I’m so tired! Today my friend Aylan and her son and I went to pick up Posey from her dog sitters, who is a ways away so it took a while. Also on the way we stopped at Six Nations to see our friend Terri. It was a good day, but a long day and me and my pup are sleepy. It was great seeing Posey again, she was excited, I was excited. She was wagging her tail and if I had a tail it would have been wagging too. We just love each other! I missed her so much! She was away since the beginning of October, so we had a month away from each other. A long time! I’m glad her sitter loves her so much and they have fun together.

I didn’t get my travel grant to go to London. Which sucks. But my Mom offered to pay for it since she just got an award and also we’d been wanting to go to London for a while anyway. So I guess we had a vacation. It still sucks not being supported for a travel grant because you really don’t know if you can afford it until you’re back and find out if you got the grant or not. BUT ALSO it concerns me because I have consistently gotten all the travel grants I’ve applied for for the last decade or so, and the only difference between then and now is that I’m trans and the grant was to travel with a film about being trans. And it was to a relatively prominent film festival too, so it sucks that I didn’t get it. Suspish.

My income has generally gone down a bit since I came out as trans, which is something I was worried would happen. I know so much of film industry stuff is being appealing to the masses, and marginalized people just aren’t as appealing according to a capitalist reading of audiences. So that’s frustrating. I’ve also posted on some social media in support of Free Palestine and ending the genocide and I know people are getting blacklisted around that. So that’s another concern. I’m honestly so relieved I chose not to go into academia, because of the silencing of scholars on these issues. And I feel like if I didn’t say anything I would feel like I wasn’t living up to my principles. BUT does it mean I will never get to make a feature film, and be confined to only doing a life of low budget short videos? I think it would rob the world of some great art, but also honestly probably some part of me feels like if I am punished for saying what I think is unjust, then that’s what happens. And if the world doesn’t want to fund my projects, then I’ll probably just keep making them and do sex work or something. Like, I know what it’s like to spend years doing DIY projects. And I know how to be poor. And I am not losing some job with benefits, I am just getting a slow trickle of money instead of what it was before I came out.

I was trying to encourage a friend to keep asking people out because she got rejected recently, but so did I this morning so it was kind of funny timing. I was telling her to try try again with someone new. And then I said something like “I’ve been rejected by so many amazing people!” Which is true the people I have asked out on more romantic dates this past year were all really amazing but not interested. So I guess at least I am picking amazing people. Not aligned yet I guess.

The strangest thing happened to me, I was talking about my last broken heart in the car with my friend today and after I was done telling them all about it, Snapchat sent me a friend suggestion and the friend was my ex. It was kind of eerie! I know it’s probably just listening or something creepy. But it always feels like “Is the Universe sending me a sign?” when really it probably just went through contacts and found someone with the same name as who I was telling the story about.

OR I DON’T KNOW maybe it is the Universe. They’ve been heavily on my mind and I’m just so tired and frustrated of myself and not being able to just move on. I feel like a failure in the art of letting go. And it seems like they’ve completely let go of me, they probably don’t even really remember me by now. And I’m just stuck with these reminders and haunted by these memories. And the sad thing is I really still wish it could work out some how, but I am so stuck and I can’t message them because they told me not to. Like I wish they had left it open so we could have talked a few months later, but NO they wanted no contact. Ever ever ever. So what am I supposed to do about that? Nothing, there’s nothing I can do and it’s the worst feeling. They could talk to me but not the other way around.

I also had an awkward session with my therapist recently around current events and I feel anxious about that now too. This world is getting so ugly and things are getting torn apart everywhere because of it. It really sucks.

I don’t know if things will get better. I wish they would but it looks pretty dire out there. I also think the refusal of the Canadian and American governments to listen to their citizens about issues like not sending arms to Israel has demonstrated pretty clearly that we don’t live in the democracies we are pretending we live in. Like the United States government listens to big money lobbyists more than their constituents, I think that’s a government run by capitalism more than democracy. And I don’t know what the fuck is wrong with Canada even tho I live here. We’re stuck with the Liberals and if we go Conservative it’s gonna get so shitty and fascist and I’ll probably lose my access to legal HRT. ARGH! And the NDP DID finally turn around and start asking for a ceasefire, but there was a long period where they went along with all the other parties in terms of the bombing of Gaza, which was really disheartening to me as a progressive. I really don’t know where a safe place is anymore. Fascism is rising all over the place, and based on my reading about what happened with the Nazis after the war, it makes sense. Most of them weren’t punished, most of them were welcomed to other countries all over the world. It just went more places. It is very disturbing.

And I was reading about the rise in hate crimes in Canada, and there’s some against Muslims, but a LOT against Jewish people. Like it definitely spiked. And that’s really scary and something I am trying to remember in all of this. I don’t want people to be unsafe because of what is happening. And also just the fact that I can never have a view of the world from all these different perspectives because I don’t have lived experiences in those communities. I can try to empathize. But I’m limited, and the fact that Meta decided Canadians can’t share news stories has meant I don’t see these events as easily unless I deliberately seek out news sources. Which I was just lazy about before and would read what friends shared on Facebook. But now I have like, a responsibility to actually keep on top of this stuff.

