hermionesviolin | Entries tagged with issues: trans

Dunno if it was the accumulation of everything, but the under-19 trans care ban tonight hit me harder than I was expecting.

I appreciate Chris Geidner on this:

There will be challenges, and Law Dork will have coverage of them. It is, however, a failure of humanity, governing, advocacy, and journalism that we have gotten to this point.

Those who were insistently “just asking questions” and unceasingly pushing the needle further right — in addition to those who encouraged and then exploited that for their explicitly discriminatory or hateful aims — all bear a measure of responsibility for this, for making trans teens — and, with them, trans adults — fear for their lives tonight.

Current Mood: tired

A whole bunch of books by trans-fems came in for me at the library around the same time, so in addition to my perpetual book club books, also on my to-read-soon list are:

The Sunforge by Sascha Stronach -- sequel to The Dawnhounds (which I recently read for feminist sff bookclub, yay)
It Gets Better... Except When It Gets Worse: And Other Unsolicited Truths I Wish Someone Had Told Me by Nicole Maines -- which I'm interested to read in conversation with Elliot Page's Pageboy, which had a lot more trauma in it than I was expecting, and of which Abby said, "It's what The Trans Memoir™ is supposed to be, which is a story of trauma and triumph and omg it's so hard to be trans because the transphobia." (Abby admittedly DNFed the book, but...)

I had put a library hold on the Nicole Maines book approximately for the title alone (before Abby and I even started reading Pageboy, just when I saw it on a BookRiot Our Queerest Shelves "The 10 Biggest and Buzziest New Queer Books Out in Fall 2024" on Sept 10, 2024), in large part because I feel like queer (esp trans) memoirs are dictated to have to be So Inspiring.
Lucy, Uncensored by Mel Hammond and Teghan Hammond

04/04/2024 I had posted in a Discord:
BookRiot Our Queerest Shelves a little late to TDoV with this link, but one of the upcoming YA books is a trans girl applying to a historically women's college.
Hi, it me, a graduate of a historically women's college, dating a trans woman.

***

Also, speaking of literature by trans-fem folks, if you haven't heard of The Transfeminine Review [website, Bluesky, Tumblr, etc.], you should check it out.

Bethany's taste only somewhat overlaps with mine, but her booklists are incredibly comprehensive (I can't believe she's only 22!), and I appreciate her literary criticism. She's also doing "A Brief History of Trans Literature" -- which has turned into a huge historical deep dive (see the Every Post Ever list), which I haven't started trying to read yet, but which definitely makes me think of Jules Gill-Peterson's A Short History of Trans Misogyny.

I read her Start Here post and commented, "I feel like it tracks that I recognize almost all (11/12) of Tier One, much (9/22) of Tier Two, and almost nothing (1/22) from Tier Three. (It me, a cis book nerd with a transfemme partner.)"

She also has my kind of thoroughness. A recent post is 15 Black Transfeminine Novelists You Should Read (10/9/24) – "Looking at the position of black transfeminine novelists within the industry and their major works." Like, she literally found all the Black transfeminine novelists she could and read them (often only one work by each one, but still).

She recently skeeted, "one of my plans for this winter is to go on a high fantasy/hard sci-fi kick, it’s really a blind spot for me atm (fantasy especially)."

***

And while I'm highlighting trans-fem art: Black Trans Women at the Center: a New Play Festival: November 18 – 21, 2024

"The festival will premiere on Nov. 18 and be available to stream for free for three days." [source]

***

(Subject line is from a Discord conversation today about the forthcoming trans women ~~tennis~~ indoor volleyball book -- which the Boston NWSL's abandoned marketing campaign makes me think of.)

My partner messaged me earlier this month: "I’m proofing a Transgender Day of Visibility doc for someone in [a Facebook group]. Do you have particular kid or adult books you’d recommend? (And how is it that I don’t actually have any?)"

I made some preliminary recommendations based on my memory and then started digging through assorted tags ("shelves") on my GoodReads (and yes, I know, I should move to StoryGraph) to come up with more thorough recommendations.

Here, have a post on my rarely-used wallet-name blog.

A few weeks ago, Touch Performance Art did a workshop production of "Sexyback: or what you will" at Club Oberon.

The website said 8pm. Doors didn't even open until 8:07, and the show didn't start until ~8:35 (because not only do you have to wait for everyone to get in, but you want everyone to buy drinks). Le sigh -- I forget what Club Oberon shows are like. I saw Sarah V. from feminist sci-fi bookclub in line, and we hung out once we were inside, which was nice (the killing time part is more enjoyable with friends). I was hoping people would be actually dancing during the pre-show, but people were just standing about, alas.

It does with "Twelfth Night" what "The Donkey Show" does with "Midsummer" -- bare bones of narrative with lots of song+performance. Which actually basically worked. ( spoilers )

FWIW: After the show, they said their plan is to do 3 more workshop shows in July and then 10 full shows in the fall.

Someone posted to LJ:

I'm directing a gender swapped production of Taming of the Shrew being done in Arlington on March 22, 28 and 29. We've got the men playing the women's parts and vice versa. Some people view Shrew as a misogynistic, outdated play. The experiment I wanted to try was whether by swapping the roles it becomes simply a love story between two socially maladjusted people. While I expected this to be interesting, I have been fascinated at what swapping the genders has done. In the hope that some of you will come see it, I won't say more so your own experience won't be tainted one way or the other.

I was really intrigued, so Cate and I went last night. [Verse and Vodka's website; tickets to this show via Brown Paper Tickets]

However, (a) they didn't genderswap the opening frame story (which confused me because I was expecting gender-swap); and (b) they kept all the language intact (so it's all, "your sister Bianca," etc.), which I think lessened a lot of the impact of the gender swap.

Given the LJ post, I was expecting the gender swap to do more than I experienced it actually doing. Petruchio was great -- and the genderswap enables some stuff one couldn't do in standard productions (like, I think it was the first wooing scene, Kate is sitting down and Petruchio sits on her lap, straddling her, which I think would have read much differently if it were a male-presenting person on top of a female-presenting person) -- but mostly I felt like I was just watching any other production of Shakespeare (possibly in part because my brain has gotten somewhat used to parsing people as their character even when that is ostensibly at odds with the gender I'm reading them as).

In the frame story (which I always forget exists), they put a guy in a dress, and when the drunk !lord was wanting to hook up with the "woman" and "she" was putting him off, I felt super-uncomfortable because the expectation is that the audience is laughing because they know that if the guy does get under "her" skirt he'll realize she has a penis and won't that be a terrible shock and ha ha ha -- and hey, that's a very real fear that lots and lots of trans women live with every day. I've read lots of trans women pushing back about the "guy in a dress as humor" trope, but I don't think I actually internalized it until that moment.

When I think about this play, I so want to read Petruchio/Kate as a consensual BDSM relationship, and in the first "wooing" scene it feels plausible; but then when Petruchio is keeping her from eating or sleeping it's clear that Kate hasn't consented to this dynamic and while I understand how we're supposed to parse Petruchio's plan, it makes me uncomfortable -- and as it continues with the sun/moon etc. thing on the way back, to think of it as leading up to a consensual BDSM relationship makes me think of lots of sketchy narratives wherein the guy dominates the woman without her consent and she ends up liking it (despite her expectations) and that somehow retroactively makes his boundary-crossing behavior okay.

I also didn't get much sense in this production of Kate herself coming to be sort of in on the joke -- she does during the encounter with the old man after the sun/moon bit, and Petruchio's whispering to her at some point (I forget if it was during that scene or the closing scene), but while I want to read Kate's final speech as her being super over-the-top saying shit she doesn't believe to just piss off all these other women, I didn't really get that sense from this scene.

They don't close out the frame story, and I was thinking about what the (existence of the) frame story suggests about the main play (reversals, illusions, etc.), but I wasn't really coming up with anything -- so I went to Wikipedia, as one does.

