#we don't have public transit

[jacuzziwaters]

I rode Thomas The Train today.

#just riding a train in general is so much fun #i don't get to experience that much #looks at small town #we don't have public transit #cries #jay's attempts at communicating

[cosmic-kaden]

:') Weather unfavourable for going out. So second government thing is going to have to wait.

#I'd rather not have the humidity trigger my Ménière's :/ #Like it's 8AM and the apartment is boiing. checked the weather and no thank you :') Unsafe for me to travel. #If I had a way to get down there without having to use public transit or walking I would but since I rely heavily on those things- I don't #want to risk it. Learned my lesson a few years ago when the weather got super hot #I decided to run errands that day and as I was standing up on the busy bus I got a horrible vertigo attack and fell #smashed my head and scraped my arm pretty good on the bus- >_>; someone got off the bus with me to call an ambulance because I didn't have #anyone at that time to call. (Believe people were out of the country for a wedding) SO LESSON LEARNED! When its humid we do not leave the #confines of home #tw: chronic illness

[vogelmeister]

i hate car centric infrastructure but most of all i hate how people have been conditioned to think its the only way

#'how do we improve traffic' well firstly we increase public transit options so people don't feel inclined to drive #make people feel as if driving isnt the only option #i do like the idea of riding the horse to uni tho #heel leuk #POINT IS people were saying 'oh we actually increase peoples car education bc people are shit drivers' #which they are and it's valid #my ex friend was awful at driving but i never said how unsafe i felt with her behind the wheel until after we fell out #and never did i say it to her #but i was more looking at less cars on the road type beat #its scary how people are conditioned to think around cars #even my mum is like 'all cities are car centric' even though she's been to amsterdam #sickening #and i know this is just me screaming to the void but one of the big reasons i want to move to nl is not bc im bsc about the netherlands #i am insane fyi i am very normal #but its because i can't bear to live a life where i have to drive everywhere #i would simply rather learn to cycle #or ride the horse to uni #anyways my assignment is about walkability now so i can blab on about amsterdam in the reflection

[savrenim]

........AND MY CAR HAS NOW BROKEN DOWN

#S C R E A M S #I AM THE ONLY ONE WITH A CAR IN MY HOUSEHOLD #LIKE I CAN SURVIVE THE 1HR20MIN PUBLIC TRANSIT EACH WAY EVERY DAY TO WORK I GUESS??? #BUT WE DON'T HAVE A GOOD WAY OF GETTING OUR STANDARD G R O C E R I E S #AND UNLESS I AM EXCEEDINGLY LUCKY AND CAN DRIVE ON WHATEVER IS WRONG #MY CAR CAN'T EVEN BE SEEN BY THE SHOP UNTIL MARCH 26TH #WE NEED TO FIGURE OUT HOW TO DEAL WITH THIS FOR??? A FULL MONTH???????? #AT LEAST #BC WHO KNOWS HOW LONG REPAIRS WILL TAKE

[hyenaswine]

a fun fact is that it didn't become fashionable or common to hate LA until after 9/11 when it became UNfashionable to hate NY. new yorkers were notorious for being rude & horrible (whether the person stating the opinion had ever been to new york or even MET a new yorker, this was the trope) until tragedy struck & suddenly We Were All New Yorkers. this was a phenomenon i remember noting as it happened. i have no opinion on new york because i haven't been there yet, but a whole lot of people seem to have totally skewed & uninformed opinions about LA whether they've been there or not (& there's no way you can get a sense of the real LA by just visiting - i grew up there & there are many parts i haven't even gotten to explore yet).