I read about the Hellfire Missiles today and saw a blurred video of a man with his legs chopped off in Gaza. Like it’s basically a missile with giant blades around it to chop people up. It’s disgusting, what kind of fucking monster would imagine something like that into existence? This genocide is bringing new horrors to the world every day. And yet we’re getting blacklisted for saying it’s wrong? Ugh fuck.

I am writing this from Canada, I got back here yesterday. On Saturday I went to Pride with Diego and it was fucking incredible. Over a million people marching for LGBTQ Human Rights, but also in solidarity with a lot of other movements like Free Palestine. And they were also super political because an election is coming up with a far right guy they don’t want. And while I was there they also told me a lot about the military dictatorship and I found out about a lot of trauma that happened around those times. And it was over in 1983 which really isn’t that long ago. Like I would have been five years old when it ended, totally unaware in Canada. But they did a really amazing job at preserving sites of remembrance of the terrible things that happened. I showed my films at a building on the same grounds as ESMA which is one of the bigger detention camps where a lot of torture happened. And murders. And they had a plane on the grounds that was one of the death planes where people were sedated and bound and thrown into the ocean or the river. And the plane ended up being sold to the US for a mail plane, and then it went on to be a plane for a skydiving business in Arizona. And then they tracked it down and brought it back to Argentina. It’s intense seeing stuff like that. Canada really does its best to sanitize it’s history. Like, I don’t know that we have a specific residential school as a site of memory. It feels like we should but people kept burning them down.

But anyway, I think I was trying to figure out why they connected with my work and then I thought about some of the newer stuff I’d shown there and how it talks about Indigenous trauma and historical trauma and stuff and I realized nêhiyaw people and Argentinian people are both traumatized people. So maybe that’s the connection.

I do notice that I feel more comfortable around people who have trauma in their history like that.

Anyway Pride was amazing and inspiring and I got to march with some trans people which was super cool. I also went to a trans art exhibit and the curators gave a bunch of us a tour. And then my last night in Buenos Aires I went into an Airbnb with a hot tub, and floated around in just a pair of swimming trunks for the first time. Only two other people were in the hot tub area, so it was a nice intro to being topless in public. Like a regular guy.

I went on Grindr in Buenos Aires and made plans with a guy who bailed, I think he just wanted to jerk off. So that was fine I guess lol awkward but then I didn’t feel like continuing to find a date there. I have a man interested in fooling around in Toronto, so that might happen which would be nice.

I got on this big plane and flew 10 hours to NYC and then in NYC I got delayed for three hours while they fixed something on the plane. And I had a screening last night of work I curated with KJ Edwards and it was like, totally nuts doing ALL the things before and in time for the screening. Like customs/baggage pickup/getting home/taking a bath. And also I had to pick up food but then my card stopped working, so I had to call and get someone’s credit card numbers for the customer service woman to get paid so I could leave. But it all worked out. And today I had a massage and then talked in a class and then just finally relaxed. I’m trying to conserve money so I am smoking roaches in a pipe until Friday when I can pick up weed someone grew for me. And trying to eat the things in my house already. I need to go buy coffee and toilet paper tomorrow tho.

Anyway my point is I’ve been go go go for a while and I’m glad I just get to relax more again. I have therapy tomorrow morning and that’s gonna be nice. I hope! I don’t know I might feel weird who knows. I thought I was gonna have to reschedule her next week but I think 40 minutes is enough time to get home. I have a talk at 1:30 so yeah it’s cutting it close, therapy usually ends at 12:50. But there’s a bus that goes from there to here and I think it’s pretty quick.

It’s so much work being me! I’m glad my work is picking up again though. My income took a hit when I couldn’t work while recovering from surgery. But I think it’s starting to come in again. I remember there was this nice moment when I decided to be a full time artist that I knew I just had to keep doing all these gigs that were offered to me and I could make a living at it. I mean also the big creative projects sustain me. But doing talks and events also brings in a lot of money. I was meaning to do a break down of my income and see what pays me what. But I haven’t.

I’ve been passing as a man pretty consistently these days. There was one guy who called me seniorita in Argentina, just some guy on the street, but mostly people treated me like a man. I’ve noticed people in queer spaces aren’t sure what to do with me tho. I think I read more transmasculine to people who know trans people. But I dunno. It’s like people are shy to flirt with me because they don’t know if I am a fag or a dyke. And that is a weird feeling, to know if people were less confused it might make more dates happen. I was thinking of getting a bisexual flag pin or something to look more open to different genders.

I’ve noticed straight women treat me different, which is interesting. Like, they are a bit more flirty/open to me than when I was presenting as a masculine woman. I haven’t gone on a date with a straight woman yet, but I’m nervous to and also I just have always liked bisexual women. But I should try being open to a straight woman, I don’t know what dating them is like. I did fall for a straight woman once and it was very confusing for me.

Anyway I am passing so well that I had a trans experience with TSA finally on the way back from Buenos Aires. I got a red square over my crotch in the sensor thingy and they did a pat down which was VERY INVASIVE. Very awkward. I don’t understand why someone missing a penis could be hiding something. Where am I hiding something? There’s nothing there! Like that is the anomaly is that there’s an absence, how is that suspicious!? And what about the smoothies?! I guess they are always suspicious?

