calculated.  

But you have to draw the line somewhere, don’t you? 

Some friends say that what I did was understandable.

That what I did was vindication for the emotional distress I had been caused.  

But, come on now:  I know it was wrong.  

The person had absolutely no idea.

I know it was wrong because when I was deciding if I should do it, I knew if I did it, I would have to do it knowing that I could never face the person again. 

Not in any real way.

And then I decided in favor of doing it.

And so I did it. 

I don’t regret it.

Even though it is awful.

Perhaps even to be described as pure evil.

Does that make me bad?

Is it worse that I don't mind if it does?

But, still, the Catholic in me still mandated that I put forth the Trinity of Confession Russian Roulette: To create the possibility that I would have to confess what I had done.

Only this time, again on this third and final time, the chamber was empty.

And midnight, that beautiful hour of all things to change, was set as the cut off point for a reply to come.

Nothing.



We all have our dark secrets, don’t we? 

Some of them just get strangely, and instantly, lighter. 


Be well; be loved.


k.

Sunday, January 24, 2016

The Gorgeous Hearts That Make Up My Net (as in, Trapeze) and Life


Part I

Would you tell me what it was that opened your heart?


There was a key I had found long ago.  


Not quite on the bottom of the ocean, for it had washed ashore.

I put it in my pocket that one day. When I was sick but we were by the ocean. I put it deep into my pocket and pressed it close to my leg.


I remember watching you walk out into the water.  It seemed to be something that you needed. 


While you were out in the ocean, I walked up and down the beach, wondering if the sand could fill my heart: It had only to do with family.


You came out and asked if I would take your picture.  


Of course I would: You know how much I always enjoyed making you look and feel as beautiful as possible. As handsome. As confident.


I took the picture. I tried to capture the sea inside your hair- inside your eyes.  

I knew it already existed, there.

You moved too fast.  
I was scared. 
I tried to keep pace. 
I couldn’t. 
So I stopped all of that. 
But you kept going.


So here I am:  


You out to sea


and me on this beach contemplating the sand.


Part II


Exhale, eyes closed, head flopped backwards and face pointing directly to the sky.

Exhale, again.

Today was full of meetings and discussions.

Today was a healing of something that left two and a half years ago, and the ending of something that had been going on for roughly the same amount of time.  

It's strange how life is like that:  Healingly cyclical at times.

What I loved about today:  A harried phone call from a loved one in New York simply wanting to cough out their feelings about a person we both know well. His laugh makes me smile and relax.  His thoughts, and how he ties them together, make me feel less alone in uniqueness. 

(pause)

I'm searching for lesson in the midst of the smoke of the demolition around me. 

You can give your love to a friendship but if it's not being reciprocated, at some point, you just have to let it go.

Don't give someone your everything and then turn around to settle with their "some things." Pour your all into someone who pours theirs all into you. - some guy named Lloyd Barker

He's right. 

Surprisingly/unsurprisingly so.

(pause)

Sometimes, there is too much heartache that happens at the same time.

Sometimes,  the only thing you can do is count your breaths. 



Exhale. 

Exhale, again.



k.

Thursday, January 21, 2016

Verses

It's that feeling when your throat tightens.  Something between fear and the inhale that happens before a guttural scream.  

That's an accurate description of where I have been existing on quite a few levels.

Not exactly ideal, but also not the worst situations I have found myself in before.

The quicksand and rocking horses that have been underneath each step I have taken for the past four, roughly five months are finally starting to solidify.  

To become sturdy. Motionless.  

But there is that movement that continues in the pit of your stomach while  you watch the storm clouds dissipate. 

Now it is an exercise in learning to walk on solid ground, again. 

Puke this infected heart out my mouth and let's start anew. 

See you then/there.


k.

(photo credit: Jordan DeLawder via untrust you tumblr)

Tuesday, January 19, 2016

Protect What You Must

Come here, she said. Let me tell you something:

I will miss you with a good portion of my heart.

I will miss the safety I felt in your hugs, and when I would wear your sweatpants to bed at night.  I will miss your laugh and the way that you drive (even though I hated it). I will not be able to listen to Lana del Rey and not think of you and of road trips. I will not be able to watch the television shows we watched together, nor listen to the radio shows we would listen to.  It was part of our ritual.

I will miss the smell of your various hair products, and the smell of your shampoo that was actually baby wash. I will miss the seriousness of your face when you are researching something- no matter if it is scientific, or pop culture.