#also i can't compare its public transit cuz i don't know enough about transit in other cities #but i've spent many many MANY hours on LA buses so you can't say we don't have transit #it just takes forever to get anywhere bc of the traffic & sheer size of the city. but that's excruciating by car too

[welcometogrouchland]

I am gripping you by the shoulders and begging you to listen when I tell you teens want to be outside so bad. We want to be outside so fucking bad you have no idea

#ramblings of a lunatic #WE DON'T LIKE STAYING INDOORS ON SCREENS ALL DAY EVERYDAY ITS NOT FUN IT DOESN'T FEEL GOOD #yes there are exceptions and yes we like to do it more than previous generations but by god if it doesn't take a toll on your mental health #AND WE KNOW THIS BTW. WE'RE COMPLETELY FUCKING AWARE OF THIS FACY #*fact #but it's like. there's such a lack of options sometimes #like for example- i live in a pretty small town. walkable but not without some effort #there's no shopping centre (mall for americans) and maybe 3 parks (one of which is up a hill on the far side of town) #there are community centers but they're underfunded and don't cater to teens- especially not as casual hangout spaces #so like. unless you corall all your friends into one persons house (me and my friends generally go out in a group of 8-10 ppl- #-so while going to one persons house is doable it's not the most convenient and again this a small town. lots of the houses are small too) #or are willing to hangout at a park (a place where there's generally going to be young children and their parents- #-which isn't a deal-breaker by any means but can make kids feel like intrusions or even be perceived as sketchy) #(this is generally what me and my friends have to come to terms with everytime we hangout since we usually do it in the park) #then like. where the hell do you go?? yknow?????? #also plenty of my friends live in rural areas where it's a 20 or 30 minute drive into town and only one of us has his license #all this to say #I'd really love to see some statistics on what the hangout habits of kids from different living areas is like #because i have a feeling that kids who grow up in big relatively walkable cities with public transit and nice hangout spots #are getting out of the house a lot more often than a bunch of lower and middle class teens scattered across rural country spaces- #-and a town with little to no space for them to just exist without doing some kind of activity to justify their presence #this isn't even touching on helicopter parenting that prevents kids from being independent #anyway yeah i wish i was not on my phone so much i enjoy life better when I'm not on it but. god does not love me so <3

[keygen]

I don't actually want to swing a big bat at a hornet's nest but I don't think single very rich individuals should get to fly big stupid planes all the time and ruin the planet for the rest of us poor bastards.

#noa.txt #we should get reliable public transit and high speed rail and if we don't then celebrities should have to ride schmuck grade public transit #like the rest of us. #and wonder what the mystery damp spot on the seat next to them is. #and have snow in their boots from running across a snowbank because the city didn't plow the bus stops properly again. #and sit next to an old lady drinking a can of molson and staring you dead in the eye. daring you to fucking try to stop her ancient ass. #public transit is beautiful because it brings all us schmucks together. long live the schmucks.

[musicrunsthroughmysoul]

SECOND CONCERT OF THE MONTH COMIN' UP THIS WEEKEND, YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY! I debated adding a third (there's another one I wanna go to at the very end of the month), but it's in Seattle, and I just don't know if I feel like going through all that trouble a second time...(plus my family, who I stayed with the last time, will probably say "Oh, back again already? Well damn, we've seen you more in one month than we've seen you in four years!" and they would not be wrong. ._.)

#crystal visions of lilies in the valley #I have no idea how I will get home from this concert this weekend but I am SO FUCKING STOKED ANYWAY OMFG!!! #(it's local but hmm not driving or having a household car means getting home after concerts that end at 11pm is TOUGH...) #seriously what bullshit it is that public transit don't run any later than 10pm on a SATURDAY #AND I PRETTY MUCH LIVE IN A CITY. and no we don't have night owl buses like Seattle or Bellingham but FFS I WISH WE DID #IT MAKES NO SENSE TO ME THAT WE DON'T! we're too large a town not to...fuck...:(

[wizardhex]

I actually am pretty thankful I grew up in a walkable city with decent (compared to most of North America) public transit bc hearing Americans talk about how they can't get anywhere without a car and are dependant on said car literally boggles my mind

#Also the fact that we have any infrastructure prioritizing bikes AT ALL I take for granted...and I don't even know how to ride one #Like that should be normal wtf do you mean majority of US cities don't have bike lanes and accessible public transit

[trainsinanime]

I wonder: Do Americans know about american school buses? Not their existence in general, but how they're seen overseas.