Anyway ugh. I am doing my name change finally and I gotta do a gender change too on my birth certificate, but that’s not gonna stop the TSA pat down. I was literally standing there getting this pat down and thinking “Maybe I should do phalloplasty just so I don’t have to do this all the time now.” But I don’t want phalloplasty, it was just some desperate thought. Aw. I don’t know if packing would help either because that’s definitely a detachable thing. I think next time I’ll just tell them I’m trans and see what they say.

Blahhhh.

It’s freezing rain here today so I didn’t go out after I got back from my massage. But tomorrow I am going to the post office to mail my name change, and also to the parcel place to get my packing underwear. I ordered five pairs! One for every weekday. I hope they fit good, I think they will. I’m just looking forward to underwear that will help me pack, because honestly I would do it more if it was simpler and I didn’t have to wear a harness or deal with it moving around in a sock. Like they fall out so often if they aren’t attached somehow. I think I’ll feel better.

I’m doing fine I guess, transition wise. I need more testosterone soon, I gotta call my pharmacy for it. My chest is healing well, the scars are getting lighter with all this scar care I am doing. I massage it with scar cream and then I put silicone scar strips over it most of the day until I have a bath again and do scar massage again. I did leave it off a couple of nights, but it’s definitely working and I want to minimize them. I know likely they would lighten on their own though. But it’s keeping the scars from getting raised which is good. I still need to get a seroma drained. It’s just not absorbing fast enough.

What else? I’m tired! I’ve got a lot of thoughts on my mind. And tomorrow is the two year anniversary of getting dumped by the person I hoped would be a true love so it’s like yay feelings ugh. At least I get to see my therapist tomorrow.

Well, I was gonna post on this page but I guess I have to tether my phone to actually do that, so I am writing this offline and posting later to save data. I was wondering because the wifi here won’t let me look at definitely legit pornography, so I was tethering to my phone for j/o sessions. BUT NOW I find out my own sad sack overshare blog is ALSO pornography.

Please let me know if you have ever orgasmed from my self-indulgent anxieties as detailed here. I would love to know! I never thought of myself as a pornographer but I guess I am, according to right wing leaning Internet Service Providers. I should step it up I don’t think my writing or art has ever made anyone cum. Lol emotional pornography. I do know that my friend who is a school teacher says their school blocks this webpage, and that was a long time ago.

ANYWAY I am in Buenos Aires and it’s been really nice. I am TOTALLY out of my element in terms of not knowing enough Spanish tho, I know very minimal things. I need to practice more. Google has been helpful though, I learned the word for pumpkin (calabaza). Someone on Grindr taught me the word for cocksucking because he prefers to use the Spanish word as it isn’t so rough (peteros). I guess that’s a trigger word for pornography but like whatever grow up.

I’m feeling in between here because I feel too hairless for the men (and also I’m not sure how to signal I also date men) and too dudely for the women (and also I date women but I don’t think I’m around women who date trans men but who knows). There was that one guy on Grindr into peteros tho so I might meet him (and he did specifically say he liked how hairless I was). It’s a confusing time! I also don’t know enough Spanish and I can do easy things like order uno café con leche y dos medìalunas, or uno calabaza risotto y uno limonada. But the menu and google is helping me. I had an awkward time at the store because I was trying to buy blueberries at the wrong counter and they were trying to tell me to go to the fruit and veg guy’s till. I did figure it out (or they figured out how to show me what they meant). I’ve been eating a lot of empanadas and I think the festival people are like “Uhhh but there are also all these other things you could be eating” which is fair but I know where the nearby cheap empanada place is that seems to know enough English so it’s kind of a standby at the moment.

The festival people are great, they are radicalizing me ha ha. The director Diego was telling me how their gender identity laws work here because they are MUCH better than Canada. In Canada I need to get a doctor’s letter to change my gender on my ID, but here you just go and tell them who you are and they change it. Even eight year olds can just go to their teachers and state their name and gender identity without needing anyone’s permission. Diego was saying Identity is a human right and I’m like fuck of course it is that makes so much sense. Also it makes me realize how backwards Canada is still. I mean the whole thing with trans kids is still being debated there, and here it’s just a human right.

Of course tho there’s a lot of violence against trans people in Argentina, one trans person gets murdered every week. I know we have violence against trans folks in Canada but I don’t know if it’s because our population is smaller but it’s not at that scale.
But also the population of Buenos Aires alone is comparable to the population of all of Canada. So there’s differences.

The economy here is in a bad way, so things are really cheap according to my exchange rate. However I notice I get charged more in certain touristy places, like, I think they just know I have more money. Like I bought a stamp and postcards and it was kind of nuts, and of course it was from a touristy gift store. So I just mailed one postcard. I might mail the rest from Canada, but I don’t know.

My money situation is also sucky but I’ve managed to coast on my perdium so far. BUT FUCK! So many places owe me money and they all very happily tell me I’ll get it in a few weeks while their systems process whatever. No one is in a hurry to pay artists. It sucks. It really does, and I know they could speed it up but they don’t, it’s not THEM who has to pay the rent, it’s ME. So I could get tossed out of my apartment but whatever, they’re not gonna rush the administration to put my payments through. I also still have $8000 worth of travel grants that I don’t know about yet. I would love to have them because I’ve had to front a lot of money for the London trip. For this trip I got some help from the Embassy of Canada because we were waiting and waiting and I needed to get a plane ticket to come here so they used my artist fee to buy it. But now I’m in this weird situation of needing my artist fee and I still am waiting to hear from the ISO if I am getting covered.

