Month: September 2021

When I was 7 years old if you cornered me and forced me to answer the question who was my best friend, assuming I answered at all, I would tell you Optimus Prime. I had a Power Master version of the popular toy so I knew he would always protect me. I would never give a human name.

I kept that same answer well into my teen years. My best friend growing up was a toy. My mom would have given you different answers. At 7 she might have said that kid Marvin. To her I went to his house and bonded every day. To me he was a gateway to a boat load of Gobots toys. I picked all my friends growing up solely on the toys they had. I wasn’t interested in the person, people didn’t register in my brain. I wanted their toys, video games or comic books.

As a teenager I started to get overwhelmed with hormones and lectures on being a true friend. I had a desire to make friends, but I kept falling into the same trap. My friends were people who had toys I wanted to play with. Israel was into breakdancing as was I so he became the first friend I had with a shared interest rather than object, but he also had a GameCube so there is that.

Then there were the dark times. By the time I was in my twenties my friends had learned what I was doing. They began to shun me. We’d hang out sometimes and they’d laugh about how weird I was. I was a form of entertainment for them. An oddity they kept around because it amused them.

A couple of years ago I looked back on my life and realized I never connected with any of the. Ask me their names I can answers you. Ask me any details about them and you’ll here which one had a Sega, an Xbox or a Playstation. Who had the iPod and who had a PSP. I can tell you the movies they had on their book shelf. I can tell you what car they drove. Which alcoholic beverage was their preferred poison. Ask me a personal detail like their favorite color, their mothers name, how many siblings they had, or even their birthday and I draw a blank. I don’t connect with people. I connect with things.

This is why I collect toys. I can relate to toys. They are oddities people put on a shelf and only bring out when it amuses them to do so. Toys are caricatures of people, sometimes represented by anthropomorphic animals or robots. That sums me up. But they are things. I relate to things. I don’t relate to people.

Earlier this year was the first time in 38 years of living I truly connected with another person. I can tell you few details about my sister Robin. I connected with her toys before I connected with her but she understood and kept working with me. I am growing because of her. I still have a ways to go though.

I used to day dream about winning the lottery then moving into a house in the woods on top of a mountain in Montana where I could live, alone, with my toys, comic books, video games, trading cards and other things. I didn’t ever imagine there would be other people there. I never fantasized about getting married. I day dreamed at what age would I introduce my kids if I ever had any to Nintendo. Would I give them a Sega first or let them pick between the two? Would I buy them Transformers or force them to try Gobots before moving on? Even when I tried to picture  a romantic partner I didn’t imagine what vacations would we take, what our wedding would be like or how we would raise the kids, it was all superficial things. Toys. How many pets would we have. Would we have a swimming pool. Would we have a wet bar and a pool table or a study?

Even now as I slowly begin to develop an intense relationship with a woman I am falling deeply in love with, I still struggle. I wish I could be better. I wish I could get closer to her, my sister or any of my other friends. I just don’t connect well with people. I connect with things.

The woman I love is not a thing to me. She is the first human, no offense Robin, that has broken through the barrier I placed over my heart. And let me tell you that was a solid 12 foot tall adamantium barrier. That’s how much she’s melted my heart. It might take me longer to get there than she wants but I am trying. I wish I new why I couldn’t connect with people. Why toys are more real to me than my own friends. But until then all I know is I am grateful I found at least one person who broke through to me. I also know why I have a hard time letting go of my toys. They aren’t things to me, they are my friends.

I tell people it started when I was 12 years old. My parents gave me a typewriter to keep me busy. I wasted so much paper writing down random “blog” posts, pretend news articles and of course short stories. At 12 I tried my had writing my first novel, Cyber Wars. It was a dystopian science fiction story about a war being waged with giant mechs but it was different than the others, it was corporate not political. Even at 12 years old I knew a corporation could take over the world easier than a hostile government.

