trying to find some words

when im in a weird mood, i write. so here- some works in progress, maybe i'll edit them later, who knows.

what to tell you about london (for c.jarelle):

i am pretty sure that the squirrels are fatter here.
they sit on their hind legs slovenly, daring young schoolchildren to get close,
waiting till the last moment to scurry away from their cautious advances.

most students here look like balls of hair growing from toothpick sticks.
skinny hipster legs accentuated by bone-tight jeans or lackofpants
curly mops cut in strange, asymmetrical patterns, usually with
a buzzed patch on one side, or in the back, the rest
spiked curled gelled dyed (mostly a bright burgundy red, the kind of
kool-aid color everyone went for in 10th grade to prove that they were
red-blooded rebels).

people rarely touch here. i think this
is what bothers me the most. there is an
unspoken rule- there is never to be any touching.
not even amongst friends, not even accidentally,
maybe if you are dating, but even that is looked down upon
with a silent disdain. touching is only for new, inexperienced lovers
who don't know better yet.

here, the wind is indecisive.
there are some november mornings that feel just like
early spring. the sun shines and birds peep, and it is always enough
to convince me to leave my house with very little. by three,
the sun begins to set and so does the cold. the wind blows hard
and unforgivingly, like a bitter woman out for blood.
her stage whispers turn to screams of agonizing loneliness,
and the truth of this is what chills my bones the most.


----

"yes, you are a lion, but there is some judas in you, too"

how do i greet the natty dread who hangs around the
front of my favorite jamaican restaurant?
he greets me with a slight nod, but the
look in his eyes betray the gloss of unfamiliarity.
i know the words but they stick in my throat.
jah bless, breddrin.
i wonder if he would be surprised, the greeting stumbling clumsily
out of my mouth, old accent of my youth peeking through my front teeth.
or maybe he would laugh at this strange, awkward bodied boygrrl thing,
who gave up their crown of dreads for oversized button-downs and some
strange longing for wimpyboi androgyny.

[...]

don't be like your sister when you grow up, my mother warns him.
the way she's headed, she's only asking for trouble.

My Gay Zine

So I forgot to tell you guys that I am helping put together a zine for the LGBT(Q) society.

(oh we also had our queer discussion and it's looking like we're gonna add it, but it's serious business here- they have to go to some student union higher up people and ask and its a big deal.. aaannyyways

Yes. So I am making sure people submit, putting it together, and I also wanted to submit something. A memoir piece. At first I was going to write about how I am my Daddy's "lil grrl" still, and how, even though he believes that still, I knew when I was 13 (and fooled around on his couch with the grrl next door- whoops, sry dad!) that I could no longer be that.. and how I feel like I'm lying to him, because he thinks I'm some sweet daughter who's still stuck at the age of 7. Right. that piece never got finished, although I still think it needs to be written. I will hopefully upload that soon enough. But here's the piece I was thinking about using. I am probably going to cut it- a lot, since I get really self-absorbed (gasp- who me?) and go on and on about myself and my gender (again!!). But I feel like this is the most updated, best way that I understand myself and my gender and sexuality right now. So tell me what you think and if I should put it in the zine.

-----

why i use they:

"Stokely," my flatmate Jenny slurred drunkenly one night, holding a delicate hand-painted teacup in her hands. "I heard a rumor, but I don't want you to get mad."

I leaned against the wall, trying to keep my face and body composed, all the while bracing myself for what she was about to say. Jenny always keeps me updated on flat gossip, and I knew that if she had a question for me, it was because I had somehow come up in conversation. As far as I know, my heterosexual, teenaged flatmates only ever gossip about me when it comes to two topics: My sexuality/gender, or the sexuality/gender of my friends who make it a habit to rarely come over and visit.

"Amy and Dion were talking," Jenny continued. "And I just want to know so I don't offend you... but they said you used they. Instead of she. And, like..." she trailed off, waiting for me to explain.

"Yes, I do. Although at this point I don't mind if you use she." I smiled to show that I wasn't upset, and headed for the door.

"Okay, because I didn't want to offend you," Jenny called out behind me, as I stepped out into the hallway. I gave a quick wave and headed back to my room.