I will miss the way you hold your guitar, and they way your fingers move when you play it.  I will miss the crooning slightness of your voice when you sing.

I will miss the pride you have in your body. I will miss the squareness of  your face when you are mad, stressed out, or trying to impress someone. I will miss the scent of your room and even the mysterious smells of your car.

I will not miss the glasses you ultimately decided upon: The other ones were infinitely more flattering on you.

I will miss your awkward stance when you are dressed up, and I will miss the jutting out of your jaw as you overcompensate for it.

I will miss the calmness and confidence that comes over you when you know you have done a good job: In your work, in your art, in your family.

And for now, that's all I can say.

She sat down, picked up a pen, and started writing.

be well; be loved.


k.
(photos: Lara Stone in Get Back! Stay Back! for V #76
Shot by Nick Knight
Styled by Carine Roitfeld via lelaid tumblr)


Sunday, January 17, 2016

Lessons From House Plants


In between fresh flannel sheets, in a clean room.  The scent of candle wicks and wax and their slight amounts of smoke snake and rise in the air.

Today has been one of self love, love,  and slowness.  One of those days when I get up before the sun rises, and am moving about in a hoodie (hoodies up!) and running shoes to all sorts of places to get errands done.

There is an enjoyment in things as simple and basic as picking out the food that will nourish me in the next week.  There is a humbling feeling to it.  To be able to go and gather the food I will eat in the next week from a store a few blocks away with money that I have for it.

I drank coffee while having a long conversation with a friend back in Brooklyn.  It was an incredible conversation in that I learned so much. About my friend, about myself, and about how trust-filled friendships and relationships are the places that we can all, truly and in a lasting way, grow.

There are those moments where we feel we have come so far, and simultaneously recognize how much further we need to go.  Today was one of those moments.

(pause)

I'm really getting into using gouache, lately, in painting. There is something incredibly satisfying about the vividness- the opaque brightness- of the colors as they absorb into a thicker, white watercolor paper.

I have been documenting.

My relationship with writing on a keyboard, writing with ink, painting, and drawing has been fluctuating so rapidly. Different utensils for different moments.  Different mediums for different expressions.

For now, I go back to reading.

It is always suspicious when one's amount of production exceeds the amount of of time spent to absorb, and seek for, influence.



be well; be loved,

k.

(photo via a--t--m--o--s--p--h--e--r--e tumblr)

Saturday, January 16, 2016

Goodbye, Kitchen Table

"These avocados taste like perfume." Sam wrinkled her nose as her teeth were sunk into her bagel and looked over at Grady.

"I told you they weren't ripe." he paused and sipped his coffee, steam fogging up his glasses that had made their way to the end of his nose. Coming back up from his sip, and setting the mug down, he added, "I have something to tell you."

"So that's what this breakfast invitation was all about..." Sam smirked and looked around Grady's bright and sunny, yet spice-cluttered kitchen like it was the new premiere restaurant in town.

Grady stirred his coffee again, although he had already stirred it.  Sam saw this and dropped her smirk.  The kitchen clouded, somehow.  Her words had absorbed the weight of water without her noticing it.

"What's going on?"



k.
(photo: novel illustrations by Sam Pash via crackbitch69 tumblr)

Open (Hello Fellow Human!) and Closed (Eat a Big Bowl of Fuck.)

When someone asks, "What's your name?", I usually tell them my first name and ask theirs. 

The exception to this is if it is late at night and I'm by myself. 

Tonight I learned that if you do that, a man could end up sitting next to you and thus pinning you in on the bus with an unplugged electric guitar making up songs to serenade you with that include your name until he finally gets off the bus.

Here are some other reasons from tonight that I usually don't work late on Friday nights. ("Late", here, meaning 7:00 pm)

"Are you involved in the arts? God has given me the gift of reading souls, and I can see this in yours."

"I love your shoes. You are very attractive. You're married aren't you?"

"(whistle)"

(The above came from different people on my way home.)

I want to know how to resist becoming an insular, unfriendly fucking asshole. Because that's not who I want to be.  But what is the line between being friendly in the way that conveys the faith I have in humans, and not getting harassed/becoming a target?

I want to know how to feel good about how I am presenting my gender any particular day and be able to come home without feeling annoyed/threatened/gross/bummed out by something some stranger has said to me.


k.

(photo from sadviolences tumblr)

Friday, January 15, 2016

Be Crumbled

"Have you heard from him lately?" her voice asked. 

Peter looked down at the ground. Considered his sneakers. 

