slap my face
harder
let me be your good girl

shove my head
closer to your cunt
my hair is the handle
make yourself come
with my tongue
and my lips
here for you to use

fill me with your hand
or your cock
still yours
whether you wear it or not

kiss me sweetly
kiss me rough
it doesn’t matter

since it’s only ever make-believe
since it’s only wishes and longing
since it’s only me

alone

single

and fucked (except not)

Check out her pictures of me here — 52 Pickup – 9 of Diamonds “Graffiti”. — and the rest of the incredible art on her blog, http://mimart.wordpress.com

Sure, I’m probably biased, but that doesn’t mean it’s any less true when I say she’s talented and awesome…

Take a look!

Had a chance to watch and listen to many astounding performers, and also got to rock the mic myself.

Got my hair braided for the first time ever (the girl who did it said she’d be gentle for my very first time… I said, “no, please — rough me up and make it hurt!”)

Shared some touch and contact — brief, but enough to remind me how drastically touch-starved I am, and was in enough control of myself to decline an invitation to a slow-dance party everyone was headed to because I didn’t trust myself to respect boundaries and wasn’t going to put myself in a potentially compromising position.

Passed around witty, gutter-dirty banter with other women whose minds are as smutty as my own, laughed, sighed, smiled, swooned, near-wept, felt more than I have in far too long…

And it was only after the night of sleep that it occurred to me how rare it is for me to be anywhere that isn’t a male-dominated space, someplace I don’t feel smothered by masculine energies… because, between the excitement of the other performers and my own anxious anticipation, I hadn’t thought about anything more significant than “this is where I belong!”

Yesterday overall was pretty damn kick-ass, actually!

Got up early, left a bitchy, bitingly sarcastic note for the spoiled-rotten wealthy girl-child along with one-third of the internet bill (even though there are 4 people who live here, only 3 pay towards rent or electricity or water or internet…)  I’m done being kind and polite to those who kick me down, insult me, blame me for their problems and then expect me to come groveling at their feet for more.  You fuck with me, I fuck right back, and I take shit from nobody.

Traveled by bus to Vallejo, got the money my mom left in my account to make up for the check that never arrived in the mail, stopped at the little Chinese food place next to the bank and was touched that the woman there remembered me when it’s been almost 2 years since I dropped in… the little things bring the biggest smiles!

Crashed at the waterfront coffee shop for a bit, my once-upon-a-time time-killing spot, and caught up with a couple of the folks still working there… chatted with a couple strangers, one of whom had previously seen me at the open-mic event there.  Someone mentioned the upcoming “holiday” on the 14th, and I made my perennial quip about “Oh, you mean Singles’ Awareness Day, S.A.D. for short!”

When I said I was taking a break after my last couple of girlfriends being… less than fantastic, shall we say… this guy asked me, “So, if you’ve had such bad luck with women, have you ever considered trying men instead?” I wish I’d been more quick-thinking in choosing my reply; I used that as a segue to come out as transgender, with “Nah, trust me — I used to be one, and I’m not interested.” I wish I’d thought to point out how fucking stupid that line is by turning it around on him, since he was clearly using it as a pickup line after just mentioning that he was single — asking him why he hasn’t “tried” being gay if he doesn’t have a woman right now. Ah well. Stupid is everywhere, you can’t avoid it. Best you can do is learn to laugh at it and keep moving!

Also managed to stop by a couple other old haunts, said hello to a few friends I haven’t seen in near-forever, and on the BART ride back home I got to listen to the beautiful song of French being spoken by a lovely couple behind me… which also reminded me to put a few particular songs on my phone to play when I’m out and about!

Ended the night in the company of a great friend who was celebrating the beginning of yet another year on this crazy little spinning ball we call home, met a couple of his friends and had a couple drinks, then came home and slept.

Any tonight…. oh!  Tonight is going to be even more fun than the last!

Maybe it’s because I’m open and comfortable with my sexuality, that I carry no shame for my desires and never apologize for being a sexual creature.  Maybe it’s something to do with people seeing me as “used to be a guy” and equate “being a guy” with “automatically gets laid anytime.”  Whatever the reason, people seem quite shocked when my answer to “what’s your favorite position” or “do you like [insert sex activity here] more than [insert other sex activity here]” is something along the lines of “Well, I can’t tell you for sure, since I haven’t ever tried much of anything…”

So, I haven’t had much sex (with other people, that is — as Woody Allen quipped, “It’s sex with someone I love!”) Here’s the other bit, the thing that’s frustrating, the point of this post: I’m the only person who has ever made me come.  Just me and Miss Right Hand, my steady girl most of the time.  Sure, there have been other people present while I bring myself to orgasm; I spent nearly 6 months with my psycho ex (see this post for more about her) and there were plenty of times when, after servicing her, she held me as I jacked myself off… hell, even when she was trying to get pregnant she’d scoop up my semen and finger-fuck herself (yes, it was totally hot — I won’t lie) but I was the one who got myself off.

The grand total of two times that I’ve had any sort of sexual encounter with a cis woman, I still took care of my own orgasm; the first one at least, she was interested — eager, even — to see that I was cared for, but I was nervous and tense and had a hard time communicating what worked and what didn’t.  That was the closest I’ve come (pun intended) to having someone else involved, and with her hand over mine as I worked myself, it was certainly beautiful… but it was certainly still me doing it.  The second time, several months ago, neither of us were really prepared.  Nobody had any lube, and I need plenty because otherwise it’s painful for me… we finally figured out something, but again it was me laying back and fap-fap-fap.

It still seems weird when I get the startled look from people, even good friends, when they hear me repeat that my actual experience having sex has been very limited, that most of my likes and dislikes are hypothetical rather than practical.  I would think it no stranger than saying that I love all kinds of food, but my actual experience in eating a variety of world cuisine has been limited… I don’t know.

Regardless — if there are any ladies out there, anyone who’d like to have some fun… let’s sing with the Beatles, and “Come Together!”  Yeah? Maybe? ~sigh~… Someday.

But I’m balancing that need
That desire
Against my physical exhaustion
Against my minimal food intake today
Against the enormous effort that it takes
To remain outwardly calm
While the sounds from the next room
Fill me with
Irrational
Insistent
Immense

PANIC.

No, it’s not a “logical” connection.
No, I can’t explain why those sounds affect me as they do.
No, it’s not just me finding something to complain about.

I have worked over many years
Learned very carefully
Through practice
Mistakes
Refinement of technique
To appear relaxed
And pleasant
And friendly

Instead of screaming as loudly as my lungs allow
Smashing any solid object within reach
Against any other object in my swing
Stomping and smashing
Making noise and breaking things
All in a feeble and ever-failed attempt
To demonstrate to others –
But no, not a demonstration –
It’s an attempt to harm others
In a fashion that they can comprehend
To a degree equivalent
To the harm they inflict on me.

I have learned to be mute
I have learned to accept harm
I have learned to do nothing in retaliation
I have learned to turn inward and die

And I am praised for my “success” far too often
Told that I am “strong”
That I am “brave”
That I have “accomplished so much”

How is it
That so many seem to envy
This so-called “skill”
Of saying nothing
Doing nothing
Lying on the ground after being driven there again
And most of all for my friendly smile
And calm, even voice
As I am kicked again and again and again?

You value self-restraint
You value compliance
You value non-violence and avoiding confrontation
And I have learned these things you so value

But you never taught me when to stop holding back
You never taught me how to say, “Fuck no, and fuck you!”
You never taught me how to knock a motherfucker out when they come at me wrong
Or to do anything but whimper, turn, and run or better yet, stay and take it with a smile

So I have learned nothing of value at all

In the same way as many other things about my life, though, I intentionally ignore my recognition of “this is a serious problem!” because I have no directly accessible remedy. This place has fleas and bedbugs and ants and probably still roaches, but fixing that means coordinating with roommates and landlord, taking significant steps to prepare just my room and depending on both roommates to take equivalent steps, pushing the landlord to address the problem, to even acknowledge the problem instead of dismissing it offhand or making yet another excuse… so instead I know that I’ll be bitten by insects, that any food I leave unsealed will be unusable, and I check my clothes and other things carefully before leaving the house and add diatomaceous earth to the bottom of containers, I only open what I can eat in the moment, and I expect much of what food I have or am given to go to waste.

I have significant concerns and questions to address with a health care professional, things that should have been looked at — and treated — long ago.  Living with things isn’t fun or easy, but trying to make sure I call a doctor during their limited “business hours” is difficult when those hours are during the small part of the day that I’m either sleeping or trying to get a few things done at home… or, more often, simply avoiding this place and going out to kill time and keep my sanity.  It’s after 3 in the morning as I write this, and I have plans for tomorrow that will take most of my day. I’m hoping to still get a few hours of sleep between now and when I have to be up and out the door — if I could call and schedule an appointment between 11pm and 5am, I’d have an appointment. “That’s when everyone is supposed to be asleep,” I’m told, so naturally there’s nobody answering phones at the doctor’s office!  So I just ignore major medical concerns unless or until they keep me from functioning at all.