The truth is my writing began much earlier than that. Even as far back as pre-school age I was crafting stories. I used to delight, and bewilder my close family with tales I would weave. Sometimes I’d write one down in a notebook once I developed the skill to do so. I was reading books in Kindergarten that were at 4th grade level. By the time I was in 5th grade I could read college level books. I never stopped reading back then. I read novels, textbooks, books on psychology, books on religion, sociology and more.

I got my first taste of writing for others while in 6th grade. We had a class newspaper and apparently my essay writing was good enough they gave me a column in the paper. It was amazing seeing my name in print. Sure it was a name I now disown but at the time I was happy to get that byline.

It wasn’t a very good article though. Just a weekly recap of what happened on the most recent episode of the Transformers cartoon. This was the Generation Two era so it was a sloppy cartoon. Nonetheless I was allowed to write six of those column and I was so proud of them. At 12 I was proudly boasting I am a published writer.

Okay I was loose with the word published but I stood by being a writer. I worked hard honing my craft over the next several years. From age 13 until about 27 I worked tirelessly on another novel, Nova Star, I also never finished. This was a fantasy novel that more or less ripped of my favorite D&D campaigns with a lot of borrowing from video game RPGs. Or stealing depending on how you look at it. The novel got about mid way written before I lost interest. The story didn’t resonate with me any more.

Oh I have tons of unfinished works of fiction lying around in digital files. Will they ever become finish works, maybe in time. I have one novel I have completed. It’s a horror/thriller about a man who loses his wife and devolves into a serial killer as a result. I borrowed heavily from my own traumatic experiences for inspiration, sprinkling some slasher movie elements and eventually finished it last summer. I stopped editing it because I began transitioning and realized the book I wrote was written by a transwoman who clearly hated men and wanted to hurt them. My story doesn’t work anymore so it needs tweaking.

IN high school I was given a chance to prove my writing chops once and for all. The assignment was simple enough, pretend you are facing death and write what your final thoughts would be before the lights go out. The teacher was so convinced my letter was a suicide not he turned it into the authorities. After an investigation showed I in fact was not suicidal he gave me an A+ on the assignment and the school district told him he was forbidden to repeat that assignment ever again. That was the most validating day in my childhood for my writing. If my essay was so convincing the police were concerned, I was a writer no bones about it.

By the time I finished, not completed mind you, my formal college education I knew being a writer was going to be a part of my future. Sure, I still had aspirations to be a film maker and do other things I haven’t entirely pursued properly, but I settled on writer.

Sure my first job in the news business was video editor, I was still given the task of writing headlines for the show and coming up teases. It wasn’t much but it allowed me to be creative and get my writing chops professionally. I used that experience to somehow talk my way into a staff writer position at a small town local community newspaper in North Central Texas. That first paper that came out I was so proud of it I was in tears. I couldn’t believe it here I was a full time, professional writer. It was also, at the time, the best paying job I had ever had.

It didn’t take long before my writing aspirations grew larger than that small town. So I moved up in the world to the daily newspaper. I made the most of my time there. I wrote articles for our flagship paper but also our side magazines, our weekly subsidiary papers and of course I kept my website going along side all of this.

Today I sit here looking back and I don’t need validation I am a writer. I don’t need to work for a company that lists writer as a part of my job title or even the job description. I know I am a writer because I write. Plain and simple. And I love it tremendously.

Evil begets evil. It’s a brief line uttered near the start of one of my favorite blockbuster science fiction flicks of all time, The Fifth Element. It’s such a fitting line that I am sure resonates with those around the world on the anniversary of tragedy that united a splintered country, even if only slightly. It’s a thought that sticks out in my mind as I reflect on how that frightful day has shaped the events of the past twenty years following it.

Everyone has their story of where they were when they heard the news of the attacks. I was sitting on my moms desktop computer chatting MSN Messenger with my grandma. I don’t have a clue what we were discussing I just remember the message that tipped me off she said “TURN ON THE TV WE’RE BEING BOMBED” and so I did. I watched the news for a few minutes. The first plane had already struck the tower and the chaos had already begun. I watched for a few minutes until I saw the footage of the second plane hitting the other tower. I heard them repeat the phrase possible terrorist attack repeatedly. I immediately ran to awake my mom screaming get up we’re under attack!