"Not so much." He rubbed his eyes with the meatiest part of his palm.  His eyes stung. Not from sleeplessness, but from reading too much and from looking for things in the dark at night that just weren't there.

"Well, I'm sorry that's going on.  I know you guys were pretty close..." Jessie studied his face looking for more of a response. A crack.  A movement.  Anything, really.

Peter pushed his shoe forward a bit on the gravel to hear the crunch, a tiny puff of dust blooming into the air.

He glanced to the horizon, then turned his head slowly back towards the direction of the conversation. He closed his eyes, raised his eyebrows, paused like that- eyelids stretched taut- then let his eyes snap open again.  An attempt at massaging his own eyeballs.

"I guess so." he said, and picked up the metal bucket of cold water that had been resting by his feet.

With the cool of its slender metal handle against the curl of his fingers, he could feel the teeter of the water hitting the walls, inside.





be well; be loved,

k.

(title:  A line from this Rumi poem:

Be crumbled.
So wild flowers will come up where you are.
You have been stony for too many years.
Try something different.
Surrender.                                           )

(photo: the fuselage of an abandoned american navy cargo plane that crash landed in 1973, photographed under the aurora by Suranga Weeratunga on Iceland's Solheimasandur beach via nubbsgalore tumblr)

All of the above inspired by a conversation a friend and I had yesterday about love.

Thursday, January 14, 2016

When Someone Tries to Holla While You are Hanging Out With an Ex But Then Backs Down and Says Simply to Your Ex, "You're a Lucky Man" So Still Doesn't Get It

For the love of the familiar:

Exhale. And breathe it in, again. Exhale.

Sometimes, you hang out with people who expand your perspective on life.

And if you are lucky enough, these aren't chance interactions: They are the people in your life.

A friend, who is also an ex of mine, was in town from New York. One of the things I love about being friends with people who I've dated is that there is a particular, and incredible, bond you can have with them.

They know you enough to be able to talk to you about things that matter.  Call you out on the things that need to be called out. Support you in the things that need to be supported.  Challenge you to do and be better.

They know you. They've seen you.  They still see you.

It feels good. And hilarious. And loving.  And familiar.  And great.

To be honest, it feels like hanging out with family that makes you see things you didn't necessarily see before.

And to laugh at the things you did see before.

Love is love is love.

The exhale comes with a particular relaxation that happens with letting masks slip, and the stress of strangers recede: It feels so good to have history with people. Years deep, like rings around a weird ass tree that just grows stronger every year.

Here is to the family that sticks around.  Here is to the family that engages.  It's this kind of engagement that make us- each other- better people in the world. It's within such family that real change within ourselves, and the world, can happen.

In the words of Killer Mike:  Love honestly. Love hard.




Be well; be loved,

k.

(photo: Richard M. Coda via 2000 Light Years From Home)

Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Quilted Comfort

I love that you treat me like precious cargo.  That you let me be gentle.  You let me let you know that I need someone looking out for me.

The coffee that you make me is good only because you make it.  Even when we are poor and have nothing but instant, it tastes divine because it has been stirred by your hands and perhaps a trick of using more or less water to make it taste better.

I know that you know that my family is a straw man to most people that I talk to. The stories I tell are the handful that I have.The people hearing them don't know that, but you do.

You taught me how to make a bath warmer.  You taught me how to stay warm in the winter time. You taught me most, though not all, of the uses of a hot water bottle.

You taught me patience. You taught me family. You taught me love. You taught me understanding. Flexibility. The complexity of feelings.  The complexity of truths.

You taught me that it is important to bring people *in*.  To make people feel welcome. To make them feel accepted.

You taught me to laugh when life gets too serious.  You taught me to reflect on what I am doing and what I have done. You have forever been encouraging me to see the future in right now.

You know that there are pieces of my story that are missing.  You are patient and careful and slow with these pieces of things. They have edges even I am not aware of.

You taught me humor in the kitchen. Humor on the couch. Humor in the car. You reminded me of how much I love road trips at night. Road trips to the ocean. Road trips to nowhere.

You prepare food intentionally. Slowly.  You taught me that it is something that creates relationships and communities. It's what holds them together. Nourishes them. If there is something to talk about, we can talk about it after dinner.  If there is something to laugh about, we can laugh about it in the kitchen and over dinner.

All of this is patchwork.  Clippings of things I have learned from the people I love.

Sometimes it serves as a beautiful reminder.  To reach inside my heart, and pull a handful of these truths from within it.  To admire them fanned out in front of me upon the floor- a spread of love-  before I tuck them back away in the center my heart for safe keeping.


k.