Basically I don’t think I’m gonna get any money until I’m back in Canada. Because people who have money to give me are fucking slow and not in a hurry at all. And I still have another week here and I guess I’m just lucky that the economy here is not great so I can get things relatively cheaply unless they know I’m a tourist (which they clue in on pretty fast when I don’t understand what they are saying). But really I just wish I had money again so I could like, actually go get a steak and not another dos empanadas. I’ll be fine I guess I have a place to stay this whole time and the festival is looking out for me, and I do have family back home who could send me money in an emergency.

ANYWAY ha ha I guess that’s all for this blog. I am gonna tether to my phone now and try to post this.

It’s late evening in London UK and I am sooooo tired but at least I am making plans to see friends while I am here which is good. Mom and I saw some really good films, two standouts were Sky Peals and All Roads Taste of Salt. They were both slow savoury kind of films that made me think a lot in different ways. Sky Peals seemed to be about a man trying to understand his fathers and his own neurodivergence. And All Roads Taste of Salt was very tactile and rich and a really interesting way to tell a story of a woman’s life.

Anyway, tomorrow we are going to the Book of Mormon which is kind of funny because my Mom has Mormon related trauma but wanted to see it. So that’s what we are gonna see!

We’ve eaten tons of things and I try to take pictures of the exciting ones, although I did take a pic on the first day of a substandard English Breakfast with a sausage that tasted like it was made with sawdust. Who knows, maybe it was! The English breakfast yesterday was amazing tho.

I’m also thinking about things like my life and shit like that. I think maybe what is tripping me up about getting over my ex is that I really wanted that relationship to MEAN something. It wasn’t a real relationship tho, it was a situationship. Which generally don’t mean much. BUT now I am seeing it did mean something, just not what I was expecting. It somehow was a catalyst for my transition. BUT the funny thing is even though it was, I don’t think I transitioned to try and win them back. Like I just wanted to finally be myself. It sucks to be rejected, but even worse is to be rejected when you aren’t even being yourself fully. Maybe I can console myself that the next person who comes along will reject me for who I really am instead of for who I am pretending to be.

I don’t think I was a very good lesbian. I mean, I didn’t even really date lesbians anyway, I was always dating bisexuals because deep down I knew I was a dude.

I feel fundamentally changed by that situationship though. It did something to me. I don’t know if it was good or bad. It felt bad when I was in it, on some level I knew they didn’t love me and then they even told me that straight up at the end. I felt like a wilting flower in that relationship, like my shine was getting duller and duller the longer it went on. It was like never being seen for who I am, I even told them they couldn’t see me for who I am. It was so frustrating and sad and made my self-esteem go in the shitter. I feel like as much as it hurt, them dumping me for good was probably the best outcome ultimately. Afterwards I could finally be myself and fall in love with myself again and do all the things I wanted to do and be ambitious again.

Like really I did all the things they say you should do after a breakup. I went to the gym and started working out. I made major physical changes because I transitioned. I know they don’t say “You should transition after a breakup” but they do say stuff about improving your appearance and I did improve for myself in more masculinizing ways with testosterone and top surgery. I didn’t really change my wardrobe, but I have started wearing tighter shirts now that I don’t have chest dysphoria. I even embraced my bisexuality which I was always trying to stamp down before because my attraction to men confused me when the only options were boring straight guys who didn’t care about making me cum. Suddenly I was having sex with queer guys who liked having queer sex where cumming is more equal. That was really nice. I think I got more confidence also. I also worked REALLY hard in therapy on things I’d been having issues with and some of it is making demonstrable changes in my life. Like my boundaries are a lot better. I’m more protective of myself now. And my self esteem is not in the shitter anymore. And my career is in a really good place right now. I made an entire video game. I’ve continued with other projects. And I guess I learned to love myself more so I don’t need to find outside validation.

Can something shitty make life better sometimes? That seems like a weird path to go on. No one says they want to fall in love with someone who won’t love them so it will make them a better person. But is that what happened? I don’t know. Maybe I could have gotten better in a different way. Maybe with the therapist I was already working with I would have gotten there anyway.

BUT I do remember why this bad ending turned into a catalyst for my transition, and it wasn’t entirely to do with that person. It was a long distance thing and I’d cancelled an overseas flight somewhere else and Air Canada was trying to do something so they gave me extra aeroplan points in exchange for not giving me my money back. And I took them because I was like ok, this is enough for three round trips to the area my person I loved lived. And then it all went to shit so ok, those flights are not getting used to visit this person anymore. So I took a FUCK YOU trip to New Orleans to use one of my round trips. And at the time I knew something was up with my gender so I was trying to get people to rotate using she/they/he for my pronouns. But people were REALLY resistant to using he/him for me, except for this new friend I made in New Orleans who was using he/him for me all the time and I realized those were my pronouns. And then it kind of all snowballed from there.