Over here, they're one of the symbols of America, on par with the Statue of Liberty, the flag, the Eagle, and well ahead of any chain restaurant you can name. People won't know any US states, but they will know these vehicles.

The thing is, here in Germany, we don't have dedicated school buses. The general idea is that kids go to school on their own. When that's not practical, they're expected to use (and given free tickets for) public transit. Public transit is designed around this requirement; there are many places where there is a bus, and anyone can get on it, but the route and timetable really only makes sense for school children. In case a dedicated school bus is really needed, that's generally subcontracted out, and the lines either use something like a Sprinter Van for smaller routes, or a normal city or interurban bus (often a used one that's a bit older). School trips are normal public transit, or a rented bus, typically a coach or regional bus.

It's not a perfect system, in the past couple of years there's been an epidemic of people bringing their kids to school in their cars instead of letting them walk, which is less than ideal. It is what it is. But building a dedicated network of public transit lines only for students, and building dedicated vehicles only for that, has never occurred to anyone here.

Of course we know about these buses, from movies and such, but they're as foreign here as cacti or pick-up trucks (actually we're seeing more and more of these here) or yellow cabs (all europeans will assume all cabs in the US are yellow until they actually visit).

You do see these buses here at times, because people still generally like the idea of the US, even if they have a lot of issues with a lot of details, and so folks bring them over, along with stretch limos and stuff (also not really a thing here). And of course, if someone goes to all that trouble, they don't do it to haul school kids, they rent it out for city tours or as a party bus or whatever.

So you see these yellow things as a symbol of faraway places, scenic vistas, some vague undefined idea of freedom that doesn't necessarily hold up to any contact with reality, and it's just a huge part of the whole US aesthetic.

And then you go to a student exchange with the US, and you finally get the chance: You yourself get to ride in one of these iconic chrome yellow buses! It looks just like in the movies! You get in, you drive in them a little…

…and you realise they're shit. Just the worst buses in the western world. Terrible suspension. Uncomfortable seats with weirdly high backs (so they don't have to put seatbelts in, they just restrict how far kids can fly in an accident). Everything made out of the cheapest materials. Turns out the reason why the US uses school buses like that instead of normal modern city buses, which the US has, is to save money and because they just hate kids.

And then it hits you why US Americans say "as American as apple pie", a dish that is made and enjoyed literally anywhere in the world, instead of "as American as yellow school buses". Of course the Americans already knew all this. They got tortured by these things forever. It would never occur to them to see this as a symbol of America, it's just a normal part of life for them. It's a symbol of school and school life and sometimes normalcy, and tells us that these actors getting out of it are supposed to be teenagers, nothing more.

But most people in Europe have, of course, never ridden on these buses. So when they see them in movies and TV, that's a giant big yellow signifier that we're not in Hessen or Wallonia or wherever anymore. A symbol of a different world, one that may be at most a once-in-a-lifetime-experience for most people, just like a picture of a tropical beach, Mayan Pyramids, the Great Wall of China, or Hildesheim (there's no reason to go there twice). And I think Americans don't know that, and that's fascinating.

#bus #buses #school bus

[thrivingisthegoal]

Golf Courses ARE Being Converted

The Solarpunk "fantasy" that so many of us tout as a dream vision, converting golf courses into ecological wonderlands, is being implemented across the USA according to this NYT article!

The article covers courses in Michigan, Pennsylvania, California, Colorado, and New York that are being bought and turned into habitat and hiking trails.

The article goes more into detail about how sand traps are being turned into sand boxes for kids, endangered local species are being planted, rocks for owl habitat are being installed, and that as these courses become wilder, they are creating more areas for biodiversity to thrive.