Which wasn't helpful for this specifically, but which did quote [RSC] director Conall Morrison:

By the time you get to the last scene all of the men – including her father are saying – it's amazing how you crushed that person. It's amazing how you lobotomised her. And they're betting on the women as though they are dogs in a race or horses. It's reduced to that. And it's all about money and the level of power. [...] It is so self-evidently repellent that I don't believe for a second that Shakespeare is espousing this. And I don't believe for a second that the man who would be interested in Benedict and Cleopatra and Romeo and Juliet and all these strong lovers would have some misogynist aberration. It's very obviously a satire on this male behaviour and a cautionary tale

I found this interesting because I know I didn't even think about the contest from that one-level-back perspective or about the implications of everyone's glee at Kate's having been tamed.

My Riverside Shakespeare (2nd Edition) says:

Northrop Frye once remarked that the Katherina of Act I is not really dissimilar from the Katherina of Act V; at the beginning of the comedy she is persecuting her sister Bianca, and at the end she is engaged in precisely the same activity---except that now she has learned how to do it with social approval on her side. (Anne Barton, p. 139)

and

the stage convention which allows the actress playing the part to show plainluy in her face that she falls in love with Petruchio the moment she sets eyes on him has much to recommend it. Heartily sick of a single life, not to mention all the adulation showered on Bianca, she is really more than ready to give herself to a man but, imprisoned within a set of aggressive attitudes which have become habitual, has not the fainest idea how to do so. (Ibid)

I think one of my difficulties with Kate's trajectory through the play is that I know so little about her pre-Petruchio. We see her fighting with Bianca, but we know almost nothing about either of them. We're told that Kate is shrewish bladdy blah in a way that suggests she acts like that to everyone and has for a while. Offstage she breaks the lute (of the tutor who's just there to woo her sister, so possibly she's not just being peevish for the sake of being peevish...). We don't really know why she's so upset at Bianca -- when she's asking Bianca which suitor Bianca wants to marry and Bianca's all, "Whichever you want to marry you can have," there's lots of room for Bianca to play that in various ways (is she refusing to answer Kate's question to provoke her? does she really desire Kate's happiness, as a plain reading of the text would suggest?) and this production just played it as a plan reading of the text, so we get no insight into why Kate is so upset with Bianca, and Bianca herself remains flat and uninteresting. (Not that I'm saying you have to stage this scene against the plain reading of the text in order to make sense of Kate's crankiness at Bianca or in order to make Bianca and interesting and/or complex character, just that this scene is one of your only opportunities to do so -- well certainly for the former; admittedly we do see Bianca with the tutors picking a favorite and participating in a ruse, so she's not entirely the flat paragon of passive virtue that the early scenes might suggest.)

My Riverside also says of Petruchio's "taming" of Kate:

he goes on assuring her, despite everything she can do and say to prove the contrary, that she herself is gentle, rational, and loving: exactly the hidden qualities in her that he needs to foster and encourage. Petruchio wins in the end not because of superior force but because he succeeds in showing Katherina both the unloveliness of the false personality she has adopted and the emotional truth of the self she has submerged. (139)

I don't buy that, because whatever he actually believes about her (and I do think he genuinely likes/cares about her), all this rhapsodizing about her is entirely enmeshed with the "taming" such that everything he says to her feels false or cheap or insincere or IDK the exact adjective I'm looking for here.

The Riverside also says of Bianca: "Once married to Lucentio, she ceases to be 'sweet Bianca.' At the wedding feast itself she reveals an unexpected streak of bawdry, willfulness, and arrogance" (140), which I thought was interesting -- I think we tend to have a fairly flat impression of Bianca (because there's not much there there), and we interrogate Kate's closing speech to the exclusion of interrogating anything else about that closing scene (and I include myself in that "we").

( more details about the performance )

Current Music: "Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)" in my head

FCS

I was surprised that Thom W. took so long to teach us "Uyai mose (Come All You People)," as I feel really familiar with this Zimbabwean song, but maybe I know it from e.g. Convo.

Apparently we're doing a summer book series, and Molly started off with Where the Wild Things Are. (

fox1013, I thought of you.)

It was Jubilee Sunday, which meant the kids were in the Sanctuary for the entirety of the service. Jubilee Sunday is not my favorite thing. Molly talked about how people have negative conceptions of Christians, but those aren't necessarily true of us ("We're not weird" -- which we all know is not true, so I hate that she used it as stand-in for "we are not weird in the negative ways that some people except us to be"; she invited people to say "I'm a Christian and [something about themselves]"; one of the new members said, "Late at night, when I'm all alone, I play the banjo in my attic;" yeah, we are totally weird).

***

I went to a Keshet event and picked up a copy of their July & August 2012 calendar, which included:

July 19

Beit Midrash - Boundary Crossing: The Story of Ruth

As queer Jews, our identity is rich and complex. What does it mean to alter our identity? Or come into our identity? How do we learn to read other boundary crossers? Take a journey through the Book of Ruth and see how the best known and most beloved pair of biblical women cross identity boundaries and struggle to be recognized.

Facilitated by Penina Weinberg, biblical scholar and member of our Community Events Committee.

Cosponsored by Havurat Shalom

6:30 pm
Havurat Shalom
113 College Avenue, Somerville
RSVP by 7/16
Free

My experience with the Hav has been that RSVP is in no way required (though I'm sure it helps them for planning purposes). Anyone interested in coming with?

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Anyway, the event itself.

Ladin read from "The God Thing" chapter of her book.

"we are all melachim [angels] -- as if human lives were God's vocal chords"

"Sometimes we want divine room service, but usually we don't, anymore than children want to be followed around by nagging parents who are always right. So God speaks to us through the voices we so desperately want to hear -- other people's."

She talked about circumcision, about the idea (from rabbinic tradition I assume, though I didn't write it down in my notes) that male Jews recreate their bodies to reflect their true identity.

She talked about Shakespeare plays where people change clothes and people don't recognize them and fall in love with them -- said she always thought that was stupid plotting, but then she was at a conference and when she was dressed as herself, people didn't recognize her at all (they knew her as a man, so when they saw her as a woman, it was like, "I don't know a woman who looks like that, don't need to register that person at all").

A woman in front of me said she "works with kids who are born in all sorts of ways parents didn't ask for or sign up for" and mentioned a book of blessing (the name/author of which I didn't catch -- I should have asked afterward) which has the (non-gendered) blessing: "may you be who you are, and may you be blessed in who you are."

Same woman said that "welcoming GBLT...QI..." people is not an add-on but a different theology.

Ladin talked about the fact that we make assumptions about people's genders based on the initial cues we read and talked about the need for a definition of humanness that doesn't rest in gender distinctions -- so that we can respect people even when you can't make sense of their gender.

She talked about how surgery etc. for trans folk is considered medical decision. She said, "we are not allowed to know who we are -- other people have to approve that."

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There were lots of attractive queer-looking ~women, and I am bad at initiating small-talk, and after the event proper was over and people were just mingling, I just wanted a nap (the heat of the room probably wasn't helping), so I bailed rather than attempt to socialize, but I was also thinking about how I feel sort of like an interloper in Jewish spaces. I sent Scott an email about this and he replied the next morning: "this requires in-person comment.... but the short form is DON'T PANIC!" ♥

***

"Joy Sadhana is a daily practice in the observation of joy."
-

mylittleredgirl [more info]
Thus says God to these bones: "I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. I will lay sinews on you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live; and you shall know that I am God." (Ezekiel 37:5-6, NRSV, alt.)

( Read more... )

I woke up at like 6am this morning and got to go back to sleep :D I got up around 9 and had a leisurely morning.

