Another messy year

Stepping further into the chaos after two years of writing Art Date

Dearest readers, old and new,

It has been two full years of blogging at least once a week about my personal journey and omg you are all still here. Consider me shocked and grateful to have people show up for some of the ugliest, most embarrassing moments I have ever dared to tap into my keyboard.

And here I thought that year one of Art Date would be the messiest year to date, and yet year two has far exceeded expectations, probably for a lot of us. May 8, 2024 until the present has been one for the history books in a lot of the worst ways here in America and around the world.

As I write this, I am still torn about the allegiances of the platform hosting this newsletter. I wrote previously about my frustrations with Substack CEO Chris Best’s lack of criticality when it comes to Nazis and Nazi-sympathetic gestures, an ailment affecting us now in 2025 that apparently no amount of Steven Spielberg movies can cure. (Didn’t we all watch Indiana Jones growing up? Come on people.)

I have also reached out directly to some of the biggest names on Substack who presumably make a decent monthly income from their paid subscribers and asked them how they reconcile the bad with the good that a platform like this has to offer. I have not heard back, and I would assume that it’s because it’s so complicated that even the best minds, (not the Chris Best minds), are not clear on what to do. It’s a tough cost-benefit ratio to weigh out when we can’t see into the future. Like with Facebook, who would have guessed that a platform made for flirting online and one-upping your college classmates could turn into a weapon that would undermine our presidential elections? I’m not sure Substack, with its mix of self-help-y vibes and independent journalism, is so easy to weaponize because readers have to be more intentional about what they have to take in. And there’s the many-step process of subscribing and following authors. But still, as I go into Year 3 it’s on my mind.

Putting politics to the side, as if that’s possible for someone undergoing a gender transition, I wanted to share a little bit about that process to date. You know, to start the new year of confessional blogging with a bang. I have been on T, aka testosterone, for three weeks and have not felt a thing, to be honest. I am on the gel because I am very averse to needles. I might be the only human between the ages of 18 and 50 with no tattoos for just that reason. Because of that the hormone intake is slower and less noticeable. Although the placebo effect is great. Having had nothing to mirror my gender identity for, well my whole life, doing something that actively reflects my gender is a welcome mirror and one that has given me a little boost when I am not totally confused about what I am doing with my life and where this is all going.

I imagine that if I stay on gel hormones, versus the higher dose intravenous injections, the process will be similar to watching my kittens grow up - barely noticeable until all of a sudden I am changed. My kittens are now almost one year old (little Gemini babies) and are starting to shed adult fur in a way that until now their kitten fluff did not. They are boldly leaping onto the tree in my courtyard and asserting their voices in a decidedly adult voice, a MEOW! and a yowl instead of a little kitten meep. If you had to ask me when it changed, I would not be able to tell you. Their sweet little faces still look like babies to me, but their bodies have changed and they have each come more into their own. Dior the hunter, and DiDi the waifish goofball.

Dior, instead of bringing me mice or birds, will leave little sticks as presents for me.

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