Did I say something about hoping to get some sleep? Huh, guess I did. That was pretty stupid, really, because I know full well that there will be enough noise here until almost 7am to keep that from happening. As I type, my roommate is hacking up her lungs — I’m not sure whether that’s because she’s awake and smoking pot or awake and still dealing with being really sick (which I only discovered accidentally, that she’s been sick for quite a while) because the sound is the same. If the schedule goes like usual, by 4 or 4:30 there’ll be lots of sex, by quarter to 5 the guys upstairs will be up and stomping around and hollering like apes, by 6:30 if not before the teenage boys next door will be running up and down the stairs and screaming at each other, and traffic outside will pick up considerably.  I need to open my window and get some air and chill in this room, which I hate doing because it takes away even the small amount of sound isolation to the street.

Maybe I’ll get lucky and fall asleep anyway. Sometimes I just drive myself to stay awake far beyond “tired” and way past “exhausted” to “I’m going to fall down now, hopefully it’s on my bed.” I have a pretty damn long endurance, though, one I’ve developed as a coping skill, so I frequently have to do things that are against my immediate best interests in order to actually achieve those interests mid-term. It’s an ugly dance, one I’d rather leave behind.

I’m thinking about the fact that I make clear distinctions between types of pictures with nude women in sexual contexts, and smiling.  I spent some of this evening preparing to attend and participate in events for December 17th as the International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers, and I’m looking forward to meeting up with my boyfriend there.

I have a boyfriend! I’m a lesbian, I’m transgender, I’m kinky and queer and ethically non-monogamous, spiritual but not religious, and I have my own personal worship and ritual if I choose to indulge myself in it.

I’m listening to my roommate fucking quite loudly in the next room with her current boy-toy, the most recent in a long string of boys, men, lovers and fuck-buddies, and my reaction at the moment is mild annoyance — but at least it sounds as if they’re just going for a quickie before sleeping. I hope so.

I’m a feminist, a masculist, a gender egalitarian and an aspiring social activist, with some very clear ideas about where I stand on many different issues.  I’ve been keeping an eye on Planned Parenthood and the attacks against them, reading up on the latest from the EFF and Bruce Schneier, following a ton of queer, sex-positive, BDSM-friendly, and feminist blogs, looking for good quality porn that depicts the kinds of things I like, adding my name to form letters to elected officials when there’s an issue that grabs my attention, and sharing what I can on Facebook and Twitter with the hope that others will see and support the same causes if they feel strongly.

And then I look back 3 years, and I shake my head and laugh, just as my eyes widen in amazement — because it wasn’t all that long ago that I wrote my very first blog post (on MySpace back then) under a fake profile and an assumed name.  It wasn’t all that long ago that I’d never seen another naked body in person, was still hiding from my parents the fact that I was masturbating regularly, and not too long even before then that I was trying to “give up the sinful habit” completely.  It wasn’t all that long ago that I was a boy — a rather fat one, too, at 250 pounds!

3 years ago I would have cringed if someone brought up prostitution, because back then I thought hookers were dirty, evil creatures, the lowest of the worthless invisible people.  Actually, knowing the group I spent time with, I probably would have made a horribly insensitive joke about the difference between “theft of goods” and “payment for services.”  Back then I would have said plenty of hateful things and thought they were hilarious, because that’s what I was surrounded by.  Lots of young, heterosexual, cisgendered, white males whose idea of a punchline could just as easily be “That’s what she said!” as it could be a one-line rape joke.

Today if someone mentions prostitution or other sex work, and I hear the echoes of what I once thought — and if there’s a comment that comes from misinformation, general application of old, broken stereotypes, or a chance to teach someone, I step in. I call people on their hateful and ignorant comments when I can.  I listen when someone calls me on something, because I want to learn and I especially want to learn from those who really know.

It’s delightful sometimes, to “look back on where I’m from, look at the woman I’ve become…” and to enjoy how beautifully routine some of these once-strange things have become!

It’s been nearly a year since I’ve been fucked. Late January last year was when I went in to fake a “let’s kiss and make up” with my ex, and this after having been without since early November before that. Yeah, the make-up sex was hot, but it was a desperate (and dangerous) move.  I had the option then, though — now I’m alone.

This lust hits me hard in the late night hours, when I’m in bed and drowsy but not yet exhausted.  The time when I’d be at the peak of my “afternoon” if I were keeping to my natural sleep cycle, when my body and mind want to be full-on and engaged, but more often are left strained and weary… but either way, I’m sitting here horny as all fuck with nothing I can do about it.

Sometimes, if I remember, I pick up single-use lube packets and condoms from the folks who run the weekly needle exchange, HIV test, and safe sex supplies deal down the block, but more often I forget.  I recently found out that I can stop by their main office to pick up the same supplies, but that means fighting the same “business hours” bullshit as everything else, and remembering to try heading out there when I’m figuring out what I’m doing on any given day.  Considering that much of my day is spent on “fuckfuckfuck gotta keep it together through this major panic attack long enough to get myself dressed, cleaned up and out the goddamned door right fucking now!” it’s honestly surprising that I accomplish as much as I do.

Sure, I meet girls somewhat often.  Many are interested in being friends — and I won’t deny that having good people in my life as friends is a huge thing that I haven’t had in a long time.  None of them are interested in being “girlfriends,” though.  None of them are interested in a relationship that involves hanging out now and then, going out for drinks and conversation, and also fucking sometimes.  I don’t necessarily need a primary romantic partner right now — a “girlfriend” — though I do eventually hope to find someone to fit that role with me (and I for her.)  What I really need now is sex — sex and cuddles and good physical pain, but mostly the sex.

When I have all the supplies on hand, I have a few toys I can put in my ass, but I don’t have the ability to fuck myself with any of them.  It’s just not something I can do.  Things go in, they feel good in certain ways, and then they come out at some point afterwards. What I need is someone else to control the process, to be the one who fucks me, so that I can let go of all the thinking and planning and deciding how and what to do and just lie there enjoying being fucked.

I can’t pleasure myself in many of the ways that my body demands it.  Even if I had the technical means, I don’t think I could get any enjoyment from giving myself pain, or filling and fucking my own ass with a toy, or running my own fingers and hands across my skin.  Much of the joy in those things comes from knowing that the pain is given by someone who finds joy in doing so, that I’m being fucked by someone who wants to fuck me because it feels good for them too, that a gentle caress is shared to show affection for another beautiful human.

When I’m trying to balance all of that on top of the stresses and anxiety triggers at home, and struggling to find somewhere else to live, and working towards (but still often failing to accomplish) eating enough, sleeping enough, keeping my personal hygiene in order and masturbating regularly (definitely not taking care of that one, see “no lube” above) I feel overwhelmed and discouraged about even the smallest things — and less likely to get the small stuff done next time around, which piles up into a huge wad of “small stuff” bogging me down to the point of near-insurmountability.

The advice that should fit this situation just sounds hollow — be patient, good things take time, love will find you, look at what you do have not what you don’t, life’s a bitch sometimes, other people have it bad/have it worse… none of that changes the fact that I need to be fucked tonight, that I’m not being fucked tonight, and that I don’t know when I will be fucked again.  Yes, I laugh about my ability to be patient; my ability to wait is not a wonderful skill that fills me with great pride, it’s a coping mechanism which I loathe because it is so well-developed from regular and frequent use.  I’m good at waiting forever for something to go right because if I couldn’t handle that, I’d have completely lost myself by now.

I’m not lost, but I am damned tired of waiting.

I realized a few days ago that I’ve never written publicly about this.  I’ve shared the story in person with many people, sometimes even to a group, but I’ve never written, and knowing my mind the way I do, writing this down and putting it visibly out there will help me immensely in letting it go.

I’ve been in love twice in my life.  The first time I fell, it was a whirlwind 3 weeks  from before Thanksgiving to just shy of Christmas, and I walked when she got physically abusive — and suddenly could see the verbal, emotional, and psychological abuse she’d been doling out since day one.

The second girl I met mid-August last year, when I moved into an apartment in East Oakland after being homeless for 2 weeks — she and her primary partner already lived there.  By the beginning of September we’d both realized we had feelings for each other, and one week later we’d fucked for the first time, with her partner’s blessing.  I should mention that when I got there she was a few weeks pregnant — I’m not certain how long, but she’d just started showing.  By the time we had sex, she’d miscarried, and I later learned that this was not her only recent pregnancy and miscarriage — in fact, this was either her second or third in a short period of time.

Well, we had lots of sex, discovered that we had a number of common interests and fetishes, several that (she claims) she’d not had a chance to explore, and all of it new to me in practice (as opposed to “in porn.”)  In the instances where our preferences differed in the particulars, we did what she wanted — often with the promise that we’d try things my way “next time,” or lots of talk and work to convince me that it would be okay to try something I didn’t like, didn’t want, shouldn’t do.  I did many things that, without her consistent wearing me down, I’d have said “not on your life!”

She slowly worked to gain my trust, to let me grow comfortable with her, until finally she felt she could share what she considered to be the ultimately important secret with me… she lives in another reality.  She’s delusional and hears voices talking to her.