Saturday bff phonecall had an intermission on account of when my available slots for a "I would like a haircut tomorrow" were, but we still possibly broke our record of longest phonecall (2:21:01 + 6:23:33 = 8:44:34).

My hairdresser asked me if I'd biked (as I had the last time). I said no, that I'd been on the phone with my best friend and I knew I could keep talking to her if I walked but not if I biked.
Hairdresser said, "You'll have to call someone else you like on the way home."

I continued to acquire new projects -- like liturgical dance Sunday and adding hymnals to hymnary.org

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Someone on my facebook feed posted: "I'm so proud of our massachusetts ucc churches. We just voted to make sure Open and Affirming churches welcome transgender people and people of all gender identities and gender expressions!"

I look forward to our utilizing non-binary gender language in e.g. liturgy, our not assuming people's pronouns, etc. (No, I don't actually have any optimism on this front, but it does give me more grounds from which to push for that sort of stuff.)

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Poll inspired by conversation with la bff (which was in turn inspired by a book she's reading):

Do you believe in the resurrection of the body (of people in general, not Jesus in specific)?

I'm mostly interested in responses from people who identify as Christian, but I'm not gonna stop anyone from filling out the poll.

[Poll #1847424]

***

"Joy Sadhana is a daily practice in the observation of joy."
-

seen on facebook this morning:

(1) The Naked I: Monologues from Beyond the Binary
OMG I love this show so much! (I saw it when it debuted at Smith and then again at UMass Amherst)
returns to Smith (Hillyer Hall) Tuesday, March 23 @ 7:30pm
Also: Social Justice Week (sometimes I love my alma mater)

(2) Australia may have made gender history this week, as the New South Wales government lays claim to being the first in the world to recognise an individual’s sex as officially “not specified”.

Dreams this morning included Jenny (my brother's fiancee) having a trans sibling. She kept saying "he" and then she said something that made me think the sibling had been born "he" and so I said, "Oh, SHE's trans," and Jenny was v. confused, and I kept insistently asking, "What gender was your sibling assigned at birth?" (knowing that I could just reverse that to come up with the correct way to refer to the sibling now) and she refused to answer and as the dream went on I came to the conclusion that it was because she was referring to her sibling by the correct/chosen gender and wasn't gonna provide me with personal information -- which was interesting, for me to be the bad guy in an interaction like this.

( crankypants )

***

CWM tonight was a small turn out (though we had 4 newbies), but it was a good night.

Our guest preacher was Rev. Chuck Hartman from Melrose, who was good. After service, Barbara was saying Sean did such a good job with his creative and powerful story of the Last Supper and we have such talented people here and oh, Elizabeth preached and that was great. So Chuck asked me about that, and I sketched out how I became this girl who wrote sermons in her free time and Tiffany insisted I preach out loud before she left. He asked if I was studying, and I said no -- told him where I work, said I have an undergraduate degree in English and people keep suggesting I go to divinity school and I keep saying no (he made some noise in agreement with all those people). I said that church is basically what I do with my free time, and I sketched out my primary weekly church involvement -- so I said it's like I'm taking classes. He invited me to preach at Melrose and I said sure.

Chuck: "How about next Sunday?"
me: "Maybe not so much."
Chuck: "How about the next few Sundays? I could take a vacation."

[GoodReads]

I added this to my GoodReads after reading Lee Wind's review. Then

mjules read it, and had comments which reminded me of Ari's complaints about Luna. So I was pleasantly surprised by the protagonist's reactions overall. (Also, I really liked that he almost always referred to Sage as "she," even when he was first feeling all, "Ugh, Sage is really a guy." He has only ever known Sage as "she," so that response makes perfect sense -- see also my comments on Luna.)

Jules makes a good point about the fact that this might be difficult to read as a trans person, though -- it didn't occur to me in reading it (hi, I am cisgendered) but which on reflection, yeah. However, I was really pleased that the reactions to Sage's revelation were varied and plausible. ( Read more... )

[GoodReads]

I reread this after having finally read Parrotfish. My mom got an ARC of this through work (and gave it to me, obv.), and I have barely any memories of that first reading experience.

Ari read this book last year (July, 2009) and commented, "it was really pissing me off (because the protagonist is the younger sister of a trans girl, and she, the protagonist, is trying really hard? But she gets pronouns wrong, and doesn't really understand, and I am auto-fixing pronouns in my head and it's really, really frustrating)." So when I read it this year, I had Ari's comments very much in mind. As I was reading, I kept forgetting about Ari's criticism because it felt so natural that Regan (the trans character's little sister) was referring to her sibling with male or female pronouns depending on how the sibling was presenting -- though yes of course it's problematic, since Regan's sibling is female, regardless of presentation.

Other notes:

I really didn't care about Regan's het romance plotline -- and I winced a lot.

After I finished the book, I found myself wondering who the target audience for this book is.

[GoodReads]

♥ Yes, this book is About Being Trans, and it is Educating you the reader, but it's so good. (Caveat: The exoticization of one of the secondary characters made me uncomfortable.) Yes, things go much more easily happily than is likely realistic, but people deserve to see lives like theirs reflected in positive ways. The dead/evil cliche has been around long enough. Especially since I think this is the ONLY ya book with a trans protagonist. (Lee Wind's Transgender Teen Characters/Themes list has a couple YA books -- The Suicide Year and The Sweet In-Between: A Novel -- which I haven't read yet but which seem more like the protagonist cross-dresses because of a particular situation, so it may deal with gender issues but it doesn't actually have a trans protagonist per se.)

Serendipitously, this morning's daily lectionary readings were: Isaiah 61:1-7 and Romans 7:1-6.

I saw FCS-Ian last night 'cause there was Council after Rest and Bread. The copier's still broken, and he asked me if I still had the lectionary sheet* and I said yeah, not with me but at home, that I was planning to bring it to church and that I could also email him the Thursday daily lectionaries for the weeks until Lent. I got home and couldn't find it, so I typed up the Thursdays until Lent from my RCL book.

*Two Thursdays ago, he hadn't printed up slips, so I used his sheet of the month's daily lectionaries, and took it with me, thinking he had another copy, and the next week he didn't have a copy but I still had mine in my bag.

He replied later this morning:

Thank you very much. It is so nice to see you on Thursday mornings.

Bless,
Ian

***

Today was really busy at work. I literally didn't get done all the things I had to get done. I didn't feel like I was dropping balls, though, and I did take various breathers (including a comfortable lunch -- outside! -- with Cate). Scott said he'd never seen me so busy. I pointed out that the day Sonia came to visit was really busy. He said that was the second busiest.

At one point, he complimented me on a phone call he had been present for, said I clearly work in the Negotiations unit. I said that was funny because when Jim had approached me and said, "A project for your diplomacy skills," I had mentally recoiled, thinking, "Least favorite part of my job -- diplomacy, politic, negotiation." Scott said be that as it may, it doesn't change the fact that I'm good at it. "In certain contexts," I insisted. (I feel like what Scott was present for wasn't much of a negotiation.)

I am good at being mad at people, and I am good at taking care of people -- these are modes I operate really well (comfortably) in. I debated going to Blue Shirt tonight, because I was feeling like I needed to recharge and being around people was going to drain me further. But I went anyway. I got a sandwich and a fruit&sorbet smoothie -- yay healthy food. It was just Kathy and Gianna, and Gianna was leaving. We talked about church and family and etc. (Laura Ruth greeted me with, "Doctor [surname].") Erica, and Jeff, came later.

Laura Ruth told the story of going to Scott Brown's office today -- she was at the State House to lobby for trans rights, and Scott Brown's office is right near her Senator's office (Sonia Chang-Díaz) -- and confessing that she had thought she didn't need to know anything about Scott Brown because she was so sure that Martha Coakley would be elected, and so she doesn't know anything about him, and she talked to his legislative liaison or somebody (I forget) and asked questions, including, "My congregation is really progressive, so what can we do to support you, given how different we are?" and the guy said, "Talk to us -- write to us, email us ... we have to represent the whole state, not just a part of it."