So yes, changing pronouns is like, a foundational thing that can lead to good things. Because as disruptive as transition can be, ultimately being yourself is a good thing.

Anyway, I don’t want this to sound like my situationship ex was a terrible person. I’m just not made up of things they find lovable. But that doesn’t mean no one will find the things I am made of to be lovable.

Buenos Aires is coming up later this month. It’s getting confusing!!! So many trips. I’m excited tho, it’s going to be super fun. I’m working on my Spanish with Duolingo still. I can say “Una hamburguesa de pescado, por favor!” Although I don’t want a fish burger, but pescado sounds so pretty. I’ll have to think of another food item that sounds pretty in Spanish. El pescado es bonito! There now it just is pretty but I don’t have to eat it. I’m in the Emerald League right now. Maybe after I learn enough Spanish I’ll go back to one of the other languages I ditched. I was pretty advanced in German. It would be nice to finish one entire Duolingo course instead of a few units. Una hamburguesa con queso por favor is probably more my speed really.

I probably won’t post here while I’m in London because I’ll be busy or tired. But tomorrow night I go to London! Super exciting. I did laundry today and took out my trash. And bought a bunch of Clif bars for the trip in case we are doing something and I suddenly get hangry. They’re kind of the easiest thing for me to maintain my appetite needs since I got on T, you just open them and eat them and you don’t have to worry for a while.

In Animal Crossing there’s all these apple trees on my island and sometimes I eat the apples after I pick them but also I don’t know if it really does anything for my character. He’s very underfed honestly, usually I sell his apples. Manzanas!

I’ve been doing Duolingo Spanish for the last week and a bit and I got really far with it the other day and did like, ten lessons! It was a lot. I ended up number 1 on the Ruby League leaderboard. I’m gonna fuck up my statistics while I am away tho, probably lose my streak. Unless I can keep it up just before bed. I think I’m at eight or nine days in a row which isn’t a lot but it’s at least something.

I tried to set up a hook up before I leave town tomorrow, and this guy seemed kinda ok but now I found out he doesn’t kiss so my interest went from 75% to 0%. I don’t know, if you’re going to stick your dick in me you should be able to use your tongue too. Maybe that’s just me. Kissing is the best part! Ugh. So nevermind.

Anyway hopefully I will post at least something from London. It depends how much free time I have I guess!

I had my first chest massage yesterday. It was so cool. I’d just been talking with my therapist on Monday about not feeling someone’s hands on my chest, and then my massage therapist offered to do a massage for my chest so I said yes. And it was great! I could feel all the pressure which made me feel more at home in my body. Not like a body that is still numb from surgery, even though my nipples are still numb. He also said my surgeon did a good job which is true! It was nice to get complimented.

Anyway London is coming so soon! Saturday we leave! It is a LATE plane flight, almost midnight here when I leave. And when we arrive it will be noon! I haven’t been in a few years so I’m excited.

Also my grants are in, I don’t have to worry about it anymore. I can still worry I guess but I can’t do anything about it. I hope the research part of it makes sense, it’s mostly all research and scriptwriting. AHHHHH. But also I just hope I conveyed the idea well enough.

I wish we had Universal Basic Income. I am getting paid for a thing I’ve done, but it was taking a while to come. Now it’s coming on Friday which is a relief because it means I won’t be totally broke in London. I will be able to buy their overpriced food!

I’ve been trying to increase my protein consumption. It seems to be working, I think I’m getting bigger muscles. They are still small but they are bigger than before T.

Ahh I don’t know what else to report. I have some screenings coming up, the one at BFI London Film Festival on the 13th, and KIN is finally premiering at ImagineNATIVE this month on the 20th at 6:30pm I hope the screenings go well! I’m also doing an Artist talk with my Mom in Nelson this month. I also have a screening coming up in Buenos Aires which I intend to be there for. I’m just like, last minute trying to figure out how to get money to buy this plane ticket. It’s constantly like that. I’m getting nervous because it’s harder to find the flights that go through Brazil instead of Miami. I’m pretty sure no one would bother me if I DID pee in the men’s room in Miami because I am more passable. BUT it’s still anxiety inducing and I would still have to go through the USA Border there. There’s also some flights through Texas though that might be ok. Really I want to go through Sao Paolo though and skip the states entirely.

ANYWAY we’ll see what happens. I just have to trust that things will work out.

I kind of knew this month would be a write off for actively working on creative projects, just because of all the traveling. I don’t know, I feel like I need a moment of stillness to work in, and the energy around multiple flights in a month gets really chaotic. I have noticed I’ve been more responsible with my money now that it is at a low point still from not being able to work during surgery recovery. Like I used to gamble more, and now I don’t when I know I can’t afford it. And I have these playsmart limits on my gambling site and the couple of times I’ve deposited money I haven’t gone anywhere near the limit, just like, 30 bucks once in a while. So that makes me feel good. And I’ve bought more of my groceries myself instead of getting them delivered. And I eat more of them too because I’m only buying staples that I need because I can’t carry a lot. It’s such poor person living ha ha. But I did live on extremely limited funds for a long time before my career began to help me actually earn a living, so it’s not awful. I have enough to eat. And today I got a cheque so I could get an iced capp which is nice.