She also ran to the living room. Within a few minutes she scolded me for waking her up. “It was just a plane crash” she said. I said no they said it was a hijacking. Moments later we saw the footage of the Pentagon and learned of the third plane. It was no longer a doubt in our minds. Suddenly the President came on TV and called it a terrorist attack. Suddenly it felt real. We knew instantly our country was at war.

I wish I could tell you what I learned from that day. Looking back on it the first thing I remember was learning how quickly everything fell apart. Then the entire country stood still as news of Flight 93 began to roll in. The first brave Americans willing to sacrifice their lives to prevent further destruction etched their names into the hearts of every single American that day.

What can I write that hasn’t already been said? Is it even possible to write about that day without getting hyperbolic? I know it absolutely was true, for the next few days we were ALL united as Americans for the first time in my entire life. It was a surreal moment where we didn’t hate each other, we saved it for those responsible.

What I remember is that was the only day I ever saw my dad cry with my own eyes. He didn’t even cry at his mothers funeral. I didn’t even hold back my own tears. I didn’t feel shame or less manly. I knew in that instant it was okay. We all did. We cried together as a country knowing this single act of terrorism changed the world, forever.

I remember watching as then New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani comforted us. I remember how we put aside our differences and let President George W. Bush lead our country over the next few days. It wasn’t until a few years later when we got drawn into the Iraq war that we’d start to lose faith in his presidency. In the days following 9-11 he was OUR president and looking back, he was there when we needed him those early days.

We all know mistakes were made following the attacks. We let our xenophobia, manifested as Islamophobia,  take over our hearts. The phrases “War on Terror”, “Global Terror Network”, “Islamic Extremists” “National Security” and “Never Forget” entered our public consciousness. We handed over our privacy, willingly mind you, as our government passed the USA PATRIOT ACT. At the time, even the most liberal minded of us were willing to trade off a little freedom for some sense of security.

Even as we used the residual anger left over from those attacks, and that proclaimed War on Terror to move our military into Iraq, in those early days we just went along with it out of fear. We overreacted. We became the very evil we set out to destroy.

Before 9/11 if the U.S. military wanted to fly an air craft into a sovereign state, drop satellite and laser guided missiles on an apparent military target, we went through the United Nations or NATO. Post 9/11 we began flying our newly invented terror devices, automated drones, into wherever the hell we wanted. We declared it a GLOBAL war on terror, we had no boundaries. The rest of the world collectively got out of our way and let our military walk all over the planet taking whatever we demanded in the name of “Never Forget.”

We chanted that phrase as we systematically stripped Muslim and other Middle Eastern people of their God-given rights. We turned a blind eye as our country began abusing its power as we set up an internment camp in Cuba were we could incarcerate whomever we identified as a terrorist suspect, no questions asked. We even went so far as to demonize Edward Snowden, the man who opened our eyes to the NSA’s overreach under the guise of the PATRIOT ACT. We didn’t care, we chanted “NEVER FORGET” as we condemned him to death without even giving him a trial. When we captured Chelsea Manning we decided we’d persecute her in his place. We didn’t care we just chanted “NEVER FORGET.”

What began as a reminder that our country was not about to let the events of that fateful day go has turned into a reminder that we absolutely will never forget that day. We also will never forget the atrocities it has led to. Nor will we forget the personal liberties we sacrificed in the name of National Security. It’s easy to forget that we didn’t even have an NSA before 9/11. It was commissioned in the aftermath of that day as a reminder we weren’t about to let that shit ever happen again. We demanded blood. We didn’t care how much or even who’s blood we spilled, and we spilled enough blood over the ensuing years to fill both of those towers to the brim with it.