Around 7 (I got there around 6) Laura Ruth and Jeff had their meeting about re/New etc. Well, it started with Laura Ruth saying that she and Jeff needed to have their meeting, and I got up, and Jeff said, "It's an open meeting," and I sat back down.

I wasn't sure how helpful I would be, but I had some potentially useful thoughts, and I was really useful in practical matters of reminding them of things they had said they would talk about, asking Laura Ruth if she should input into her phone calendar a change they had agreed on verbally, etc. At point I said, "And people wonder why I'm never planning to quit my job -- this is what I do," and Laura Ruth said something about Calling (in a way which Affirmed that this is a gift of mine).

They talked about "Christian rockstar music," and she made a disgusted face. She said, "My nephew's a Christian rockstar. I love the boy, but it's nauseating," and she mimed preening flowing hair. I said, "Would you feel the same way if he were gay? I'm just thinking, with the [miming], that if he were gay, you would be like, 'Oh, that's so [mentally searches for a good word].' " She was appropriately abashed and said, "Point taken, you don't even need to finish the sentence."

At one point, Laura Ruth mentioned a couple in the church and referred to them as a straight couple and then said, "Well, I don't know -- [male name] might be trans." I said, "Trans people can be straight," and later, "If one person uses masculine pronouns and the other person uses female pronouns, they're an opposite-gender couple -- who may or may not identify as queer." Jeff asked, "When are we [First Church] gonna do queer theory 101?" and I got all excited. He said, "I probably sound like my grandma does on race," and Laura Ruth assured him that wasn't so, and she also said she wasn't sure she even knows what queer theory is. I said that "queer theory" in the academic sense contains a lot including a lot of stuff I don't necessarily understand, but that what Jeff meant, like GLBT Issues 300, is something I'm really excited about -- about the nuances of language and the difference between sex and gender and all that.

We finally departed around 8:30.

Other good things about today: The job candidate didn't mind my taking him outside, the glitches that there were seemed to be fine, my W-2 came in the mail so I can now file my taxes, the FCS prayer retreat is 5pm-5pm so I don't have to miss the teaching part of that workday.

Edit: Tiffany and I made a date for coffee before she leaves, and I asked if she wanted to meet at Mr. Crepe or somewhere else, and she said, "Why break with tradition? Mr. Crepe works for me." ♥

Current Music: "Step By Step (O God You Are My God)" Christian rockstar music in my head

As I was setting up before Rest and Bread tonight, my cell phone rang. I almost didn't answer it because I didn't recognize the number and I figured they probably wanted my money, but hey I was way early and if they were someone I wanted to give my money to I had my credit card in my pocket. It was the therapist I'd left a vm with this afternoon. (The woman Tiffany referred me to is out-of-network and I have an HMO, and the two people she named are also out-of-network, so I did a brief browse of the in-network online search.) I felt bad that I was chatting in the chapel ('cause partway through a guy came in and hung out a bit and then left) but it turned out that he was a guy who had come a while ago and didn't know we'd moved service to 15 minutes later than it was before so he was just very early.

After I'd finished set up and gotten off the phone, I went upstairs to Laura Ruth's office. She told Keith (who had been in Puerto Rico) that I was "AWESOME!" on Sunday. She then said. "I met her mum and dad on Sunday, and you know that thing she does? [demonstrates standing behind me, her hand on my back/shoulder] Her whole family does that." This is apparently a thing that I/we do without even thinking, because I had to think to remember that yes my mother did that, and had to work even harder to remember that this is a thing that I do. Hugging I know I do -- and random shoulder massages I know I used to do a lot. But that way of maintaining physical contact with someone even when you're not directly engaging with them... yeah, that is totally something me and my mom would do but is not something I ever would have thought of.

Laura Ruth was cold, as per usual, and I asked, "Would you like fingerless gloves?" She was resistant to the idea of my buying her a pair as a gift (what is WRONG with people?) but she is letting me get her a pair (I said, "They're like five bucks," and she gave my a $5 bill and said she would give me whatever additional money it cost; I am reminded of how ungood it is to not allow people to bestow a gift on you -- but seeing the $5 biill in my pocket when I was emptying my pockets before bed reminded me that I need to find her a pair, so that's good).

Dear Beloved Congregation,

At 6:30 PM today, we will gather for Rest and Bread, to pray and share the feast of Communion. Music for meditation begins at 6:15.

In Davis Sq., one of our neighbors is the Haitian Bible Baptist Church at 45 College Ave. We'll pray for this congregation and all our neighbors whose families are affected by the massive earthquake in Haiti.

Speaking of praying, our Annual Retreat is coming up, February 5 & 6. Our theme is Prayer. We will be exploring the ideas and practices of prayer, looking for ways of praying that feel real, are real. Some of us need to draw in order to pray, some need to move our bodies. Some of us need to pray with words and some of us don't know how to find words, but we can find the alignment of our spirit to God's presence. Some of us are at the beginning of a prayer practice and some of us begin again each morning. Please contact Liz [redacted] and Betsy [redacted], copied here, to register.

Love,
Laura Ruth

(This tempts me to attend the retreat.)

***

Psalm 121
Ephesians 2:12(?)-22 (I thought of Yoder's "Baptism and the New Humanity" chapter.)

Rest and Bread is following FCS Sunday morning in doing a series on "Race, Immigration and Justice."

During Prayers of the People, I said, "I pray for the trans woman I read about today who ( this may be triggering ). And I pray for all those who do not have control over their own bodies because of gender, disability, class, race." (After I finished, I realized I should have said, "or any other reason.")

And later I listed a litany of prayer requests and closed with prayers for myself that I be able to take care of myself with all this stress. \o/

Inviting us to Confession, I said, "We acknowledge the moments where we have missed the mark -- where we have done that which we wish we had not done, and where we have failed to do that which we know we should do. And we acknowledge those moments, knowing that after we acknowledge them to God, we can let them go, let go of the guilt -- knowing that God is always welcoming us into that light, into that love."

adult class
Sun, January 3, 2010 7:32:00 AM

Hello Elizabeth,
I hope you check your email this morning because I just got a call saying that they have canceled church.
I lost your phone number (if I had it) or I would call you.
Owen

At one point this morning, Melissa's houseguest asked me when church was ('cause I was hanging around the house).
me: "10:30 -- my 9:00 church was canceled."
Melissa: "I didn't know you went to two Sunday morning church services."
me: "I don't -- the 9:00 is Adult Ed."
Melissa: "Because you're not educated enough."

Later, Melissa's houseguest was checking out my bookshelves and said, "You're a knowledge junkie."

[FirstChurch Mailing List] Yup, we're here at Church
Sun, January 3, 2010 9:01:10 AM

Dear Beloved Ones,

I just got in from Jamaica Plain. The roads are slippery. If you can get here, come. If you can't stay home, stay safe. We'll pray for you, and then eat your share at coffee hour.

Love to you, with wishes for your safety,
Laura Ruth

CHPC

I called the office ~8:30 and ~9:30 and got the generic message both times.

While I think church should basically never cancel, a large part of me was hoping CHPC would cancel so I could go to First Church instead because I didn't actually want to go to CHPC.

I felt like the snow was worse than it was the Sunday before Christmas (though I don't think I would posit either as bad). It had actually stopped by the time I left church around 12:15.

Intro'ing the Call to Worship, Karl did the usual "please rise as you are able" and said, "if you are able -- I assume most of you are." Disability FAIL. I know that this phrase is part of the rote liturgy and we don't think about why we say it and if we did we think of people who are in wheelchairs and elderly people and etc., but hello invisible disability -- and not making assumptions about who is in the room. (Yes, I am bringing this up in the email I am writing to him.)

