Looking Back, Looking Ahead

As the final hours of 2016 tick by I, like many others, pause to take stock of the year that is ending and to look ahead at the one about to begin. Looking back to the end of 2015, I see such a tremendous difference in my life. This year has brought significant challenges, painful losses, and buckets of tears. But it has also seen my life blossom in amazing new ways that have enriched and expanded my world.

At the end of 2015 my marriage was coming to an end. I had just started on the brave journey of transforming myself. I worried intensely that 2016 would be the loneliest year of my life. I knew that the one friend who had helped me have the courage to embrace my identity would soon be moving away and I wondered whether I would find any others to fill that void, not to mention how I would recover from the painful loss of a 25-year relationship. Here, at the end of 2016, I can say with relief and joy that my fears of loneliness have proven empty. When I stop and reflect on the circle of friends around me and the network of relationships that has developed over this year, I am overwhelmed with gratitude. I am a rich woman, because of the wealth of friendships that I have. As I write this so many names and faces come to mind that I almost cannot focus on writing. If I haven’t expressed it clearly enough to you yet, let me say again how much you all mean to me.

Which is not to say that I never experience sadness or loneliness. I do feel lonely at times. Tears still overwhelm me at unexpected moments. It’s hard to adjust to being single after 25 years of marriage. Even while my life is rich with relationships, I have not replaced that single, intimate one that I enjoyed for so long. I don’t know when I will. I’m open to the prospect but for now am learning to be content on my own. I don’t want to get involved with someone only in an effort to fill some void in myself. I want to connect with others out of my wholeness. As a result I do sometimes feel lonely, but I try to remind myself that I am not alone, and that’s a big difference.

This year also saw the end of a promising career in foreign language education. That hurt a lot, because I enjoyed teaching and I was good at it. That it ended due to my transformation felt incredibly unjust, which still makes me angry. But I enter the new year established in a new position, with a new and exciting career path open before me. I see opportunities and connections opening to me that would have never been possible in my previous work. I am accepted and affirmed by my coworkers for who I am, without prejudice. I know that my work contributes to the needs of my community, which provides a significant amount of job satisfaction.

I have my concerns for 2017. The beginning of the fascist dictatorship of der Trumpenfuhrer gives me great cause for alarm personally, for the future of democracy in my country, and in particular for the well-being of minorities and all those who do not conform to the reinvigorated worldview that advantages those who are white, heterosexual, cisgender, male (or attractive young female) Christians. But I refuse to give in to fear, just as I refuse to submit to those who use their privileged position to silence those of us on the margins. I affirm the need to engage, to resist, and to stand together with those who will be crushed by the new regime. Rather than leaving me fearful, this invigorates me as we begin 2017.

I don’t look back on 2016 with regret. I’m not even particularly glad to see it end. It has been a year of fantastic personal growth, even though growth always comes at a cost. Looking ahead to the new year, I am excited to grow and develop, to live more wholeheartedly, to engage actively, to stretch my boundaries and challenge myself to become more fully the woman I am. There’s lots of living still to be done.

Proud to be LGBTQ

A transgender sister posted this story on Facebook recently in which the author, who self-identifies as a gay man, expresses his dissatisfaction with the LGBTQ designation. I see some of his point, such as when he says: “This [the LGBT] community does not exist….LGBT isn’t a club I’m in.” Certainly it does not exist as a monolithic block of people who share all the same characteristics, any more than, say, the “evangelical community” is a monolithic block. Any time we group people under a label we ignore that which they do not have in common in order to emphasize what they do have in common. It would be a mistake to assume that all individuals within a group agree on everything, or even that they all like each other. This does not mean that they do not share some element or elements that are particular to them.

This author suggests that the one thing those united under the LGBTQ banner share is the letter V, for victim. He insists that we should not view ourselves as victims, and in this I agree in general, though in reality we often still are because we do still face the challenges of marginalized people. Those challenges vary from one group to another and from one individual in a group to another. A white gay man living in San Francisco is going to have a very different experience and perspective on the practical aspects of living his identity than a transgender woman of color living in a rural town in the deep South.

