It’s My Life – Sights, Sounds & Rants

Books, It's My Life, Music, Ramblings, Travel

soul on my skin

August 21, 2020 No Comments

It’s been around five years since I plucked up the courage and got my first tattoo. I have a literal armful in the meantime and plans are in place and designs are decided for the other arm, because hey, I have two. I have had it relayed to me that someone (who apparently does not know me really well) was wondering what had gotten into me that I went and had those ink smudges done, and what is up with them anyway, as me and my tattoos don’t have anything in common. Which I find hilarious, as far as comments […]

It's My Life, Ramblings

interlude

August 2, 2020 No Comments

Interlude /ˈɪn.tə.luːd/ , noun: a short period when a situation or activity is different from what comes before and after it, according to the Cambridge Dictionary. The word popped up in my mind when I had but a vague feeling of what I wanted to say in this post. The feeling is still vague, so I expect it will be another stream of consciousness ramble with the sole merit of quieting my head for a bit, while I try to pour it all into pixels. The urge to write has been there, numerous times, but the act of firing up […]

It's My Life, Trans Soul Rebel

trans soul rebel (vii): the pronouns conundrum

November 3, 2019 No Comments

Pronouns are important. I get it. I just have a massive issue with them. When I think of myself, I think of myself in first person. I do not assign gender. That actually only ever comes into play when I am deliberately posing or trying to imagine myself. Otherwise, it is just “I”. Am I bothered by feminine pronouns? Not really… or rather, not by the words themselves, more by the reality they define. Even if I plucked up all my courage and came out to the world tomorrow, it’d feel silly asking everyone to change to male pronouns, when […]

It's My Life, Trans Soul Rebel

trans soul rebel (vi): the lion’s den

June 17, 2019 No Comments

So… I guess that even though I still have some doubts and even if not mandatory for transitioning, a visit to a therapist would still be in order, I have more or less found my identity. The question is, “now what?”. I can try to ignore the new-found name for the way I have been feeling all my life – for thirty seven years. I can go on as I have until now, I am not doing bad after all. No one ever needs to find out the truth behind my little quirks, I can pass as “normal” and cope […]

It's My Life, Trans Soul Rebel

trans soul rebel (v): nothing wrong with me

June 17, 2019 No Comments

As I said, the closest I had come to describing how I was feeling, was to my desk mate Anna in highschool: like there is a gay guy living inside of me. I still lacked the vocabulary to put a name to it and the knowledge to recognize that I am not really broken in any way. In all the (very often very complexed and serialized) fantasies I had, I found myself slipping into the role of the guy as often as not. Eventually, with high speed internet and a laptop that I could take in bed with me, and […]

It's My Life, Trans Soul Rebel

trans soul rebel (iv): dysphoria

June 16, 2019 No Comments

I can’t remeber ever liking my breasts. Or wanting them. When I was twelve or so, a girl from the neighborhood and me hid in the stairwell when no one would see me and she showed me her breasts and asked to see mine. She was anxious for hers to grow and showed me how she pulls on her nipples to make them grow faster. I couldn’t understand what the big deal was and shrugged it away. In highschool, I had a good friend who was almost flatchested. She kept buying padded bras and suffered terribly and kept telling me […]

It's My Life, Trans Soul Rebel

trans soul rebel (iii): just an oddity

June 14, 2019 No Comments

In the end, I don’t think anyone can say it comes as a surprise. In retrospect, a lot of things make sense, a lot of jarred images fall into place and make me go “a-ha! well, duh!”. As a kid, there were definitely instances when I said I wanted to be a boy. But the memories are too blurry to tell if I craved that on its own, or as a way to resist all the chains I felt being progressively looped around me on account of being a girl. Girls don’t run around. Girls don’t make a mess. Girls […]

It's My Life, Trans Soul Rebel

trans soul rebel (ii): the clothes

June 13, 2019 No Comments

In the time since I have figured what “might be wrong with me” (story for another chapter), I have occasionally dared to look for more information. Sometimes in passing, skimming through links, not really wanting to read the answers to my half formulated questions, sometimes with more determination. Since I have decided to allow myself to think that I am most likely trans (I have yet to speak it out loud), I have looked at various Q&As, checked if there are any local support groups, probed the sea with a finger for reactions and finally ordered some books. One of […]

It's My Life, Trans Soul Rebel

trans soul rebel (I): the toys

June 9, 2019 No Comments

I do not really know where to start. I know the old saying, “start at the beginning”, but that is easier said than done. What is the beginning? I cannot ever remember me as being anything else or feeling any different. Maybe I should start with the toys. My favorite toys were lego bricks, some plushies I loved dearly (a little horse called Johnny, a dog called Blondie whom I lost at a picnic once and a little lion whose mane I cut to make it grow back thicker – that is what they were telling me when taking me […]

It's My Life, Ramblings

pride (in the name of love)

July 30, 2018 No Comments

I am still trying to gather my thoughts and organize and sort through them. Like always, I stumble when it comes to the eternal egocentristic question “what does this mean for me?”. For some reason, the Christopher Street Day (the German version of the Pride Parades) takes place here in July. I have a feeling that it is also a lot more political, though it is certainly not lacking in color. Two years ago was the first time I had the occasion to witness the exuberant joy and cheer from the sidelines. Last year I sadly missed it, as it […]