I will never forget where I was that day. I will never forget how it united us for a few days. I will never forget the freedoms I lost and today don’t even miss because they’ve been gone too long. I can remember a world pre-9/11 and a world that came after. The very fact our most popular video game, to this day, is one where U.S. soldiers continue fighting that War on Terror is a reminder how that chant, “Never Forget” has permeated every aspect of American culture.

As we reflect on the 20th anniversary of one of the darkest days in U.S. history there is one thing we can’t say today, 20 years later and that war is still raging. Our current president made a sacrifice. He gave up political capital to finally end the war that began moments before 9 a.m. eastern time in New York City on September 11, 2001.

As we look back at the events that unfolded over those last twenty years let me say it one last time as we move forward finally able to begin healing, NEVER FORGET.

Whether you believe in magik, the Bible or some other higher power, faith has always been a big part of my life. I have been struggling with my faith for a long time. Today I made a decision. I am walking away from Christianity to devote myself to my witchcraft.

I have not decided which path I will walk. I know I am no longer going to reference the Bible. I am not going to pray as I have my whole life. I am not going to observe the Christian holidays or adhere to the new testament teachers that have left me scarred my entire life.

I am going to pursue a path of nature magik. I am considering devoting myself to studying nature magik. I don’t know if I will go the Wicca route or pagan route, or find a different path. What I do know is I have to cut ties with a religious order that has caused me too much pain.

I do not believe I am turning my back on God. I will still keep him in my heart. I just won’t follow his followers teachings any more. I won’t wear his name as a badge tying me to a cultural practice I don’t feel connected with any longer. I am a witch. I cannot wear Christian as a title any more. It is no longer an accurate adjective to describe myself.

As hard of a decision as this was to arrive, I know now in my heart it is the best one for me at this time. I tried to walk the middle path, claiming to be a Christian Witch. That felt like an oxymoron to me. I now shall revert to my original state of witch. It is the path that I need to walk.

It was a long time getting here. I have a long ways to go to begin the healing process of shutting that religious order out of my life. I don’t want to abandon my faith, but I don’t want to do anything that can get me mistaken for a Christian. I have always been a witch.

The first dog I ever had as a kid was a black mutt named Buster. I honestly couldn’t tell you how old I was when I got him or how long we had him. I do remember having him when we lived in Miltonvale the first time around. That was before Kindergarten. It was around the time we moved from there to the next town we had to give that dog to my uncle Walt. I was heartbroken he wasn’t going to be *my* dog anymore.

After Buster I didn’t get another dog that was my own until I was 11. His name was originally Cookie but I changed it to Pete, after the neighbor on Goof Troop. I didn’t have him for very long before I ended up giving him to a girl up the street that needed him more than I did. He was part Poodle but not a very big dog.

Aside from family dogs my sisters and I all shared, or little lap dogs my mom became attached to over the years, I wouldn’t get another dog of my own until I was 16. In fact he was a birthday present for me. It was a memorable birthday in 1999 so I may tell that story one of these days. It was a day that almost didn’t happen.

I remember when my parents brought Bear into my life. He was already about five or six years old so I kept the name he came with. Renaming a dog can be tricky after all.

Bear was a little black mutt that reminded me of Buster so much I almost felt it was him reincarnated. He used to run back around the yard and I would chase him. Then he would chase me after I caught him. Once he caught me he would lick my face until I fell to the ground. This was easily the first living thing that wasn’t blood I truly felt love in my heart towards.

My parents knew how important Bear was to me. They went out of their way to ensure we always had a place that would let us keep him. We had to give away the family dog for a move once and it broke my moms, and us kids hearts, to the point mom swore never again. She meant it too.

Bear was the cutest dog. He used to wave his whole butt with his tail when he got excited. He was a very passive dog. He never barked or growled at the neighbor kids. He did sometimes yell at me if I forgot to put food in his dish, but beyond that he was fairly well behaved. Sure he liked to run so much we had to keep a close eye on him or else he would dart off, but he stayed a big part of my life for a very long time. He was small enough he could sleep in my bed at my feet. But he was also large enough he was technically an outside dog.

