I would like to add my voice to the many others out there congratulating you on your winning the homecoming queen crown a couple of days ago and offering support and encouragement since then. Regardless of what the haters are saying, you have done great and done us all proud. And regardless of how you feel right now, you have you whole life ahead of you, and you can build on the successes you have had already.
Take solace in the fact that you have what it takes; this will carry you forward through the many ups and downs that the future will hold. What others say need not discourage you. And remember, we, others on the same journey and as well as allies, have your back.
Sometime last night (it's now after midnight) the twelve thousandth visitor came by. My thanks to you and to everyone who has visited over the past couple of years. I hope this blog has given you something valuable in return.
43 is a nice, round number. But not a major milestone. So, this year, this weekend ... today ... I'm taking it easy, celebrating my 43 years in quiet mode. Not monastic quiet, but very low-key: warm, cozy meals, reading while curled up on my futon next to my cat Tatum, going where I want when I want while being in absolutely no hurry.
I no longer feel isolated, in fact, as today's deluge of Facebook birthday wishes have shown, I have friends-a-plenty. I can choose to be others or to be with myself. Also, after a brief medical scare over the past couple of weeks, my biopsy results came back negative. I'm happy to be alive.
Here come the shorter days, the earlier sunsets, the evening cool breezes and the season of Virgo until the last official day of summer. There is also the return to work and school for many starting tomorrow. As this is also the time where I turn another year older, I am normally reflective this time of year. But, I am more reflective and, even a melancholy, this time around.
This past spring and summer, relentlessly cool and rainy at first and then, very warm and dry, seemed to be seasons of disillusionment, loss and grief punctuated by brief moments of brightness and pleasure that came with an anxious aftertaste: how long would the good times last? At my workplace, people have left, been let go, former co-workers have died and others stricken with life-threatening illness. An atmosphere that began, at the beginning of this year as I finally transitioned on the job, as bright and optimistic, became by the end of spring became much dimmer with most of us carrying a horrible, sinking feeling inside ourselves: we (I know I did) felt shipwrecked.
Outside work, life included sudden loss such as when my friend and electrologist passed away suddenly on the Friday before Canada Day. It also included disillusionment; Pride weekend had its high points, but also its busts and resurfacing of years of animosity between the local trans* community and the Pride Society. DJing a low-to-no turnout dance event was enough to get me contemplate leaving DJing behind. Even behind the mic on my radio program, I was running out of steam and envisioning having a younger, soul music fan take over in my place.
Friends of mine have had fallings out with each other, broken up or divorced. I chose to maintain my friendships with all of them. I also have stayed friends with the man who was my brief summer romance and continue to miss him terribly.
Through all of this, at least one bright spot, my 24/7 life, transition, has gone very well. I do at the moment, however, have some unrelated health concerns to deal with; my fingers are crossed for a good result (more on this in another post).
I have had other mixed late-summer, pre-birthday seasons, back in 1994 when my mother passed away and in 2009 when, at the end of my pre-transition rope clawed my way back to wanting to live. This year, with all that has happened, and as the world darkens (Syria, Fukishima), I definitely want to live, in fact, like never before. Perhaps that is what I am being shown, at this point in my life, how much stronger I have become as I have come into my own. Age forty-two might not have been the answer to life, the universe and everything, but instead a revelation. I made it.
Sure, today is a holiday, but as I said in my post two years ago, today is a day of remembrance of sorts as well: for all the hard work and struggles of working people the world over, past and present and the struggles, social, political and environmental to come. Here's a playlist of songs to carry in your head today:
In light of the 50th Anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington For Jobs and Freedom highlighted by Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech, I decided to post some of my favourite speeches and interviews which have proven to be even more timely of late.
How Long? Not Long! (Rally at the end of the Selma March, in Montgomery, Alabama, 1965)
Interviews during the Selma Voting Rights Movement, 1965.
Antiwar speeches, 1967.
Memphis Sanitation Workers Strike, 1968
Last Speech: "I've Been To The Mountaintop" (Memphis, April 3, 1968)
Perhaps, I should have wrote this post as one of the many love letters to the much loved, an now closed, Rhizome Cafe back during their open house night in June. But tonight, over twenty-four hours after their final night open is when I find myself typing away my own short, sweet eulogy.
I first heard about the Rhizome several years ago. There had been several restaurants and cafe in that East Broadway space beforehand, but this time the friend/s who suggested meeting there did so with much insistence; they said it was an awesome space, with great vegetarian/vegan food, amazing desserts and awesome chai. It was also an incredibly relaxed, open-minded, progressive space. And so dinner with friends it was. That evening and every other time I was there up until this past Thursday night was everything my friends had said it was ... and more.
It was where I performed my last gig as Miss Penny in 2008, and where I began coming out to friends as trans; it was where friends and I got together for rounds of Christmas holiday cheer, where I grabbed a quick bite while passing through the neighbourhood (I'll never forget the miso and tofu rice bowl and the vegan orange cake with a very rich white frosting), where I attended a going away party for a friend who was moving to Ottawa and where I recently attended a board game night.
There were also many events that I wished I had gone to: queer salsa classes, various speakers, poetry nights, mini film festivals (though I did go to the Trans Film Festival there in 2010) and countless music shows featuring local artists.
And tonight, on my bus ride home from the movies, I saw that the space formerly known as the Rhizome Cafe had been cleared of its tables, chairs and couches, all of the art on the walls gone. Soon, there will be a new community hub/cafe in its place which will try to revive the best that the old place had to offer. But, no doubt, some things cannot be replaced.
