Quarterlife Queer

I start and stop books constantly. I start and stop movies constantly..projects..hobbies..this blog. CONSTANTLY.

Sometimes it’s because I can’t keep the motivation I have in the beginning and others it’s because I just get too busy.

I sometimes suffer from a failure to launch out of fear or misplaced intentions.

But, I’ve come to realize that what I’m striving for and failing at is perfection.

I pick up a book or movie and want it to be the best thing ever..earth shattering..world changing..the book or film that I will look back and credit with changing my life for the better..then when it is not it is swiftly cast off into the pile with the rest of them. I pick up hobbies because I think I would be interested in them the way someone else is..because they seem like the thing to do to be the person I want to be..then if I am not the best at that hobby or it’s not the most entertaining/creative/constructive thing in the entire world I just let it fall to the back of my mind.

At 26 I think I am finally able to ACCEPT that I can never be perfect and BELIEVE that nobody is perfect..or..nobody can be perfect. It won’t and can’t happen. (With that said I still feel incredibly nauseous at this fact that I can never be perfect no matter how hard I work..because I work REALLY hard)

Today I looked over at my book shelf of half read books and thought to myself… “I wish I could just read those books”…like I look at myself in the mirror and think “I wish I could just be this girl”…or I look at my life and wish I could just live this life with it’s inperfections.. I wish I could just let my life be based on allowing myself to learn lessons as I go instead of tediously molding myself into the person I want to be..or others want me to be.

I want to stop striving for perfection and start striving to be free.

I want my list of ideas of who I want to become be based on the values I hold dear to me and not measured in how close I can get to a list of attributes I don’t even know fit me.

I want the freedom to change like the wind..to try out new things without the pressure of being the best..to meet new people and enjoy their wisdom as visitors and not conductors of my life..learn new ideas..have uncensored real life experiences without pretext of perfection.

I want to live life as a journey and not a destination…stop believing that life starts when I reach some goal that has too many variables to predict and start believing that this right now is life.

There will never be a better time than now.

Time flies when you are having fun.

Life changes faster than a blog can keep up with.

So quickly..I’m still Quarterlife…still Queer..still raw and fierce and angry.

This blog isn’t dead..just napping..stay tuned for what’s about to happen.

Till then….have a quickie on me 😉

For those of you tuned in to the identity politics and school of thought debate around Butch Voices and it’s board..this is what this entry is about.. if you are not then you’ll have to google it because I don’t feel like linking to everything that is out there (sorry..you can still follow along here I promise)

I just have a few thoughts on the identity politics, Butch vs Masculine of Center, gender policing, and the counter productivity of bitching and moaning.

The bottom line to all of this conversation and the reason for the initial split between Butch Voices and Butch Nation is that identity in ANY form is self selected AND that to honor that we should use those identities that people use for them self, however they use them, and not put up resistance to their truth. If this means that in order to represent all of the people you want to represent in a mission statement you have to have two extra sheets of paper to call the names of everyone’s identity..then do it. And when someone comes up to you and says that their identity is not listed just add it. Simple. But there are some other underlining issues that I feel get lost in the debates below:

1. How I Identify:  I never have and will never identify as Butch..not because I think Butch is a “bad word” or I am scared of what comes with taking on that identity..it just doesn’t fit me. I have seen no definition of Butch that has fit who I am..how I carry myself..how I live my life. I will never follow “butch rules” or “butch code” and my voice will never match my “butch exterior”. I will always and forever be a grrl/boi..all genders..genderqueer. I DO sometimes use MOC, just like I sometimes use queer, as an umbrella term. But for now..i’m just using genderqueer..all the squabling going on has totally turned me off for using anything else.
2. Umbrella terms: There are these umbrella terms that people like to use when there are too many individual things to list.. like saying “I have tools in my box” instead of saying “I have a hammer, a screwdriver and a wrench in my box”(not to say that identities are as simple as tools..that’s not true at all) ..we also use these umbrella terms when we talk about racial/ethnic identity.. Latin@ is a good example. We also use “Queer” as an umbrella term. INTERESTING how we pick and choose when umbrella terms are a good idea to simplify and bring together a community that has SOME similar traits but at other times call the use of umbrella terms “erasure”. I don’t know when it is appropriate to use an umbrella term or not..or if umbrella terms should be tossed out all together..But it is something to think about.
3. Language: The language that we use to define who we are varies by geography, education and economic  background and age. I’m from the midwest. As a 26 year old African American I have never heard anyone in my hometown, St. Louis, or my second home, Nashville, use the word butch who wasn’t white. I definitely never heard anyone call themselves Butch that was under 40. This word “butch” only existed in vocabulary as a adjective.. “You are so butch” or “You need to butch it up”..never as a self identified “I am Butch”..that was for old white lesbians with flannel shirts and buzz cuts or mullets… masculine presenting women of color under 40 = “Studs”. I’m sure I know some Studs that would think it an insult to be called “Butch”. So, sometimes we are all talking about the same identity with different words..which doesn’t make one better than the other..it just has different vocabulary.
4. Legacy: Let me start this section off by saying that I respect all the work that the people before me had to do to get me and my generation to this point. I appreciate all of the things that civil rights activists had to endure to allow me to live the life I live, I am grateful for all of the feminists that have done great things to allow me to love and respect this body, and I thank all of the queer people that had to go through hell for me to be out today. BUT.. i disagree with all of them at some point because none of them lived in 2011. Civil Rights activists called us “colored” and “negro”…I use African American. Is that disrespectful to their struggle? I hate Gloria Steinem and other feminists who view the entire world through a Caucasian lens.. Does that make me less of a feminist? I openly denounce the word Butch and the Butch Femme dichotomy.. does that mean I am disrespecting those that worked hard to allow people these days to embrace those terms? Are we as a people bound to the ideas of the people that first fought for them or should we be allowed to evolve into terms and ideas that fit our current condition?

In Lieu of the lessons I learned last week, I’m posting Ghandi’s Ten Fundamentals for Changing the World.. Ten things I need to remind myself of daily going forward 🙂

1. Change yourself. 

2. You are in control.

3. Forgive and let go.

4. Take care of this moment.

5. Without action you aren’t going anywhere.

6. Everyone is human.

7. See the good in people and help them.

8. Persist.

9. Be congruent, be authentic, be true to yourself.

10. Continue to grow and evolve.

Recently I realized that I am exactly half my mom’s age..which means twenty-six years ago my mom was a twenty-six year old with a baby and a babydaddy living far away from her family. At first I thought about all the ways our two 26 year old selves are different: One queer and one not, one with a masters and one with a high school diploma, one with a cat and one with a baby, one living in LA and one in Arizona…

But then I talked to her and she said something that made me realize all of our similarities. We were talking about now that all the little kids in our family were now big kids and my mom said something about needing a hobby, and then she said “There is nobody to take care of, I don’t know what to do, I guess I take care of myself now?”

At that moment, I saw myself in my mother and my mother in me. And it scared me.

Will I wake up one day after a lifetime of being a caregiver, devoting my life to make change, and spoiling everyone I know and have to ask myself what to do now?

Then I saw all of our similarities.. I saw two 26 year old women making the best of the life they have, two women taking chances, two women that moved across the country to start life, two women that care and love deeply and work hard.  Two women with the same laugh, that cook with lots of garlic, and know how to do a lot with a little.

My mother..my mirror.

I found my life and my mother’s life were more reflections of each other than I thought..In her I saw my future.

And it shook me.

After 6 months.

After moving to a city that isn’t the nicest to the unemployed.

After being blessed to have people that wanted to help me along.

After having an amazing opportunity to learn and use what I have. (and being more grateful for that opportunity than I could ever express)

After having to make the hardest decision yet in my adult life (I will throat chop the first person that says “well..your adult life hasn’t been very long”).

There is a rainbow at the end of this storm..and a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

And I’ve found it. 🙂

More on that..a little later.

Till then..when you think of me..celebrate.

