For those who didn’t make it. For those who are struggling to make it. You have all the resources you need within you. We are more than just survivors. We are thrivers.
Powerless. That’s how I felt growing up during my childhood. Blanketed by the bible, suffocated by scripture, bubbling is my identity, yet suppressed to please and conform. I came out to myself at the tender age of 10. I remember the first boy I kissed and how I wanted to give him head in the YMCA bathroom. I came out to my parents at the tough age of 20. Decades after decades of years informed of trauma, acceptance, discomfort, and a new form of self-love.
I remember not necessarily identifying with any binary, floating between people and places, like a leaf in the breeze. I remember my mother crying, saying the devil is trying to ruin her family, trying to take away her only good “christian son”. I remember packing my bags, getting in my car and heading out of the city to carve out a life of my own, rediscovering my necessity for breath.
Now at 24, I feel as if things are coming to be. I am a part of a loving queer community, just got an awesome therapist, a new job opportunity, and am self-actualizing the prophecy that I envision and walk daily. Yet why do I not feel grounded? Stable? At peace within my bones and in my spirit?
There is something that is comforting about having a stable physical home environment. A place where you can truly be. Let your hair down, if you will. Yet I don’t have that at the moment. I have been homeless since June of 2017, luckily finding farm work to provide an ephemeral glimpse of a stable routine environment, yet once the season is over, I’m back searching, yearning for a place to call home. To be honest, deep inside there is a twinge of envy for those who have a home. I have always wanted to feel secure. Yet the visceral effect of now being homeless has magnified my sense of instability.
Swift features float ahead. Unclear and vibrant.
A gentle nudge from uncertainty.
Unknown is a place where I can truly be. (((12.29.17)))
There’s a lot of stats and misconceptions about homeless folks. “Go get a job, make something of yourself and you wouldn’t be in this situation in the first place”. Or when people talk about “the homeless” as if we are some other species of human beings (sometimes not even seen as human), some big group of faceless people with no voice that’s immediately worth saving.Everyone’s charity case or piece of trash to be stepped on, grinded into, rendered invisible, and neglected. Yet everyone has a story about why things are the way they are. Why we are in the exact situation we are in. Specifically, many homeless queer and or trans youth are pushed out of their home because threats of physical violence, emotional abuse, sexual violence, and the list goes on and on.
I was pushed out because of childhood trauma, spiritual and emotional abuse under the guise of Christianity and dogma. I didn’t feel safe in my childhood home environment. And even to this day I still don’t feel safe. Being out in public more often than not means the threat of police violence, maybe crossing some asshole who doesn’t like me for who I am (for being a black trans person). Quite honestly, just finding a place to sleep is stressful in itself. Often times I awake in terror when I hear a siren, hear footsteps, and voices. As the day goes on I find myself fighting sleep, holding on to the little energy I do have, trying to maintain healthy relationships with others let alone myself.
Yet it isn’t all bad or at least I try to make the best of my situations. I have learned to hold myself up and hug myself daily. I take care of myself in radically new ways like creating my own mobile cooking system, cleaning with clothing scraps, making cowboy coffee in the morning and pitching a tent in the middle of the night, lying down and looking up at the stars. I’ve made new friends with folks like myself, who don’t have a place to stay but share the little that we have. Advice, stories, cigarettes, food. Lots of encouragement. I have declared my independence and existence to the world. I still ask for help when I absolutely need it. My relationships with others are true, more mutual. I have developed a deeper trust in myself. And my powers only continue to flourish.
Gratitude and Grace…
I am truly thankful for those who have opened up their doors, offered their beds, couches, futons, and hearts. For those who I have shared meals with, shared water with, shared bodies with, shared souls with. The moments where we dream in secret, plan in public, scheme as the sun sets, and stretch as the sun rises are all held in my heart. The love and gratitude I have for my chosen family and friends is beyond words. I only hope we continue to grow and support each other in ways that are comforting, new, radical, and healing.
I can finally say that I am thankful for being here. For not giving up even though it seems so easy. For my ancestors telling me “hell no child, you ain’t gonna give in that easy.” For my childhood even though it was rough. It has made me into the resilient baby I am today. Thankful to the Earth and all its medicine and wisdom. And thankful for the future and what’s to come.
There are 1.6 million to 2.8 million homeless youth in America right now. 320,000-400,000 are queer identifying and/or trans identifying. We are on the streets, in the woods, abandoned buildings, factories, and libraries. Realistically we are everywhere. Just like anyone else, doing what we need to do to make it through the day. Sometimes it’s not the “prettiest things” being done in the world but nonetheless, we are here.
Fighting to breathe. To maintain our breath, the very thing that the cis-tem says we cannot have. That we are forced to sell ourselves for. A house does not have to be a home. Whenever we hold ourselves, find the time to ground ourselves, to just breathe in and out, and in and out, we are home. Whenever we find the time to be still, we are home. Whenever we find the comfort to exist purely as can be, we are home.
Resilience is in my blood. I can feel it pushing through my veins.
Every heartbeat is a proclamation to the world that I am still here.
And I will not be moved.
As breath circulates throughout this body my ancestors and I celebrate the gift of being alive.
They live through me and I through them.
Symbiosis.
Oh so precious are our thoughts, our orientation and perspective.