A song for you, tonight.

(photo: Junya Ishigami, Cuboid Balloon, 2012.)

Tuesday, January 12, 2016

I am Sitting in a Tin Can, Far Above the World

Throughout the years, people have always told me that I am weird. That I am very androgynous. That I am out of step with the world. Outside of the world. Multi-gendered. Beautiful minded. That I am strange.

David Bowie is one of the people in his dress, writing, gender expressions, fashion, physical appearance, and way of living that made things easier for me.

For a lot of people.

I'm thinking about all of those people today.

He impacted so many people on so many levels.  Music. Fashion. Art. Gender. Weirdo-ness. Sexuality.  All of it.

It makes sense that everyone from the music nerd to the trans painter are having meltdowns and lighting candles.

Zeb was talking with me recently about how art is not what an artist produces. The painting, the song, the photograph. The actual art is the very person that creates it.

Even in the days leading up to Bowie's death and these days after there are messages surfacing from him that let us know that this was a last installment of this art piece that has been his life. That has been him.

Thank you for making me feel less alone, and for giving me something to aspire to and feel seen in.  In your makeup, your androgyny, your waif-ness, your endless imagination, your suits, and the endless and entirely created galaxies within those unforgettable eyes of yours.

The stars look very different today, indeed.

All of my love, and all of my gratitude across the universe tonight.


k.

(title: Lyric from Space Oddity)

Monday, January 11, 2016

Turn Up the Lights In Here, Baby. Extra Bright, I Want Y'all to See This.


This year is refining what I already know:

Be yourself.

I will be, and am.

I'm a trashy queen.

Something between a gentleman dandy and a mean girl, but with a serious bend to diy all hir outfits.

I have no qualms about reading people.

The only rules are that it needs to be quick, smart, and entirely true.

No abuse and no bullshit will be tolerated this year.

If you need inspiration/motivation, go to T.S. Madison. Be Yourself, Bitch.

If you need a video explaining how one's reality is defined by oneself. This is My Hair


All of this to say to the people I care most about in both the proverbial and the literal way:


Your makeup is terrible,

but I love you anyway.




k.

(image source: this blog is garbage tumblr)
(title: from All of the Lights, K. West)

Sunday, January 10, 2016

A Toast to Personal History

One of the things that makes me feel proud are the people in my life.  These friends of mine who I have had for decades now who have always been friends and sometimes been lovers, who are connected by love to each other.

What I mean by this is that, over the years, friends have made a point to meet each other for the first time, even in my absence. This has happened in LA, in Detroit, in Olympia, in Seattle, in Columbus, in Portland, and now again in Brooklyn.  This last meeting has been especially important because the two people would hear about each other from me for over ten years. 

When these meetings happen, I ask that the friends take a photograph and send it to me.  They usually oblige.  The photographs themselves are gorgeous:  Two people standing together with the stance of people who have just met, yet have known each other for years. Looking at the camera, they are looking out to me.  To show me. To say "HEY! This person is rad we both think you are rad and here we are standing in some random bar/wedding/street corner/conference and wanting you to know that you are important to us and that we do and will end up being important to each other for reasons that both do and do not include you."

I love it.

It is beautiful.

Sometimes, when life feels a bit chaotic, I lose sight of the depth and interconnectedness of the people I love and the people who love me.  But I am always reminded.  When it matters most,  I am always reminded.

Here is to seeing the threads of those strong connections a bit brighter these next few days and months and years.

It will always go to prove that nothing is stronger than the love that is built. Piece by piece. Day by day. Conversation by conversation. Silence by silence. Time by time. Presence by presence. 

I love you.  

Thank you for being a part of what builds me, and what keeps me shining and together.


All my love,


k.

(photo: Marie Consindas ; from an older entry of Yvonne Constance tumblr)

How to Show and Receive Love Having Just Snapped an Attacker's Spine: The Art of the Woman-Read Body

The past seventy two hours were exactly what I needed. So, so, so, so deeply and arriving so, so, so so unexpectedly.

Home contacted me late last week saying that he would be in town until Saturday.  I hadn't seen him in years, and immediately made plans with him. We then hang out for the next three days.

Let me tell you something: It is healing and beautiful to be around people who want nothing from you other than for you to be who you are, and to just be there. To witness: To tell stories and to listen to them.

