Hello friends, I’ve been really happy lately! I mean, I wouldn’t say I’m generally a sad person, but this level of happiness is something new. If this happiness was a drug, everyone would be addicted to it. In my case, it might very well be a drug: estrogen. Who can say? About a month or two after a person gets sober, there’s usually a period called ‘the pink cloud’, where everything seems wonderful and perfect. It’s some neurochemical reaction to no longer being dependent on something. Maybe there’s something similar when you get on hormones. On the other hand, trans women aren’t generally known for our cheerfulness, so perhaps it fades after a while. I can’t say.
If forced to guess, I’d say, there’s no way this feeling can last. It’s too good. The other day I was watching the baby play in a grassy meadow, and I was like, I can’t think of a single reason to not be happy. Why would I ever not feel this way? I have my work, my wife, and my widdle cute widdle tiny cute little tiny cute baby. And she wasn’t being particularly well-behaved that day either!
I’ve been trying lots of things! I’m taking a poetry class right now, and I’m taking a drawing class in October. Have gotten very into pens and inks and papers and journals and to-do lists. Am eating better. It’s great. No complaints, really.
Recently, I googled "Is happiness real?" I just assumed it was a myth! Like never-ending romantic love (which I am also starting to think might be real!). It’s hard to say. I’m really not counting on it. But it’s nice while it lasts.
You know, it’s really nice to try new things. I think when you’re a kid you develop ideas about yourself, like, I’m not good art art, I’m not visual, I have no rhythmic. And those things are true! But the variations we are talking about are so small. The real difference is between someone who’s really practiced and someone who hasn’t. If you want to perform on a world-class level, maybe you need some natural aptitude, but by the time people have practiced and practiced and practiced, it’s actually hard to say who has more aptitude! Lately I’ve taken up several things I thought I was naturally bad at: foreign languages and drawing. And I am definitely pretty bad, but I don’t know if I’m worse than other people. Like, there were so many things I never tried or stopped doing simply because they came hard. But they don’t need to come hard either! You can progress at your own pace. You can take up something and put it down, read up and let it go, get into it for a while and then stop for a year or three.
It’s definitely something I wished I’d known when I was younger, but I’m only 35. Who knows what I’ll be able to do when I’m 45 or 50?
