#boihood

[boid0ll]

aweee

Another thing I found when looking up Bobby Gene (transmasc cartoonist who drew the strip I reblogged and who designed the FTM International logo) is that he wrote an articlein Transgender Tapestry that was reprinted in GenderTrash from Hell, alongside this sweet thing.

Transcript:

BOYHOOD by Bobby Gene There's something special about being a boy. I'm talking about the "wonder years." The pre-pubescent years, when a boy is a being one and apart from anything else. He's not a man, not a girl… just a boy. And there's something unique about the way the world looks upon his boyhood. A boy is endearing, sometimes obnoxious and selfish, but always filled with the magic only boyhood provides. His innocent charm and mischievous nature are the subjects of volumes of Twain's imagi- nation, Disney's fantasy.

And us, the men of today and tomorrow, who were the invisible boys of yesterday, known only to ourselves, we watched the boy rituals move about us, all around us, without us, excluding us from what was also rightfully ours but not granted. So now we discover we can be men. We travel the road to our lifelong dream of trans- formation. Our own boyhoods camouflaged and brief, having to be mixed with the respon- sibilities of adulthood we've acquired over the years. We feel the same boyhood now that we only watched before. It's okay. Put down your pen, your quar- terly reports, turn off your computer, push yourself away from your desk. Kick off your wing tips and tie on your Nikes. Slip out of that suit for a while. Exchange it for your favorite pair of old jeans, which now fit more the way you've always dreamed they should. Take a moment to live the boyhood you missed in the wonder years. Climb a tree. Go fishing with Huck. Take it, it's yours now. --Pinocchio 1992 Bobby Gene

End transcript.

[boid0ll]

but listen when this muscles fill up, what’s left is to be pushing every sketchy cis-man i see on the streets with it. will i ever retire from causing trouble to cistems that trouble me?! >>> maybe if i marry enough wives 🫂<<<    more interesting gist: was at a trans*masc panel yesterday, and the conversations were a lot more healthier that i expected. personally i never wanted to be visible in any prescribed idea of masculinity until most recently when my people were like we need you in that capacity & then tricked me into getting comfortable inside it by showing me how my visibility can be disruptive—knowing i’d fall for any opportunity to cause trouble, so yeah they said, your visibility will be disruptive (in a good way only for people who get it). much like when they convinced me to be open/vocal about gender & lack of when i saw how visibility was more than me, & as a service. 🤱🏾    i moved from boihood to manhood in a matter of hours while still having the liberty to be a boi at any given time.  if anyone asked me now what masculinity in the way that i occupy it means to me… it’s a journey of healing! not just for myself but for my kids & future fam that i am so excited to father & protect 🤍💌    i’m equally if not more excited for who i’ll be for myself, outside of being a husband & father 🤸🏾‍♀️🤸🏾‍♀️🤸🏾‍♀️

[queerliblib]

do you have books about trans men of color? Written by trans men? Asking cause I can never find books with trans people in them, let alone written by them, and it's especially hard to find books about & by trans men, especially trans moc. (Also, I've never once seen a book about a straight trans man, which idk I always feel nervous asking about cause "erm straight ppl can't be queer" or whatever but I want to see some trans het and T4T books)

Anyways, sorry for the bother but I need some new books to read and I've decided to be self indulgent this time around

oh please don’t apologize, you should absolutely be self-indulgent! these (as far as our research shows) all have trans moc main characters and are primarily by trans moc (with a few non-binary authors of color)

Freedom House by KB Brookins (poetry)

Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas (YA)

Black on Both Sides: A racial history of trans identity by C. Riley Snorton (non-fiction)

We See Each Other by Tre’vell Anderson

Felix Ever After by Kacen Callender (YA)

The Passing Playbook by Issac Fitzsimons (YA)

& here are a few more titles from our wishlists that we hope to buy in the future, just to give you a few more ideas

Pretty by KB Brookins (memoir)

Outside the XY by Bklyn Boihood (anthology)

Boys Run the Riot by Keito Gaku (manga)

The Thirty Names of Night by Zeyn Joukhadar (adult fic)

as for trans het or t4t, caveat that the authors & characters here aren’t necessarily POC but I wanted to still give you a few options!