And this is where I think the author’s fatal flaw, and my greatest critique of his article, lies. Based on what he writes he lives in a context that is relatively safe, in which his “gayness” is simply a part of who he is and doesn’t create any particular obstacles to his life. He optimistically writes: “It’s desperately important…to keep repeating the message that growing up as gay will not mean having to face isery and persecution; that everything’s getting better fast; that we’re winners now.” Therefore, he concludes, he feels no identification with others in the LGBTQ rainbow whose experiences are still those of marginalization, discrimination, abuse, rejection and violence. He certainly has the freedom to feel that way, but it’s a pretty shitty way to treat others who are not “winners” yet. Just because you have obtained all the rights, privileges and acceptance that you desire doesn’t entitle you to abandon others who are still struggling for their basic rights. Just because, for example, same-sex couples now have the legal recognition of marriage throughout the United States, doesn’t make it okay for them to throw transgender people under the bus when they seek the basic right to live openly and freely in society.

Being part of the LGBTQ community for me is not about identifying with everything every other member of that community represents. I’m not gay. I’m not bisexual. I can’t identify with those perspectives at all on a personal, experiential level. Just because I’m transgender doesn’t mean I am close friends with every other transgender person. The dynamics of interpersonal relationships still exist even within the queer community. What being part of the LGBTQ community does mean for me is that I will stand alongside my brothers, sisters and non-conforming others (we need a good summary word for that) in our fight for equality within society and before the law. It means that, while I may not be particularly close to that transgender woman who lives across town and might not even enjoy sitting down to coffee with her, I will vigorously defend her right to be herself and will protect her to the fullest extent I am able when she is being persecuted. Just because I am fortunate to have found acceptance and support in my identity doesn’t entitle me to ignore and abandon those who have not. This is what community means.

So I disagree with this author. I am proud to carry the LGBTQ banner, to identify as part of this community. It’s a loose coalition of disparate elements, but until the day when we are all free to live as who we are in society without fear of violence, discrimination, abuse and rejection  I see a need to stand together and fight for that which unites us and I will use the LGBTQ label to help bring us together.

Lighting a candle of hope

I did something this evening that I have not done in well over a year: I attended a religious service.

This may seem strange, since I recently proclaimed my lack of belief. I didn’t go as someone who believes though. I went because the service was promoted as being a place for those who are dealing with grief and sorrow and not able to embrace the joy of the holiday season. I went as someone who is seeking, questioning, wondering, exploring. I went as someone who is still finding healing for the grief that has clung to me for the past year. I went as someone wanting to know whether this religious community was a safe place for a queer woman with lots of doubts and questions and very little faith.

The answer I received was “Yes, you are welcome here. You are safe here. You are loved here.” I appreciate my friends John and Sheila, both staff members of Northminster Presbyterian Church, who have actively and readily affirmed their support over the past year, who have not pressured me to return to the church, to change my identity, to reaffirm a faith I do not connect with, but who have simply said “You are our cherished sister and there is always room for you here.” Tonight I tested that and found it to be true.

I’m not ready to return regularly to church. My spiritual journey is far from that place. But it is comforting and reassuring to know that I can go there if and when I need or want to. If only my experience were the norm. Unfortunately, too often churches and other religious communities are the least-welcoming places for LGBTQ people. A place that should provide refuge and sanctuary often provides precisely the opposite. Nor do churches tend to welcome those who question, doubt or explore. They are too often about inculcating certainty, fostering a particular spiritual “feeling,” indoctrinating a set of beliefs and a pattern of behavior. Tonight I experienced what church can be for those of us who do not fit within its typical cultural boundaries, and for that I am very appreciative. I dream and long for a time when this will be the norm for churches and queer people will not be excluded from communities of faith because of who they are.

