Airpods ✔️
Phone charger ✔️
1 book that fits ✔️
One pad (precautionary) ✔️
Phone + Wallet ✔️
Travel Journal + Pen ✔️
I come to New York whenever I feel hungry. I relish my ability to sidestep, weaving a path through urgent crowds and annoyances. I need to fight, so I fight them. A sense of pride when I remember easily how to navigate the Subway. My first day of work in 2019, I got lost after mapping it out the night before, cried and spent 60 I didn’t have on an uber. My boss made fun of me when I arrived two hours late.
📍 Moynihan Station bathroom.
Slaves to time, vagina havers wait in line while the men breeze by, no wait in sight. My body feels it was built as a joke, like we were wired to be held back in lines, just for having the audacity to exist and need a piss. When I finally relieve myself, crossing to the exit I meet myself in the mirror as my baby queer phases flash before my eyes from my daily commute five years ago. My eyes are brighter now.
Ironically, the gender neutral restroom is locked. “Dial 1 800…”
David finds me first, crushing me into his signature hug that demands I drop my shoulders. He holds me for a long time even after I finally release.
Brunch, 2 mimosas and vape puffs later, we amble with friends to a good Uber spot. Central Park trees open their arms as if to say: “We can hide you in here. There is still life, you just need a little rain water.”
I think about running.
I say nothing, eyes hazy from both gratitude and the sadness I couldn’t leave behind on my train seat. Without warning, David pulls me to him again mid group convo, willing me to collapse. We rock back and forth as I wonder how he knew I was going to run.
📍 The Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Dandy Collection awes and inspires. Today, I’m documenting exhibit notes through my Iphone.
*tap*
“A dandy is defined as someone who studies above everything else to dress elegantly and fashionably.”
A trait in the past I viewed as vanity and foolish, thanks to cult indoctrination, I sigh with longing to be able to do the same. Elegance and fashion are not something that come naturally to a dysmorphic person.
“Black people have used clothing and fashion to transform their identities, proposing new ways of embodying politics and social possibilities.”
Possibilities…transformation. Transfiguration. Corn rows to mark paths to freedom. I’m late to the game on how fashion is spellwork, but again we are taking notes here:
*tap*
“—productive tension between being fashioned and fashioning the Self.”
Whoa. Productivity has always been a toxic love…tension feels never ending in my body and interactions. Seeing those two words paired together in such a pleasing way unlocked something in the back of my mind. "*click*
Ras Baraka’s words floated to the forefront as I heard them at a Beyonce concert:
I want to hear an American poem
Something American, you know
Some sassy shit or
South Carolina slave shouter
Alabama backwoods church shack call and response
Some southern sassy shit. I can do that. I am that! I know call and response. Productive tension…
As I walk, I discover a black trans man “Described as the perfect gentleman.”
Another,
“But maybe what is most curious about Storme, is what she is most curious about: the air of someone being someone slightly out of context, and most at home there.”
*tap*
Slightly out of context has been my life’s story: A “girl” who didn’t act ladylike, a homeschooler who was bullied for things like not being allowed to listen to popular music or celebrating Halloween, while somehow too sinful for “fraternizing with secular kids” in my church circles. Too thin with no hips to be considered womanly, 40 pounds of stress later too fat/childish in the face/gender confused to appeal to a broader audience. Pansexual/bi. A performer of ancient texts, but eyeballed for being covered in tats and too “alternative” clothing at rehearsals. Frumpy outfits to hide behind to meet dress code did not satisfy the church ladies I conducted who wanted a heavy makeup femme presentation, but skirts and dresses made me feel like I was being trapped from running all over again. I cannot wear one to this day without having a violent physical response. But we don’t talk about that. A child who embarrasses her mother regularly even if she will never admit it for not turning out “put together.”
At the same time, I am most at home out of context. If something about me doesn’t stand out or seem off putting at least a little, I am not myself. But I also adore being hidden. Productive tension? WTF actually. How do I balance this dichotomy?
My desire is to learn how to let my presence and clothes speak for themselves. Research complete, I leave the Met with more questions than answers, but I know questions lead me somewhere new and unknown. I’ll be okay with that knowledge today. I hug my friends goodbye, resting in the years of memories shared, all to come, and delighting in our brief windows of adventures.
On the train, I sit facing backwards to match my mood. Ruminating for several stops about the art I consumed today and the inner turmoil I’ve been carrying. Stepping off the Trenton line, I remind myself that if my life implodes as I am frightened it will, I will be ok.
But are you really gonna be okay? Or are you just used to having no other option? says the voice hiding in my skull.
Desperately wishing I had some of Michaela’s port from brunch to drown my fear, I try finding solace at the station as the sunset caresses my eyes and cheeks. Slow. Down.
Moving again, the rail passes the Delaware and I can see the street that enters my childhood neighborhood. My heart cracks open all over again. “Trenton makes, the world takes” is the sign on the bridge. The world does indeed take. And take again. In my seat, I will all the screams buried under my skin to evaporate as the track bears me away to repurpose, fashion and transform my possibilities once again.
Fin.
Housekeeping 🧹
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everything about this resonates 🥺❤️ - thank you for sharing
I did not have time to be reading Substack right now, but your writing! Had to read every word. Nice!