Or, in her way of putting things — she’s thousands of years old, comes from outer space, is immortal, and best of all, she’s a fictional character from a Hollywood film: She tells me that she is, in very true fact, Connor Quentin Macleod!  Yep, that’s right: the Highlander movies weren’t just box-office hits, works of fiction.  They were embellished (naturally! Bigger tales make bigger sales!) versions of the tales, but at their core, they were a documenting of Real History™.

She was, so she claimed, the last one to have had The Quickening — and so, in her fantasy, the voices she constantly heard whispering to her were all the thoughts great minds of the world, telling her their fantastic secrets and discoveries and imparting knowledge.  Much of it was in languages she couldn’t understand, but I guess that’s what happens when these visionaries are foreigners…

Apparently her partner and their mutual friend were not only “in the know,” they actively participated in supporting her in this fantasy world.  They all fed me plenty of conspiracy theories, tales about the end of the world — which, although it was coming at the end of 2012, wasn’t what “all those other people predict it’s going to be.”  They told me all sorts of things about what chaos there would be, and that we would need to work together to, essentially, be the saviors of humanity.  She outlined what my role might be in this doomsday scenario, and then after being given my part, I was pressured by all three to answer — “Will you join us in our fight? Will you commit now to do all that needs doing — to hack these government satellites to free the people in Area 51 even if the dead bodies are piling up around you and exploding?” That kind of nonsense was typical for their prophecies of The End Of Civilization As We Know It.  But I was asked to commit, swear, promise absolutely to join them and follow through; sometimes it was a matter of pledging myself before I could be “trusted enough” to learn more of the important things, the things that would keep me alive when everything went to shit.

I say these things now, and it’s so striking to see the manipulation, to recognize the mind games.  I wanted to believe, though, and these action-movie plots were — at least at first — a welcome escape from the reality of life.  I hadn’t played make-believe in so long… I had forgotten the wonder of using my imagination, the thrill of knowing that anything was possible, the magic I could find in the world if I wanted it to be there.  So I played along.  I listened with excitement as she told me the latest tidbits about her good buddy James (That’s Mister Hetfield to the rest of you folks) or talked about making sure she got her important info to Alex (you’d know him as Alex Jones) since she was one of his primary sources.  I walked with her and enjoyed “storytime,” hearing her histories of Highlander lore with the details that couldn’t be shared with the rest of the world, or tales of her time in Japan, studying under a master swordsman and hermit, of the gift to her of his lovely daughter and the incredibly hot sex they had together — and still could, any time she felt like hopping back to Japan.  I took notes when she gave me dates and names and locations of certain books, things that would show me proof of glowing technologically “magical” cities in Antarctica, secret government programs designed to control and subdue everyone at will, aliens walking among us, and much more.

We also fucked.  Lots.  And it wasn’t long at all before she was pregnant again.  She wouldn’t stop smoking her cigarettes, because she reasoned that in her previous attempts to find out what caused her to repeatedly miscarry, she’d eliminated that as a factor — and besides, the smoke masked her natural scent, so when she went camping the bears wouldn’t eat her.  She refused to get any sort of prenatal care, because the doctors wouldn’t be able to deal with the test results from an immortal Highlander — she’d become a lab rat.  Instead, her “medical care” was someone she had telepathic conversations with, or answered her phone which hadn’t rung and talked with her “doctor” and friend Mythos, or came in and told us what he had said regarding her medical concerns (although he goes by Marty these days, and apparently installs flooring and carpets.  It’s a decent day job, right?)

And on December 12, 2010, somewhere between 14 and 16 weeks along in her pregnancy, when the rest of us had gone out to a party she stayed home — not feeling well.  I had a blast — and came home to find her crying.  She’d lost the baby while we were out, knew it was going to happen and sent me off to have fun.  I shouldn’t have helped create that potential life.  I don’t want children, I don’t like children, and I know myself well enough to know I’d be a horrible parent… but she got what she wanted from people, and she got pregnant by me.

A couple weeks later, on New Years’ Day, she was watching the Star Wars films — something she did to cheer herself up.  She invited me to join her, and I figured I could use the cheer myself!  She turned on A New Hope, and then set the picture to stretch the aspect ratio and remove those “stupid black bars” that “didn’t belong, and distract you from watching.”  I couldn’t get into the movie, though, because I was distracted by Luke Skywalker looking like Mr. Fantastic, and she wouldn’t hear my complaints, just wanted to “compromise” by doing things her way, as always.  We got angry, started arguing, and I left the room because I knew I was too angry to keep trying to talk.  I spent some time alone in my room, and later came out to kiss up, apologize for being wrong, and watch the last half of the show cuddled up next to her.

When the credits had finished rolling, she wanted to talk about what went wrong before — or rather, wanted to convince me that she was right, and help me understand why I should change.  Things quickly escalated again, and grew into a much larger fight about much more than that one incident — and somewhere in there, I had my hands on her sides, and I remember shouting as I looked her in the eye, “I don’t want to hurt you! Can’t you see that?”

The next few moments are a blank.  Next thing I do recall, I was pinned against the arm of the couch next to the wall, her above kneeling to keep me there.  She’d completely snapped.  But when she lost it, so did I — and it had been a very long time since I let go that way.  I had long, sharp fingernails then, and I remember clawing at her, trying to push her off of me and drawing blood from her chest in the process.  Didn’t last long, because she repositioned me so she could pin my arms and legs with her body and keep her hands free.  Five open-handed blows across my right cheek left me laughing, taunting — “What, is that all you got? Puh-leeze.  You think I can’t handle pain? Hel-loooo! Masochist here!”  Nobody else at was that end of the house, the other two were closed away in the back room.  Two punches to the jaw, closed fist, came right after — through the adrenaline and the pain-joy I kept smiling and taunting, before she sprang up, screaming for the others to come.  Soon as I was free, I got up and headed towards my room, hearing her accuse me to the others of having viciously attacked her, with no provocation.  Closed my door and sat rocking in fetal position for… I don’t know how long.  I was dimly aware that the others had gone back to the rear bedroom, and then I heard a loud crash from the front of the house.  I’d long since trained myself out of responding to anything that sounded like a major emergency — it was usually just one of them losing their temper, shouting and smashing things.  Someone else wandered in a few minutes later and found her having one of her frequent grand mal seizures — and after they helped her come to and lay on the couch to “sleep it off” they mentioned that it was the worst seizure they’d ever seen her have, and they’d both known her a few years.

When she woke up later, she’d forgotten the entire night of events.  In fact, she’d forgotten the entire two weeks prior, and thought I was avoiding her because I was angry at her for having lost our baby.  She dropped back to the day she miscarried, and seemed to truly not remember anything afterwards.  Nobody dared to try telling her what had happened, but we all walked on eggshells hoping that she wouldn’t freak out if it all came flooding back.

My jaw was incredibly sore, swollen, hard to move — it was tough going down on her, but I did as much as I could when she told me she wanted it, and couldn’t mention the pain for fear she’d remember everything.  The swelling had finally started to subside when I was mugged for the second time in under 6 months living there, on January 22, 2011 — and then got pistol-whipped three times.  My jaw had certainly still been sore, but I was silently grateful to the punk with the pistol in my face, because he gave me an “out” — I got my jaw checked out and made certain it wasn’t seriously injured from either the gun or her fist.

The last time we fucked, it was the very end of January.  I’d gone without since sometime before the baby died, and I needed some.  I swallowed my pride, put on an act of sorrow and contrition, and went in to offer her sex, because “It’s probably been so long for you, and I’m sorry I haven’t been looking after your needs like I should, and I still love you so much, dear… I bet you’d like to fuck me after I take care of getting you off, right?”  After we finished, something in our conversation led to a question — and I couldn’t keep holding it in.  She’d asked why I seemed nervous, why everyone was so jumpy, what was wrong… and I told her.  Gave her all the details of the night she turned into a monster, transformed into something frightening and surreal.  She listened, shrugged, and still swore she didn’t remember.

We were all in the process of trying to escape from the slumlord bitch who’d been tormenting us from the day we moved in, and I was fortunate to find another place to live much sooner than they did.  Of course, it turned out to be this shit situation I’m in now, but I figured “Hey, it can’t be all that bad compared to this!”  I got away from them, cut all ties and haven’t heard from any of them since.

I loved her.  We were a fucked-up couple, but I really did love her.  Of course, I also hate the bitch for all the suffering she caused me — and I don’t ever want to see her again.  But that time in January when I went in to her was the last time I’ve been good and screwed, and I’m seriously missing that.  I’ve had many more of my other basic needs cared for, and so it’s often easier to distract myself from the fact that I don’t have the sex to keep me going when I’ve got regular food and frequent positive social interaction and exercise and such, but… I’m still trying to find a woman who’ll take her cock to me, and not get hung up on how I’m hung or act like a boob because I don’t have any.  It sucks sometimes, being happily queer in a frustratingly straight society!

Then, as I said, the sudden moment of realization: the words came out in exclamation, “Holy shit!  I’m a feminist!”  In much the same way that I have been the last to know lots of things about myself, it wasn’t really a shock to anyone else.  Nor, I suppose, was it a shock to me, after sitting down to think about it, as was the case when I found other identifying concepts for myself like “transgender” and “Asperger’s syndrome.”  In both of those cases, I had people who knew me laugh, shrug, and say essentially, “Yeah, we could have told you that.”