This type of conversation doesn't bother me. In fact, I love talking about queerness, my exploration of my transgender identity, and anything else about my life, for that matter. But that night, I was a bit bothered by the fact that this was the second night in a row that Jenny asked me this. It is not her fault- I know how much my flat loves to drink during the weekdays, and I am sure that morning, she probably forgot about our short chat. However, I feel like whenever I mention my pronouns to people, or make attempts at explaining my gender, people hear what I am saying, but very few people are listening. No one else has the excuse of drunkenness.
---

At my school, it is common for people to change their names, and if there is any confusion about someone's gender identity, people rely on the pronoun "they" as a safe way to reference them.

Did you see So And So at the party? Yeah, they are a total hottie, but I think they have a theyfriend.

It can get a bit confusing sometimes. But even back home, I feel like they is constantly used as a gender neutral thing. I don't feel confused or neutral about my gender. In fact, I have begun to refer to myself as a genderfluid, or genderplural person. My confusion comes into play when it comes to deciding how I want to portray my gender to the world.

At the end of my first year, I began to collect vests. I learned quickly in high school that binding was never going to work for someone with such a large chest as mine, and sports bras only called attention to their size, rather than concealing them. So for me, wearing vests was my way of hiding the part of my body that I felt the least comfortable with. Halfway into my second year, I cut my hair and began to use my taken name more frequently .

At first, people did not know how to react to such a drastic change. Did I feel like I was trans? Was I thinking about transitioning? I was starting to adjust to my own body, and did not know how to answer people's questions, let alone my own, about my newly discovered identity. All I knew was that it felt right in that moment to change.

I tried to experiment with my new look by dressing more masculinely. I thought that this would feel right, because people began to treat me more like a "little man." At parties, I became more of the aggressor- I would dance with people only if I could take the lead. When I came home from a long day, I would demand that one of my female friends take care of me, or cook me dinner. I was testing the waters with this newfound masculinity, and I always got my way. My friends will never admit to it, but in a way, they loved it, and nurtured this chauvinistic behavior of mine.

But still, I didn't feel at home in this identity. I didn't feel like this is how I wanted to portray my male side, a part of me that I knew was very real and needed to be expressed.

Hampshire College, Mon. February 2nd, 2009 12:11AM.
My hair-
its gone.

Cutting my hair didn't make me want to be the aggressor. For me, it was a very vulnerable act, and I felt the need to affirm my ability to have short hair and be read feminine. I wanted very much to be cute. So I began to dress up, in private. At night when I had trouble sleeping, I would put on dresses that I borrowed from my friends, and wearing my finest jewelry, I would pout and pose in front of my mirror. I would spend hours tip-toeing back and forth from my room to the bathroom, carefully applying shiny lip glosses and eye shadows.

Soon, I discovered the wonder of scarves, and began collecting colorful cloths made of silk, and adorn my neck, hair and back jean pockets (right side, thank you very much!) with them. I have come to realize that by cutting my hair, I found a way to liberate my femininity, but to also make it "dirtier", and to "queer" it as well. My previous discomfort with my femininity was because before second year, I always associated "femming up" with me attempting to pass as straight -usually because of family events. I didn't know how to be "girly", because I always did it in an attempt to mislead my family into thinking that I was a well-behaved, normal, God-fearing girl.

Although this new-discovered feminine side of me was comforting, and fun to explore, I still felt a longing to be masculine as well. In fact, it was more than a longing- it was a need. Many times, I feel as if I am not fully in my body. This feeling of body dysphoria is a result of a long list of components, but it became painstakingly clear to me that one of the main reasons was because of my gender. It is like having an internal switch sporadically change from "girl" to "boy", and I have no control over it. It usually starts off with simple things, like not knowing what clothes to wear, or how to fix my hair that day. But sometimes, it can affect bigger parts of my life, like forgetting my name, or not knowing where I am or who I am with (I associate my different names with locations- for instance, I know I am at home with my family, because I am never referred to by Stokely there, whereas I am only called "Stokes" when I am in a setting with peers my own age).

My masculine identity is still a work in progress. However, I have noticed a trend. I feel the most assertive and manly when I am surrounded by gay men. In other words, I feel like there is a part of me that is a very flamboyant, borderline drag queen-esque gay man. This is when I feel the most comfortable with my masculinity, and although I can't put it into words, I can usually feel it usually in the lower part of my body. It affects the way I stand, the way I walk, the way I think.