Most of the courses in transition are being bought by Local Land Trusts. Apparently the supply of golf courses in the USA is way over the demand, and many have been shut down since the early 2000s. While many are bought up and paved over, land Trusts have been able to buy several and turn them into what the communities want: public areas for people and wildlife. It does make a point to say that not every hold course location lends itself well to habitat for animals (but that doesn't mean it wouldn't make great housing!)

So lets be excited by the fact that people we don't even know about are working on the solutions we love to see! Turning a private space that needs thousands of gallons of water and fertilizer into an ecologically oriented public space is the future I want to see! I can say when I used to work in water conservation, we were getting a lot of clients that were golf courses that were interested in cutting their resource input, and they ended up planting a lot of natives! So even the golf courses that still operate could be making an effort.

So what I'd encourage you to do is see if there's any land or community trusts in your area, and see if you can get involved! Maybe even look into how to start one in your community! Through land trusts it's not always golf course conversions, but community gardens, solar fields, disaster adaptation, or low cost housing! (Here's a link to the first locator I found, but that doesn't mean if something isn't on here it doesn't exist in your area, do some digging!)

#solarpunk #sustainability #climate change #gardening #activism #hope #climate justice #news #new york times #golf courses #habitat #conservation

[faeriekit]

"Okay." Danny slowly laid the already cold body back onto the table, ready to slide back it into the refuge of cold storage. "Okay. Dead guy. Stay there."

The body didn't move.

"Fantastic. Now. Hang out while I pour the embalming fluid into the pump, alright? It should only be a minute."

And it usually did; working in a funeral home wasn't extremely glamorous, but it paid the bills, and Danny had already been used to the rhyme and rhythm of negotiating death with the public by the time he sent in his mortuary school application. It had been a transition that made sense. And in the end, the degree had only cost him a few extra years post-graduation and a little dig into student loans, and now Danny had a stable 12-8 job and health insurance valid in the state of new jersey.

Today, though, the pump had that decided enough was enough. With a bang and a boom, the pump spat out a cloud of smoke and clunked uncomfortably.

The dead body sat up.

Danny scrambled over to push it back down. "No. We talked about this. Dead people don't move. If you want to stay here and have me put you back together all the time, you have to stay put. Got it?"

Whatever the weird gold-eye corpses were on in Gotham, they at least listened to him on occasion. They weren't ghosts, per se— they never pinged on any of the ghost detection devices Mom and Dad had packed in his going-away-to-college bag— but they were, despite being occasionally animate, perfectly deceased.

Weird. Danny had never gotten used to it. Still, they came in droves, too eager to sit on the top of the basement stairwell and lurk in the corners and stare endlessly at them with their weird, avian eyes, and sometimes they heralded the arrival similarly weird-ass bodies that had lost their heads or their arms or their limbs through the more conventional channels.

"I'm losing too much thread to all y'all coming in all the time," Danny complained to the dead body, who, at the moment, was the only person present to blame. "Stop getting your limbs cut off. This stuff is expensive, you know. It's a specialty order."

The body didn't even have the courtesy to blink. Rude.

"At least let them bury you this time. Every time one of you darts off when my back's turned, my boss thinks I'm stealing corpses. My coworkers think I'm building my own Frankenstein or something."

The corpse neither verbalized nor blinked, but Danny hadn't expected it to; with a sigh, he rolled the corpse back into cold storage, locked its little door (not that locking it in had ever stopped it) and called it quits for the night.

It's not like anyone was paying him for the extra hours anyway.

