Sunday the 31st of October, 2010
Last night I described myself as feeling “very mature on the inside”, then followed up that comment half an hour later with a brief monologue on how music is “totally amazing”. It was ridiculous, and I’m ridiculous, and I totally got my ridiculous come-uppance for being such a pretentious jerk earlier in the evening.
Of course, I don’t feel mature on the inside. I mean, I constantly feel like I’m only pretending to be a grown-up, and everyone can tell that I’m just a kid on the inside. And part of that little kid-ness involves saying stuff like “I feel mature” to try and fit in, to try and make explicit the adulthood that I try to subtly fake.
Monday the 21st of September, 2009
There are some okay things about living in a small England village, like this car that drove by my window. That’s a pretty cool car, no?
Of course, small town life has its downsides, too. Like a high school that doesn’t understand why anyone would ever want their transcripts shipped to an American university. Or what transcripts even are. Or that someone who has changed their name would probably not like to have their old name referred to as the “real” one.
The best part about this whole thing is that my high school experience was awful and walking into that building to talk to the admin staff made me so anxious that I had to take a break during my journey because my stomach was hurting so bad.
Just to be crystal clear, I wanted my name changed on my transcripts, if possible, and those transcripts then faxed to Hudson Valley Community College. That really doesn’t seem that hard, does it? I was even prepared to pay for the inconvenience , if it came down to that. But they said no, on both counts. And made me feel like an idiot.
Fuck this place.
Friday the 14th of August, 2009
Inspired by Jake Lodwick’s Standards and by a conversation with a therapist yesterday, I’ve decided to become more pro-active about how I manage my time and Getting Things Done.
Oh, that’s good. Someone should trademark that.
I promise that this was not just an excuse to purchase another Moleskine. Mostly. I just remember the most productive time in my life being around 8th and 9th grade, and especially remember the joy I got ticking little boxes after completing homework assignments.
No, I did not have friends.
I figure if I can re-create that joy with a home-made system, it should be a little easier to convince myself to do things when I need to do them.
Also this meant I could use my Crayola colors. Which — yay!
Tuesday the 14th of July, 2009
Honestly? Don’t even really want to eat it. But I’ve always been super underweight, and now that I’m on fat redistibuting pills it might be a good idea for me to actually have some fat to redistribute. Abby tells me it’s disgusting that I checked two yogurt pots for fat content and put back one for the crime of having 5g fewer than the other.
Nobody wants to hear anyone moan about being too thin. And I understand that. I understand that nobody cares that I am freaking out that my stomach — always taut, almost-muscled — is now beginning to fill out, to gather little fat cells and bunch them up. Nobody wants to hear that.
Tuesday the 7th of July, 2009
One of the interesting things about taking hormones is that it changes your brain, in little (but noticeable) ways. There’s an episode of This American Life that features a trans-man called Griffin Hansbury, who details the changes he went through when he began taking testosterone. In addition to developing the libido of a teenager, he also found himself having a better understanding of math and physics. It sounds sexist, because it is, a little bit. But there are bits of the brain that respond to certain hormones, and apparently “T” makes you better at trig.
I’ve found myself, after taking estrogen for a while now, to be better at arts and crafts than I was before. Now, granted, the pig pictured isn’t amazing, but it’s far more impressive than anything I would have been able to make before I got the magic little pills. And I can draw a little bit now, too. I’m starting to understand shadow and perspective. It’s a little bit weird.
And super-awesome, obviously. I mean, if you enjoy confirming already rampant sexist stereotypes and hetero-normative paradigms, which I apparently do.
Tuesday the 23rd of June, 2009
This is one of our bearded dragons, Bella. She’s climbing the walls lately, and I mean that in a very literal sense. She doesn’t seem to grasp the fact that her tank is made of glass, and her claws are a little too big to get a good foothold.
She lays a lot of eggs — up to thirty at a time — usually, but lately she’s been doing only one or two at a time, spacing them out over days. I think this is because she knows that doing so give those eggs a greater chance of survival. You see, we take Bella’s eggs away, freeze them, and dispose of them. This pisses her off.
Well, you know why we have to do that, Bella? You know why? Because if we don’t destroy them, you eat them. That is sick, Bella.
Tuesday the 26th of May, 2009
I’m feeling bitter-sweet. Today brought good news and bad. I saw my doctor, and made a significant advance in my “transition” (which, by the way, is a fucked-up term that implies I’m not a woman already) which I was worried wouldn’t go through. So that’s great.
But then there’s this California thing. It was too much to hope that the CA Supreme Court would knock this wildly unconstitutional law down, but I wanted it to happen. I wanted the sea change it would bring. I wanted the progress for the country I think of as at least my spiritual home, if not my physical one. It hurts me that the law still stands.
And I know that for all the pain it causes me that an entire eighth of America considers me somehow not a human being, it’s so much worse for the gay people who actually have to live there. I can’t imagine what they’re going through, to have their hopes raised so high, and then dashed suddenly.
This world is messed up.
{/livejournal}
Tuesday the 19th of May, 2009
I had a dream last night where I arranged my chaotic iPod home-screen into something resembling order. Once I’d completed the task, the device emitted a holy blue light and I felt at peace.
Naturally, there was no light when I finished in the real world, but I do feel calmer. Like maybe a family member won’t die now, or something.
This is entirely normal.
Monday the 18th of May, 2009
There are large gaps in my memory because I am fucked in the brain. Everything before 10th grade is a blur, really, with only one day I can remember in its entirety: my 13th birthday.
I don’t know why. There’s no significance to it. It was a sad day, sure, but I’m told I had plenty of those. Still, I know the presents I got, and the order I enjoyed them, and the time my friends arrived and the looks on their faces when I told them we couldn’t afford a football so I’d made one out of an orange wrapped in carrier bags.
Right now I’m sitting in bed — not wearing any clothes and a little hungry — and playing Animaniacs on a SNES emulator whilst I listen to a podcast and Abby sleeps in the background (on Skype).
Am I going to remember this moment when I’m eighty years old? Will it take the place of a memory more beautiful? Am I going to have to lie to myself and say that all existence is to cherish, and who cares what bits you remember.
I wish I could forget what I want, and remember the important stuff. I can’t trust my brain.
That last sentence is probably the key to my whole being. I can’t trust my brain.
Back to the dick jokes.
Sunday the 17th of May, 2009
Dear Bastards.
I was wondering if you could possibly, just a little bit, maybe, perhaps, fuck off. Not only have you kept me awake until five in the morning every night for the past week, but you’ve turned that kitchen into a pigsty. I get that you probably don’t think I care since I only use the fridge to store Babybel, but we’ve all paid a deposit and you are royally taking a shit on said deposit, setting it on fire, and then cooking Indian food in a frying pan (which — by the way — what?) over it.
You have angered me, to the point of forcing me to write a strongly-worded letter to post to my back-up blog which not even very many of my friends see, let alone you. If you need an some kind of reference point to understand that, I’m about as angry as one of you was last night when he bellowed “I’ve never, ever even hit you! Sober!” at a female he’s somehow tricked into shagging him.
Oh, yes, I can hear that by the way. Congratulations to him on being able to orgasm so quickly. I do wish I could say the same for her.