Bear remained a part of my life through several milestones. He was there when I learned how to drive. When I got my first job. He was waiting for me when I returned home after that summer my sister and I ran away.  He was there when I went through my Carmen ordeal. He was there when I struggled to get my recording studio off the ground. He was even there through that time I almost signed up for the military because life was dragging me down.

I dragged that faithful, loyal “best friend” from Southern Idaho to Northern Nevada, back and forth between Idaho, Nevada and Kansas so may times he couldn’t possibly know where he was half the time. When we drove to Kansas from Twin Falls, Idaho, he rode in the front seat of my car the whole trip. I cried into my pillow deeply the day my parents moved back to Nevada, leaving me and my baby sister to fend for ourselves in our apartment we had together. Fortunately I sucked badly enough at life once my record studio crashed and burned, I lost my job and needed to return home he was waiting at my parents house when I arrived back home. He licked my face as he reminded me it was going to be okay.

I always told Bear I wanted him to live just long enough for me to get married. He waited trough Rose. He watched me suffering after Carmen. He even cheered me up after I swore off girls during what became a 11-year dry spell. Sadly he passed away in 2008.

It was the summer. I had moved up to Northern Idaho to live with my older sister, Stacy. I was trying to start my life over after another job loss. I came back home after only a couple weeks to discover he had passed on while I was gone.

Like a lot of people do when they lose a pet I didn’t mourn Bear long enough. I was so distraught over his passing I replaced him immediately with another, very similarly sized black dog. It wasn’t the same. Sure that dog was soft, cuddly and also slept in my bed, but I had her one summer and then had to give her away because of a move I chose to make this time. I didn’t even have that dog long enough to remember her name.

That was the last dog I ever owned. My heart knew I couldn’t replace Bear and I was a fool for trying. After that I swore never again. No more dogs. Bear meant too much to me. He was there through too many of the defining moments in my life. I owe it to his memory to remain faithful to that never again. It’s not that I am a cat person because I hate dogs. It’s because my heart can’t take going through that ever again. That doesn’t mean I love my cat Buddy any less. I just to this day I have dreams about Bear returning from the grave to give me one last hug.

When I was  a kid I didn’t have friends. I was the weird kid. I got called all the names including the Big forbidden R word. I had my toys, which I got picked on for bringing to school. Then I had books.

I read so many books in my childhood days I can’t even remember them all. There is one book that I enjoyed above many others, it was called Tuck Everlasting. Sure it wasn’t as life changing for me as say Bridge to Terabithia, or the Man Who Loved Clowns, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. Needless to say I was thrilled when I found out we were going to watch the movie in class. No not the gorgeous Disney film you are thinking of, an earlier version. This was 1994. This is the day that story died in my heart.

It was Brookeville, Kansas. I am fairly certain it was the early part of the Fall. I believe this because we were still having recess outside and there already were dead leaves fallen from trees all over the playground. This has always been my favorite time of the year.

We recently finished reading the book collectively as a class. It was my fifth grade of elementary education. I attended a 2-story, 4-classroom tiny school house. We had two fifth grade classes on the first floor and two 6th grade classes on the second floor. This was due to my family living in a trailer house on the outskirts of an RV park in the middle of the countryside of rural Kansas. That trailer park is long gone. That school house, a faded memory living on as a haunted house in my worst nightmares. We took a long buss ride to get to that school itself in the middle of nowhere.

I remember this day vividly. I was happily looking forward to watching the movie of Tuck Everlasting. The book brought strong emotions to my heart which I always enjoyed as a kid. It also stretched my imagination quite a bit which I also enjoyed. 

I brought a small red duffle bag with a handful of my favorite toys as I often did. As per usual I was sitting on the front steps of the tiny school house playing, alone, with my toys. I would casually glance over at the boys playing a game of tag silently hating them for being so mean to me. I would also casually peak longingly at the girls playing a game of four square on the concrete. Naturally I was wishing desperately I could be one of them. 