A Lady for a Duke by Alexis Hall (trans femme)

Chef’s Choice by TJ Alexander (t4t)

A Shot in the Dark by Victoria Lee (trans masc)

Stay Gold by Tolby McSmith (trans masc)

[kunthug]

Boihood

All I ever wanted to be was a song—  something soft and light held in the mouth  sung sweet beneath the coming dawn.  I return to that first desire—its gingham blouse 

rubbed against the heavy pull of flesh hovered  in a dark that I can only recall as that dark. I ask what grace awaits that tender tendril’s suffered  stretch of green wide enough to tear a stark 

light out from under a troubled sky? I return to the center of that smallness and sing its wounds— jagged rasp crooned until edged out and earned. I was the only boi I knew dreaming in soft bruise. 

And it made me as beautiful as the blood’s slow sprawl at my knee, right before punching a bullying boy to crawl.

about the poem—

“The sonnet here is an ode to the ‘in-betweenness’ of my childhood concerning gender and the body. It is also an origin song of the kinds of love/lovelessness I sustained as a child, due to gendered expectations placed on my emerging self. The spelling of ‘boy’ here represents both the Black masculine and the center/genderqueer iteration of the word, spelled ‘boi,’ as a means of honoring the many bois like myself forced to learn to love themselves at and beyond the margins.” —Jari Bradley.

[xltribe]

This week in XL Tribesmen Tribesmen Of The Week Van Bailey we celebrate Happy Pride Month. I wanted to open the month with a person that lives the trans experience. I know it's been months since my last Tribesmen but we are back up and running on new servers that are faster and can handle the growth. What’s one misconception about Big & Tall Men that you hear often? And what are you doing to change it?A misconception I often see is that all Big & Tall Men fit the "brawn" build. I am a shorter person and when I see Big & Tall, I often wonder - does that include me? I would love to model for a Big & Tall brand, however, as a person of trans experience, I do not see that representation out there. I would urge brands to reconsider their model representation. Fashion is for everybody. If you sell the size, create the representation. If you don't sell the size, consider everyone you're leaving out due to styling limitations. Because there aren't bigger darker folks of the size of trans experience in the fashion world, I have done my best to curate spaces to highlight my love of fashion and style. I have worked with LGBTQ+ brands like DapperQ, Qwear, and the Stud Model Project, and am the lead stylist for the bklyn boihood collective. For me, in order to see myself, I have to be brave enough to put myself out there. Fashion for me is ancestral and the way I adorn my body is a means of celebration and survival. Photo credit: Stud Model Project If you could change one thing about your favorite Big & Tall brand what would it be and why?Create more opportunities for people of trans experience to see themselves in your brand. We are worthy of representation. Representation and visibility is life-saving for queer and trans communities of color. So, be more open to having diverse representation of all sizes and heights. Photo credit: Stud Model Project Tell us about your worst shopping experience? And why ? Honestly, going to malls is always a high-stress experience. I have to wonder, will they have my size? Will I be able to find a tailor who's worked with trans bodies before? I have been misgendered in spaces, especially early in my transition and those moments stick with you for life. I remember a few years ago, I was shopping online at one of my favorite stores, ASOS, and they did not have any bigger representation but they sold the sizes. This has shifted in recent years but I see a number of brands selling sizes but then not having bigger bodies display those sizes on their website. How am I supposed to know how it might fit on my body? Am I not worthy of representation? How can I know what's possible if I don't see what's possible? Photo credit: KXJ Apparel What’s on your fashion bucket list?I want to be signed to a fashion agency and model for big fashion houses. While I have walked in New York Fashion Week, I would love to get experience in other fashion weeks, including going abroad. I would love to model for DXL and Savage X Fenty. It would be a dream to be featured in a Savage X Fenty show. Photo credit: Stud Model Project How did you get introduced to the world of Big & Tall fashion?My father is a bigger guy, so I remember going shopping with him at DXL and department stores. I used to love watching him get tailored after picking out a suit. Then, as I got older I realized how there weren't people who looked like me in magazines, fashion shows, or in the media. When I started working with bklyn boihood, I was so inspired that they had representation of all body types in their calendars. I knew once I came on as a stylist and a collective member I wanted to keep that momentum going. XL Tribesmen Tribesmen Of The Week Van Bailey Social media links: Website: https://www.drvanbailey.com/styling Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dr__handsome/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@dr__handsome

[olodara]

08/10, AN ENJOYABLE TIME TODAY

i.

update

the papier-mâché mix i made and placed yesterday is still drying. i will need a kiln/oven to dry things in my studio. the acrylic is getting deeper as it dries. waiting on final results.

ii.

layering

the photos + text are hitting harder than trying to paint digitally, but not harder than trying to set scene. finding ways around setting scene with fragments in painting. it needs to set scene and tell a story. and while we are waiting to get there, photo transfer experiments and cris-crossing how things can get imprinted might be the way to go.

