reflections on the past year

I find it hard to believe that the year 2010 is already almost over.  It seems like it was only just January, and then suddenly it was May, then August, then September, and now all of a sudden it's December and nearly January again. How did this happen?

For whatever reason, this past year it's felt like things just kept happening and happening without any chance for me to catch up, and I've learned lots and become a much stronger person, but it's been difficult in many ways.

January through May, it seemed like things were going really well.  I was working instead of being depressed and failing classes, and that helped me a lot because I really needed the discipline of getting up each morning and going to work whether I wanted to or not.  I loved my job and it felt like things were actually going okay for once.

Then May hit, and it's like everything got screwed up and nothing's been going right since.  I know that's not entirely true, since I'm in a much better place than I was a year ago, but since May it's felt like everything I try just goes wrong, to the point where I wonder if I should even bother.  I can only hope that this next year will be different, but it makes me apprehensive towards the idea of trying anything, whether going back to school as a full time student instead of just taking two classes this next semester or attempting to plan a trip to visit friends over spring break.

Granted, there are some things that did work out this past year, sometimes far better than I expected.  I have an awesome job, I'm actually attempting to be social again (which is something I rather gave up on after leaving Baylor), and I know who I am much better than I did at the start of the year.  Overall, I'm a much healthier person than I was, even though I still have some things to work through.  But it seems like I've had to give up a lot for each, and sometimes I wish I hadn't had to, even if it's been worth it in the long run.

This is the only thing I ask for next year: that I have a few chances for things to work out right, for once. That I have something turn out okay without having to sacrifice something else.  It's a selfish wish, but it's difficult when I feel like I'm always fighting everything.

Anyway, I hope everyone has a happy holiday, however they choose to celebrate, and a happy and blessed new year. 

how Catholic feminism screwed me over

I am not often comfortable identifying as female.  Although about a year ago I began identifying as female again, after about two years of identifying solely as male, it's always with the qualifier that I'm genderqueer, so even though I sometimes identify as female, I also sometimes identify as male.  Logically, it makes no sense that I have this much difficulty with my identity, because over that past year I've also become much more comfortable with my body, to the point where I'm really okay with having the body I have.  If I'm okay having a female body, then why do I have such a problem identifying as female?

There is a movement within the Catholic church known as "Catholic feminism", which is the idea of promoting women's equality and some feminist ideas while reconciling them with Catholic teachings.  However, many Catholic teachings are inherently harsher on women, such as the idea that people are supposed to abstain from sex until marriage, and then in marriage to be "open to life", which means that whenever sex occurs, it must with with the possibility of procreation.  In addition, the church is notorious for promoting the idea of a woman being a wife and mother, with Mary's unquestioning obedience seen as the perfect example of womanliness for women to imitate.  It seems ludicrous that one could promote these ideas while calling for women's equality, but that is what Catholic feminism purports to do.  Catholic feminists say that women should be able to choose what they do, and yet many of them seem to choose being a stay at home mother.

My mother was the prime example of this, saying that it was her choice to bear six children and then stay home and raise them, giving up work she was happy doing in exchange for something that still often depresses her.  This sort of strange hypocrisy made no sense to me, because how could one say that women were equal and then go and do what the church wanted you to do even if it made you unhappy?  But that was what my mother had chosen, and as I grew up I could see more and more of my Catholic female friends being drawn into this.  

What the Catholic church thinks of women and what they ought to do shouldn't bother me, but it still does.  Even though I've been able to throw away most of the negative things I gained from being raised Catholic, this still stays with me.  There are other factors as to why I don't feel comfortable identifying as female, but this seems to be a huge portion of it.  To me, being a woman means following the same path my mother did and that my sister probably will, and that is something I cannot do.  

I don't really understand why this is so ingrained in my idea of what it would be for me to be a woman, because I never think that of anyone else.  Somehow it's just me, and it's an idea that I can't seem to get over. Maybe some day I'll be able to get over this, but only time will tell.

identity

This post has been a long time coming, because it's something I've been thinking of writing for a long time, but it was only really today that I've been able to get my thoughts together in a way that's somewhat clear and concise.   My identity has been something I've struggled with for a long time, because I've never really been able to find one that fits me neatly.  I tried identifying as a lesbian in high school and college, and although that fit for the most part, I wasn't really comfortable identifying that way because I had too many issues with my body to be comfortable identify as female.  Through college and up until about the past year, I identified as male, and although that fit for the most part too, I realized that there were actually some things I missed about being female, and that issues I had with my body were maybe not as severe as I'd thought.  Since then, I've been working through my body issues and am now more comfortable with myself than I've been in ages, because I've been focusing more on being me than on a specific identity.  Now, I don't really identify as anything other than the generic queer, and for the most part that's okay.

Sometimes, however, I get frustrated not having a concrete and clear cut identity. Yes, I identify as queer, but that's not really a specific identity at all, because that can mean so many things.  I don't really mind, but in a world of specific identities, particularly in the GLBT community, identifying as queer feels isolating.  Spaces for queer-identified people exist online, but most GLBT spaces offline are dominated by people who identify as either gay or lesbian.  This gets even further complicated, too, by the fact that I don't identify with a specific gender, as sometimes I am male, sometimes I am female, and often I am neither or both.  When the room is full of people who identify as either gay or lesbian, I feel like an outsider.

And maybe it's not really as big of a deal as I think it is, but I like fitting in a group and feel that not identifying as anything specific makes that more difficult.  Sometimes I wonder if I ought to just identify as a lesbian, because then I could just be butch or femme depending on my mood and even though I'd be exactly as I am now, it seems like it would make things easier.

I don't know, I guess I'll figure things out eventually.

finished a project!

Originally I'd been planning to post on gender and my thoughts about stuff like that, but I got distracted and ended up not knowing what to write, so here, have some pictures of the scarf I finally finished last night:

Pretty glad I got this finished, I started it this past May, but then that was when everything happened and then it was summer and I got distracted and forgot about it.  It's some neat super-chunky yarn I found, pretty happy with it.

oh hallo

Okay, so I made a blog which isn't on livejournal, that's a first.  This is probably going to be a weird mix of posts about crafts and projects and more personal stuff mixed with posts on whatever I happen to be thinking about.

We'll see how this goes.

Peace out,

Seb