This is a two-part post inspired by the conversation I had with Jason Hanasik, queer artist and activist, at the beginning of February at The Space Program’s recording studio. The second half and our conversation on The Side Woo will come out tomorrow. You can subscribe to Apple and Spotify to get it right away when it comes out.
Before I committed to the artist’s lifestyle, I majored in French at UW-Madison. That meant for four years the bulk of my coursework was in French. I loved every minute of it - learning French history, and examining how things were spelled, whether they were masculin or féminin, and what that did to the sentence structure. And imagining myself in Paris sipping un café, listening to 80s French pop stars played no small role.
But it also meant that the skills you usually practice in college like giving presentations or writing long research papers were that much harder because I was doing it in a foreign language. Nothing was comfortable. Every time I spoke in class I had to look up words. As I was speaking I had to consider my pronunciation and whether I was being French enough in my articulation of my ideas. And don’t forget about the faux amis and idioms that might come up like little friendly traps. An example you could say “Je suis plein” at a meal, which technically means ‘I am full,’ but translates to ‘I am pregnant.’ Whoops. That’s definitely just cheese in my belly.
One of my favorite non-French classes I took at the end of my 4-years was a random credit in fashion with the textile artist Sonya Clark. I didn’t know how lucky I was to have her as a teacher at the time. Nor did I know what a gift it was to get a visit by Nick Cave who stopped by and shared his new project: sequin-studded dildos in a rainbow of colors.
When we were assigned a public presentation about a topic, I chose fashion and surrealism, I obsessed about it feeling totally inadequate. The day of I remember preparing to give the talk when all of a sudden it dawned on me: I didn’t have to give it in French.
I had so rarely given a talk in English that my brain had gone into the same heightened state of worry that I had for all my French projects. I hadn’t even realized I was doing it, but when I did it was like a veil had lifted. It occurred to me that I didn’t have to research sentence structure to make sure I said the right thing, I could just be myself. This feeling didn’t last too long because public speaking in any language is nerve-wracking, but that initial aha-moment stuck with me.
I had that same feeling of letting go when making plans to go on a date with a woman for the first time. And then again while we were on the date. We met up for dinner and chatted about the fact that we both hadn’t been on a date in a long time. Even though it was a little awkward, as most first dates are, I had that same feeling of calm- like the opposite of when you forget your purse at home.
For years I have struggled with and avoided the many games of online and IRL dating. This sensation made it clear that I was moving closer to myself rather than farther away. My judgment felt less clouded and my needs in the moment were more clear.
It is hard to say whether I’m open to these insights around queer dating, and dating in general because of my 40+ years on the planet, my soberness, or my stronger connection to my intuition thanks to my travels and even the isolation during the pandemic. Or if it’s simply because I’m caring for myself more which means being more true to all parts of myself without concessions.
It has been weighing on me for a while whether and when to come out to you all here and to the listeners of The Side Woo. As a “new” queer person, I wondered how queer did I need to be to come out? Is it passé to even do so? After much inner debate and some time incubating this new sense of self, I wanted to share it here because it will create context for future conversations that I want to have.
My understanding of myself in this new queer prism has needed some time to evolve in the dark. But because so much of my media-based work attempts to come from an authentic, vulnerable place, it has started to feel stifling to not be more open about my own experiences. And so with this post, I hope to give myself, and you, the permission to be soft and squishy and uncertain while also being out - whatever that means. And I welcome anyone else who wants to share their expansion and evolution here as well.
The reason I am bringing this up today, on Valentine’s Day, is because on tomorrow’s episode of The Side Woo I decided to come out publicly to respond to Jason’s story about his father who also came out later in life. I thought they both deserved their own posts, so tomorrow I can share Jason’s story in all his glory.
And also because all good relationships start with loving yourself, so I thought a post about self-love would be appropriate on V-Day.
I don’t expect this to be a huge surprise for many. And also I don’t expect to get it ‘right.’ This is a journey and if you have read this far, I appreciate you joining me on it. Feel free to share your own thoughts or stories below.