It felt good to stay in a hotel room with a person who isn't trying to fuck me: To stay up, in separate beds, watching movies and talking and laughing and being shocked at what flickers across the screen and across our tongues. To fall asleep in the dark and quiet that only upscale hotels can achieve.  To sink into the perfect hard/soft of a mattress that these hotels have perfected. To wake up and wander the city I live in like a tourist: Eyes filled with new perspective and potential.

(pause)

One of the complex things about living life read as a woman is that the most beautiful things can be happening, while the regular world threads its stitches into you.

(pause)

I was in a beautiful mood today.

Sometimes, I am convinced that the demons of the world can track this. Chase it. 

Sitting on the bus, alone, I could hear a man a few seats back from me speaking angrily.  I was one of two other people on the bus- three counting the bus driver.  I was the only woman.

"I'll slap those glasses right off of your fucking face, BITCH."

It didn't take long for me to realize that he was talking to me. I turned my head to the side, to look out the window and admire the world outside and around me.  It only seemed to escalate him. "What the fuck do you think you're looking at? What the fuck do you think you're smiling at looking around, you fucking bitch."

The next stop was mine. His. As well as that of the other man on the bus.

The bus stops.  The first man gets up.  I get up.  I can hear the man yelling at me coming up the aisle behind me. "I'll slap those glasses right off of your fucking face, bitch."  I step into a seat to let him pass. He pushes past me. Shoves me.

It's the last straw. I'm so fucking tired, again, of not being able to ride the bus without some fuck trying to jerk off to me, to threaten violence towards me, or both.

I take a quick glance around, walk right up behind him, and kick/stomp down as hard as I fucking can on his leg. He spins around. "What the FUCK bitch? You fucking kicked me!" He gets in my face, and I smile wide in his face and say "What?", open my eyes all anime and feign fear, but I keep my eyes looking into his like Fuck you, you mother fucking piece of shit.  No one is going to believe that some skinny ass bespectacled girl kicked you, so eat fuck. You don't get to get away with threatening me and you aren't going to make me shrink back....."bitch"

He continues to scream in my face. I blink a few times and move back like a "good, fragile girl" should.

Sorry, motherfucker.  I've never been afforded the luxury of delicacy, but I've been read as a girl long enough to know how to fake its thin mask when I need to.

The bus driver pulls him away from me, because his nose is less than an inch from mine and he is screaming.  I keep calm, but make it a point to look "confused and scared" even though I know exactly what the fuck is going on.

When I get off the bus, the other man asks if I am okay.  I say yes. In my head I think you're an asshole, too. You heard this man threatening me the entire time and didn't do shit. He takes this opportunity to expound on his ideas of masculinity: "I hate it when men pick on women.  It doesn't make you more of a man!"  I tune him out. Nod.  Say to him "Thank you for asking me if I'm okay, and for hanging back for a second.  It made me feel supported.  Have a good day, okay?"  I meant what I said.  He says, "You, too.  And honestly, if you see that guy again, just *kick* him.  Don't even say anything. Just kick that guy. He deserves it."

"He sure does", I say, and I walk away knowing that I have retroactively received a blessing from a latent knight in shining armor to kick the shit out of the man threatening me and wonder what the fuck it's even good for.

(pause)

If you're curious what it is like to live in this body and gender, go back to the beginning of this entry and try, sincerely, to connect with the beauty of that first story after having just read this second one.

That's what it can feel like.

That's what attempts to estimate a day.

(pause)



be well; be loved; find and experience joy even while the world stitches into you. You deserve it.

k.

As a post script:  I'm shocked at people's shock about what women-read people experience every day.

(photo: Hermann Nitsch (Austrian, b. 1938), Schüttbild (16. Malaktion), 1983. Dispersion on jute, 200 × 300 cm)

Friday, January 8, 2016

Every Single Night

It's late.

When I breathe, there's a whistle in my nose.

Today was good. Calm.

It involved the attention of a beautiful women

a sweet talk with a good friend as I walked outside in the cold

and a good number of pages in a book I'm reading that I can relate to.

**

Tonight, I washed my face with warm water and felt relieved at the feeling of my hands over my eyes.

The sparks that I see in the dark of my closed eyes remind me that all is not lost.


be well; be loved.

k.

(title: Jawbreaker)
(photo: via prljavo tumblr)

Wednesday, January 6, 2016

In Other News

Step by step, they say.

I went to go get a drug test for a place I'm interviewing for. In my naive perspective, having never had a drug test, I skipped right up to the counter all smiles and eagerness. "Hello! I am here for a drug test for employment!", I announced.