The whole fic on ao3

#I'm very pro Danny accidentally adopts a whole bunch of Talons #people have definitely done it before but this scene came to me in a vision #a horrible caffeinated vision #could absolutely be an excuse for #talon!dick #talons #dp x dc #faer fic #dpxdc #dcxdp #talon!au #dcu crossover #death tw #well. the funeral industry anyway #medical tw #just in case #corpse tw #¯\_(ツ)_/¯ #free to a good home

[whateveriwant]

might I request how tf 141 tries to turn you on maybe? Sorry kind of a weird request you don’t have to do it if you don’t want to ;-;

Not a weird request at all, anon! Hope you enjoy! 18+ only, GN!Reader

Price

Three words: full body massage

That man loves to get his hands on you, and it doesn’t even have to be sexual in nature, honestly. Any opportunity to touch you, to caress you, to help ease the tension from your body, he’ll gladly take it (and if afterwards you’ll let him ease himself into you, well, that’s just an added bonus 😉)

He might use special rollers or electric massagers sometimes, but mostly he just sticks to those big, strong hands of his

He'll start by slicking up his palms with some oil, warming it up before he applies it to your skin

Beginning with your shoulders, he’ll slowly work his way down your body, paying special attention to the areas you need most targeted

Aside from those tender spots, he’ll also be sure to focus on a few of your more erogenous zones, namely your thighs and your ass (he's an ass man for sure)

By the time he's finished, you're all supple and pliant before him, but there’s something else too – a sort of warm, fluttery feeling in your gut

Luckily, he knows just the remedy for that sensation. And oh! Would you look at that? You're already in his favorite position: prone

Ghost

We all know he tends to be a man of few words, and this applies to every environment he finds himself in

…At least, every environment outside the bedroom, that is

Because when he's in the mood, you best hold on tight to your pants if you don't want them flying off from how he talks to you (but, I guess, your pants coming off is his end goal anyway)

You'll just be going about your day, minding your business, when you'll get a call from him while he’s “busy” at work

He'll start off casual at first, inquiring about your day, your plans for the night, etc., but it won't take long for the conversation to steer to the real reason for his call: to describe the way he's going to fuck you when he gets home

He'll go into excruciating, toe curling detail about all the things he's going to do to you; just how good he’s going to fuck you until you forget your own name

I hope you're not in public when you take his call, otherwise you better have the poker face of a lifetime if you don't want to make a scene in front of several dozens of witnesses

Gaz

He's a big romantic at heart, so rather than just going straight for the bedroom, he'll slowly work his way up to it over the course of the evening

First, he'll treat you to a nice dinner – either by cooking it himself or by taking you to that fancy restaurant you love but think is much too expensive for every day dining

Beneath dimmed, romantic lighting, together you'll share a delicious meal, a glass or two of wine, and of course a tasty dessert to cap it all off

The conversation will be light and pleasant (nothing unbecoming whatsoever), but while he might not outright voice the plans he has for you later in the night, that look he keeps giving you from across the table speaks volumes

When you’ve finished your meal and gradually made your way back home/to the bedroom, even then he still isn't done buttering you up just yet

He'll put on some slow music, maybe light a couple candles to really set the mood, even draw you both a bath if you're feeling up to it

Once he does finally take you to bed, it'll be a seamless transition from an evening overflowing with desire and passion

Soap

‘Subtlety’ is not really a word in his vocabulary, so most of the time when he's horny, he's just turning to you and asking if you want to fuck

However, sometimes when you need a little more build up than that, he has a few tried and true methods he knows will work you up

He'll change so that he’s walking around your flat wearing a pair of gray sweatpants. Wearing only a pair of gray sweatpants, mind you

Whilst wearing said sweatpants, he'll proceed to stretch and flex around you, showing off all those muscles he knows you love, as well as highlighting a few other assets he knows drives you crazy (i.e. bulge printtttt 😍)

He'll then get really touchy with you, starting innocent at first – brushing an eyelash from your cheek, straightening the neck of your shirt – before he gets more and more brazen with his petting

And when he's real close like that, leaning right into your ear, he’ll mutter soft praises to you: telling you how beautiful you look, how good you smell, how soft your skin is where he’s touching just there

By the time he finally goes to ask if you want to have sex, he doesn't even get the words out before you're jumping him like a wild animal. All according to plan…

#wiw asks #john price x reader #captain john price x reader #captain price x reader #simon riley x reader #simon ghost riley x reader #ghost x reader #kyle garrick x reader #kyle gaz garrick x reader #gaz x reader #john mactavish x reader #john soap mactavish x reader #soap x reader #john price #simon riley #kyle garrick #john mactavish #tf 141 x reader #task force 141 x reader #cod x reader #cod mw2 #call of duty #modern warfare 2

[magnetothemagnificent]

The world is so hostile to tweens.....