Because there were so few people, Karl said he was going to do something a little different -- rather than doing a full sermon, he would share some of this thoughts and then invite us to respond.

He talked about universalism (the star appeared to strangers, drawing them in) and incarnation (God incarnating tells us that the things of the earth hold the divine). I didn't really disagree with any of his statements (though I wouldn't have necessarily gone the incarnation route with the Epiphany story, and I think he gives the Incarnation broader implications than I think it merits).

After he was done, he asked if we had any questions, and no one said anything, and he sort of got on our case and I felt like, "I have thoughts on Epiphany and the Incarnation, but not necessarily questions." Someone commented that the Incarnation can be dangerous because it kind of brings us back to ancient days when kings for example were seen as divine. I countered that it brings us back to the roots of our faith tradition, when God created the earth and called it Good, that it tells us that God makes God's home here on earth, that God is not just in the ethereal heavens or sky but that God most fully encounters us in incarnate fleshly humanity rather than in dreams or visions.

Talking about wanting to encourage this kind of discussion/dialogue (so that he is not just "indoctrinating" us, and also so that he knows that people are actually paying attention ;) ) Karl said we often leave our brains at the door when we enter church, and I made disbelieving gestures of outrage at this implication. I asked if this meant I could interrupt and argue with his sermons, if that was encouraged. He said he had thought about that before and wasn't sure if that was the appropriate place for that kind of dialogue -- and said he has considered opening up a space right after the sermon for people to fire back -- but that afterward is definitely appropriate.

Richard did Focus on Mission -- talked about a church he has attended in Palm Springs (he travels a lot) which is actually growing and a conversation he had with the pastor, who said (among other things) that. Karl said he would be really interested to hear from those who are relatively new here, what their experience of the first ten minutes here is, and for those of us who have been here for a while ... he got on his scolding soap box and said that new people are often sitting in the sanctuary by themselves for a long time because the regular congregants largely don't start trickling in until about 10:30. I said, "But church doesn't start promptly at 10:30, so we're not incentivized to be here on time." Because trufax, I am not motivated to be at CHPC at 10:30 (or my customary 5 minutes before scheduled start time) because we so rarely start actually on time (plus, of course, I do not love this church -- I am not fed, nourished, inspired, renewed, etc. by its worship services and etc.).

Isabelle's home on break from Bryn Mawr, and at Coffee Hour Ruth mentioned that she knows a couple of guys who went Bryn Mawr -- for grad school, she explained. I said that it says something about the circles I'm in that my first thought was, "Oh, they used to be girls." After I said it I realized I should have said, "They used to be female-bodied" ('cause hi, gender identity) but since I'd already set the tone with my phrasing, I felt like I couldn't then correct Ruth when she was talking about men she knows who used to be women. (AllyFail, I know.)

CWM

The "CWM Weekly News" Tiffany sent out last night (which actually sketched out the whole month's calendar -- yay!) opened "Grace and Peace to you in this Second Week of Christmas!"

And the bulletin said: "The Second Sunday of Christmas: Celebrating the Coming Epiphany" ♥

Steven from Sacred Eros showed up at church. I win at evangelism :) Or something.

Tiffany opened with talking about an Art History class she took, which she was really struggling with because she didn't have the grounding in Christian stories to recognize the players in the paintings, and how one day her professor advised her (and the other students who were similarly struggling) to look for the halos, because that indicates the important players. She talked about how when the magi came upon the scene of the Holy Family, they didn't have the holy halos painted in by the Old Masters to guide them but that they were probably looking for the markers of power of their own day (they first went to King Herod in Jerusalem, for example, expecting that he would know who was to succeed him as King of the Jews) -- just as we seek validation from cultural markers like what we own and what people say about us. She referenced U2's "I still haven't found what I'm looking for" and talked about how we are often yearning for God etc. but are seeking big dramatic obvious moments. I insisted that no you don't really want the heavens to open and God to speak to you unmistakably -- but I respect that she does want some clarity of message from God. She said that although the world is a mess, she has learned to cultivate the spiritual discipline/practice of seeing God in little things, to see God's immanence all over the place time after time.

While I disagree with her take on the magi, what I was really struck by was when she said something (in reference to herself) about "cynical" and I thought of how she grooves on being a prophet of woe but that despite Mike R. and I being "Team Cynic" at CAUMC small group, I am forever saying, "But what is the Good News, Tiffany?"

My facebook status after I got home from evening church: "(1) continues to be surprised that not everyone else has read the blogposts she has read about the race and disability fail of James Cameron's Avatar, (1a) keeps wanting to call FAIL all over the place re: race, gender, ability, etc., but is usually too confrontation-avoidant to do so (AllyFail); (2) is not wired to be a cynical prophet of woe."

I didn't go to the Harvard Lesbian/Bisexual/Transgender/Queer Women's Lunch today -- both because I am antisocial and because I am overly committed to my job (I have a wicked "Just in case").

***

Yesterday afternoon, Jeff emailed the Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance book group:

Hey everyone!

Greetings after such a long break! I think we've been apart for too long, and even though the trans day of remembrance vigil is friday, let's get together for our next installment of zen. Let's read at least the next two chapters and go from there. See ya then!

Jeff

Sent from my iPhone

Yeah, I winced. It took until tonight for me to email him back. I read (okay, mostly skimmed) a bunch of stuff today (see list below) about representation etc., and while I was on the phone with Ari I was thinking about what a position of privilege I'm in that I could even be debating whether to say anything.

sage_theory: This is why I don't watch Heroes anymore...
seeksadventure: [links] feminists and disabilities links
fox1013: If you're on Heroes, I GUARANTEE your Christmases will be white! Also male. JSYK.

In talking with Ari tonight, I realized that CWM hadn't announced anything about the TDoR vigil this Friday or any of the related events this week. I suspect this is because Tiffany was still recovering from being sick and also had a memorial service that same day and Marla and Sean were at Boston Common in case any students got arrested* and Jordan wasn't there and yeah. I still think it is a bit o' fail for us, though. Christ the King Sunday is next Sunday and now I am thinking about trying to combine the two in my sermon. (Full disclosure: I haven't looked at the lectionary readings yet.)

*College students are sleeping out to protest their dorms being powered by dirty electricity, and in Boston they're sleeping on Boston Common on Sunday nights and lobbying legislators Monday morning, and summons were handed out the previous Sunday.

I was catching up on Saint Nicholas Is In Hull on my GoogleReader the other day, and a section of one entry jumped out at me:

Then she asked me, "I am... have you ever even healed anyone?"

[...]

My response was, "Well... I can't say that I have."

I kind of blinked.

I feel like my response would be, "Well not in the sense that a doctor does... but I have sat with people in pain, I have provided a safe place for people in crisis..."

I believe I have mentioned before that I love Julia Kasdorf's poem "What I Learned from My Mother."

Like a doctor, I learned to create
from another’s suffering my own usefulness, and once
you know how to do this, you can never refuse.
To every house you enter, you must offer
healing: a chocolate cake you baked yourself,
the blessing of your voice, your chaste touch.

***

Today, I was catching up on sermons at First Church.

In her July 5 sermon "Healing...on One Foot" (Mark 6:1-13), Kerrie Harthan posited that we are all healers, and I was so glad to hear that after reading that blog entry.

She also said, "our gospel message isn't about escaping, it's about being liberated -- it's about engaging."

She also shared an interesting thought from her spouse, Gloria, about being inspired by movements rather than individuals -- at least not until they are dead, so we can be sure they will not betray us. And also, "sometimes when a leader goes away, so does the teaching."

***

How To Practice
(Mark 6:30-34) Rev Laura Ruth Jarrett preaching, July 19, 2009

There's some stuff here I want to come back to again and again.