As we lit candles in this evening’s service I could not light it for the reason given by the pastor -- in acknowledgement of the love of God which I do not experience -- but I lit mine in hope: in hope for my transgender brothers, sisters and non-conformers; in hope for my lesbian, gay, bisexual and asexual friends; in hope for a world that knows way too much of hatred, suffering, pain and sorrow; in hope that we can create a world in which people can live in safety, in connection with one another and in connection with their true selves. This is my Christmas wish. 

Undone

I recently toured our local Jewish History Museum and Holocaust History Center with several of my coworkers. Our organization had provided some of the funding to make the center possible and the center wanted to share the results with us. I went, not expecting to find it particularly powerful or moving. After all, I have visited Auschwitz, Buchenwald, Dachau and the Palace of Justice in Nürnberg (where the famous Nuremberg trials were held following the war). I have read extensively about the Third Reich and while not an expert on it, I consider myself pretty well-versed. I didn’t expect a small history center in Southern Arizona to add much to my perspective.

I couldn’t have been more wrong.

I had only been in the center a few minutes when I felt the tears begin to well as I looked at the pictures. As I walked through the exhibits, looking at pictures not unlike many I had seen before, my emotions overwhelmed me and I could barely keep from audibly sobbing. A couple of my wonderful colleagues wrapped me in comforting embraces and helped me make it through. After we returned to our office I spent the rest of my day working through waves of tears and emotions that would not quickly release me. Even now, when I reflect on it, my emotions begin to well up inside me.

Why such a powerful reaction? Two things stand out.

First of all, as I looked at the exhibits, particularly those related to the propaganda used by the Nazis and their allies, I saw so clearly the parallels to the language and rhetoric used by political leaders in my own country today, in 2016. Hitler came to power with the support of a minority of very vocal supporters who manipulated Germany’s constitution to their own ends. He promised to make Germany great again. He promised employment. He promised to restore “traditional” German values. He discredited, then eliminated his political opponents. He scapegoated Jews and other “anti-social elements,” as well as “nefarious” international agents as the source of Germany’s problems. He made it acceptable, even fashionable, to hate certain groups. He didn’t lock up the Jews on his first day in power, but the propaganda that laid the foundation began even before he came to power. Sounds frightfully familiar to me. The parallels terrify me.

Secondly, I viewed the exhibits in this center from a radically new perspective. During all my previous interactions with the Holocaust, I had not identified myself as a member of a marginalized minority group. Now I have, and it significantly changes my perception. Had I lived in Nazi Germany, my picture might well now hang on the wall of some Holocaust museum as one of Hitler’s victims. That’s a very sobering thought and makes the pictures I looked at frightfully personal. When I connect that to current events, I see a group of people salivating at the prospect of taking power and in their zeal to restore “traditional” values wanting to restrict and eliminate my civil rights. It’s not such a far step from there to the gas chambers.

I sincerely, deeply hope that the people of my country will stand strong against the propaganda, the lies and the hateful actions of the minority that now want to run this country. Even as the tears flowed freely down my face I was encouraged by the fact that I was with a group of people who stand for equality, for the rights of all people and who will not stand silently as a minority tries to push their hateful agenda. I hope that we will not let history repeat itself in our country. But still I am afraid…

I’m glad we visited the Holocaust History Center. I’m glad that it exists, because we need to be reminded of the evil humans are capable of. We need to be reminded how easily and quietly genocide can begin, how the seeds of hatred and discrimination are planted and grow in a society (or more accurately, how they are actively watered and nourished when those in power choose to manipulate them for their own purposes – the seeds already being present.) We need, as a memorial wall at the center reminds us, to keep throwing the stone of the historical record – the facts of the Holocaust and other genocides – under the wheel of current events to keep more people from being crushed. We cannot let another Holocaust occur in a false desire to “Make America Great Again.”