finding my words through elders

After years of struggling to accept my trans identity, I began the process.  I was 39, thought I had already established who I was in the world and was steadfast that transitioning didn't need to change that.  The fact was that I was scared.  Scared to become and lose the relationships that I built.  I needed something to hang on to, but I was already out to sea.  Drifting, swimming, and riding waves. I needed to know how to speak for myself, to find my words and not use the convenient language of social media.  This archive was my first sense of trans community.  I was alive while some of these were distributed and some originated not too far from where I grew up.  As a kid, I had no clue this world existed and it breaks my heart to think that there were people that could have understood me and role models that I could have seen myself in.

I chose blackout poetry because I did not know how else to begin.  I wanted to say something but I couldn't reach it.  I needed community.  I needed a vision.  I needed to imagine what my life could look like.  This project gave me elders.