Tomorrow I get paid for real, which is just in time to pay someone back and also for London. I have more money coming in the future hopefully, $1066 for sure when I’m back from London, and possibly 5500 from two travel grants but we’ll see. I have to pay my Mom my half of the Airbnb for London also though, which would come out of the travel grant. AHHH math ha ha. So really some of that travel grant money just goes in the hole. Which is the point really.

How else am I doing? I don’t know, fine I guess. My chest feels really good finally, although I still need to get this seroma drained and it’s gonna have to wait another week and a bit. It might be absorbing again tho, who knows! BUT my scar care is going well and my chest is settling into a nice form. My scar is thin in most places but one pec has a bit of a lumpy spot on the scar under my nipple. It might smooth out, who knows! I feel like my scars are like children, like I can do what I can to help them turn out ok, but in the end they are gonna do what they want. I’m doing massage with scar gel and then most of the day wearing silicone scar strips. They are a lot less pink already which is nice. It’s only been like, three weeks of scar care. It would be great if I didn’t have to do it for a super long time. I’m just gonna go until I feel I can live with them. But really they are pretty nice.

Anyway that’s about all from me for today. I am doing a drawing a day for October so I should go do that.

It’s less than a week until I go to London! Very exciting. I still haven’t gotten my Buenos Aires plane ticket, and that makes me nervous. Cash flow issues are like, just constant. And we still don’t know for sure if we got the travel grant to go to London, and I don’t expect to hear about the Buenos Aires travel grant until November. So it’s a ways away. Being an artist basically means fronting the money and hoping the grant comes through. So far I’ve gotten them. But it’s a little nerve wracking anyway.

I’m healing well but I got to go in this week to get a seroma in my left pec drained again. I hope I can get in otherwise I have to wait until I’m back from London. It doesn’t really hurt but it’s pretty noticeable to me when I press on it and I don’t want to fool around with someone and have them feel up my pec and notice it’s acting like a waterbed. The right pec is amazing tho, no issues.

I haven’t had anyone but myself feel up my pecs yet! It’s kind of exciting, it will be a new feeling. Some of the sensation in my chest is coming back. Not so much the nipples, but other places that were numb are less numb.

I went back to the gym yesterday and did all my regular machines but tried to do lighter weights to start. So far so good. I did a 50lb row though and had to quit because it was too much. BUT the rest of it, weights and cardio, went excellently.

I’m nearly done this giant grant I’ve been fussing with for days and days. It’s not a giant grant but the project is giant and will go on for more years and I’m trying to give this poor research creation grant the best chances. I think it’s a good grant. I’m gonna read it over again tomorrow and do more edits, and hopefully attach a bio I am missing right now. It’s interesting material and should be really beautiful. Also I got a killer letter of support so I’m hoping that tips the scales in my favour. BUT also, it’s not a huge grant and I’m going to have to pick up other gigs like usual to keep going this next year if I get it. Which is fine I would do that anyway, but it is a little lean.

I’m excited to travel this month. Posey is leaving me on Friday until November! I’m gonna miss that little banana. She’s glued to me right now having a late night nap.

I got my rent cheque in but again this month I actually need to do some scrambling to make sure I can cover it. I’m pretty sure I’ll be fine for a few days because he notoriously doesn’t cash the cheques for a while. But it’s still stressful.

I remember when I tried to be on welfare and they found out how much my rent was (which was like, $900 or something at the time) and the welfare worker was like “You’ll have to move.” I didn’t though I just got on subsidized rent for a while. BUT also welfare expects people to be able to find housing for like, 500 bucks a month and it’s really unrealistic. A lot of funders and employers are unrealistic too actually. I don’t know when Canada Council last upped their living allowance, it’s been at $2000 a month for a LONG time. And places only cover very small amounts for hotel rooms when hotel rooms are pricey too.

I’m sure everyone notices that though.

I’m trying to be open to love! I feel like sometimes I look closed off to it. But I am trying! Maybe I’m just investing in my career right now instead of a relationship.

Tomorrow is therapy! I’m excited because I missed seeing her last week because she was out of her office. But now I only see her tomorrow and one other day in Oct because of travels and such so I want to make it count. Last time in therapy I just complained about money but I don’t feel like it got me anywhere. I would like to talk more about my transition and stuff tomorrow I think. I keep bringing up this old sad quasi relationship I had in therapy and I just feel like damn she must be so sick of hearing about this. I know I pay her to listen though but still she could see it was gonna be a bad scene from the very beginning and now I just keep hashing it out and trying to understand why I’m still thinking about it.

It’s been three years of working with my therapist! Our first consultation to see if we could work together was in 2020! Online! And we were online for a long time, until last year in the fall. I still sometimes see her online if I’m sick or like, just after surgery. But I like seeing her in person. And her office is set up to be really COVID safe and I was even in there with COVID one time (I tested positive the next day I didn’t go in knowingly having COVID) and she didn’t get it and neither did her clients that day. So that’s a good sign.

I’m trying to get the new COVID vaccine but the pharmacy doesn’t have it yet. Technically I should be ok because I had it in May, but also I would like to be vaccinated again.