So with that word, I had a single key that I could use to search for further information, to take as a starting point for refining my understanding and particular preferences in “flavor” of feminism.  I could plug that word into a Wikipedia search box and learn about the “waves” of feminism.  I could walk into my local public library and check out any of dozens of textbooks, non-fiction works, collections of essays, and novels presenting concepts both directly and indirectly related.

Then, as I spent more time following blogs, expanding my online reading lists, cutting out the sources that least often fit my particular views (but occasionally glancing to re-evaluate where I stand) and further refining my feminist identity, I saw that I also care deeply about other groups, their oppression, and fighting as a voice for change and equality.  I picked up new vocabulary and concepts — “intersectionality” and “kyriarchy” and “masculism” and others, words new enough in their use and function that the dictionary in my web browser insists they’re misspelled.  I picked up pretty quickly that as a transwoman, I am both woman and transgender, that both those identities which I proudly claim come with their oen oppressive baggage.  I began to see that my light skin and ancestry traced back on either side to the British Isles, mean that I have “White Privilege” — that whether I want it or not, whether I like it or not, I have societal advantages in many ways over anyone not perceived as Caucasian.  I think that sucks, actually, and when I stop to think about the ways that manifests in my day-to-day life (or, more often, when someone points it out) I remember how strongly I feel about changing things, about making the world a less shitty place.

But — there’s this little bit that’s bothering me.  I can’t quite put my finger on it, and maybe someone out there has a touch of insight for me.  I have a particularly intense passion, a very strong motivation for activism towards body positivity, fat acceptance, being beautiful in the body shape you have, especially if that body doesn’t fit the multi-billion-dollar-salary marketing moguls’ image of “beautiful.”  Which feels… hypocritical, somehow.  I mean, I know it’s not.  I know it fits right in with seeing women as individual humans, capable of deciding what we do with our own bodies.  It fits right in with my anger and outrage when I look at news headlines about a young transgender girl approaching puberty and her supportive parents approving hormone-blocking pills — headlines using the wrong pronouns, “reporters” suggesting that this girl and her parents are insane.  It fits right in with recognizing that “insane,” used as an insult, is an ableist slur, and choosing to work that kind of offensive language out of my personal vocabulary.

But I still often feel like I shouldn’t be vocal in my support of body acceptance.  I stop and question my own motivation regularly, and though every time I come to the same general conclusion, I look in the mirror and see something pretty damned close to that idealized marketing image — I’m tall, thin, white, proportioned in all the “right” ways.  Total strangers ask me “Are you a model?  Well, you ought to be!”  I’ve never really dealt with being anything other than privileged in that regard.  When I was growing up as a boy, I was tall, skinny, plain.  During the decade or so I spent on psychiatric medications, I weighed between 250 and 300 pounds, but I was also rarely in any social situations, and as a computer geek and video gamer, being that size wasn’t unusual or looked at poorly.  So why would I have any say in things? Why should my voice count?  And knowing that I’m romantically and sexually attracted to bigger women often makes me hesitant to speak out — because, “well, she’s just doing it so she can get laid or something.”  I know my motivations, but I’m scared of having them questioned or challenged, especially when I often have difficulty expressing myself about things that stir a lot of emotion in me.

I can tell you, though, that it pisses me off when the first thing I hear, with very few exceptions, when I mention that I weighed 250 pounds about three years ago, is “Wow! How did you lose the weight?”  Especially angering to see the expectant look that joins the question, awaiting my answer as eagerly as if I were about to impart the Ultimate Secret Of The Universe.  It makes me really sad when a wonderfully beautiful young woman is ashamed of the number on the scale, asks me to promise to keep it secret, and has to make sure to balance our scheduled time together against her regular, mandatory stop at her Leading-Brand Weight-Loss Program Center’s scale.  It hurts to have a good friend point out to me just how much work I’d put into avoiding the word “fat” in a conversation with her about another woman who was — and beautifully so — and stings even more to understand that the reason I’d danced around those three letters is because on a deeply internalized level, I “knew” that it was a dirty word.  I could keep going; there are many more examples that immediately come to mind, but I hope I’ve made my point.

I care, for whatever reason I do.  This particular passion doesn’t have nearly the volume of literature behind it that feminism does, though.  There’s nowhere near the amount of “suggested reading” as for transgender issues, not even the kinds of information — much of it inaccurate or poorly written, in my experience so far — about Asperger’s.  I don’t know where to look, don’t have anyone to sit down and talk with in order to — first and foremost — educate myself about anything outside of “thin, white, long-haired, big-but-not-too-big tits and hips and ass, you’re gorgeous!”  Yes, there are a few places online, and I’ve looked through what I can find, but… there’s just not much out there.  And while I have no shame about writing on my own blog about things I know for myself, things I know well, I’m fragile in many ways, and I’ve seen how one or two well-intentioned but poorly-chosen words left in a comment can be the spark lighting a blazing inferno of flaming, the hurt hurled and taken and the taking sides and fighting and often a humiliating defeat and retreat.  I don’t want to open myself to that on the scale that the internet can heap; it’s something I might handle in a face-to-face discussion with a few friends, where I could ask questions and begin to learn… but asking the “rookie questions” in an enormous forum of faceless “veteran players ” leaves me far too vulnerable.

The old folk wisdom is that “the only stupid question is the one you don’t ask.”  Well, if that’s true, then I have lots of incredibly stupid questions — and until I have someone to ask, someone with answers or someone willing to search for answers with me, they’ll stay the “stupid” variety.

Oh, why must it so often happen thus?
Libido pegged, yet lacking even means
To masturbate, and such frustrating fuss
My body makes when gazing at these screens!
Computers filled with pornographic bliss
To mock my appetite again denied
For want of lubricant, and only this
Prevents my lust from being satisfied.
But doubt ye not that choosing at my will
I’d trade away my manual company
For sweet delightful cunnilingual thrill
Or — joy of joys! — a woman pegging me!
Tonight my head on cotton gently rests
I dream instead a pair of pillow’d breasts.

I slept in, or rather I slept again after getting home from the motel room this morning — fun times last night — and finally got myself up and moving around 1:30pm.  Checked a few things online, then killed time looking at my RSS feeds and all the news and blog articles and whatnot for the day…

Around 4:45 I decided to get out and do some walking — it’s been rainy and wet, and there’s absolutely no way I could excuse staying inside when it’s so beautiful outside!  Got things together, dressed and out and as I walked I sang Carole King’s “Beautiful” out loud, stopping to say hello to strangers as I went.  Because especially on the first grey day in a while, people are often more gloomy and depressed and sour than usual, so I was out there with a reminder that “You’ve got to get up ev’ry morning with a smile on your face and show the world all the love in your heart!”

Stopped at the Starbucks downtown and did some reading, killing a bit of time with a cheap mug of crappy coffee plus lots of sugar and cream to make it passably potable, then off to my local independently-owned cafe to hang out for the rest of the evening.  One of my good friends works there, and he was there tonight, so that was fun — and after I’d been there for a bit, another guy I know showed up, and the three of us talked and had fun to make the time pass more quickly.

Headed home because there’s little else to do tonight that doesn’t need a lot of money, plus I’m kinda tired — got home and my roommate is here in his room still, just like when I left, and I keep hearing him coughing in the next room.  When I got in to my bed, though, I was rather irritated to see that ants had descended onto my “clean-up towel” — not into the bottle with a little bit of Bawls soda, not all over the fudge cookies on the bed, but onto the rag I used earlier this afternoon when I was done masturbating.  Even more obnoxious was the roach that scurried out from under the rag when I lifted it up to shake off the ants — and then the recognition again that I’m no more bothered by cockroaches on my things and in my room than an ant or a fly or a bedbug or a moth, because bugs have been part and parcel of my living situation for more than a year, both out in the ‘hood and here in what ought to be a nicer area.

Roaches don’t phase me.  That’s not how it should be.  But that’s what poverty does; I can’t afford to care about gross bugs in my stuff when I don’t know the next time I’ll be doing laundry, and I can’t afford to get worked up about how messy my room is — and it’s absolutely filthy — when my next meal is whatever someone decides to give me.

My leash, the one made specially for me by hand from one of my old roommates, is gone. Missing.  Couple weeks ago when everything turned to shit around here, the last thing I did before running off was to toss it towards the back lawn.  I saw it land on grass, but the next time I went back there, the very next day, it was nowhere in sight.  I’ve looked through the backyard several times since, but there’s no trace.  It it did stay out there, then with the rain today it’s been ruined; if one of my roommates picked it up and did something with it, then it’s even worse off and nobody has said anything about it.  I’m angry that it’s gone, I guess, but I haven’t even bothered to really think about it.  It’s another thing to add to the list of tragedy and trauma that I can’t afford to grieve right now — survival is more important.  Getting out is more important.

A few nights ago, I realized that I was depressed, that I was not safe at home, and I almost walked the streets all night like I had once before… but I remembered my friend J who implored me never to do that again, she nearly ordered me to call her and crash on the couch at her student co-op if I was that bad off again, so I did.