I think that my gender identity manifests itself in the type of people I like. In female bodied people, I usually go for (well, other than emotionally unavailable and stuck up) very androgynous types, leaning more towards masculine-presenting- in a wimpy boy kind of way. However, with male bodied people, I am also attracted to androgyny, but lean more towards effeminate men. What can I say, this genderfuck exclusively likes other genderfucks.

"i will fall in love with a gender slip into it like a bath."

I am not a boi, grrl, butch, femme, anrogyne, cis, kiki... but at the same time, I can be any of these genders at any given moment in time. Not to mention a whole other list of genders that I don't even know about yet. So, you see, I don't use the pronoun "they" to be pretentious, difficult, radical, anti-British, or quirky. I use they because I am a mixture of a lot of different genders, names, and sometimes even people, and that can change at any given moment. I am hoping that one day, my mind will make a decision and stick to one gender and one pronoun. Something comfy and soothing, like a nice hot bath after a long, rainy day. But until then, let's just stick with good ole' "they"- the consistency is nice for a change.

just some thoughts

sorry i haven't been updating this thing. but here is something i wrote:

"types"

i have a friend here who only likes black grrls.

she told me this, awkwardly,
in the smoky club where we sat down
waiting for the others to get back with
their drinks. "it's something about
the afro," she smiled, trying to pass it off as a joke.
i was silent, just drunkenly looked at my shoes
anxious for time to pass.

my friends also say i have a type,
i'd like to think its self-conceited
and emotionally not there, although
it would be more realistic to say
race and gender neutral- but only
"in that sort of way." i wish i didn't
have a type, but i am all too familiar with
how my heart skips a beat when i get a glimpse
of dark curly hair, thinking maybe this one,
maybe this time.

a few more updates

Hey guys-

I know have been totally shit abt keeping in touch. I apologize. First, I want to say that if you have sent me a letter, please let me know when you sent it! I haven't gotten anything yet because there is a postal strike here, which has been slowing down the mail. This is really upsetting for me, because I ordered a bright pink party wig and if I don't get it by Halloween, I will be very disappointed.

Things are good. I know that some of my updates can lead people to believe that I am having a horrible time and want to go home. I feel like I have settled in a lot more, and am feeling less anxious abt social things (although, let's be real- it's me, I'm always going to be anxious//nervous).

I am going to start a project that I will take back to Hampshire and create into a performance art//one-person show (hopefully). I was reading a book called "Queers in Space" which was all about the history of queer spaces, queer visibility in public spaces, queer bodies as queer spaces, etc... I really liked some essays in this book. It reminded me of the photo pieces that Cheryl, Sarah T and Maddy did for the Black History Month Show two years ago. I remember there was a quote from Sarah where she talked about how there was usually an assumption made when people looked at a picture of a public space- people tended to assume that this space was a white (& heterosexual) space. She mentioned that she wanted to challenge that. I want to do the same, but use theatre and performance art as my tool. So I want to think abt queer identities, and how we relate to these spaces- whether they be "traditional spaces" like home, school, etc. or public spaces like walking down the street, or virtual spaces like media and the internet, or our own bodies, ie- how we feel abt them, how we treat them, etc.

So I am hoping to do interviews, transcribe them, be inspired by them, and write monologues, poems.. or just do some weird installation with them. * I also have to tip my hat to Ashley & Uni for doing similar projects to me and doing them extremely well.I have a lot to live up to.* I might actually "install" bodies in public areas, make people do living statue-esque things... I don't really know. All I know is that I hope this all goes well and that I don't offend anyone in the interviewing process.

I also need to find a way to make sure that the group of people I interview is a diverse group, rather than just my friends (although I recognize that the data is already biased because I am asking people from academia- and all one specific school with a very specific type of education.)

Gah. This will be an interesting project. I am very nervous. But still excited. I realized yesterday that I have three pages worth of questions. I also realized that questions that might be deemed as appropriate to ask at Hampshire might not be taken as well here. So I am also trying my best not to offend people.

But enough of that. Let's talk about interesting things.

My flat has gotten at least five or six notes from the cleaner (YES THEY HAVE CLEANERS HERE- they take out the trash, sweep the floor, vacuum the hall and wipe down the counters... even though the dumpster is right in front of our flat... what. the...).
SO I believe that the cleaners have decided to take our dishes. Yes. They take them and throw them away. And although it sucks, I don't think that it will have ANY effect on the condition of our kitchen. I think that they're just going to buy more plates... It's so strange. Living in 52 last year was disgusting, and we did get in trouble for it at the end of the year (didn't we get fined?). However, we AT LEAST would bring our dishes to the sink. Our problem was that the dishes would no longer FIT in the sink.