I wonder, how did Jesus came to belief. Did he believe in God, or Judaism out of the shoot because, well, he was God? Did he believe in himself? But how did he learn how to marshall his energies, when to rest and retreat? When he was healing folks, how did he learn to let out the right amout of power so that folks were healed but not raptured or slain? How did he know when to raise someone from the dead (if we believe he did) and when to let folks lie moldering. How did he know or handle the fact that folks thought he was the Messiah? How do you learn how to do that, be the Messiah?

[...]

Another practice that maybe you thought was a commandment: you shall not commit adultery. Not committing adultery is hard! It takes spiritual practice not to step out on your partner! Some of us prefer the thrill of indiscretion to the centered, patient, kind, sometimes painful, sometimes dull, working out of relationship, or the careful dissolution of relationship that no longer works. What we learn from relationships, we learn about ourselves and about our relationship with God. So, practice fidelity in relationships, a kind of fidelity you and your partner work out. It takes practice.

[...]

Don’t lie. Figuring out how to tell the truth takes a lot of practice, telling truth not as a weapon, but as a means of being in relationship – letting your yes be yes and your no be no. Hard, work! Not a thing done perfectly, or instantly. It takes a lot of practicing. Once we stop being attached to telling what we wish were true, we can become free. This is what Jesus teaches, the truth will set us free.

[...]

But also spiritual practice leads us into belief, belief that little by little, or maybe very quickly, causes us to understand truths too large to be contained by our puny, valiant, striving, resilient, market saturated spirits, truths that attempt to be explained by the metaphor of Trinity, or virgin birth, life that does not end. Here is a spiritual practice. Try not to limit the work of God. Try not to make the vast mystery of God small. Try not to get tripped up by other people’s metaphors. Have patience and let God be revealed to you, allow yourselves to be opened. This is my prayer for you.

***

Catching up on TransEpiscopal blog, I read (emphasis mine)

And obviously, if you have been following this blog, by now you know that at this Convention we made stunning progress on transgender issues. As we look back on the work of this Convention, I think it will be important to see this progress in the larger context of the forward movement via D025 and C056. But I also think our progress was part of the spirit of openness and relationality, and indeed of intentional, focused storytelling that were themes of this Convention (not to mention humor, as several bishops displayed during their session Friday). The spirit of the indaba groups that were featured at last summer’s Lambeth Conference also feels connected to this trend. People were careful not to demonize one another in their disagreements. People attended to one another’s humanity. Those of us who testified on the transgender related resolutions benefited from and, I hope and believe, contributed to that spirit.

And that is as it should be. That kind of attentiveness to one another’s humanity is at the heart of the Baptismal Covenant of the Episcopal Church, which asks, “will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself?” and “will you strive for justice and peace and respect the dignity of every human being?” The answer to these questions may seem easy, but sometimes they are not — which is why the response given in the Book of Common Prayer is “I will, with God’s help.” This Christian life we are about is a spiritual discipline that we all pledge to take up upon entry into this beloved community. And I know in my very gut that when we live into that discipline, when we do, with God’s help, we grow. Advent approaches indeed.

I've encountered a bunch of baptismal/membership covenants recently (attending ordinations and such), and my reaction is often, "I cannot vow that," but that one I could, that one I want to.

***

A "when loves come to town" blog entry I read recently (the first in an "Everything belongs..." series) included a YouTube embed of Bob Franke singing "For Real," and I pulled it up and listened to it this afternoon.

"let's be kind to each other -- not forever but for real"

I was struck by this as I had spent much of this afternoon sitting (metaphorically) with a beloved, praying "God have mercy."

There's a hole in the middle of the prettiest life
So the lawyers and the prophets say
Not your father nor your mother
Nor you lover's gonna ever make it go away
And there's too much darkness in an endless night
To be afraid of the way we feel
Let's be kind to each other
Not forever but for real

I forgot about the ending verse:

Some say that God is a lover
Some say it's an endless void
Some say both, some say she's angry
Some say he's just annoyed
But if God felt a hammer in the palm of his hand
Then God knows the way we feel
And love lasts forever
Forever and for real

Love lasts forever

I thought first of recent discussions about what religion means to different people and second of Catie Curtis' song "The Big Reprise."

The previous entry on "when loves comes to town" included an embed of Alison Krauss And Robert Plant performing "Down to the River to Pray."

Rest and Bread

Dear Beloved,

We gather this evening for at 6:15 for communion and prayer. We're reflecting on sheep tonight, how we are like sheep, and Jesus the shepherd. Come be gathered in.

We have music for meditation at 6. You may come at 6 to pray.If you'd prefer to come at 6:10 or 6:14, and even if you're late, don't worry about disturbing us. We don't mind you coming in when you're ready, because we're glad to see you.

***

[FirstChurch Mailing List] an act of vandalism in Watertown, a call for witness

Dear Beloved,

The Watertown UU Congregation's rainbow flag was torched. I don't know more details than that, other than to say, that no physical bodies were hurt.

The Watertown congregation has asked for a gathering in Watertown Sq. on Saturday, July 25th at 6 PM. After gathering, we will march to the church, about three blocks away, and reinstall the flag.

The FCS Marching Band will go to lend a hand and to bear witness. Will you come, also?

Between now and then, please will you remember and pray for those who, everyday, must decide how to react in a world that cannot behold their entire humanity. While this prayer may include each of us sometime, I particularly think of Professor Henry Louis Gates, and all who have been taken out of their homes in handcuffs.

May we share the solidarity we crave.

Although we don't know the circumstances of those who burned the rainbow flag or the circumstances of Officer Crowley who arrested Professor Gates, please, may we pray for them, also?

May we share the compassion we crave.

Yours, in solidarity and compassion,
Laura Ruth

***

Before service, Laura Ruth asked how I was, and I said, "I'm a little tired, but I'll be okay." (I knew she had service prep to do, and I would lift up my prayer concerns at the appropriate time during the service.)

Later, she said, "You're a good egg, sister girl."

Psalm 61 ("Lead me to the rock that is higher than I")
Luke 15:1-7

I loved how she talked, really lovingly, both in our pre-service prayer (I was helping her lead worship, as Keith was away) and in her Reflection, about the incident with Prof. Gates and about calling us to be our best selves. In her Reflection, she talked about how God seeks us, picks up and puts us on his shoulders -- "or embraces you in a way that would be more comfortable to you."

I went to bed at like 9:30 last night, woke up at like 6:30 this morning (yeah 9 hours of sleep!), woke up again (and got up) a couple minutes before my 8:00 alarm.

Dreams included going through a series of tunnels (Star Trek reboot movie -- which I haven't actually seen -- mixed with Cold War era) and the last security door we had to go through our IDs didn't work and an official was examining mine and I got fed up and said, "IT'S FROM NASA." My companion was like, "Why the rush?" and I said I was getting tired of waiting. My interpretation of this when I woke up was something positive related to taking charge -- though on reflection it could also be something about me being an impatient control freak. But so many of my dreams involve me running (or trying to and failing), so I feel like this was probably a good thing.

I got ready for the day (black sneakers, blue jeans, brown button-down shirt, Ask. Tell. dogtag, rainbow star earrings, CWM "Religion Is A Queer Thing" button on my black backpack) and headed out to Annual Conference. #101 bus to Sullivan, Orange Line to North Station, bought double breakfast at Dunkin' Donuts and also a round trip to Beverly Fams (Zone 5). I was gonna read on the commuter rail, but instead I totally fell asleep -- though I woke up at every stop, and the stop before mine I got up to be sure to not miss my own stop. I had Beverly City Taxi in my phone from when Cate and I went to NSMT, but I was really feeling the fact that I had barely walked all day, so I took out the Google directions I had printed out and walked the ~2.5miles. It was a nice walk.