Like we joke about how our schools growing up would ban the latest toy trends, but that reality genuinely horrific when you think about it. Like maybe 1% of the bans were based on safety, but the rest cited reasoning like

-"kids were bartering for collectibles" (kids learning about economics and product value)

-"kids were wearing them and the colors were too flashy" (kids experimenting with self expression and fashion)

-"kids were playing with them during lunch and recess instead of using our rusted safety hazard playground" (kids utilizing their free time to do what helps *them* unwind).

Play areas specifically geared towards children and especially towards teens are constantly being shut down. "Oh kids today are always on their phones!" Maybe because

-there are barely any arcades left and even less arcades that aren't adult-oriented,

-public pools and gyms are underfunded and shut down,

-"no loitering" laws prevent kids and teens from just hanging out,

-movie theatres only play the latest films and ticket prices are only rising,

-parks and playgrounds are either neglected or replaced with gear only directed at toddlers and unsuitable for anyone older

-genuine children's and young teen media is being phased out in favour of media directed only at very small children or older teens and adults.

-suburbs and even cities are becoming more and more hostile to pedestrians, it's just not safe for kids to walk to or ride their bikes to their friends' houses or other play destinations

Children's agency is hardly ever respected. Kids between the ages of 9-13 are either treated as babies or as full-grown adults, with no in-between. When they ask to be given more independence, they are either scoffed at or given more responsibilities than are reasonable for a child their age.

This is even evident in the fashion scene.

Clothing stores and brands like Justice and Gap are either closing or rebranding to either exclusively adult clothing or young children's clothes, with no middle ground for tweens. Tweens have to choose between clothes designed for adults that are too large and/or too mature for their age and bodies, or more clothes they feel are far too childish. For tween girls especially it's either a frilly pinafore dress with pigtails or a woman's size dress with cleavage. No wonder tween girls these days dress like they're older, it's because their other option is little girl clothes and they don't want to feel childish.

And then when tweens go to school, the books they want to read aren't available because they cover "mature" topics (read: oh no two people kissed and they weren't straight or oh no menstruation was mentioned or oh no a religion other than Christianity is depicted), so kids are left with books for way below their reading level. No wonder kids today are struggling with literacy, it's because they can't exercise and expand their reading skills with age-appropriate books. Readers need to be challenged with new words and concepts in order to grow in their skills, only letting tween read Dr. Seuss and nursery rhymes doesn't let them learn.

Discussions about substance use, reproduction, and sexuality aren't taught at an age-appropriate level in school or even by children's parents, so they either grow up ignorant and more vulnerable to abuse, or they seek out information elsewhere that is delivered in a less-than-age-appropriate manner. It shouldn't be a coin-toss between "I didn't know what sex was until I was 18 and in college" or "my first exposure to sex as a tween was through porn" or "I didn't know what sex was so I didn't know I was being sexually abused as a kid."

Tweenhood is already such a volatile and confusing time for kids, their bodies are changing and they're transitioning from elementary to middle to high school. It's hard enough for them in this stage, but it's made worse by how society devalues and fails them.

We talk about the disappearance of teenagehood, and maybe that's gonna happen in the future, but the erasure of tweenhood is happing in real time, and it's having and going to have major consequences for next generation's adults.