It took me a second to recognize that the crumpled crew in the waiting room looked like they were hating the fuck out of life.

As I brought out my license and got together my paperwork, a few more people came in.

"Hi, I need to take a piss test for my ex-wife."
"For what kind of drugs", the attendant asks.
"All of them."

Looking around I realized that this place only does drug tests - for a variety of reasons- and paternity DNA tests.

I sat down and tried to dim the light out of my chipper.

The medical assistant calls me back.  I am met with suspicion when the name on the form and the name on my ID don't match. This goes on for a bit.  I finally find something to prove something with.  (What, I do not know.)

I am given the okay.

"Empty out your pockets. Take off your jacket and your hoodie. Fill this cup up but don't flush the toilet when you're done. If you flush the toilet when you're done, the test will be invalid."

Fair enough.

I appreciated that the medical assistant had perfectly sculpted eyebrows.


(a sketch by Frank O'Meara for his 1882 painting, The Widow)

Tuesday, January 5, 2016

The Politics of the Dance Floor (You Want Me Down On Earth, But I am Up in Space)

On Christmas night, I found myself on the dance floor of an out of town gay bar.  The crowd was mostly straight, to be honest, but there were a few well manicured boys littered about.  Small town mashups, I guess.

In any case, the music they played was to die for, and I spent most of the evening dancing. It felt so good.  I have to say that me, my friend from back home, and the cool kids in the corner, were the best dancers there.

It may not be all that to say that, but, I think I'm starting to get why the last two people I've dated were too shy to dance in front of me.

At the end of the night, this man who had been checking me out at the club was crossing the street with a group of his friends.  When he saw my group of friends walk out, he yelled, "Woman with the stockings!" (That was me.) "You are incredibly sexy! Okay. Have a good night!"

Now that is how to catcall if you're going to: No expectation or demand, and a closing statement at the end.

(pause)

It's nice to be on the floor and not have straight dudes grinding onto you.  I like that gay bars set up the expectation that that should not be happening. It leaves the night to dancing and fun and music and the thin, fun flirting of gay boys and queer girls. 

While Icona Pop's I Love It played, a woman and I danced together a bit and she leaned over to say "I feel like we should be burning our bras!", then proceeded to mime burning a bra and tossing it at me.  That kind of flirting: Harmless.  Still allowing for people there to dance, to dance.

Anyway.  Here's to the little out of town club that had a pretty fucking great set of music to dance to.  At least enough to keep me up and out there until the better part of 2AM.

On that note,  I'll leave you with the Icona Pop song.  A bit out of step as far as the mix went that night, but I think it encompasses the spirit of the evening.

I Love It.

Be well; be loved,

k.

Monday, January 4, 2016

That Battery Acid Taste: Why 2016 is the Year of Choosing

Borrowed computer. Borrowed time. 

Things are back in motion.

Tonight I hung out with a friend of mine I haven't seen in a while.  He's a Deaf guy from California who works as a mechanic. Anytime we get together, he always has some turn of phrase or perspective or two cents that I leave thinking about for the next few hours if not days.  Tonight was no exception.

For the record, while it may be stating the obvious: People who only hang out with people who look and were raised like themselves, and monolinguals, miss out on everything.  Lord knows the world could do with less of the people who cling to their linguistic and physical mirror images and then want to talk about "diversity" and "diverseness of perspective".

(pause)

Today involved dealing with a lot of sexual harassment. Pretty heavy handed shit, too.  Some guy rubbing his cock at me on the bus.  A dude thanking me for his boner.  Fucking obscene ass shit. All the while the only skin that was showing were my face and my hands.  Leave it to their imaginations.

(Of course, it wouldn't matter how much skin was showing. Fuck that slut-shaming crap and keep it in your pants.)

On a humorous note, as I waited for my friend to show up at the bar, a woman pointed at me and then approached me telling me that her and her husband both like women. Her husband, as it turned out, was the man I kept eyeing thinking that he was Damian Jurado. Turns out, he's not.  I'm so bad at these pale, bulldog-faced men in stubble and plaid shirts.  There's so many of them out here.

(pause)

One of the first interpreting situations I experienced at the company I most recently worked for was with a man who kept telling me that I looked like Eartha Kitt from Batman.  It was both deeply complimenting and, deeply, well, odd: If only I could go to work in a catsuit.

Well, let's face it:  I practically do.

Be well; be loved,

k.
(photo: Eatha Kitt on the set of Batman in 1967. Swiped from mazzystardust tumblr)