We have a "family dinner" every Sunday, and everyone takes their time cooking. Adorable, right? Except that after this Sunday, all of the flatmates looked at each other, looked at the mess that we had all made, and just got up from the kitchen and left. I was SHOCKED. How in the hell...? They didn't even scrape their plates. And a lot of that food (well, the dishes that I didn't wash... I did 6 full sink's worth of dishes) is still on the kitchen table, unless the cleaner threw it away as promised. Craziness. I wonder why I always end up living with people that are a lot of fun and sociable and enjoy doing thing together, but ABSOLUTELY HATE cleaning or being tidy..? I wonder why I can't get the best of both worlds..? Maybe it's cuz my friends are so damn crazy? I dunno.

That's it for now. My life is muy aborrido. Tell ME things instead.

IT NEVER DIES

OH. MY. GOD.

seriously, this is a slap in the face. since when is blackface only hurtful to americans? what about black people in their country? this is horrific and i am appalled that anyone would think that it is an insult just to americans, or that blackface is just having a "bit of fun". i am also ashamed that america ever created such a horrible pasttime. man. sometimes i think, why do i study minstrelsy? don't people know the history? and then i watch things like this AND I KNOW.

vlog number i've lost count now.

yes, i was a bit of a debbie downer last night. but still.

who the hell am i and how did i end up here?

hey guys.

i am sorry it has taken me a while to post anything, or to even do a video update. there is so much i want to talk about, so much i want to tell and share with you all, but for the past few days, i have felt very pent up- constipated creatively (sorry for the shitty -no pun intended- mental images). i am actually surprised that i feel up to writing today, but this is going to be very frazzled, so bear with me.

i have been very unsatisfied. my loneliness//homesickness is showing through me constantly feeling restless and sleep deprived. its hard because i feel like i need to spew out feelings and words and thoughts with people, and am so used to being able to go lay/complain in najee or mikayla's bed or smoke a cig on the stoop with skrim or send stupid texts, saying "nyah nyah nyaaah" to helyx or just generally be around c.jarelle all the time. plus i learned that it is hard to fall asleep when you are not hogging yr best friend's covers. i miss being at hampshire, but i don't feel like i am in a place where i can be there. i kind of want to go back, back a couple of semesters and start from there again. but its different now. hampshire feels different and i feel different.

i am constantly having identity crises. i have explained it to some people before, but i have a couple of names, and they all suit me at different times. sometimes i feel very much like a stokely or a jd, but at other times i feel very much like a damali too. sometimes, i am forced into a specific name, like on the first day of school, or when i go home for breaks, and this makes me very disoriented for a couple of days. but i think that when i decided i was going to go by jd stokely, i assumed that this was my "boy name". under the "about me" section of this blog, i originally had something along the lines of "m. hopper likes flowers and dresses and she dislikes ______. jd stokely is a fratboi wannabe and he likes ______." i think i automatically put my different names//ways of expressing myself into neat little boxes. i thought that when i was stokely, i had to be soo masculine, and to be honest, i think there are a lot of times where i overdid it. i think i felt like i had to compensate for something, like i had to show how macho i was because by "turning my swag on" i could forget abt how big jd's bra cup size is, as well as forget how that might affect the way that they function through the world. i often caught myself thinking really misogynistic thoughts, like feeling possessive//protective over female friends. i think that sometimes my friends might have unconsciously fed into that not-really-still-a-little-boy-not-yet-a-grown-man mentality that i had by coddling that forming black masculinity. in the end, i kind of exhausted myself out.

when i left new york at the beginning of august, i had to prepare myself mentally for "becoming damali". i think over a month of it really threw me off, especially since i came to london right after being home. a lot of my clothes reflect that month of being home. i have a lot of flowy scarves, a dress or two, shiny ballet flats. at first i was uncomfortable with wearing those clothes, many of them hand-me-downs from my mother. then i began to take every day as a drag performance. instead of fighting against the dresses, i would wear them with red lipstick and tiny cardigans. it was a fun game, but then i would obsess with what i was going to wear the next day. i would wake up in the middle of the night and try on clothes, have my own personal fashion show. i would put on the clothes, take time putting on lots of makeup and jewelry, turn on all of the lights and take pictures on photobooth. i know that sounds strange- mostly because it is. i would spend hours doing this every night, and i couldn't sleep unless i did it. whenever i took off the clothes and wiped off the makeup,i always felt like i had just spent the night cross-dressing, like what i had just done was bad.