I’m excited to be nearly done this grant. After this I have one more grant to write, then between travels and writing a budget and a moodboard for another project, I will just be scriptwriting and finishing off my lesbian vampire video game. I’m hoping to release it soon! I should have timed it for an OCT release tho, Halloween themed games are cute. There’s no pumpkins in it though and vampires are cool any time of the year.

I started learning Spanish today, which seems kind of silly considering I haven’t finished ANY of my other Duolingo lesson trees. I know a lot of German now. French I already had a head start on from being Canadian. I’ve forgotten most of Scottish Gaelic except sometimes I can still translate pub names that are in Gaelic. I barely scratched Portuguese. BUT now I’m moving right on to learning Spanish so I can get around Buenos Aires next month. I so far learned to say man woman boy girl apples milk water bread. So I will at least be able to talk about a couple of genders and ages and eat bread milk water and apples. TBH tho there were a lot of Spanish words I already knew just from hearing them around. Like, I am pretty sure I could order an empanada no problemo.

It is kind of funny that two kinds of intense weather patterns are basically called Little Boy, Little Girl. I’ve never really thought about it before.

Anyway it’s still early in my Duolingo lessons, AND I have to travel two other places first this October so I’ll be really busy and trying to squeeze in times to learn.

I’m really enjoying my new chest. If I could make it better I would have bigger pecs tho, and I can’t work out my pec muscles for a little while longer. I mean I could but I don’t want to stretch my scars. I have full range of motion again which is great, I’m just so nervous about working that area as hard as I worked out before. Although I’ve heard I could do weight exercises that don’t include raising my arms above my head. I don’t know, to be honest everyone seems to have different ideas of how soon you can do weights after top surgery. I’m not gonna do bench presses until November at the earliest, but maybe I could start doing push ups again, I don’t know.

I didn’t realize I would like going to the gym this much until I got on testosterone. Like seeing gains is really motivating, and even having the energy to do life stuff AND still want to go work out is incredible. I definitely didn’t have this much energy before testosterone.

I’m starting to get used to being single finally. I think I was fighting it on an interior emotional level. But being single while I’ve been transitioning has been really good for me. I read all these stories from other trans guys whose partners are being manipulative and talking them down from making major steps in their transitions and it’s really depressing. I’m worried I would have been too influenced by trying to hang on to some kind of love, even a toxic love, that I would have stopped taking T, or decided against getting top surgery just for someone else who isn’t me and who might not even be around my whole life. I’m glad I took steps based only on what I needed to make myself happy in my body. Because the only for sure person who is gonna be here my whole lifetime is myself.

Also though I’m sure there’s great things about having a partner, but I have a particular freedom I think I take for granted. Like my life decisions even beyond transition only affect me. Like decisions around moving and money and stuff like that. And living alone is great, it’s very stable. I’ve been here since 2015 living on my own and it’s amazing, I am settled in my ways. And I can hyperfocus on projects and no one feels neglected.

I’m open to love but also not really feeling the vibe right now. Like I keep opening these apps and swipey swiping on people but I’m not really into continuing a long conversation for some reason. I think I should probably give it a rest until I can actually interact properly. I’m probably more open to people I already know, because at least we’ve spoken in some meaningful way and maybe belong to some of the same communities. I know I probably belong to a lot of the same communities as people on the apps tho.

I found out a couple (ok a few more than a couple) friends know my therapist, or PROBABLY know my therapist. And my therapist was really straight up with me when we started that we belonged to the same community so we probably had some friends in common. And the good news is none of the ones I suspect are people I am super super close to. It’s just awkward. I hope we never have some kind of mutual connection that is too close where we have to stop working together, because she is really awesome and has helped me get through some really negative things and patterns etc. Especially because if I dated someone too close to her it probably wouldn’t even work out because none of my relationships have worked out so far and so it would suck if I was ever in a situation of losing my therapist because I dated someone for two months. OH MAN that would suck. Luckily though it hasn’t happened so far.

Fears of things that never happen! I am also afraid a mouse is gonna run down the spout of my kettle and drown in there and then I’ll make mouse water for my oatmeal the next day. HORRIBLE THINGS!

Anyway, life is back to normal so work takes up most of my days again. Today was a heavy admin day, not as creative. But I did figure out an issue I was having with my video which I am prepared to fix now. I also got a lot of fees and payments today that let me pay my cleaner, therapist, internet and phone bill, put a sad but symbolic amount on the visa, and late tonight I got an artist fee that let me finally buy my plane ticket to London UK next month. I was getting super anxious about the plane ticket because I know prices get higher the closer to the date it is. So I totally lucked out and got an okay priced economy ticket with Air Canada who is hopefully not as sketch as they can be.

So it’s official now! I am going to London! We have a place to stay but I need to raise enough to pay the other half of the Airbnb. I know Airbnb sucks but this guy actually lives there most of the time so it’s not AS bad as some places. I hope not anyway! I’m excited because I haven’t been to London since before the pandemic. Like, 2019. SO LONG AGO so much has happened! A whole pandemic unfolded globally AND I transitioned, so I am returning a very different person in a very different time.