One of the boys did the cruelest thing you can do to a loner like me. He asked me to play tag with them. I was naive enough to think it was either the fall or because it was movie day the kids had a change of heart and were going to accept me into their little tribe, even if just for a game of tag.

They were playing in the field on the side of the school house, out of sight of the adults who were intent on observing that four square match like it was the Super Bowl. There was a tool shed next to the building. They told me the base was in the space between the school building and the tool shed. I walked into their trap unbeknownst to what was about to happen.

Once inside the leader of the pack drop kicked me and said “You’re base retard, kick the dummy for safety” and suddenly the game turned dark. One after another these kids would run out and pretend to be playing tag, in order to return to safety they would each rush over to my tiny body that had already fallen to its knees sobbing wildly crying for help as they claimed safety one cruel kick after another.

My eyes blurred with tears I desperately looked around for anything to fight back. I saw there was a crack in the wall next to me. I stuck my foot in the wall ad began pushing back with my leg. I climbed over the top of the tool shed, on to the roof of that school house, over the top of the building to the open window on the far side of the building and climbed to safety of the principals office. Or so I thought.

The secretary thought I was playing Monkey climbing the roof like that. Even though my face was red and soaked in tears from crying so much she grabbed me, angrily, by the collar and demanded I explain myself. I said the boys were beating me up and I had to climb on top the tool shed to escape. I…said…huff…it…huff…like…sob…this, because I was exhausted from my desperate escape from a traumatic experience.

She called me a liar. Forcefully dragged me outside to see the boys in the field happily playing a game of touch football. She asked teacher looking over recess what happened. She said they’ve been over there playing football this whole time.

As punishment for my “lies” and for my “absurd” behavior. I was given a weeks detention along with 2 days of In School Suspension. Their favorite punishment was to stick me at a single desk alone in the library where I had to read books. Normally, even when I was being disciplined for merely surviving their assaults today was the worst. Not only was it the worst beating of my life, here I was being attacked by the one adult I thought I could trust. That betrayal stuck with me. But the worst part was they robbed me that day. I had to miss the movie. I lay my head down in my arms, using my bookbag as a pillow and I cried the entire day. I was only 11 years old. I was robbed of the joy that day, the excitement of watching a live action adaptation of a beloved book of mine. I was robbed of something else that day, my memory of the book.

To this day I refuse to watch any movie based on that book. I scrubbed it from my memory. I can’t tell you any detail from that book I once loved. I swore I would never read that damn book again. Those sons of bitches robbed me of a childhood memory I actually cared about. That was also the last time I let them get away with that.

From that day forward I preemptively fought back. I decided if I was just going to get punished anyways even for defending myself I would get it out of the way by beating them up. I started that day with the leader of the pack. I ran into the room in a fit of rage, picked up the largest textbook I could find and began smashing it into the back of his head. This assuredly earned a phone call from my parents. Thankfully my parents knew better.

My dad grabbed the woman by the collar and said she should have believed my story. He demanded I was released from detention and they pay closer attention to me during recess. This naturally resulted in the school taking recess away from me. I was from that day forward required to spend recess in the library under strict supervision. Fortunately it was 1994. We had just gotten a computer so the librarian, unwilling to sacrifice her free period to babysit, gave me free access to that computer.

I will never forgive those kids for what they did to me that day. I forgave them for the deception and the violence long ago. I forgave them for inadvertently cursing me with being granted the perfect recess. But I will never forgive them for robbing me of a beloved book that remains so traumatizing I erased it from my memory. As for the adults I trusted to take care of me, they can rot in hell for all I care. There is no forgiveness for them. They failed to keep me safe. I was 11 years old.

I had no friends. I was dirty and poor. They mistreated me because my mom was a waitress. My dad a grunt at a factory. Not important like that kids dad who was a cop. That aside, I wish I could forget that day, re-read a book I once loved and get my memory back they robbed from me. But I would rather bury it in the past and move on than risk opening up the scar that day left upon my fragile heart that cold fall day in 1994. 

