Author Archives: adventurerliberated

It’s not the first time that I’ve had deep, intense emotions related to my gender identity — feeling a deeper & broader sense of exploration, discovery, and understanding of my gender — through singing or having sex (both with other people, not just myself). But I hadn’t had either in a while and I’ve experiencedContinue reading “Exploring my gender through sex & song”

In one of my dreams last night I had a beard. Still in its infancy and very fair, a light blond beard, but clearly a beard. It’s not the first time that I’ve dreamt of suddenly having — or suddenly noticing that I have — a beard. And I’m always a little upset, or troubled,Continue reading “The boy in the mirror, the boy in my soul”

I’m at a work event at a National Lab for the annual meeting of the big scientific collaboration that funds my advisor’s grant that pays my research, i.e. pays my bills. I arrived Sunday evening, the meeting started yesterday morning, very early, and finished late yesterday evening, and again another long, tour-de-force day today.  I’veContinue reading “Toxic STEM”

I had to come all the way to the U.S.A., to the Western States, to California and then even more specifically to Colorado, in order to find myself. Like Hesse’s Siddhartha: he had to go through all those experiences, all those “lives”, all those roles or “versions of himself”, to eventually, finally find himself (&Continue reading “Traces”

This last weekend of October, from Saturday through last night, I went on a trad climbing trip to Utah with my closest climbing buddy from Colorado. A three-day-two-overnight road trip together. Our first road trip together and a huge step up in our friendship, in our relationship.  Last December we spent nearly 14 hours togetherContinue reading “Platonic polyamory”

Today’s an important day — actually, both yesterday and today, two days marking important recurrences for me.  One year ago today I got the letter confirming the courthouse approval of my legal name change. Although the courthouse issued the approval on October 21st, 2022, I didn’t get the letter until October 26th, 2022, so inContinue reading “Pieces of myself blooming again”

My closest climbing buddy (who’s also a badass mountaineer) lost one of his toes on Denali, in Alaska, a few years ago.  My European genderqueer ex-lover had to have a big chunk of their tongue cut off when they had cancer a little over a decade ago.  From these two people who are both AMABContinue reading “Amputations”

One of the songs my friend from Iowa & I sang together when she joined me for a couple days on my trip in August was the ballad “This land is your land” — she with her beautiful soprano voice (& strumming the guitar) and me in my now very deep alto (or maybe alreadyContinue reading “This life is my choice”

It’s a month away from my birthday, my 42nd birthday.  And my English grandmother, Grandmummy, died exactly a decade ago.  I can still remember that day: it was a weekend day (Saturday, I think). I was living in Barcelona with my ex-partner at the time and we went out for a long walk that afternoon;Continue reading “Thoughts & feelings on October 12th, 2023”

I just walked into Caribou Coffee in Minneapolis and saw a trans flag & a non-binary flag at the cashier register and nearly started to cry. I literally had to take a moment to catch my breath before making my order. I’m in Minneapolis for a one-day work event, the “Future Faculty Symposium” organized byContinue reading