I am a masculine Goddess.
The process of creating these photos was powerful, healing, fun, and revealing. I love my body and all the ways it has changed as I have aged. I love this marker in time. The last year of my thirties! By the time this gets published it will be the month I turn 40! I love that I have wrinkles now - lines that shoot out of my eyes that tell a story of the joy I bring to the world and receive from being a creative creature of the universe. I love that I still have a child like sense of wonder, a deep empathetic compassionate side, a serious take action side, and a curious playful let’s see where this goes side - I love that I am multifaceted and that over the years I have been given the opportunity to explore by choosing to step outside of society’s standards.
I have heard people describe both their queerness and their gender as an innate experience that they just knew - like how you just know what hand to write with. Yet my experience has been very different.
When I was a child, I would write with both my hands instinctually. I was ambidextrous. Until my third-grade teacher forced me to pick a hand – removing me from my natural way of being. I consciously decided that I would choose the left hand because it was seen as less normal in society, the underdog, more unique, and rare. I was not afraid to be different or to be called weird. I also decided to subversively keep using my right hand for cutting, throwing, teeth brushing, and occasionally at home writing my name. I soon discovered that being different came both with being made fun of but also with wonderful magical gifts. I realized that having an identity on the margins – on the edge – allowed me to build strong friendships, forge my own path, and be wildly creative.
The movement narrative of “Born This Way” when it comes to queer, trans, and non-binary identity does not tell my story because I would choose this every time and I believe we deserve rights, love, and freedom whether we chose this or were born this way. I am neither right-handed nor left-handed. I am neither a man nor a woman. I am both. My queerness is part of my flesh and bones and also something I actively choose. When I say my queerness - I mean so much more than my sexuality - I mean my gender, my body, my mind, my lens of looking at life.
What is super unique about doing this particular photo shoot in comparison to the many nude photo shoots I have done is that this was about capturing the microsecond moments that are often missed. This was not about being posed or looking sexy or being objectified. It is profound to see certain facial expressions and slight body movements that I do all the time but do not actually get to see. It’s a radical moment for me to see myself in nothing but light.
The things I see here compared to other photo shoots: I look so similar to my parents and grandparents and those before them. I can see that over the years I have become grounded - deeply rooted, confident, clear in who I am, and at my core genuinely happy. I can also see all the lines, the bumps, the scars, the bags, the way I have gone from being super skinny to more rounded, the way age and lived experience has changed me. I can see my wisdom. I can see I know things now that I did not know in my twenties. I can also see the loved ones I have lost - I can see where I store that sadness and I can see the imprint of that heaviness on my body.
I can see that I have been through things –
come out fiercer, stronger, and more ready to show up.
I can see in my eyes, in my lines, in my body the ways I have worked for justice
the intensity I have put my body through
the times I faced off with soldiers, cops, multinational corporations
the miles I have walked
the days into nights I have stared at computer screens
hunched over working to get the word out
the times I literally saved people’s lives
the way society has pushed on me and I have pushed back
the mountains I have climbed - the journeys in nature
the projects and communities I have built
the workshops I have facilitated
the moments of holding people in grief and in cheer
the lifecycle rituals
the epic nights of partying in queer clubs
-dancing and sweating-
staying up till sunrise celebrating with my dear friends
the electric feeling of going home with a stranger
the powerful magic of synchronicities
the years of living as a nomad - always on the road
the past four years of living in a community house and building a home
the joy of performing on stage
the wild adventures - the pleasures and pain
the experience of being a body that bleeds with the tides, the moon, and others who bleed
the way my body has shifted through time and space
to allow me to do the things I want and need to do.
I am so proud of this body for holding me in all of life and so excited to honor the way my body has changed and grown. Every wrinkle, every line, every added pound, every worked muscle, every bruise, every curve; every piece of me is a story and I love all that I am.
This project is part of my activism and personal journey. This is a revolutionary act of stepping out past shame and fear of judgment into courageous vulnerability. Participating in this project is my way of honoring all of us that have lived through harm because of societal pressure to conform. There are so many messages forced onto all of us: body shaming, gender needing to look a certain way, nudity being something to hide, shutting down our true selves. There are so many ways bodies are dominated, consent is broken, and harm is created. This is me rising up with everyone else in this project and with you all of you – your witness a form of participation. This is for all of us to be able to be free. This is me owning my power and standing up to the people who told me negative messages about my body, that expect me to perform gender a specific way, that slut shamed me as a young person, that tried to physically harm me, and dared to attempt to make me feel less than. I refuse to feel less than and I refuse to have anyone be considered less than. We are all so needed, so valuable, so important. We are all gifts in our glorious, gorgeous, lived in bodies.
Every body literally is beautiful. I hope someone sees my body and realizes their body is beautiful. I hope someone sees me loving myself and realizes they can love themselves. I hope I get the opportunity in the decades to come to keep witnessing myself in nothing but light and I hope you all get the opportunity to witness yourself in nothing but light. The photographer gave me the opportunity to take photos of her and it made me realize this is a healing modality that everyone can benefit from and that we can all experiment with this art form and make it our own. I gave my permission to be in this project and the photographer gave me her permission to take this particular healing tool into my life and yours.
May these images inspire you to be your fullest most brilliant self – fearlessly and unapologetically - no matter what society tries to tell us. We are beautiful.