Birthday

My birthday was a couple days ago, and I wanted to make a video on the day. To keep my thoughts straight I read something to read for it....which is below. The video is here, if anyone wants to see it.

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I used to think that my birthdays would never bother me, that I would grow older without being phased by the passing time. And on one hand that's so: I delight in each new white hair I find on my head, enjoying the contrast they make against the dark hair I was born with. But although my age doesn't bother me, I've found that each year around my birthday I wonder what I've done with my life. It's so easy to focus on what I feel are my failures, so perhaps I should take a moment to think about what I've accomplished.

I'm fairly decent at writing, although I haven't been doing much of it lately. Worth mentioning though, in 2009 one of my poems was published in the magazine Cricket.

I'm told that I'm great at photography. And if I may say so myself, I am pretty good at it.

I'm talented at a variety of hand crafts, such as: needlework, spinning yarn, crochet...and more, but I don't feel like listing everything I can do.

I've competed internationally with the Sweet Adeline's chorus Pride of Portland, and in 2009 we took ninth place at internationals in Hawaii.

I'm very close to completing my English degree at Marylhurst University. I spend a lot of time worrying about what a barrier anxiety and depression are in completing my degree, since I'm very aware that I should have graduated by now. But I should probably also remember that it's taken a lot of work to get where I am now.

And, I've always managed to work my way through anxiety and depression. I still struggle, and I'm sure I'll always have my ups and downs, but to have gotten past the really tough times in the past is something.

So maybe, maybe next year, I'll be able to think about all this and my other accomplishments rather than scrutinizing what I haven't succeeded in yet.

A photo of stairs that I took on my birthday

Gender Tag

Over on my YouTube channel I did the Gender Tag a few weeks back. I decided to also write my responses to the gender tag...which should be interesting, particularly since my understanding of my gender has changed since I did that tag.

If you're curious about who started the gender tag and why I'd recommend reading up on it here. It's actually supposed to be a YouTube thing, and I'll put the video I made down at the bottom.

1. How do you self-identify your gender, and what does that definition mean to you?

I am gender fluid, which means that my experience with my gender can change. When I first realized I'm genderqueer I was a woman and demiguy, but realized it's more complicated than that when I woke up one morning feeling no connection to any gender at all. You know, agender. At the moment my gender is back to being somewhat feminine, and I'm kind of missing feeling part guy. If that makes sense.

But yeah, I'm gender fluid. Or gender complicated, as I sometimes call it in my head.

2. What pronouns honor you?

I'm happy with she/her, and I wonder if I might also be comfortable with he/him if I'm feeling and presenting more masculine. That hasn't been put to the test, however.

3. Describe the style of clothing that you most often wear.

This has changed over time, and I now realize that that's probably partially due in part to how my experience with gender changes. For much of the past couple years it's been more feminine but with definite hints of masculinity, like professional shoes and a watch that aren't precisely feminine. But I'm kind of starting to explore...it's still feminine pretty often, but I also want to experiment. And during my agender week I was definitely avoiding my more feminine clothing.
 
4. Talk about your choices with body hair. How do you style your hair? Do you have facial hair? What do you choose to shave, or choose not to shave?

My hair style has been changing...for quite a few years I kept it up in a tight knot secured with a hair stick, but now I'm wearing it down much of the time. I definitely don't have facial hair, and I shave my armpits and legs.

5. Talk about cosmetics. Do you choose to wear makeup? Do you paint your nails? What types of soaps and perfumes do you use if any?

In the past year I discovered the joy of makeup. Let's just say it's a fun play toy. I've also started having my nails painted pretty much constantly. I don't like perfumes, or even scented deodorant, but I do have some nicely scented Axe body wash I've started using that I really like.

6. Have you experienced being misgendered? If so, how often?

This question always brings to mind an experience I had when I was a teen. My younger sibling and I took some dance classes together, and when there were dances with gendered parts I always wanted to dance the guy's part. And that was pretty much always allowed. However, this one teacher insisted on pairing siblings, which put Tall One and me together and the other two girls in the class with each other. Apparently the only proper way to do things, so far as this teacher was concerned, was for siblings of opposite genders to dance together...?

This left me pretty upset since I really wanted to learn the guys part, and after figuring gender stuff out it finally makes sense.

7. Do you experience dysphoria? How does that affect you?

I thought I didn't, but then I had the agender thing happening for maybe a week. During that time I wanted to bind my breasts, which was a surprise to me, and towards the end I finally gave in and tried binding for a few hours one evening. Based on the relief I felt I'm going to say that I occasionally feel dysphoria, enough that I want to get a binder at some point but rarely enough that it probably won't see much use.

8. Talk about children. Are you interested in having children? Would you want to carry a child if that were an option for you? Do you want to be the primary caretaker for any children you may have?

Let's just say that my feelings towards kids is complicated. On one hand I've kind of always wanted kids, on the other hand I'm kind of scared of screwing up being a parent.
 
9. Talk about money. Is it important to you to provide for a family financially if you choose to have one? Is it important to you that you earn more than any partner you may have? Do you prefer to pay for things like dates? Are you uncomfortable when others pay for you or offer to pay for you?

I'm going to pretend that "family" means significant other. I'd like to be able to provide, for in case that becomes necessary, but I don't care if I'm the breadwinner. I also don't care who makes more money. As for dates...the way it works with me and my significant other is that whoever has more money pays. Or if we're somehow equally broke, we split the check. That works pretty well for us. As for others paying when I'm out and about, unless it's my parents I tend to be uncomfortable letting someone else pay for me. I'm not sure why.

10. Anything else you want to share about your experience with gender?

For some years I'd been wanting to change my name from Sarita to something else, but every name I considered was too feminine. When I figured out I'm gender complicated I finally started looking at gender neutral names...which is how I found and embraced Raine. It's now legally my name, but since I don't want to abandon Sarita entirely it's now my middle name.

The New Year

New Year's Resolutions:

1) Actually stick to exercising
2) Get myself closer to where I should be mental-health-wise
3) Graduate

...and I guess I'll stick to that for my official resolutions. I have other things I want to do, like make some money off my photography, get a real camera (my iPhone can only do so much), and knit a scarf (not loom knitting, but with knitting needles). But I'm so scatter brained right now (thanks, depression and anxiety) that I'll stick to three main goals.

I already got a start on exercise, and on a photography project. I've made an Instagram account separate from my Earth Worshipper Photography stuff, and plan to post a photo a day throughout the year as a way to document it. Maybe not an original idea, but I think it'll be fun.

Here's a photo (ok, two photos smashed together) of me exercising. I have this fascination with how windows turn into mirrors at night, and since our exercise bike is right next to a big window it was pretty natural for me to take photos.