I don’t often experience “breakthroughs”. I’m more of a slow and steady, parse the information, ruminate on all the options kinda gal. But I guess ‘breakthrough’ is the closest word I can use to describe where my head is at right now.

Two weeks ago, I marched in the Sydney Mardi Gras Parade for the first time. It was actually my first time even attending the parade since 2000. I’ve always been queer and I’ve never felt the need to label my queerness. The crowds, the hullabaloo, the spectacle, the Pride-with-a-capital-P aspects of queerness weren’t really for me. But I’ve been intentionally exploring my place in the ‘alphabet soup’ of LGBTQ+IA for a few years now, and since I had no other commitments I decided this was the year I would do all things Mardi Gras.

It was important to me to join a float that spoke to my intersectionality, so I chose Aspect, an autism support group (whose theme this year was literally ‘Intersectionality’ by the way). Because my health has been somewhat in decline the last 5-6 years, and having never marched before, I was worried about the physical demands of the parade. Everyone I spoke to said something different, from the “Oh it’s really quick, like a light jog, I don’t think you’ll be able to do it, why don’t you hire a mobility scooter?” crowd, to the “It’s a quick walk but there’s lots of stops and starts and chances to catch your breath, you’ll be fine.”

And you know what? I was. In fact, I felt more than fine, I felt AMAZING. Seeing the crowds lined up to cheer the marchers on was so empowering, and I felt especially proud when I walked past the disability and accessible viewing space and saw two awesome individuals I’d met and shared a train into the city with. The walk was easy, I was dancing the whole time. Afterwards I went off to a metal gig and though I was dressed in 80’s gear (the sub-theme of Aspect’s float), nobody cared and they even complimented me on my outfit. Then I spent the rest of the night hanging out with some friends feeling completely relaxed, completely myself, and importantly, feeling good about who my whole self is. I even connected with someone unexpected, in a really open and honest way, no games or bullshit, which is always such a blessing.

It made me realise there’s a lot I’ve been missing out on in life, because I’ve thought it too hard or that I didn’t deserve it. It made me angry at myself and my entire perspective has shifted since that weekend, for the better. I immediately put myself on a sensible diet plan, and have already lost 2 kg. I’ve organised some fitness training, which I’m nervous about but will try my best to stick to. I haven’t even needed my cane at all during this whole time. I’ve finally got my house in order. There are some negative things in my life right now that I’m dealing with. But overall I’m feeling like the good outweighs the bad.

Best of all, I feel the creative juices flowing for the first time in years, and decided to revamp this blog site (that I hadn’t touched in ten years, d’oh). I’ve spent the last couple of weeks trawling through old livejournal accounts, google drives, multiple emails and FB pages and profiles to find the majority of the poetry I’ve written since 1998 (prior to that it’s in a notebook somewhere and I was an angsty child and no one needs to read that stuff, haha). I’m so close to re-launching this site, and questioning myself hard. What is my motivation here? How do I want people to engage with my art? What if this is all just angsty depressive love poetry word vomit and I’m not as good as I think I am?

It’s easy to run back. It’s easy to say, “You know what? At least I tried… ” and disappear again into my cave. It’s easy to tell myself that nobody wants to read my style of writing anymore, that my health problems are too much of an obstacle to experiencing human connection, that people will ultimately just betray and hurt and reject anyway so why bother. It would be easy to go back to my victim mindset and cry about my loneliness and feel sorry for myself. But… I don’t want to. I WANT to put myself out there again. I WANT to see if there’s still a place in the world for my art. I WANT to see if there’s someone out there who can love me.

They say ‘The heart wants what the heart wants‘ – and I can’t tell my heart to be quiet anymore.