#leftie shit #i guess #ageism #social issues #tweenhood #the disappearance of tweenhood #current events #relevant issues

[blupcretia]

my car died

it's the only way my roommate and i were getting to work every day. the drive is about 25 minutes, but the bus ride would be almost 2 hours, and that depends on how late/early the busses will arrive at each stop.

we live in california, and it'll already be in the 100°s staring tuesday. my roommate is severely chronically ill and cannot deal with the heat for that long without the risk of passing out (or worse)

i have my eyes on a used car for a low price at a dealership, but we're going through extreme financial hardship right now. i currently have -$9.61

i get my paycheck with overtime hours on the 6th, but even then, i might not be able to afford the initial payment.

the down payment ($600) + dealer fees ($85) + taxes ($638.12) add up to $1,323.12 and that is the MINIMUM. not sure if the dealership will try to raise it.

the full price of the car is $4,900 and with taxes it adds up to $5,623.12

right now, i'm setting a goal of $2,000. i'm aware that it's high, and i most likely won't reach that, but i need all the help i can get.

please, please help if you can, and reblog even if you can't. i'm desperate. we need to be able to get to work so we don't lose our housing.

$257 / $2,000

c4shpp $astrolics

vnmo h_jenkins

you can ask for my paypal

#polls #poll #reblog

[violet-snail-sfw]

The first time I saw a trans woman was in porn. I was pretty young then, in early middle school I think. My first thoughts about trans women only existed in a sexual context, since that was the only place I saw us mentioned

The next time I saw trans people mentioned was a TV show presumably about trans people and transitioning. I didn't watch it, only saw the description because even as a kid I had already internalized the idea that it was taboo and I would get in trouble if my parents walked in and I was watching it

Eventually I saw enough TV and cop shows to see an episode with the dead trans hooker trope. It further reinforced the building idea that trans women were something else, separate from "normal" people and always on the outskirts of society

And then Caitlyn Jenner came out. At my Catholic middle school there were few kind things said about her and plenty of nasty comments, but this was the first time I saw trans people being publicly talked about

In high school my views on trans people started to fracture. On one hand, I was being pushed the idea that gender was about what's in your pants, that if you've got a dick your a man and there's nothing that can be done about it. On the other hand, early high school me had stumbled across some gender change erotica and quickly became obsessed with it. While it wasn't great representation, it was still pretty positive about transitioning. The people in those stories were always happier afterwards

I struggled to reconcile what parts of society were saying about trans people with my daydreaming about what I'd do if I woke up the next morning as a girl. Eventually I decided that it was just a fetish. I just thought it was hot, there was no way I could be trans because I was just a normal person. I wasn't weird or a spectacle for others to gawk at, I was just a person

Around that time I also met a trans person in passing for the first time. One of the trans guys at my high school was in one of the musicals that I went to because some of my friends were also in them. When I was talking to my friends about it after someone mentioned the trans guy and that he was trans. I wasn't really sure what to think so I kinda just didn't think about it. Thinking back, there were a few trans guys at my high school but I don't think there was a single out trans woman

Eventually in college I actually met some trans and nonbinary people. In some classes we introduced ourselves on the first day with names and pronouns which was my first exposure to people using pronouns other than just he/him and she/her. I had a few classes with trans and nonbinary people, including a survey of transgender studies class I took in my last semester. I had plenty of excuses for why I was taking it (I needed a few more credits to graduate. It still had room open. It fit with my other classes. It seemed interesting. I'm trying to be a good ally.)

Around this time as well I found some trans creators online like ContraPoints and Philosophy Tube (whom I had watched before she came out as trans). I was weirdly excited and interested when Odyssey Eurobeat came out as trans and I went to go listen to some of her music right after I heard. I was starting to have examples of trans people just being people. Not just porn stars or public spectacles, but people

Later I met and befriended a few trans women, one of whom was extremely open about her transness and happened to share a video which started the initial steps of my egg cracking and figuring out who I am now

If I had actually known any trans women, if the world had been kinder to trans people, if representation of trans women as people existed and was well known, I might have been able to realize who I was sooner. I would have been able to exist as myself for more than a tiny fragment of my life so far

Representation matters, both in media and in daily life. Trans people being out and open about who they are made it possible for me to realize that about myself. Please never stop being who you are

#violet's rambles #trans #transgender #transfem #nonbinary #okay to reblog