As she met me down the block and we started walking back, I got a call from my roommate.  He essentially accused me of hiding his stash of weed from him, “maybe because you didn’t want somebody to see it when they came by or something.”

“Dude, I’ve barely been home, I’ve been staying away from there as much as possible — and why would I touch your weed, seriously?  I have no idea where it is, and I haven’t touched anything that belongs to you.”

“Well, maybe somebody walked off with it then, do you know if anybody’s been by there at all?”

“Like I just said, I’ve barely been home, and I lock everything when I leave.  Again, I didn’t touch it and I don’t know where it is.”

This was just before midnight, and he seemed pretty upset about it then, but apologized for bothering me and wished me goodnight.  Next morning before 8am, he called again to tell me that he still couldn’t find his marijuana, and that he didn’t know what to do because he owed money to someone else for it, and was supposed to have sold some so that he had enough cash to get to work that day, and that he may as well just kill himself because there was no point to anything.  He then broke into a tearful apology, seemingly for anything and everything that came to mind, telling me that he thought I must have killed myself when I’d tossed my leash in the back yard and walked off, and that he was sure it was all his fault and then — this was the weirdest and scariest part — acknowledged that I’d mentioned before on multiple occasions that I had Benadryl for the rare times I needed medication to help me sleep, but that he’d gotten some prescription Buspirone (Buspar) from someone he knew and would gladly give me some if I wanted because it seemed to be helping him so far when he’d taken it.

There wasn’t time in the call, especially with him getting so weepy and emotional, to mention that I knew full well what Buspar does, since I took the stuff for a decade… and it scares me to know that he’s popping psychiatric drugs like that.  I’m far less concerned about someone smoking pot, or doing any number of recreational drugs (with the exception of meth, but that’s a whole different story) than I am with something cooked up by big pharmaceutical companies.  Just another reason for me to stay out of the house, keep my room closed and locked, and interact as little as possible until I can find another place to live.

Someone starts their day, within minutes of waking up, with a drink or two of alcohol.  They have another drink with (or even as) their breakfast.  Before noon they’re smashed drunk, and rarely sober up while they’re awake.  Maybe you make a comment to them that you’d like to talk to them, but that it’s a serious subject and you’d prefer that they weren’t inebriated — and they reply that they can actually function when they’re drunk, even suggesting that they’d be less likely to carry a conversation otherwise.  They drink with dinner, have a few more drinks in the evening with their friends and a last few before going to bed.

Now… what changes if instead of alcohol, that’s marijuana?

I’d say that person is still addicted.  I’d say it’s incredibly frustrating, actually.

-=-=-=-=-

Imagine, again as a hypothetical, that you’ve had some pretty significant bad experiences with dogs.  Bad enough that you’ve developed symptoms of PTSD, and when you hear a dog bark nearby or see a dog in the same room as you, it paralyzes you with fear, gives you flashbacks to a particularly traumatic experience, makes you want to scream and run and fight and ohgodohgodohgod get it away NOW!

Now imagine you’re living with someone who brings a big dog to visit your house on a regular basis, who talks non-stop about how cute and wonderful and cuddly and sweet this dog is, even keeps the dog around the house overnight or for a weekend sometimes.  Imagine that you’ve completely freaked out a few times when confronted by this dog, flipped out and started screaming or maybe tried to attack the dog when it’s just being playful.  Imagine telling your roommate that you’re dealing with PTSD and that having dogs around isn’t okay, that you understand this particular dog is harmless but that you can’t handle being around any dogs at all, and you get scolded for being mean to the poor little doggy, blamed for scaring him with your screaming when all he wants to do is be cute and lovable and adorable — and the dog keeps coming back again and again.

Now imagine any other PTSD triggers, say — not just as a random example — low masculine voices, especially loud ones.  Same situation, same response.  That’s what I’m living with, and today after having my schedule thrown apart with a last-minute cancellation, being absolutely broke but hoping to get something done around the house… the dog — erm, I mean the boyfriend – came by, and I’m trying to type this while managing some extreme anxiety.  Not only am I having to hear loud low male voices that make me want to scream, I’ve got loud coughing too, because the addicts are all drinking smoking in the next room and the wet lung-hacking that goes with getting stoned makes me want to scream.

If I had anywhere else to go to escape this shit, I’d be there.  If I had anything I could do to avoid dealing with this, I would.  I don’t.  I need to be able to feel safe when I’m at home, and I rarely do — not that I’m physically in danger, but I feel emotionally threatened on a near-constant basis, and I’m not getting some essential things done that I need to, like searching for a new home, because I spend so much time struggling to barely maintain my fucking SANITY that I have nothing left to actually do anything.

I need to write some more but I can’t do this with all of the shit in the next room. I’m going to fucki9ing smash things if I don’t get out of here now.

fuck you all and go to fucking hell and DIE.

I know it’s a lie, I know I don’t really want to be dead.  I know what I want is to be alive and to have my life not be such COMPLETE AND UTTER SHIT.

That’s not going to happen right now, though, and since the years of depression and all the other fucked-up-ness leave me with an easy shorthand for “I want life to stop sucking ass, and I want to either be able to fix all of the pain and suffering in the world or stop caring about trying and I know I can’t do either but I don’t know what else to try,” the thoughts come again:

“I want to die.”

But I don’t — I just want to be able to go through one day without huge miscommunications that leave me hurting and vulnerable.  I want to be able to clearly voice how pissed off I am that when I heard “We’ll meet on Thursday and have some fun” what was really meant was “I might maybe possibly be free Thursday, and on the small chance I am, we’ll meet and have fun.”  I want to be able to tell my mom that I need the money she planned to deposit so that I can eat today, I want to be able to tell her when it’s urgent, but to also know that it’s always urgent when someone’s offering me assistance, that every day is a juggling act with pennies and hoping someone decides to take care of me when I can’t.  I want to be honest with her how I budget my money, what I do with my time, the people I see and the things that bring me joy in life — but she’s still talking to her son, and I’m not going to flood her with details of things that to her are morally, fundamentally wrong.

I need a safe place to cry, and I haven’t had that for a long time.  I need someone safe to hold me so that the tears will come out, and I’ve had to go without that for even longer.  I need to be fucked, I need be cuddled, I need pain, all the good kinds of pain that help me make it through the shitty pain that I’m so accustomed to anymore.

I need a safe place to live — emotionally safe, where I don’t feel threatened and I don’t have PTSD triggers flooding in from every side, every hour of the day and night.  I need a quiet place to live, where I don’t have to fight off a sensory overload all the fucking time.  I need to live without men, without masculine-presenting people, without the HURRR HURRR I’M FULL OF TESTOSTERONE AND I LIKE TO SMASH AND YELL AND THAT MAKES ME SO FUCKING AWESOME ALL RIGHT YEAH BITCHES!!!!! I feel threatened by the sounds of men, men’s voices, and I don’t have anywhere I can go to be free of that for even a moment.  I hate this.

I need to have someone who actually gives a FLYING FUCK about anything at all — when my landlord completely forgot that my lease ended at the start of the month, and I finally managed to get in touch with him YESTERDAY, when he was still on vacation.  Said he’d call today, no surprise that he didn’t.  Need to move again, and that scares me.  Scares me on a really deep level because that’s all I’ve fucking DONE for 2 and a half YEARS is move and fail and move in desperation and get fucked over and pack everything again and move and move and move.

And I don’t even want to get started about the people I live with… I’d get even more angry than I am now, and I don’t want to keep hurting like this.

“I just want to fucking curl up and die.”

Curl up, sure. Nice long darkness, definitely. Heavy crushing weight on me, making it hard to breathe, absolutely. Die?  Probably not, but it sure sounds tempting.  Not that I could put the significant effort into the kind of detailed planning it would take to kill myself — if I’m motivated enough to go all Aspie-focused on something, it sure as hell isn’t going to be on researching suicide.  But I don’t want to keep dealing with all this shit.  I don’t want to feel helpless, I don’t want to know that other people are dealing with much worse shit and feel like I’m powerless to help, even though I want to fix everything and I’m having to work hard not to offer more than I can give.

I’m not eating right, when I do eat.  I’m not sleeping enough, or regularly, or very well when I do.  I’m growing tired of trying to explain to people what’s going on, following the same scripts for “How To Open The Eyes Of The Privileged Pricks Who Never Lack In Their Needs” when people suggest over and over the same things that aren’t available or aren’t feasible or sometimes just completely fucking laughably stupid suggestions.  They mean well, which is why it’s really hard not to smash faces in sometimes… they’re just clueless, not intentionally assholes.  If they were trying to be obnoxious, it’d be easier to blow it off.

Sick of it all.

Don’t want to try.

Bored, depressed, apathetic.

Need things, know I can’t have them.

Alone, isolated, lonely.

Yeah, I’m definitely dealing with depression, but as always I have to try to manage until things get a little bit better.  There isn’t much outside support, and anything outside is going to be a long fucking wait.

Maybe tonight’s a good night for Benadryl… at least I’ll sleep.  I’d rather have alcohol than antihistamines, but beggars can’t bitch, right?