I had skimmed the schedule, but didn't think to look closely or print it out, so I retained the "Registration at the Barrington Center" part and even looked at a map of Gordon College to have a basic sense of where I was going, but when I got to the Barrington Center it was empty. It was nearly noon, so I figured I'd soon see floods of Methodists heading to lunch, but I was getting bored so I started to walk back through campus. I saw a guy with a nametag and said, "New England Annual Conference of United Methodists, where is that?" He replied, "Everywhere," but then said it was almost lunchtime and lunch was on the lawn in front of the chapel, "the tall white pointy building," and pointed me in the direction thereof.

As I walked up the steps of the chapel, I saw Barbara at the rainbow stoles table. I'd been given one at Convo 2007, but it was a bit too flourescent for my taste, plus I just felt weird, so I didn't wear it (yes, I'm the only person in the CWM photo not wearing one), but here there were a multitude of options on this table, and one pattern reminded me of a facebook quiz my best friend took, so I bought one for me and one for her. (If anyone wants one of their own, just let me know, since I know the folk storing the leftovers. There were beautiful ones reminiscent of stained-glass windows, but since I am never going to wear one it seemed extra foolish to wear two. Though I found myself really appreciating seeing all these people wearing stoles and knowing they were Reconciling, and I'm actually still wearing my stole.) ( rainbow stoles explanation )

I had lunch with the Reconciling folks (apparently you couldn't buy a lunch ticket, had to have pre-registered, so I was glad I had brought second breakfast and trail mix). Someone said that 12 or 13 retired Reconciling clergy (I wasn't clear if this was just in the New England Annual Conference or nationally) have presided over same-sex marriages and holy unions -- because the Church can't do much to punish retired clergy, whereas it can punish those who are not yet retired. Hi, I think this is awesome. He also said they're gonna be making a public declaration of this fact, signing their names, as a show of support.

***

I had come today primarily because Tiffany had raved about Violet Fisher's preaching. And really, coming for lunch + church service was probably a good plan (though next year maybe I will go for some of the discussion/voting). The service lasted literally from ~2:00-4:50pm. I knew almost all of the hymns, and I found myself really conscious of the language of submission and Lordship and blood atonement and so forth.

Scripture Readings:
Amos 8:10-12
Psalm 119:97-105
II Timothy 2:8-16

Bishop Violet Fisher preached on "Being the Word." Her sermon was very much slanted toward the confirmands etc., which made sense [the booklet we got said on its cover, "Order of Worship for: Recognition of Local Pastors, Commissioning of Provisional Deacons & Elders, Ordination of Deacons and Elders, Reception Into Full Connection"] but which still felt a little weird to me.
She said that there is a famine of the Word and we are called to be the Internet. (Near the end of the sermon, she repeated that with lots of specific examples and after listing Facebook and MySpace, she had a slip of the tongue and said SpaceBook :) )
She quoted Gandhi as saying the Bible "has enough dynamite in it to blow the whole of civilization to bits; to turn society upside down; to bring peace to this war-torn world. But you read it as if it were just good literature, and nothing else."
She exhorted us: "Don't get so wrapped up in church-work [e.g., what color a room should be painted] that you lose sight of the work of the church [saving people, healing people, loving people, blessing people]."
Don't lose your joy -- "Dragging to the pulpit -- just as I am, without one plea," she deadpanned.
She said, "Don't let the folk in the church wipe you out," and in part because I was sitting with CWM folk, I automatically heard that as a word of encouragement to queer folk (and anyone else the institutionalized church would be happy to not have to deal with ... though I know that in the context, what she had meant was in the sense of "worn out and worn down" rather than "eliminated").
She exhorted us to be, said "our excitement is contagious ... that others will hunger and thirst for righteousness."
She reminded us to "stay in the Word, find yourself in the Word."
She said that people outside of the church ask, "What is the lifeline of that church? Where is the transforming hope?"

It was really unclear when we were supposed to go up to get communed (P.S. It still irritates me that the official UMC Communion liturgy says "wine" when one of the defining characteristics of Methodists is that WE DON'T CONSUME ALCOHOL.) so eventually when we saw Will really near us, we just went and got communed. Will said, "The Cup of the Holy Spirit, poured out for you." Yes, I am glad the CWM balcony contingent were able to get non-traditionally communed. [At LizL's ordination, the people communing me just said "The Body of Christ" and "The Blood of Christ," and I almost said "The Bread of life" and "The Cup of blessing" or something as a response instead of "Amen" because I was so thrown. I am used to there being metaphors, both because straight-up blood atonement is uncomfortable and problematic and also to make it more meaningful and relevant and resonant.]

Tallessyn and Michele went down at the not-an-altar-call (apparently in the UMC, there's a whole Process for becoming a deacon, not just for becoming an ordained minister [edit] at CWM on Sunday, Sean reminded me that in the UMC, "deacon" is a position of ordained ministry -- though there's also "deaconess," which is a lay position and is what Michele is discerning a call toward [/edit]) and the congregation was singing "Here I Am, Lord," and I didn't go down to pray with them because I didn't really understand this unfamiliar-to-me process and didn't feel like I was in the right [soul/head/heart/something]space to pray with them, but I actually cried as I watched their family [for various definitions] gather around them, which surprised me.

***

Tallessyn drove me back to Beverly Farms T station because I didn't have quite enough time to walk back for a 5:36 departure, but then Carolyn called and said her friend Sarah had another seat in her bug, so I got a ride all the way to a block from my house. She picked me up about 5:35 and I got home around 6:10. Sweet! (I wouldn't have gotten to North Station until 6:22, and then I still would have done Green Line to Park Street, Red Line to Davis, and walk home -- because I didn't have a #101 schedule but didn't think it would be running very frequently and I don't know the walk back from Sullivan.)

***

Sidebar: If you Google hrc + enda, this really thorough blogpost from October 4, 2007 is the first hit. \o/ Someone was asking me what the trans community's complaint with the HRC is, and I wanted to confirm that I was recalling correctly.

***

"Joy Sadhana is a daily practice in the observation of joy."
-

mylittleredgirl [more info]

"Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: you don't give up." --Anne Lamott

Good things about today:

It was not grossly humid out.
The abovementioned good things about Annual Conference.
During part of the service, Carolyn was scratching my back, and it felt really good.
Apparently Singspiration is happening for a 12th season, just on a reduced frequency. (I worry about JoeF burning out, but it will be nice to see the gang.)
bff (2:34:58)

Things I did well today:

I did sufficient planning ahead (okay, much of that happened in previous days) and successfully got to Annual Conference.
I did some LJ commenting, and was thoughtful and attentive of others in various ways.
I appropriately set my alarm for tomorrow.

Things I am looking forward to (doing [better]) tomorrow:
["anything that you're looking forward to, that means you're facing tomorrow with joy, not trepidation," as Ari says]

9am corporate prayer at SCBC
Kelsey and Kristy are leading worship at CHPC, and I'm lay reading.
hearing more about Annual Conference from CWM folks ~~(oh, and I'm lay reading there, too)~~

First, Happy 28^th wedding anniversary to my parents.

Second, Happy PRIDE!

The Pride Interfaith Service felt a lot like last year's. ( Read more... )

We got second breakfast at the Dunkin' Donuts by Boylston and came back and watched the Parade from about where we did last year. Unfortunately we didn't manage to meet up with Roza.

Five minutes after I left my house, I realized I totally hadn't thought to bring a camera. (Allie didn't either, which we both regretted a bit.)

