Human Connection

I don't want to get too good at being alone...

9 Parts of Desire

Tonight I saw the play "9 Parts of Desire". It was beautiful. And sad. And intense. 

The premise of the play is this: one woman plays the parts of 9 Iraqi women who are talking to an interviewer. During their interviews they share their experiences of life before and during the Gulf and Iraq wars. Each story is very moving as they express all the nuances of living in fear. And all the nuances of finding enjoyment and peace and pleasure where ever they can. The violence that is a common theme among the women is gripping. And equally gripping is the disclosure of a doctor who has been delivering mutated baby after mutated baby that she herself is pregnant and that she doesn't know how she will be able to look at all these malformed infants when they grow up. 

Like the war in Iraq and the constant news coverage that faces us all, this play does not let up. There are several lighter moments thrown in, but from start to finish it is one full story of intense emotion.

Magnet Poetry for Posterity's Sake

Music is to smear

red sex passion

deep into

raw nude rhythm.

Monuments need green aesthetic.

I remember my first dress.

Every straight man

is a femme in the closet.

Use more leather.

Transitions

Tell someone you are transgender, give them enough time, and I am willing to bet you will eventually be asked where you are in transition. Everyone seems to be obsessed with transition. There is an assumption that all transfolk who were assigned male at birth want to be female and that all transfolk who were assigned female at birth want to be male. There is an assumption that the end point to being transgender is to have crossed the gender binary and to once again fit neatly into one of the two boxes (of course there is also an assumed, and much focused upon, surgery that goes with that as well). These assumptions often are made from within the trans community too- not just from without. What most fail to realize, though, is that the idea of transition doesn’t apply to all transfolk. Certainly the idea of a definitive one-gender-to-the-other idea of a transition doesn’t apply to a large portion of transfolk. It doesn’t even need to be this giant, all-consuming, concerted effort that it so often is portrayed as.

“This is my secret: trans[folk] don’t ‘do’ transition. People say things like ‘When you transitioned’ and ‘when you made your change’ and they have no idea what they are talking about. Transition isn’t an active verb, but a passive one. You don’t transition, you simply stop resisting transition, you just give in. You just stop fighting. You just let the current sweep you away. Transition is a sacrifice, like an act of submission, like going to sleep, like dying. Maybe sex is like that too. Maybe everything is.” -Stacey Montgomery Scott

What if the idea of a transition simply meant that we allowed ourselves to be who we are- that we stopped pretending, stopped acting, stopped misbehaving, stopped pushing? What if the idea of transition simply meant a wardrobe change for one person, a full SRS for another person, a hormone regimen for another person, nothing for another person, a change in behavior for another person, and another person, and another person, and that all these changes were seen as equal transitions? They don’t all mean that boys become girls or that girls become boys. They idea of transition is allowed to also represent those who go from being boys to being another gender. And girls who become another gender. And the other genders are recognized. And moving and flowing between all the genders becomes easier and acknowledged and allowed. 

We in the trans community so often complain about the male and female genders/spaces being policed. How about we stop also policing the spaces for transition and the spaces for other genders? How about we let this whole gender experience just happen and end the rules and expectations for all of it?

Cling Wrap

How fortunate it is to wake up in the middle of the night and remember that lying there in bed with you is someone who is so beautiful and so amazing. Someone who you love so very much. How wonderful it feels to cradle them in your arms and to feel their arms around you. But how to tell them you love them when you're not sure it's what they want to hear? To risk everything to lose it all. To risk it all to gain everything. And so there is silence. An extra unspoken squeeze during a hug. Perhaps a reciprocal look in the silent gazes. Is it possible that too much is being read in that perfect smile? Sigh.

Random Text Message: Elaborated

In this mechanized metropolis there is no park. It is all grey and desolate and polluted. At the far end of the park there is a hopeful sight. Upon a bench four dusty corpses sit in a row. Each living their own death. Each waiting for a reward from their previous life. A flower bud struggles to reach high enough between their decay to bloom. Only a few more inches. Yet her neck is craned and her legs stretched all the way out already. It begins to rain...

HMS Life

It seems that life is as a ship at sea.

The energy levels rise, crest, and fall as waves.

Sometimes in a frenzy, the emotions pitch the boat back and forth,

Eventually calming to a gentle rocking again.

Sometimes land comes into sight.

And sometimes all is adrift with no hope of rescue.

It is a constant struggle to stay aloft.

A struggle not to fall into the undertow.

A struggle against raiding ships only after your goods.

Then there are days when the sun shines and the wind softly blows.

And on those days everything is perfect as headway is made.

Alas, on the high seas those perfect days are few.

But for a port or a harbor to anchor at.

Work

A quick note about an experience at work:

I just got a new job at an assisted living facility and on my first day of work I was going around introducing myself to the residents. I told one of the residents who I was and when I would be working. He sat quietly for a minute taking it in and then asked me "I just have to ask, what are you?" I was taken aback for a minute- my first day and already I'd have to decide what boundaries around my identity I was willing to share? He noticed my pause and clarified, "I mean are you a nurse or an administrator?" Ah for the fun of assumptions on my part some time. I told him I was on the nursing staff and he happily went his way.

Changes

Remembering what was.

Knowing what is/what can be.

Imagining what will be.

All I can say is "wow".

RNC 2008

With the week coming to an end, the Republican National Convention is also finally over. And what a week. From every Republican who spoke, we heard lies, attacks, taunts, exaggerations, and a whole lot of Bushit (even though McCain's campaign is trying so hard to distance itself from being aligned with Bush). It's also very interesting to hear the Republicans speak as if we've been run by Democrats for too long now- even though it has been a very overbearing Republican Bush administration for the past 8 years. They pick at the current congress as not getting anything done and as having the lowest public approval ratings there is, but they fail to recognize that congress has only been, narrowly, Democrat controlled for the past year and hasn't been able to get anything done because of the president's overuse of the veto and unfair pressure from the administration for earmarks, and special interests. But enough about the current admin- let's get back to the RNC.