23andMe says some of my genes are from Greater London. I knew I had Scottish ancestors but the Greater London genes kind of surprised me. Sometimes I wish I knew all of the people in the past who combined genes to one day make me. I think the diversity of all those people makes it even more cool. I have Mongolian DNA and my Grandpa also had Mongolian DNA so I know where it comes from in my family. It’s kind of cool to think of ancient Mongolians traveling on to become Crees. I know this is a contentious subject though that makes people upset, but that’s just been what the DNA test said, two different tests and Grandpa’s was with the big Genome project. So I believe it. I do still think Crees were clearly in Canada for a long time. Like thousands of years.

Tomorrow is this Canada wide protest against trans and queer people in schools but it’s like, basically overall an anti-LGBTQ2S protest. And there’s obviously counter-protestors and so I wish I could counter-protest with them but at the same time I feel pretty obviously trans. And the counter-protestors are telling people to go with a friend and leave with a friend for safety and that people are taking pics and doxxing people. And I have very identifiable tattoos also and I have a large online presence so I’d just rather avoid it. I’ve been concerned though because I still want people in power to know how I feel. So I’m going to take some time in the morning to write to various politicians and stuff to explain my concerns. I know it’s just a small way of being heard, but I’m hoping it makes a difference. I might do an email but I also know written letters can make an impact, so in the morning I will decide if I want to do written or email. It might not help, but it might, I don’t know. It would be better than being silent, and better than being in harm’s way too.

I wish I didn’t have to be afraid. I was telling my friend today that transitioning has been such a source of joy and the only hard parts about it have been the hateful cis people. Like, literally no part of my medical transition has made me unhappy. I just get treated like shit because of it sometimes and that makes me resentful. I don’t know why cis people want to make us the problem when it’s obviously the other way around.

Not all cis people are transphobic though. Some cis people have even been involved in my medical transition. It’s just this very vocal minority of cis people who are trying to be super hateful who suck.

All this being said, I am aware that the UK has it’s own particular brand of transphobia that I might be walking into next month. I guess we’ll see!

My chest is officially healed and I got the all clear from my surgeon to go back to regular activities. SO I got to cancel all the future helping shifts and now I can take out my own trash and do my own laundry and walk my own dog! I’m gonna miss seeing people all the time tho, so I hope I can get back to being social.

Here is my beautiful chest! The surgeon said my nipples were cute and they are! I was so concerned about how they would turn out but they turned out amazing!

I’m really so happy with how it looks. I know it still has to settle into itself a bit, and the nurse said it would be 8 months to a year before I see how it really is gonna look. But fuck am I ever glad to be out of that binder. I was so tired of it, and it reminded me of always wearing a bra only it had to be on overnight too so definitely awful.

She did have to drain the two seromas I got, so that was an awkward experience, just trying not to look at this giant syringe sucking out this sad red liquid. Ugh! I can watch the needle for blood draws, but watching that didn’t even cross my mind, I knew it would be too much. And I don’t feel like fainting. And omg there was A LOT. But wow did my chest ever feel better after, no more internal pressure of all that fluid.

Anyway, I celebrated by going to see a TIFF film (The New Boy), and had a bath for the first time in weeks and had a joint for the first time in months! Not since July! I really loved all of it. I finally washed my nipples more than just letting soapy water run over them. And then I just sat in the tub running my soapy hands over my chest and feeling really happy and thinking “mine!” It was really getting to me, I don’t know. These past weeks of healing have been super hard and sometimes I would forget why I was sad or grumpy and then remember I’m healing and at the time had a bunch of restrictions. I can sleep on my stomach again! I sent a text to an old hookup to tell them I was cleared to go back to regular life so maybe I can have sex again soon too!

I’m also doing better at cleaning my house in between when the cleaner comes. Like ok, if anyone dropped by unannounced it would prob still look messy. But generally I go through and clean it ongoing, so I must be improving. I have more energy for things like that too so I am glad I can go back to regular chores.

They said I healed really well, so now I’m just doing scar care which involves this gel and massage and she said I could get silicone strips. I’m not too worried about scars BUT ALSO I know if they were more faded I wouldn’t get clocked so easy in the locker room.

I am going back to the gym in the next couple of weeks and probably starting really light and maybe only with cardio but I am gonna start going to the men’s locker room. I’m hoping it will be fine. I’ve had to use the women’s locker room when the all gender locker room is filled with kids, and that makes me feel way more awkward. So I’m just gonna do the men’s now. I don’t know if I will pack to make myself seem more cis. I kind of don’t want to because my packers are huge and I leave them home when I worry people will think I’m a pervert. Which is maybe sad and self-hating. Maybe I need a special gym packer. BUT ALSO it’s like, the gayest YMCA in Toronto and they’d probably know exactly why my chest has scars so they probably won’t care.

What else? Some people started offering me gigs so that is super helpful. I can work again for sure and hopefully will be doing three work trips next month, one to London UK for BFI, one to Nelson BC, and one to Buenos Aires Argentina. That’s a lot of work trips! But I’m glad to have some adventures in before I have to stay put while my name change goes through.

Anyway I am really happy to just feel a t shirt on now. Like right on my skin with no bra or binder under it. Free! I’ve realized so many of my shirts are baggy though, and I thought that was because I was chubby but now I recognize a lot of it was to do with dysphoria from having a chest I wasn’t happy with. So now I want tight himbo shirts! I want to show off my body more. I hid it for so long because it didn’t fit me, and now it does.