iii.

spiriting

i'm besides some spirits and some spirits are beside me. it's too cute, my life as it has been happening now. i am enjoying process and patience. i swear i am learning delightful beauties about myself and how to be as i sit to create. i am thankful to not have so big a pressure that removes me from doing what i am doing now. today, i whispered in my chest: i am a full-time artist.

the other part \divinity\ of this experience and feeling is healing through the boihood i am choosing to live. not only am i being carried in the spirit of masculinity at its purest, i am also becoming. sometimes healing is becoming. or becoming is healing. it feels really good to become. it feels good to create as transsexuality creates.

and on transsexuality

i wanna dive and dive. like, create like transsexuality is. this riotous, audacious and glorious power of creation. primal and basic. i am at the base like sex and as i thought more about this i am getting more comfortable with openly using ó/he pronouns, till when i drop the he for just ó. till then revelling in transsexual audacity!

iv

hacking, which makes the marriage true and more true.

as i was tattooing text with acrylic, i felt this strong sense of my best friend being near, right inside of me even. i love you. i thought about my next memoir being titled mostly unimpressed as it describes a constant state i've been in for most of my life. not much makes my heart flame but i would argue it is how we know ourselves. and so, i love you orí odara, odara and every other flame.

the real gist of this section is about hacking but first a dream: this person coming to tell me odara favours good penmanship. fast forward today, and i'm tattooing letters remembering that. puzzle pieces join another puzzle piece in the small stretch of a moment.

odara will help me override and overtake. its grace i claim, it is a grace i call a birthright, without even reasons and anxieties of "late blooming" given. it is inside the process we learn to hack.

(visualizing in the absence of photo transfer tools.)

[mae-we-post-poems]

Boihood

Jari Bradley

All I ever wanted to be was a song—

something soft and light held in the mouth

sung sweet beneath the coming dawn.

I return to that first desire—its gingham blouse

rubbed against the heavy pull of flesh hovered

in a dark that I can only recall as that dark.

I ask what grace awaits that tender tendril’s suffered

stretch of green wide enough to tear a stark

light out from under a troubled sky? I return

to the center of that smallness and sing its wounds—

jagged rasp crooned until edged out and earned.

I was the only boi I knew dreaming in soft bruise.

And it made me as beautiful as the blood’s slow sprawl

at my knee, right before punching a bullying boy to crawl.

[theburningflash]

From Boihood by Jari Bradley

[ukdamo]

Boihood

Jari Bradley - a bittersweet childhood remembrance from the genderqueer poet.

All I ever wanted to be was a song— something soft and light held in the mouth sung sweet beneath the coming dawn. I return to that first desire—its gingham blouse

rubbed against the heavy pull of flesh hovered in a dark that I can only recall as that dark. I ask what grace awaits that tender tendril’s suffered stretch of green wide enough to tear a stark

light out from under a troubled sky? I return to the centre of that smallness and sing its wounds— jagged rasp crooned until edged out and earned. I was the only boi I knew dreaming in soft bruise.

And it made me as beautiful as the blood’s slow sprawl at my knee, right before punching a bullying boy to crawl.

[cullen-rutherford-wifey]

https://bqic.net/donate/

https://blacktranswomen.org/donate/

https://www.bklynboihood.com/shop

(There website doesn’t have a donate but you give ten dollars and they give a great sticker stack)

I implore anyone and everyone to keep adding queer charities who would love/need donations

[dyke-a-saur]

Woods Adventures Of A Young Butch (Pt. 2)

Went out again yesterday! This time I decided to check out the thickets across from my house. It was really pretty and it had less thorns:

Then I decided to revisit the statue I found yesterday and leave some gifts for her:

There was also a pretty brook that I forgot to mention in my last one:

Anyway, here's how I looked today:

(Also, I recommend listening to Gaelic folk music while on these kinds of hikes. It hits different)

[fearlesslyinbloom]

Our blackness is divine. 🌻Acknowledge the power that has always been yours.

Poetry from Black and Blue

Follow on IG

[lesbiansovereverything]

[keepitandro]

I am worth it.

[hodariblue]

“he’s got to learn to swim”

[everything-but-my-bones]

Paying to have my laundry sent out is the best decision I've ever made ( besides hiring a cleaning person). $25 and 4 hours later it's washed, dried, fluffed, and folded for me.

May 2018 continue to bless me with enough disposable income that I never have to do anything domestic for myself again.

A boi is tired after an 80 hour work week.