Denouncing ones faith is a major step. In a way it’s openly defying everything you believed in that got you to where you are. If you lose faith what are you left with? Hopelessness? I know religion comes from a place of desire. We desire security, peace of mind, taming of the wilderness. In a way it goes against the chaos that is the universe.

I haven’t spoken about chaos since I killed the retro witch character. I never stopped believing in chaos. But, what do I believe about God and the Bible these days? I was raised Christian, or was I? Let me explain.

From birth until about age 11 we had no religion in our house. Not formally at least. We had witchcraft and a level of skepticism caked into our lives. Mom and dad never talked about their beliefs. I knew mom had been Mormon as a child but knew nothing of what that word meant. I knew not what dad believed he was private. He worshiped the can of beer in his hand, and it’s countless brothers.

I used to ramble on and on about how I witnessed my dad become a changed man by giving his life to Jesus. That power he discovered I was drawn to that myself. I, like others in the family, was aware of spiritual stuff. I was deeply into witchcraft and felt it was perfectly fine at the time. I even delved into the taboo game of Dungeons and Dragons to satiate that thirst.

My dad kept a strong hold on me though. Once he converted to Christianity I was destined to follow suit. I had explored other religions. By that time I was 12 I had read all the different books on various mythologies. I was obsessed with spiritual stuff. The spirit world, the undead, vampires, werewolves and other creatures we sometimes think of as monsters. This obviously bled into, and fueled, my love of horror. But when did it end or rather, where am I now?

My faith has been shaken. I still believe in God. I don’t follow, no I flat reject what is masquerading around as his church doing atrocities in his name. Yet I still feel compelled to attend mass every Sunday at the local episcopal church. Why them? It’s the gay friendly church but also most similar to what I found in Catholicism. But since coming out trans I have struggled with that.

The bible says you cannot serve two masters. But if the church abuses me and the God it worships loves me, what am I to do? Change everything about who I am to conform to someone else’s interpretation of what his image is? OR abandon my belief system entirely for something else?

Do I give into the darkness that calls to me? That is the question. I follow chaos because order is unnatural. Even the Bible, God is a god of destruction, wrath and disorder. His old testament is filled with legends on par with those dead religions reduced to mythology in modern society. Then what am I left with? A New Testament where one teacher says love and unity, another spreads had and prejudice and yet Christians try to reconcile the contradictory beliefs as God’s ways are not our ways. Maybe true but if God is a spirit, a formless light as we are taught, is he more than an idea? I don’t know. Not anymore.

If my faith burns out but I hold onto my belief that he still loves me is it hypocritical to turn to other options for that peace and comfort I sought after? What about the chaos? The bible makes no sense if you read it without being told how to do so. But it says within its own pages the reader let him understand. Then what?

If the Holy Spirit is the one guiding people do harm others then I want nothing to do with that. I doubt it is the case so I ask was I deceive before or now? Was it a false spirit that led me all those years or is it now so?

My heart aches. My head hurts. My soul grows tired. When I gave into being a witch I had some clarity. I knew I could summon the strength from within myself and overcome obstacles. It is a different sense of power. Take control, or surrender it.

I have lived my entire life under someone else’s control. I desperately try to find my own way. I live in the dark. I thrive in chaos. I desire disorder because I want peace but peace is a lie. It is a falsehood we invented to cope with the world around us. What gives you peace? I want that.

This sounds like I am rambling but I am wrestling with an idea. Do I denounce my faith? Walk away from the Christian ideology entirely? Or do I find a way to reconcile my connection to the chaotic dark forces. Why do we consider the darkness to be evil? The sun lights up the dark space around it but it sits in darkness itself. I am confused and alone. But I am seeking something new. Something different.