It was surprising when McCain claimed that his campaign is one based on a "Culture of Life". He clearly was referencing Palin's staunch anti-choice views. What he forgot about was that his campaign is also pro-death penalty and pro-war. How do death and destruction fit into their definition of "culture of life"?

I was not surprised to hear McCain as he chided Russia for having national ambitions and for intimidating/invading other sovereign nations. (Apparently he doesn't understand the American military and foreign policies as well as he'd have us all think.) It also was no surprise that even though McCain has a personal interest in Georgia, and has been very harsh towards Russia, he still wants us all to think that he could work positively with both countries to establish peace again. 

Throughout McCain's speech, he spoke again and again about doing things for the country, not for himself. He went on and on about recognizing the people of the country. In so many words, he has declared himself to be "The People's Candidate". He didn't outright state that, but may as well have. The comical part of all this is that "The People's Candidate" was a title given to Senator John Edwards when he ran for the presidential nomination. It's interesting how McCain and Palin both keep pulling from the Democratic party for inspiration and/or ideas on how to do things.

McCain made a very big deal in talking about his military service in Vietnam and the time he spent as a POW and all the amazing and heroic choices he made. It's striking, though, that every time the story is told it changes. AND there isn't any corroborating evidence that its all true-just McCain's word and his memoir. And still, McCain uses his time spent in Vietnam as credentials for knowing what the military can do and how it operates. Yet, if he really knew so much about the military, and really knew so much about war, and really knew so much about Vietnam then why does he continue to think that we're winning the war in Iraq? In both Palin and McCain's speeches they spoke about how we are now within sight of an Iraq victory, an awkward echo of Bush's statement years ago that it was "mission completed". (Unless of course the mission wasn't really Iraqi liberation but really getting America (and American corporations) entangled with the middle east in a way that we'd be there for quite a while yet to come.)

McCain made the comment at one point that "I don't care who gets the credit" for any thing that happens or for anything someone does. Yet he then went on to talk about how "I...I...I...I...I...I" am going to blow my own horn and make myself sounds like an American hero- The American Hero. People who preface statements like that, really mean the opposite of what they say. McCain is all about receiving the credit for things he claims to have done.

I foresee that McCain's administration would be just as damaging to the American people as Bush's administration, if not worse. First, Palin spoke of a clear disregard for human rights and civil liberties and then last night McCain talked about how after the Vietnam war "I wasn't my own man anymore- I was my country's." Of course he was telling everyone that they should turn their lives over to the country too- let the will of the government control their actions and desires. He then clearly restated that by saying "If you don't like the country, join it...enlist..." 

An point of note is that McCain's whole platform is based on how being in Vietnam and giving up his free will in favor of mindless government orders is what makes him so amazing- is what makes him a hero. He even credits his life to America because during the Vietnam war "my country saved me." Of course, he fails to acknowledge that his country is the one who put him in harm's way to being with.

On a more comical note, McCain stumbled over the statement that people should "teach an illiterate adult to read". Perhaps he and Bush will volunteer to be the first in line for that service.

McCain ended his speech with the same old American Dream rhetoric that's been spewed out relentlessly. If you fight hard enough and push long enough, you will succeed, nothing is outside of your reach if you really try. We are American's, we don't give up. Etc, etc, etc. To bring it all to a point, McCain said we need to fight, fight, fight. We need to stand up and fight. 

I was certainly glad to see that many people are already doing just that. At the RNC there were two disturbances during just McCain's speech. Both Code Pink For Peace and the Veterans For Peace managed to get onto the floor of the convention and almost managed to get a sign hung up! They are standing up for us! At the same time, hundreds of protestors outside the convention were arrested- with a focus on the media and journalists. But we can't stop there:

I think we need to stand up and fight against another Republican Administration taking over the White House and our country. I think we need to stand up and fight for all of our civil liberties. I think we need to stand up and fight to decrease corporate greed taking over the smaller people. I think we need to stand up and fight against America intimidating and invading other countries. I think we need to stand up and fight for the common good of all our fellow human beings. I think we need to stand up and fight against everything that isn't in the common good for us all.

ANTM

Last night was the season premier of the 11th Cycle of America's Next Top Model. The focus of the episode was on the model Isis. For any who missed the show or didn't hear the gossip, Isis is an out transwoman (the first transwoman to appear on ANTM). There are many who saw this as being a positive move, both for ANTM as well as for the trans community in general. There was hope that ANTM's treatment of trans issues would be well done. Any hope of that was quickly shot down.

Before I say much more, I need to give the disclaimer that I never finished watching the episode- I was watching with a friend and we had to get up and leave. It didn't take long for Isis' fellow housemates to air their "concerns" about living with a "he-she". There was one who said it made her uncomfortable that Isis has a body different than hers (the actual model was much more offensive in how she said that, though). There was another model that talked about how when she grew up she was given "good, solid values". The implication is that Isis received poor values, that she is less moral, etc. I'm not sure, but I also think I heard some pronoun mishaps in the conversations as well- referring to Isis as "he".

So, what did ANTM hope to get out of having Isis in the cast? Ratings. I predict that at some point in this season, the models will be asked to do a nude photo shoot (thus putting Isis in a very precarious situation). I'm also predicting that during a photo shoot there will be a well-filmed and highly embarrassing mishap involving the failure of the tape Isis uses to tuck/bind with. And then, after ANTM has milked all the ratings they can get out of Isis they're going to ditch her (and thus also receive the approval and ratings of the conservatives who are pissed off that Isis got on in the first place.)