Then as I was halfway down the street, three of those words stood out at me with disturbing clarity: Drink to cope.

No, of course I can’t really afford it. I realized something else, though — and it got me singing Creedence Clearwater Revival: “Someone told me long ago, there’s a calm before the storm…”

I’ve been spending a fair bit of time and money on myself recently, stocking up on good times and pleasant experiences… because I can see the storm coming. I can see the signs all pointing to some seriously deep shit hitting a majorly big fan very soon, and I’m doing what I can to minimize the damage to myself.

If I had access to a therapist right now, I’d be seeing her. Unfortunately, I’m getting fucked over and then passed to the next clueless bureaucracy to turn me like a cheap trick while I do what little I can to fight against the agencies who claim to want to help me, in order to accomplish anything productive.

I’m currently living here without a lease; my landlord hasn’t returned any of my calls in over a week.  I was trying to reach him before my lease ended at the start of September so I could let him know I’m looking for something that doesn’t completely suck ass like this place does, but I can’t even tell him that much if he doesn’t care enough to check his messages and call me back.

My roommates are driving me absolutely crazy, and are much of the reason I went out for a beer tonight, much of the reason I’ve avoided being home as often as possible lately. I’m as polite as can be to anyone’s face, and even go out of my way to do nice things when I can, but this place is toxic. It’s leeching away my emotional reserve, if there’s any left at this point, and it’s pulling me down into depression, apathy, anger and even occasional — very unwanted, and actively fought against — but occasional suicidal thought patterns.

I did not, absolutely DID NOT want to move again. 8 homes in 36 months is already far too many, and that’s not counting the first half of August 2010, which I spent floating in Vallejo, lucky to keep myself off of the streets each night, but doing so by making some choices I’d rather forget and by sacrificing some things I regret giving up.

One big difference I hope to have this time around is that I will give myself enough time to find something that works, and works well. Each of my other moves has been last-minute, with no significant planning and in complete desperation. Moving here was essential so that I could escape a physically and emotionally abusive intimate relationship as much as it was to get out from under the thumb of a slumlord bitch and away from a hellish neighborhood where I’d been mugged twice, both times in visual range of a police or fire station with absolutely zero response from “the authorities.”

I often find that people compliment me on how much of a difference I make to their day; I get thanked for the types of things I do every day to be like Daniel Goleman’s tale of a bus driver mentioned by maymay in his post “The Bus Driver and The Gadfly” — something I was glad to have put in words much better than I could have expressed before reading that.  I only wish that others could more easily and readily see that I put so much effort into making life a little less shitty for those around me because I am suffering so much myself, that the few smiles I bring to the faces of others are a few moments I can still hang on, a few more days that I still have a reason to try.  I wish more people could do something significant to help me; I know there are plenty of good people and friends who would help if there was anything they could offer, but there’s nothing that’s in their power to change so that I can make it through.

I should go to sleep now, but there’s plenty more to say.  It’ll have to wait.

In addition, I listen.  I know how to listen; people feel comfortable talking to me about all sorts of things that trouble them, and I can’t begin to count the times I’ve heard variations on “I don’t know why I shared that with you, I’ve never told anyone about that, I just felt like I could give you my deepest, darkest secrets…”  I know things.  Things I can’t share, things that could hurt people, or destroy their careers, or endanger their families and loved ones.  Things that I’d really rather not have to carry with me.

And then there’s my secrets.  There are things about me that I know, things I want, things I hate, things I’ve done… stuff that I’ve never shared, some of it stuff that I’d rather forget, some of it that I’d love to celebrate.

But it’s all secret right now.  Some of the lies I’ve kept on telling because I know that telling the truth now would make good people hurt, and because at least for the moment I still can benefit from dishonesty.  That scares me, but right now that’s less scary than tearing away the layers of lies, risking loss and causing emotional harm.  The secrets others have given me, many of them are meaningless out of the context they were given, many are ancient or from people I knew “once upon a time,” but still filed in the great database in my brain, waiting only for the right query to retrieve them and fill me with the turmoil of remembering that I know and cannot tell.

The things I keep for myself, I need a very safe place with someone I very much trust, and the opportunity to do some emotional digging — I’m certain I’ll be able to manage a lot of that with a therapist, and there’s some chance of making that happen in the foreseeable future, so I’m hoping that’s the case.

I’m falling asleep while writing here, so I should probably post and sleep.  My dreams lately have been quite full of the sex that I’m so sorely lacking in reality… I welcome the escape.

I have a home, one that (with some work on my part) should be a long-term place to live, and some roommates who (despite my bitching and moments of frustration) are genuinely good people, and who want to put effort into working with me to make this a welcoming space.

I don’t always have all of my needs met, and I frequently lack even some of the most basic life necessities, but I get by, and I’m finding ways to address those needs better and more often.

But sometimes… sometimes in those most quiet of moments, when everything else fades away… sometimes when I’m alone, and my thoughts turn inward… sometimes there’s a quiet voice with only one small question:

“What if they’re right?”

It’s a question that I’d like to just ignore. It’s a persistent little voice, though, and eventually I do answer:

“They’re not.  You know it — you just told me, point by point, everything about how you know you’re happy, the things that you can measure and compare, and the certainty you have of yourself and your path in life.  They’re wrong.”

“Well… yeah, I know.  But… really, though — what if it’s all true?  What if the choices you’re making really are sinful, what if you’re just mistaking the temporary pleasures you’ve found for joy, the lasting kind of joy that can’t ever be had from the things of this world?  What then?”

“I… I guess I could consider the possibility for a moment.  Okay — if they’re right, which I don’t believe, then… then…”

“Go on, say it.  Get it out.”

“Then I’m setting myself up for eventual pain, loneliness, suffering and sorrow sometime in this life — just delaying the day that it comes while I pretend that I’ve found joy… and, I suppose it also– ~sigh~ I suppose it also means that if I continue down the road I’m traveling now, then after I die I’ll be confronted with the undeniable knowledge that I have done wrong, that I was given the truth and consciously chose to disregard it… that I’ll spend the rest of forever kept away from my family, the people who I love most and who love me, weighed down by the guilt of turning away, the shame of having chosen to sin, the endless suffering of having walked away from what could have been, without another chance to fix things.”

“How does it feel?”

“God… it hurts.  It’s scary, scary beyond belief.  It’s irrational, illogical, completely contradicting the things I can directly observe, but there’s just this… this fear, this doubt, y’know?  Because if I’m wrong, then I’m even more fucked than I can imagine, and I lose my family forever, I hurt more than I ever have or can ever imagine… but I don’t know how to do anything else now, and the whole cycle of guilt and shame and ‘repentance’ just isn’t something I can do again, not after knowing what else is out there.  But… I just don’t know.”

“No… you don’t, do you?  And you won’t know until the day you die.  The uncertainty won’t kill you, though.  Trust me, you’ve got a lot of years left to go.  I’ll be back to ask you the question again, when you’ve forgotten about me, when you think you’re doing well, when you’ve stopped expecting me…”

And so it goes, the little questioning voice leaves me for a while, lets me go back to remembering how awesome it feels to be “out and proud and loud,” how exciting it is to discover new kinds of kinky fun that I enjoy, to have incredible sex once in a while, and to actively look for pleasure and happiness with other people who like the same things.  I go back to the struggles and the joys of every day, like the ones that came before.

It’ll be back, I know.  I don’t know that I can do anything about it besides have the same fight again when it decides to trouble me — but for now I’ve come out on top.  We’ll see what happens next time…

At the same time, I was taught that the ideal toward which I should strive was to “turn the other cheek,” that a truly loving person would forgive any trespass against them, that the most pure and perfect example of what we could be, not only forgave everything of everyone, but did so with a smile and a gentle reaffirmation of his love.

I made a mistake recently — a fairly significant one.  I understand now, looking at the structure I’ve had, why the response I got shocked me like it did: because the people involved have exemplified the supposedly unattainable ideal I was taught that we all should be, instead of the degrading, demeaning, and demoralizing cycle of shame I expected.

There are good people in this world.  There are folks who strive to make a difference, who make mistakes themselves and understand that others will do the same.  There are wonderful members of our human race who want to be happy and want to help others be happy as well.  I’m fortunate to have found many of these people, and to recognize that I share many of these traits; I’ll have to work to un-learn some of my old ways, re-train some broken patterns and discard many of the lies I have so deeply internalized… but it’s where I belong, and I’m grateful to know the folks I do, and to know that I have a chance to get to know them better!

Most of these photos, the ones with “beautiful” women, are skinny white girls, they’re studio photography, edited and oh-so-obviously posed but trying to look like “oops! Did I have a picture snapped when I was just sitting here with no clothes and touching myself? Tee-hee!”

Sure, as a blossoming young feminist, I’ve been reading plenty about privilege, about the lack of representation in every arena — not only, but definitely in pornography — of other races, body types, genders, sexual orientations, and more.  Sure, I understood, on some level, that it’s a Big Fucking Problem that the images available and often thrown in your face of what “beautiful” looks like aren’t anything like you, that even the women held up as the ultimate ideal to strive for, even they are photoshopped and enhanced because even they aren’t good enough.