by the end of august, i felt very confused. i didn't feel comfortable wearing more masculine presenting clothes, and even if i wanted to, my mother would always have something to say. i also didn't feel like playing the part of my mom's cute straight, girly daughter (i notice when i go home and try to "pass"- sadly, i have been guilty of doing this- i always interpret "girly" or "straight" as very cutesy, frilly, young-looking.") i decided that i wanted to experiment more with what feminine meant to me through clothing, but thought that i didn't want to do it for anyone's sake but mine. i wanted to find ways to express my queerness and my femininity. one night, i discovered that i wanted to king it up for a bit, and created the persona (another one, i know) of franklin, or "frankée fierce". i never got to fully flesh out this persona, but for me, i discovered that one way that i could express my femininity and my masculinity was through the persona of a gay male. i think that there is a side of me that is very much a gay man, but that is beside the point. unfortunately, i have not had a chance to explore frankée more, but he comes out occasionally.

but, anyways. i am in london. i am still feeling bottled and confused.

i think that this is mostly because i really lack a home base. i want someone i can vent to, someone i am close enough to who will listen to my crushes and stupid, slfish complaints abt gender, and generally spend all my time with. i know that it is selfish, but i really feel like i need a good friend right now, and i know that it is hard to just befriend people, but it feels like everyone else has found that here already. i feel like i am doing something wrong, and i keep thinking- i am only here for 2 1/2 more months. i am running out of time for friendship. the time is going by so quickly, but it also feels like it is going by so slowly because i am so alone. it drives me crazy. my flat is lovely- i really enjoy spending time with everyone in it. however, they are all straight and 18/19 and have very crappy, liberal lovey-dovey politics. in fact, the video i am working on right now is called, "can we please not talk politics? i want to still respect you in the morning." harsh, i know, but i have yet to find conversation that i feel pushes me forward. i feel like i am back in that white//str8 place where i have to be the educating token queerblackfriend. and i don't like it at all. i don't even have good politics! i am still working on myself and i want people who can help me work on myself, recommend good essays to read and call me out on my shit or call me out on not calling others out on their shit. what im really saying is that i want you guys here. i have a queer friend but it is always so hard to find him//hang out with him because he is always herethereeverywhereandnowhere, yes, like freddy. i also dont know him that well, although he promises me a day of hangingout, listening to queercore and eating pie.

i have even been to the library and taken out 6 (i originally htought it was 7 but i realiz now that i miscounted) books from the library, only one for class and the rest all abt queer theory. the ones that i am the most excited abt reading are black queer studies, queers in space, and feminist and queer performance. the only downside is that it has been so long since my brain has done anything academic, and i need someone to help me digest it all (the one queer conversation that ive had here that i was excited abt was for five minutes in the middle of a gay club during a katy perry song that i sat down for in protest and i could barely hear them over the music. they also no longer go to goldsmiths. i also havent seen them since.) i am surrounding myself with piles of books so that i can flip through pages to find one image of me or at least one sentence of something familiar. its not working- i just feel tired all the time from all the readings.

AND SO, IN CONCLUSION-

the actual reason i started writing this note. i feel very lonely and miss my people//community. you guys are my roots. because of this, i am constantly in a very hazy, vague state of mind, also causing me sleep deprived nights, while also always making me tired. i also feel like i haven't been able to express myself creatively or verbally, which is why i haven't updated as much (via email, letters, vlogs). I also feel like it is affecting the way that i express my gender//identity, and i have no idea what name i am at right now, or how i should-or want to be- dressing or who i should-or want to be- seeking out for company. i also spend way too much time on facebook, and have been looking at old pictures of myself- reminiscing abt who i was in the different stages of my life, who i am now, who i will be. i start thinking, maybe i should have grown up to be this way, or, when did i start looking//acting like that? i am excited abt this trip and glad to be here and am enjoying myself, but i am anxious to find people to share it with.

and with all that said, i will definitely try to start writing again, there are more poems for people coming up, as well as vlogs, emails, etc. love you all, thank you for reading this through. i'm not quite sure if it makes sense, since it was an hour-long ramble!

** oh, and here is the picture that started this whole train of thought!! me, at 16.
**