I don’t know if I will ever abandon my faith. I do know the church has left me behind. I think I want to summon a dark demon and unleash chaos upon the world. Maybe that is the answer. Stop trying so hard to find answers and accept the world isn’t supposed to make sense because it is chaos. That wasn’t a question. That was my clarity. I don’t feel peace. I feel drawn to chaos. I want that. Let me have that.

I am a transgender, queer, biromantic, probably asexual lesbian woman. That’s how I identify these days. I might tack on a new adjective or two, merge a couple as my understanding evolves but at this point in time that is me. I sum myself up in a haste as queer, trans or when talking to cishets LGBTQ+. Finding the right words is a rite of passage for everyone in our collective community. But that’s the trick, finding the right words.

Gay. It’s the cornerstone of it all. It used to be called just the Gay community, everyone else was lumped in together or left out in the cold. Depending on who you ask, it wasn’t better but some say it was more efficient. I have trouble with gay. I talked about how much I prefer queer here. Let me explain.

I am a lesbian. There are no bones about it. I am a woman. I am holding on to the T because it’s a part of who I am but there are days I drop it and just say female. Woman. Girl. Lady. Goddess. Then there are days I sweep it all under the rug and hide in shame. I think we all had those days. They’re not our best days. 

Gay doesn’t work for me because it undermines my being a woman. It gives power to the bigots who take away my womanhood and strip me down to a gay man playing woman. I know gay men who refer to one another as girl, use male pronouns, embrace their manhood while exploring femininity. That is not me. I  was a woman born into the wrong body, but I was also born a lesbian. I thought I was into guys but honestly, the truth is the idea of touching a dude makes me gag. It just does. But the idea of making love, whatever that looks like, with a transwoman even one with a penis, excites me. 

I know gay can also mean happy. Queer can also mean strange. Words have meaning and we have to accept the given meanings even when we try to find ways around them. I say I am probably asexual because even though I say lesbian and biromantic, I know I am into girls first, but sex is, not a priority for me. I haven’t even masturbated in months, so long in fact I forgot when was the last time. I don’t miss it. That was definitely driven by the male organ. That’s over now.

I am gay in the truest sense. I am a member of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trangender, Queer, Intersex, Asexual, Pansexual plus community. Gay is shorthand for homosexual. Yes as a woman I am attracted to other women, even transwomen. Right now I am deeply crushing on a transwoman who has expressed similar interest in me. I hope there is something there, I truly do because she’s absolutely amazing and right now I value our friendship above all others. 

Therein lies the issue. I used to identify as bisexual because I liked cis women and transwomen. I fell into the trap of trying to separate trans from cis. Once it clicked in my mind I was just a woman, as are my fellow transfemmes who identify as such, that’s when I realized I needed a new word.

I chose biromantic because I am either demisexual or asexual. I can’t get arouse without feeling like I belong first. I’ve been hurt one to damn many times to give anything, including my heart to just anyone. I’ve made that mistake too many times. Never again. I deeply adore the woman I am chasing, so much so I light up whenever I see her icon on Twitter interacting with our community. But I am not rushing into anything. I am not going to just give my heart, or body, to anyone just because their nice to me. I learned that the hard way.

Maybe, maybe I am just bisexual but deserve respect? I don’t know I don’t have a sex drive to be honest. I fantasize sitting on the couch, watching a movie with my partner with boring old microwave popcorn and chilling. That’s my ideal relationship. The breeders can have the sex. The gays, pans, lesbians who are into that can have the sex. I don’t feel the need, the pressing desire. I never did. I was happy to be rid of my sexual desires.

That’s why I don’t want  to be identified with a word that is tied to sexuality. I want to be identified with a word tied to my gender. Because sex is not for me. Being a woman is all I want. Find another woman who shares that ideal would be amazing. But should I walk alone, single and untouched forever, so be it I am fine with that. Don’t call me gay. I am trans. I am queer. I might be asexual. But I am not full gay in the way you think of it. And yet, I am. Just let me pick my words. I’ve had enough of the wrong ones slapped on me all my life.