Sans Seraph

Tag: travel

  • You are (not) free

    I was born to deeply religious, conservative parents in a deeply conservative part of the country. I was raised to believe in the supremacy of the United States, that we were on the right side of history, that we were “the good guys.” At some point in my life, I even wanted to join the military, to serve my country, and to participate in whatever way I could in the great American experiment.

    Today is the Fourth of July, a day that used to be my favorite holiday. Each year in rural Montana we would go into town to watch the parade and spend time at the local faire in the park. This small town was the epitome of life when “America was great.” This was the kind of life that people had in mind when the wave of conservative thought rot swept the country. A place where you knew your neighbor, where you lived in harmony with the land, and where the great Big Sky that the state of Montana is known for opened wide to greet you.

    It was a town with such accolades as “the place FDR visited once,” and one of the few places Max Brooks in his book World War Z said would survive the zombie hordes. A place where if you were white and male, you enjoyed the pinnacle of existence, as long as you had a job; at the mill, or the mine, or worked for the Forest Service.

    Well, the mill closed ages ago, and the mine is, well, a mine. Many forestry jobs were lost when the government gutted the Forest Service, selling out the land that some many people, who voted vehemently for this administration, love and cherish. The nearest hospital is the next town over, and will probably close with the recent cuts to healthcare. Most of the people in the town are aged, and will almost certainly now suffer a higher mortality rate due to lack of accessible healthcare.

    Corporate interests will move in on the newly purchased land. Maybe enough labor jobs in logging and resource gathering will spring up to keep what few young people remain interested as the trees on the mountains thin, and the fish die out. Maybe, finally, after the mountains are run through with shafts and tunnels, and the Earth herself tries to shake us off her skin like biting fleas, will the people realize what they have done.

    When I planned out this post, I had intended to write about how today, as we celebrate the independence of our country from tyranny, that I, a trans woman, am less free that I have ever been before. I, someone who at one point wanted to serve this country, who, for all intents and purposes, has done everything “right” in my life, am in a position where I am simply a political pawn for our corporate overlords. All of that is true, and, honestly, the working class hasn’t been free in this country since, well, ever. However my thoughts today return to my small hometown in northwestern Montana.

    The overwhelming majority of those that fell prey to the MAGA cult are people like my parents and former neighbors, who wanted so desperately to live out in the wilderness and enjoy the serenity of nature and the quite of only occasional social situations that they deliberately chose to live in what could be called economically and educationally depressed areas. It is the people in these places that will feel a sickness of the soul that will grind them down into weak things even as people like me are hunted and destroyed bodily.

    The passing of the Bulbous Bubo Betrayal has doomed the average American worker, both those that voted for this administration, and those that so viciously fought against it, to a fate worse than what potentially awaits me and other trans people. Though it has become clear that the ruling body of this country will stop at nothing until me and my ilk are rounded up and done away with, it is those that linger and will have to endure the epigenetic blight that will suffer the most. You see, I never thought I was free. I took up the mantle of womanhood knowing that I would have to fight for my rights, yet I did so willingly. It is those who are truly the most vulnerable, who were duped into thinking what they were doing was right, who believed the lie that they were not free who will suffer the most as their spirit decays.

    So today, it is as I prepare to celebrate not the birth of my country, but of my community, that I lament the fall of the noble redneck, hillbilly, and good ol’ boy. The farmer, the miner, and the rig worker. To all of those that have finally realized their betrayal, who now realize that the lines aren’t left and right, but us and them that I say “welcome to the party.” You were always allowed in. We love you, and it’s okay. Now, grab your torch and pitchfork, and let’s get to work.

  • Gay, in the park, with the garlic bread

    Yesterday was a dreary day, but also the second annual Gays Eating Garlic Bread in the Park at Meridian Playground here in Seattle. After the it went viral last year over 750 people RSVP’d to the event, which was, of course, BYOGB.

    My girlfriend and I, being gays ourselves, thought that it was too good of an opportunity to miss, and so I hastily made two loaves of garlic bread, poured some store-bought marinara into a container, and headed out into the gloom and weather to “try to meet some people.”

    The event was nice. There were gays, there was garlic bread. People set up little canopies to get out of the weather. The host had organized some games and there was tale of a showing of a movie after dark. None of that is what this post is about.

    This is about SOCIAL ANXIETY.

    You see, I had been looking forward to this event. I woke up at 5 A.M., giddy as a school girl, ready to go and meet people. That has been my goal recently. I love my friends, but a lot of them live a few hours away. Also, being 30/40 somethings, we have our own lives now. All of this is well and good, but since starting transition I have felt this need to be social in a way I have never experienced before.

    You see, I am different now, and there are a lot of things I’m trying to figure out, or just straight up change about myself. One of those things (and perhaps the highest on the list beside the whole “I’m a girl now” bit) is dealing with my misanthropy and social anxiety. I have always known that my anxiety is a major thing holding me back in life, and now I have the will to do something about it, but I keep missing the mark.

    I’ve tried therapy, and will almost certainly try it again, but, as one therapist told me “I think this is something we try to manage, rather than get over, at this point.” Now, I’m not one for backing down from a fight, so I’ve started to take matters into my own hands.

    So, as my girlfriend and I drove to the event, dodging rain like shrapnel on the freeway, I was feeling pretty confident. I had a pop up canopy. I was going to be a hero. I would take in these soggy queers under my vinyl shelter, and through an act of service they would see I was useful and adopt me as one of their own.

    Delusion, it seems, is not something I am immune to.

    Of course, we arrive at the event, and the rain has stopped. No big deal, but, it also seemed like everyone was okay despite the deluge. The park had a pavilion most had gathered under, and others had brought their own deployable shelters. So, feeling awkward and no longer useful my girlfriend and I set up our shelter and two chairs in an out of the way spot, and ate some of our (now cold) garlic bread. A few people wandered by and we exchanged bread, but I was absolutely paralyzed to do anything other than cling to my girlfriend and our flimsy rain aegis.

    Around an hour in and my two very close friends arrived, one of which is one of the most social people I know. He even tried to get me to go with him and make some rounds passing out the garlic bread, but at that point my fate was sealed. That’s not something I can do.

    You see, almost all of the people I’ve ever become close to have been brought into my gravity well through some sort of project. I have tied my whole identity up with being useful and helpful, so I really don’t see the point in being social for sociability’s sake. There is not a world I can imagine where someone would want me to bother them, or, as I like to say, “inflict my personality upon them,” that is beyond the scope of a common goal.

    I am a useful person. I have a lot of practical skills. I have a lot of gear. I am frequently the most prepared person in the room. I have plans. However if you take that away, I am nothing more than an NPC. Just a grumpy, judgmental bitch, who hides behind said grumpiness until the next situation arises where I can prove my worth. There’s a problem? Oh, I can solve it! Didn’t I do a good job? See, I’m useful, don’t abandon me! Woof.

    Where this leaves me in regard to getting over this I don’t know, but I do know I have no intention of stopping. I think, for now, the plan has to shift to doing something with strangers where there is a clear goal or activity. My beautiful partner and I both love to rollerblade, so we’ve planned to go to the local rink and do that. We also enjoy bar trivia, and have plans to do that as well. Then there is trying to find a local DnD group.

    Things like that, while very “in my lane” feel like they aren’t helping me get over the problem. I guess what bothers me is that I feel like I have to get out of my lane and see where I fit. The trench of my comfort zone is immense however, but perhaps it is far wiser to slowly purge the ballast tanks and rise, rather then blow them all at once.

    For now, I suppose it is sufficient to just keep swimming.