But tonight I really, really “got it.”  I found words for my frustration at being unable to find just two beautiful women to display on my computer screen out of the thousands of pictures in this folder, as I said:

I don’t want photos of airbrushed, post-processed, blemish-free, makeup-caked girls taken with leading-edge, brand-name, professional-grade cameras and fill lighting.

I don’t want that same fucking facial expression — the one that’s supposed to say “Ohhhh, so good!” but to me just says “Oh, so what?”

I don’t want photography that sucks the soul out of a woman who might be beautiful, and leaves a plastic, packaged, profit-making product.

I want women who are beautiful, women who have been captured on film (or in pixels, gol-durn new-fangled techno-loogie!) because they are beautiful and worth sharing.

I want big women, who rock their curvy bodies and aren’t being marketed as a niche fetish for losers and weirdos.

I want women with skin any color besides the narrow range of white from “porcelain” to “peach.”

I want women who might not have been assigned that gender at birth — again, not because they’re being marketed exploited as some freak of nature, but because they’re fucking sexy, and worth being photographed showing off their sexy selves.

I want to see women who are just as gorgeous as the girls I see walking around town every day, almost none of whom even remotely resemble the ones in the majority of this collection of pictures I have.

I want to see the beautiful women who don’t go out much, the ones who are too ashamed of how they look to walk around, who sometimes believe the loud messages, the flood of lies telling them they’re ugly, telling them they’re unwanted and undesired.

I want women who might not believe how incredible they look because if someone actually tells them they’re beautiful, it must be a flattering lie to get something in return.

I want real women, real beauty, celebrating the sexiness that we naturally have.  Keep the plastic, and show me some skin!

But… in order to express my thoughts, I need to organize them, to have a safe, calm, space where I do not feel threatened, trapped, overwhelmed, or unable to cope.

I’m not doing much writing. I wonder why?

Her boy-toy mumbles, or talks, or sometimes even yells, while he walks around the house, or in and out of the house (slamming the door half of the time.)  When I’m sitting in my room, and I have my curtains and window open to let some much-needed cooler air through, and I’ve turned on some music to let my mind focus, started singing so I can let out just a tiny part of this storm of emotion I keep bottling up inside… well, I find it really unsettling, put mildly, to suddenly see a face right outside my window, and then before my body can fully react to the “Oh fuck! What is this? Do I need to defend myself, or run away, or WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON???” feeling, the face is gone again — and there’s a voice unseen, arguing with itself.

Am I the only one who doesn’t think that’s cute, or endearing, or refreshing, or delightful and charming? Am I bizarre to feel threatened by that behavior?  Am I wrong to call it “creepy” or compare one person walking around and  talking out loud in angry tones to nobody, to others displaying the same observable actions — namely, the often homeless “crazy people,” the ones outcast and avoided because those behaviors are not socially acceptable, and make most others uneasy?

I had hoped to let myself breathe today, to relax and let free some of the emotional weight and tension inside.  The moment I began to do so, I was startled and interrupted by the sudden flash of a face in the window, and moments later a momentary glimpse of someone there and gone again in the hall.  I’m more tense than when I awoke, I’m angry and frustrated and feeling trapped… and I have to either psych myself up for preparing to go out now, moving through the house and past the boy-toy and trying to keep the disquiet inside to a low roar instead of a banshee howl on a stormy night — or take the route I do more often: stay locked inside my room, stay in this self-imposed prison until the threat abates, until he’s gone, and I feel as safe outside as I do here (and neither of them feels particularly safe.)

This is no way to live.  When the emotional hazards from the people in my own home and the guests they invite are so great that I cannot face them directly, and my only other option is to remain self-exiled and intentionally isolate myself, knowing that what I need most is emotional and physical closeness… I’m trapped in an incredibly unhealthy place.  If my choice is between emotionally and psychologically harming myself or putting myself in situations where I’ll be emotionally or psychologically harmed by others — intentionally or not — then it doesn’t ever feel like much of a choice.  I usually choose self-harm because in that one small measure I retain my own agency, I feel the victory of keeping my autonomy and control of self… but each one feels, as King Phyrrus would understand, that another such victory would utterly undo me.

I have to stop writing now, get myself dressed, prepared, and out the fucking door. Now.  It’s just too overwhelming here…

Sunday didn’t seem as though it would be anything remarkable; some noise around the house, neighbors and traffic and all the daily cacophony surrounding me as I lay in bed and killed time on my computer.  The usual group of deep, resounding voices was here, but I sighed with relief to recall that most of the people I know from living here were headed to their weekly RPG party night, and I’d have some time alone.

Well, as I was attempting to wrap up a few last things on the computer, I heard a huge FHWOOMP! and the power went out.  It was not quite 5PM, and though I’d never heard the sound before, logic stepped in and said, “That was a transformer blowing out, and very nearby!”  Sirens down the street in the moments that followed confirmed that something had happened, but an authority figure of some sort, police or fire or whatnot, surprised me with his words: “That’s a live wire! Get back in your house and stay inside. There’s 17,000 volts in that thing; it’ll kill you!”

So, as the next hour and a half slowly passed, we waited for the electric company to show up — on a Sunday evening, they don’t respond too quickly — and that time was filled with lots of shouting, mostly from the same man I’d first heard, repeating the message to everyone who came near: Get back! Behind the barrier tape! That wire will kill you! Just stay in your house and wait! Another 30 minutes after the power guys rolled up before the wire was safely down, and I found that it wasn’t just “nearby,” it was directly in front of my apartment!  Had I tried to go anywhere, I’d have had to walk beneath the sagging, sparking cable in order to leave.

When it was finally clear to leave the house, I did so; being pent up with no power sounded like no fun, and I try to get out of the house at least once every day, to go walking and get some sun and a chance to breathe a bit of fresh air.  As I walked, I asked the people I saw what they knew about the blackout, and was surprised to find that power had been knocked out to quite a wide area.  The nearby subway station, 6 or 7 blocks out, had gone dark, out of service until they got their generators running.  Several blocks beyond that were out, and various spots further away in different directions had been affected, including a few businesses downtown which were “Sorry, closed early — no power!”  I found out later that some residences had their power go out later, around or after midnight, which fits with about when the power company sent out more trucks to restring the wire.

After going out to sit at Starbucks for a spell then recognizing my tedium, tiredness, and anxiety, I decided to go home once again.  The power was out still, and as I sat down in my room and saw the shadows lengthen and the sun fall, I laughed.  Mind you, what I wanted was to bellow a hearty belly-laugh, but what came out was just a soft chuckle… I felt such awe in the silence I heard that I reflexively quieted myself in respect and reverence.  I listened.  Then I strained to hear, listened more closely, and smiled as I heard… nothing.  The beautiful sound of silence, so rare and so often needed — and here it was for me to enjoy!

I know how frequently I go without enough sleep, and with darkness and quiet for the second time in as many days, I prepared myself for slumber and once again received sweet, beautiful rest.  A few hours later — I don’t recall precisely how many, and I didn’t have my large digital clock to check — I heard loud voices once again.  The others had returned, screaming and shouting and talking loudly as usual, though it was a definite delight to hear her lose her calm, to “freak out” as she put it.  Not because I take pleasure in her emotional pain, but because her displays of emotion are so rare, and she frequently works to suppress visible emotion entirely… she seems to think this makes her more “grown up,” but it was refreshing to hear her humanity, to be reminded that she’s like everyone else.

Perhaps an hour later, they all left again.  Blessed with that blissful silence once more, I went back to bed and slept.  Once when I awoke, I noticed that my clock was flashing its big red 12:00 — then I rolled over and rested some more.  When I finally found myself unable to go back to sleep, I got up, started my day at half past noon, set my clock and asked around to see when the electricity had been restored… just before 5AM, fully 12 hours from the time it had gone.  If it wasn’t for the spoiled food in the fridge, I’d love to do this again, even as a frequent — but unexpected and unannounced — occurrence!  It got the rest of the noisy people away, it pulled me away from my technological time-sinks, and allowed me to catch up on some much-needed rest.

Of course I realize that many of these same joys could be had by, say, going camping, or having another place to stay for a night or two even if it’s somewhere with electricity — and I’d certainly love those options or others to enjoy… Right now I’m without any such luxuries, though I hope to find someone to help me figure out how to put those into action.  My ultimate dream would be a home of my own, a little place with a few rooms, far enough from major roads not to have the noise of traffic, in an area where nobody finds it acceptable to use their car as a “neighborhood stereo.”  A modest space to call my own, to invite whomever I chose to share that space — whether a woman (or two, or more) for a night, friends for an evening of fun, or whatever else felt right.  I know that dream is distant now, but I’ll keep it in my heart and look for ways to bring it closer as life moves forward!

And for the moment, things have returned to “normal” — lots of noise, lots of people, lots of loud, low voices, lots of coughing and traffic and the buzz and hum of computers and refrigerators and lights, too little sleep and too much stress… but I look forward to any chance that comes my way to revel in that lovely sound of silence once again.