[Parade was about 12:20pm-1:20pm where we were.]
I think it was the Roller Derby girls who had pretty girls (shimmery midrif-baring outfits and brightly colored hair) holding their banner.
We also saw a costumed contingent from comicopia incl. Dazzler.
I liked that not all the politicians were white men. I also liked how many groups there were of middle-aged/retired folks (including a couple drag queens).
There was a group of Indian (as in, Indian subcontinent) folks, which we didn't remember from last year.
One of the trucks representing a gay club had folks with whips and floggers, but I think that was the only BDSM representation.
I saw First Pres Waltham and LizL looked hott in her clerical collar. I also recognized RevSteph with The Crossing and Desmond from ASC and recognized lots of FCS folks (marching as one among many UCC congregations). I didn't see ANTS, but I did see their banner hung up at the Interfaith Service.
[official website: parade route and participants]

City Hall Plaza seemed even more crowded than in years past. We hit the Bisexual Resource Center booth (Ellyn -- formerly of Teen Voices, now living with her partner in Brockton -- and I chatted catching up) and I considered getting a "It's not a phase It's my life" t-shirt. We regretted not stopping at the "Don't Ask Don't Tell" booth. I bought a black messenger bag with a beautiful tree picture on it. $45. I love my cheap black backpack for weekdays when I need to carry a change of clothes (gym) along with a book and water bottle and etc, but it feels a bit much on weekends when I'm only carrying a book and water bottle and etc. We found CWM's booth but didn't stay long (though I did take a pin which I'll put on my backpack) because Carolyn wanted to see about maybe buying a bag like mine and then we were meeting up with

offbalance and

j_bkl. (So I also didn't get to hit the Poly-Amory booth.)

We wanted sit-down lunch, so we headed toward Faneuil Hall. J. mentioned that if there was anywhere we wanted to go but couldn't 'cause we're locals we could use them for the tourist excuse. When we got to Sam's Cafe at Cheers, Allie and I mentioned that neither of us had been there before, so J. decreed that's where we were going. He explained, "As a heterosexual male, it's my job to enforce the patriarchy" (though he also said he's a lesbian). Yeah, I like J. (I've heard lots of "Awesome boyfriend is awesome" stories and I didn't have any reason to disbelieve, but this was the first time I'd actually met him.) And then at one point we were talking about Buffy and he made a cutting remark about Dawn and I flipped him off and he shook my hand -- "Stand up for your girl."
There are 3 ATMs in Quincy Market. We hit all three of them (the first two were broken -- "Throat Error" said the first one) and Erica(?) from the Hav said hi to me during our travels (I was really impressed that she remembered my name). We sat down at the restauarant about 3pm. We hit the bathrooms on the way out of Sam's and hey, ATM. Anyway, I got Pasta Caprese (included artichoke hearts) and a Blueberry Ale (look at me, drinking beer and not minding it at all).
I hadn't seen Sharon in two years, and Allie didn't know either of them, but the four of us easily geeked out together -- plus, bonus, Sharon really likes Boston :)

Allie and I hit Million Year Picnic and Herrell's on the way back.

Getting off the train at Davis, we saw a guy wearing this t-shirt. Allie and I frequently lamented that we passed as straight (and we didn't even get any stickers or beads or anything); we kept seeing all these people who clearly had come from Pride, but we didn't so code to an outsider. Clearly next year we need to plan our outfits better (today we were mostly going for "what will make us overheat least").

Also, apparently I need to take the ferry out to Provincetown with Allie one of these days. And we also need to do the Freedom Trail.

Walking home, we saw the little girl on stilts from the Parade. She was selling lemonade, complete with blue heart-shaped ice cubes. (Yes, we bought some.)

I got home around 6pm and washed the sunscreen off me (Mom, you can be so proud: not only did I remember to put sunscreen on, but I put the bottle in my bag, which meant not only could I put some on my chest -- which I had forgotten initially -- but Allie got to put sunscreen on -- she'd forgotten to put any on until she was too far from her house to go back) ... and napped a bit. Apparently I was more tired than I realized. I probably would have just stayed in bed except I wanted to get this written (parents' anniversary and all).

I was going to also see Trinidad but I woke up (having gone to bed at like 1:10am) at 12:19pm (the film was at 1:30pm, and it takes about an hour for me to get to the MFA).

LGBT Film Festival
Film
Kiss the Moon (Chan di chummi)
3:30 — 4:50 pm
Saturday, May 9, 2009
Remis Auditorium

Kiss the Moon (Chan di chummi) by Khalid Gill (Pakistan/Germany, 2008, 80 min.). Kiss the Moon portrays the lives of Khusras, members of a close-knit subculture of transgendered women in Pakistan. Well aware of the complex and ancient cultural traditions of Pakistani society, the sizeable Khusras community struggles to maintain a harmonious relationship with society, but often at noticeable odds. Kiss the Moon demonstrates how it feels to live in a world where life is divided into a rigid binary of masculine and feminine, crossing gender boundaries to discover the true essence of being: the desire to love and be loved.

The woman who introduced the film said that these people in Pakistan probably wouldn't understand themselves to be "transgender" the way we understand it in the West but would understand themselves as "Third Gender," which carries with it connotations of mystical powers, though there is also the universal experience of alienation and not having good access to medical care and etc.

One of the older Khusras said that they used to be much more respected but now folks are very influenced by cable tv.

We watch one scene of some Khusras dancing to bless a baby boy, and I was unclear as to how much everyone wanted the Khusras to be there -- in part because I don't know the culture, so I don't know if some of what I was reading as hesitancy is just part of the social norm performance (like, when at the end the lead dancer gives the mom back the money, saying it's too little, but ultimately she does take it and says that the mom will have another baby boy next year and so she'll be back next year to dance for that boy).

In one segment, a number of them talked about Khusra community and how they are loved there better than they are by their birth families. But later, one of the older Khusra (called a "mother") explains that each Khusra has a man, without a man life as a Khusra is very difficult. The interviewer asked if this leads Khusras to go into prostitution, and the mother said yes but she disapproves and is glad that her girls aren't doing that.

Despite the intro-er's talk abut "Third Gender," my impression was that the Khusras truly think of themselves as women. Some of them even said as much, including talk about having a "female soul." Some of them talked about how they do all the female domestic work and their families like that, but when they go to become part of a Khusra community their families are all scandalized and don't want them to do that.

There was some talk about being castrated (Nibran Khusra), and one who had had it done said that she felt a feeling of purity, of being free(d) from sin. Another talked about how much she wanted to have herself castrated but she thought surely there must be some purpose for something that God has attached to your body.

Most are given a new name when they become part of their Khusra community. One said she never had an identity card made, said when an official asks for her identity card she just claps once and that indicates that she is Khusra.

There was also some uncomfortable race stuff underneath.
One Khusra wished she had been born white, because she thinks they're prettier.
One Khusra talked about wanting children and had a picture of two white, blond, little kids (one boy, one girl).
And in a segment talking about love, one has a photo from the Titanic movie (Leonardo DiCaprio kneeling and kissing Kate Winslet's gloved hand) up on her wall.

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Elizabeth (the delinquent, ecumenical)

May 2025

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burning like matchsticks in the face of the darkness

when faced with my demons I clothe them and feed them

Entries tagged with issues: trans

(no subject)

"Elizabeth's future: reading trans books so Abby doesn't have to 😂"

[TDOV 2021] book recs

[Touch] Sexyback: or what you will [2014-03-24]

[V&V] The Taming of the Shrew [2014-03-22]

[Pentecost +4]

[Saturday] ALL the hymnals

happy news

"Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets"

Almost Perfect (Brian Katcher, 2009) [2010-02-15]

Luna (Julie Anne Peters, 2004) [2010-02-13]

Parrotfish (Ellen Wittlinger, 2007) [2010-01-22]

Yes, I am up past my bedtime again.

"I lift up my eyes to the hills -- from where will my help come?"

I wore my sparkly gold sweater (for Epiphany).

my facebook status: "is trying to be a better Ally."

ris'n with healing in his wings

"The Word became flesh and dwelt among us."

"we your people, ours the journey..."

[MFA GLBT] Kiss the Moon (Chan di chummi) [2009-05-09]

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May 2025

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