My Lessons from the last week include:

1. There are people that know exactly how I feel about important things in my life..people I’m just getting to know who just GET IT!
2. The universe will continue to test and bless at the same time..over and over..I just have to believe that there is an award at that end.
3. “When you feel crazy it’s because buried deep inside you know what you want to do, you are just fighting against it.” ( I heard this on some web series I was watching last week..and it struck me..it hit me close because I often find myself saying ” I don’t know what I’m doing” but in reality..I almost always do.)
4. The food at “The Boiling Crab” has crack in it..
5. I LOVE our house and that it is the place for gatherings. Give me that QWTOC community space!!
6. People don’t treat you the way you treat them.. they treat you the way they know how to treat you based on what works in their life and their experiences. ( This is a tough one.. learning that people don’t just mirror your actions/attention/affection/intention…I’m learning this very slowly)
7. I don’t know what “Swagu” is.. but i’m dripping it!

Let’s talk for a second about a chronic illness I have.. it’s called an unbalanced life.

My symptoms include  living in a bubble of serious, extreme frustration with life, lack of fun, chronic complaining, over analysis of every thing, extreme calendering, the inability to not plan things out leading to extreme aversion of plans from being overwhelmed, sailor mouth (ok..that might just be me),  debbie downer-ism even when I don’t feel down…and the list goes on.

This chronic disease has followed me around since birth. I was the child that sat on the front steps contemplating life and watching the other kids play. I was the teen who hung out with mostly people in their twenties and the young adult that didn’t spend my 21st birthday at the bar (ugh..that story is really messed up though so we won’t go down that road).

I simply can’t seem to figure out how to do it all.. and by all I mean how to work hard and be focused, be good to myself, have a great relationship, and have a kick ass social life. I can get two or three of the four down at a time..but NEVER all of them.  I usually put the ones I can’t fit onto my plate away and forget about them until I can’t bare life any more and then realize “Oh, no wonder I am burned out and sad..I’m not taking care of myself or having a social life”..

You are reading this and shaking your head..you have the urge to comment to this blog that life is all just one big balancing act and that with time and age I’ll learn..right? Or you are rolling your eyes and saying get over it..just do it..right?

Yeah, that has been my response too..for years. For years when I was getting straight A’s and falling in love but forgetting to sleep or eat food that didn’t contain 100% sugar and caffeine.. or years where I was missing classes to make it to work and wracking up debt because I refused to live without a new outfit every week (ah..to be 21 with a Gap card again)..Flash and burn relationships?? I did that… Dropping out of all my friends lives suddenly and then popping back up 3 months later..Did that! Taking 18 hours my last semester when I only needed 12 just because..Owned that! Worked 12 hours a day for a week AND did grad work AND held down a long distance relationship with a princess AND coordinated a move across the country AND had panic attacks while driving..CREATED THAT!!

So when does that wisdom with experience and age start to play? I’m 26 yeah sure.. but I have goals and ambitions and I live in a city where there is something to do every damn night.. I’m missing out on life on all levels because I keep getting stuck having to back track to run down that part of my life I dropped back there and starting over.

When do we fast forward to the part where I’m all being FIERCE, smart, and ambitious all day in my Dapper Boi outfits..then jetting off for a fab 5k..and getting drinks with a bunch of amazing other young people that also have this fab life..and then leaving to have a romantic dinner… and when do my weekends get filled with wild inappropriate behavior at parties that I will later have to explain in my later political life..and weekends away for cute cuddling and raunchy sexiness???

Oh.. what is that you say?? I can’t have it all right away? I have to work hard on each thing and build toward all of that amazingness? I’m only 26 no matter how old I feel?

Fine. FINE! I’ll just take my time and work it out..

7 Lessons from the second half of my week.. yay for self/life/world discovery 🙂

1. I’m inspired by lots.. and when I sit back and be still..I find more things to get inspired by everyday.
2. Pain really  messes with your mental and emotional stability (I will go completely nuts if I can’t just go for a walk without feeling like death in the next week 😦 )
3. Most of the time I have the mind and wisdom of a 80 year old…but sometimes I slip to 26 (or 16 and that ish is not always pretty..good thing it’s very rare)
4. The smell of privilege makes me nauseous. It smells like trust funds, luxury vehicles and entitlement. (This I learned while driving through USC)
5. There REALLY is something important about seeing real live people that look like you. (Thank god for trips to South LA)
6. There is such a thing as TOO sweet.
7. June gloom and this Southern-California-is-colder-than-the-rest-of-the-country-during-june BS was made by the Devil.