So! Friday night was a much-needed contrast to the way the day began. Started off with an angry guy screaming in my face and lots of unpleasant emotional pain… ended with some delightful physical pain and a beautiful woman in my arms speaking words of kindness and praise!

There was a play party at the local BDSM dungeon, and with as much shit as I’ve been dealing with lately, I knew that I needed to be there.  Had a great time, met lots of people, some potential friends, some potential play partners, and got to be the talk of the party — “Oh! That was you up there? Your ass-cheeks were such a beautiful deep shade of pink!”  Then in my mingling and chatting, I came across one woman who struck me as… well, as powerful, but more “potential energy” as opposed to kinetic.  I mean, she didn’t have to display power, it was more striking to see the power she held in reserve.  Anyway…

We were talking, this power-woman and I, and she asked me what I liked, what I wanted; I felt at ease already, having been smacked around a bit and being in that welcoming space, so I answered openly: “I’ve been craving cunnilingus, really.”

I’m so used to the almost patronizing reply from people when I express unfulfilled wishes, dreams of what I want, even lament that I’m struggling to survive and just want some peace — the “Well, things will turn out okay…” or “You’ll get what you need eventually…”  So common is that kind of “I can’t help, but I want to sound supportive” comment, that I misunderstood when this queen said in a simple, even tone, “You shall have what you desire.”

And so I did, have what I have so long desired — plenty to sate my palate that night, still little enough to leave me wanting for the next time.  Oh, and rest!  I had such a beautiful, full night of rest! Dark, quiet, peaceful, and every time I awoke and looked across to see the smooth and gentle curve of her belly, hip, thigh, I laughed to myself the reminder that I was not dreaming, and drifted off to sleep once more.

Sleep is something I ought to be doing right now, since my body is in such severe need of it right now… there’s more to write still, but it will wait until I wake!

I know what I did tonight was wrong, and not on a small level.  I’m not sure how else this could have ended, though, because when I can’t speak, don’t speak, won’t speak about shit that’s going on, it will eventually explode, like tonight.  Screaming, in-your-face and if she hadn’t stepped between us I’m afraid I would have harmed another person.  That’s not okay.  That’s never okay, and I don’t want to ever be in an emotional space where I feel the desire or capability to harm someone.

In yet another of life’s great damned-if-you-do-and-damned-if-you-don’t jokes, I’d love to stay here, to make a home and finally put down some fucking roots instead of moving and running away again… but even if I decide to go anywhere else, there’s absolutely nothing that I can afford in northern california, and I’ve got occasional assistance with food and money and other things where I am — I’d have none of that if I tried to leave.

She’s a little child.  I have to remember that, keep it in mind when the wealthy, pampered brat shines through the mask she works so hard to keep up, the mask of a mature and responsible adult.  She’s not — she’s often pretty damn clueless, blind to the most glaring things around her, and I wonder sometimes how much of that is willful ignorance, otherwise known as “stupid on purpose.”  I’ve been repeating to myself lately that “you can lead a fool to knowledge, but you can’t make them think” and when she remains so oblivious so often, I have to remind myself to be patient, to be the mature woman I can be instead of turning loose a toddler’s tantrum like I did tonight.

I tried calling my mom’s cellphone just after everything exploded, but she was already asleep, and I know how she sleeps — with earplugs, a pillow on top, and a fan to make white noise by her bedside.  She’ll probably see the dozen or more calls and hear my one barely-coherent message sometime tomorrow morning, long after there’s any chance for her to help me.  I also tried sending a text message to someone else I trust, but he’s either asleep or not near his phone, and I’ll probably get a call tomorrow from him too… again, far too late to be any real help.

I don’t have anyone that I can reach out to, anyone I trust or feel at all comfortable with, anyone I can call in an emergency like this and get any sort of help.  I’ve learned from repeatedly bashing my head against the idiocy of the public mental health system that I cannot get help from them, that in fact I am more likely to suffer more trauma from attempting that kind of call for help than what I am already handling on my own… but it really pisses me off that I don’t have any emergency support system.

I can’t do a “crisis line,” because even if I have their number handy, even if I get someone whose voice doesn’t make me want to scream, I won’t have anyone who can do more than be a disembodied voice in my ear with a script to follow.  I can’t call a psych hospital… last time was the worst night I’ve had in years, being assaulted by a large black man while staff paid no attention, being told that I was suicidal and forced to take drugs because “how else can we calm you down?” and spending an unknown amount of time barely conscious, in a panicked and drugged haze.  I can’t go to any sort of walk-in facility — I’m transgender.  If that’s not “enough said,” then I can’t explain for you.  Ask someone to pass you the clue-stick.

I’ve gone far too long without any sleep, and as much as I hate to do it, I’m going to have to turn back on some noise to block out the rest of the shit here… and maybe I’ll be lucky this time.  Maybe I’ll get enough sleep to be functional tomorrow.

See you all in hell…

Is it so terribly much to ask, to have a home with no men, no smokers, quiet when I want (or need) it, and reasonably simple access to the particular kinds of healthcare I need? I’m sick of moving, moving, moving, every time filled with wonderful dreams — “This is the place! It’s perfect! I love it here!”  When will I wake up and realize that as soon as the novelty wears thin, I’ll be as miserable as I ever was, that I’ll be struggling not to yell at the people I live with, fighting the same fucking battles all over again?

Yes, my general trend has been towards better and better places — but all of them have had their perks and their pitfalls –

• Darling little Filipina who gave me a $100 case of makeup because “she wouldn’t be there for my birthday” when I’d just told her I was moving out after a week and a half… because the place was disgusting and the creepy old man renting the other room kept trying to tell me what Jesus wanted me to do with my life.
• The gay guys who showed me what it was to party, had a hot tub and swimming pool, but smoked 4 packs a day in the house and treated me like shit half the time. Oh, and the infestation of fleas… still makes me shudder.
• Beautiful home, big room, beautiful yard with a garden and a lying manipulative old bitch who moved her asshole boyfriend in rent-free.
• Two fucking gorgeous Ukrainian girls, quiet neighborhood with a 10-minute walk to Ocean Beach, but both girls straight and taken and sleepless nights of sex in stereo every weekend… plus dosing my chewing gum with Ketamine and making sure I wasn’t on the 2010 Census.
• Wonderful little apartment in Daly City, cool roommates (mostly) and convenient access to shopping, but a 2-month time limit with nowhere else to go.
• And how can I forget East Oakland — my “welcome to the ‘hood, motherfucker” was being there two weeks and a 9-mil in my face, everything gone…an old foul-mouthed alcoholic who threw a shit-fit if someone called him “sir” because it was supposed to be obvious that the big fat hairy dude was a woman, endless yelling and fights between the men living there (regardless of how they self-identified, they acted like pigs), and of course the bitch who slowly earned my trust and intimacy so she could have me get her pregnant — and then almost broke my jaw.  There wasn’t really much good in that place…

And now here I am in Berkeley — the town fits me so wonderfully, sometimes I can’t believe it’s really my home.  I’ve just met almost all my neighbors up and down the street, I’ve been making connections and acquaintances and contacts — no real fiends so far, and I’ve stopped expecting to ever have those. But I’m living in a place where I’m constantly surrounded by men, where the endless chorus of deep, booming voices tightens my fingers into fists, where the unpredictably-timed but reliably-occurring coughs from lungs destroyed by smoking is as mentally devastating as water-drip torture, where I’m ignored and invisible to the extended group of friends who all have a fantastic time doing things together unless I stand up and yell and scream and flap my arms around…

I’m still single, still alone, still horny all the damn time with no outlet, no relief, no release, and no one to hold me.  The girl who responded to my personal ad, the reason I found this place to live at all, casually dismissed me with “you’re not my type” and claims that she lost interest because there was such undeniable chemistry between me and the other person who lives here — so much for “undeniable” when a month and a half had gone by before I had any clue that someone was interested in me, and I don’t have much interest to give back.

The few small possibilities I’ve had for intimacy, romance, even just one-time one-night fucks, have all amounted to nothing. Lots of idiots who say they’re looking for someone like me, but they really want a hideous creature like they just saw in the latest “she-male” porno DVD.  A couple of intelligent, really cool-sounding women who actually seemed interested in me… and then flaked or stopped writing back or just wanted sexy instant messages about how awesome it would be to watch me with a dude.

I’m a lesbian.  I like women, I love pussy, I’m crazy about tits.  Once in a while I might want some cock, but it’s tough having to deal with the huge dick attached to the end of the phallus — and usually not worth the effort.  It’s frustrating trying to find a woman who’s also interested in women but isn’t hung up on how I’m hung.  It’s frustrating trying to find a girl who hasn’t been burned by the crazy psycho-bitch “tranny” girls who rant about “Hollywood perpetuating broken stereotypes” and then provide a great example to reinforce the stereotype they’re screaming about.  Frustrating to look for a girl who’s as interested in getting me into her bed as she is in getting to know me because I’m “so cool to hang out with.”

I have so much that I need to write, to express, to get this shit out of me and onto the pages here — it’s been too long since I’ve had this outlet, and I hope to use it more.  For now, I’ve got to stop myself, or I’ll be too drained to do much of anything else.