And then there’s this, from the same essay:
“Queer communities often wish to hide things from some of their family and friends, while also being able to share parts of their life with others. Making friends, dating, escaping abusive situations, accessing healthcare, exploring themselves and others, finding jobs, engaging in safe sex work are all aspects of queer lives underserved by the modern privacy community”
When I was in my early 20s, I lived in a room with clutter all over the floor, too anxious to buy storage; and one of my friends - who turned out, in the fullness of time, to be evil - helpfully nudged me into like, shopping for one of those basics clothing rails; but I couldn't stop thinking of what I really wanted. Anyway, I remember them saying "just get a clothes rail, you've got your whole life in front of you to collect 'pieces' ". I found an affordable 1940s wardrobe, with embroidered handles and a key and little metal tubs inside the doors labelled 'camphor'; I learned how to assemble and dismantle it myself and lugged this gorgeous thing (that deserved a better owner) from house to house to house; and that promised time has never come, that rest-of-my-life where I will collect nice furniture. It's a stupid thing to care about, in a way; but to be surrounded by persistent ugliness and cheapness is oppressive and it wears you down.
Weird, unnameable emotions about having been so close to disaster-poverty for so many years - and then somehow, through compromises and luck, be abruptly out of it and like contemplating buying some absolutely beautiful furniture, the sort of furniture which says "I will never be homeless again, for see! I have furniture 'pieces'"; and this weird dual sensation of looking at it like on the one hand, oh god I've had enough, I just want to treat myself and be in a space which says Permanence; and on the other, feeling the expense burning a guilty hole of "but what if things get bad again?" and a second guilty hole of "you know people are struggling, and that should have been shared"; because this is how so much horror is justified, from the largest scale to the smallest: "it's ok if i do this because i deserve it, and i've earned it, and that comes above what we owe to one another, and that comes above the material needs of people in danger - who aren't my responsibility, and I really do deserve this wanton luxury"
anyway, ive bought a 1930s grandfather clock
One of the nice things about queerness is deciding what things are going to mean; for example, the discomfort at the gym about maybe being looked at, vs the subversive queer pleasures of going to the gym specifically to look and be looked at. I've got my headphones in, I'm pretending it's 1970-something, pretending what I really want is everybody having a peep.
NSFW oversharing about transition
Reportedly, taking testosterone drives your libido into overdrive (or at least, makes it into a male-pattern libido that's intrusive and prominent, instead of the subtle strangenesses of a female libido), and it's one of the first side effects to come up. Unsurprisingly, I haven't been looking forward to this.
But I've been two weeks now, and I'm sort of sitting oddly with - it couldn't be, surely - because that's yet to occur, and I feel so settled and good in my body and good in my soul.
My relationship to asexuality has always been fraught; i've identified in and out of it a lot, responding to whether or not i feel like that's the best framework for explaining what's happening for me. But I'm wondering if, by some bizzare turn of events, getting my hormone balance right is the thing that allows me to settle affirmatively into an asexual place - despite the tendency of T to give one a teenage horn. Not going to speak too soon, but absolutely Fascinated.
That said, I've found myself quite desperately missing tumblr recently; the specific tumblr vibe, being around people sharing their arts and crafts, the people I was in-proximity-to (who feel like friends, but are not friends, but were nevertheless people in my life for a long time). It's sad, I miss it like a place I no longer go - maybe like missing a bar; but like, having had this thought I immediately spent like, nine solid hours archive-binging, and did not eat or sleep and *that's why I'm not the fuck on tumblr* (and it also brings out the worst in me over time, just oversharing and discourse). But maybe it'd be nice to be somewhere familiar and around familiar things again?
Three things I wanna get thru this year for my independent reading
1. https://totem-project.org/ (Primarily "How the internet works" but all of them seem pretty handy)
Digital Security training for activists and journalists
2. https://pirate.care/
Pirate Care is a transnational research project and a network of activists, scholars and practitioners who stand against the criminalization of solidarity & for a common care infrastructure.
3. https://www.autostraddle.com/author/alarae/
Notes for a Queer Homemaker
i suck at capitalism and this is a good thing.
i suck at capitalism and this is a good thing.
i suck at capitalism and this is a good thing.
it does not feel good because i am trying to survive and it is a system that very much wants to destroy me, but for my heart's sake: i suck at capitalism and it is still a good thing.
Pros&cons: real fabrics
> Professionalism
> It'll look more authentic
> I can try real techniques
> expensive
Pros&cons fake fabric:
> I have the stuff right here today
> I can use real fabrics for my v2 at lower risk
> I...really don't like the authentic pattern, I think it looks bad; but maybe it looks better in wool? Or maybe it just looks bad and I need to trust my eye?
rough draft of my ascii gemcomic https://gemini.yesterweb.org/proxy/cinni.cities.yesterweb.org/comic/chapter1.gmi :-x
…and on the theme of today’s tarot draw, Brave Sparrow by Avery Alder. Something between a solo offline ARG and a ritual:
Taking stuff that changes your neurology is so freakin weird, like you can suddenly feel this extra capacity which previously you had to be fiercely protective of; but you have none of the habits to make use of it. It's like...maybe...maybe I don't have to spent the whole day on twitter? Maybe I could...leave bed? and you suddenly feel like a dormouse awakening in the springtime, anxious about the light outside your leaf-pile.
Fencraft is a mix of animism, traditional witchcraft, historic paganism, and folk horror. My favourite tree is the hornbeam.