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And this is what I actually made! [just text because images on public journal feels scary]

Which, funny story: I realized when making the sauce and thinking about putting food in my bento . . . “OH RIGHT I want to be able to share with vegans because I adore them!! I want to be able to, on an unexpected occasion, potentially open up my bento and share with them. I forgot that was my objective.” and if I put honey in my recipes I won’t be learning how to use something else, and I won’t be able to feed them with zero extra effort, like I want to be able to. /laughs/ so I did use substitute for ingredients that were not honey, and probably will continue to avoid honey when cooking.

In the bento box, we go: 1/1 cup compartment >tempeh, edamame, & mushroom sautéed in a sauce of [soy sauce+rice syrup+garlic+picked ginger+rice vinegar+sesame oil+avocado oil] with white sesame seeds on top 1/4 cup compartment >sprout mix (alfafa, clover, mustard, & radish sprouts) 1/2 cup compartment> strips of sunflower rye bread with cookie butter spread & topped with candied pecans 1/8 cup compartment> sunflower seeds & mixed nuts 1/2 cup compartment> cauliflower puffs tossed with some extra nutritional yeast

In a side-box, I have a mixture of: Muruku, baby carrots, apple slices, and grape tomatoes — with a tofu dip option and peanut butter dip option

And then the “more food if I don’t just go to sleep” layout was: upcycled oat cinnamon vegan cereal with oat milk & and a shiitake mushroom bar (past tense because I will probably in reality get food from somewhere after swordfighting)

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For the first time in a while, I actually used my bento box in order to pre-prepare a meal for the day!

It was . . . really nice. I recognized when crafting the bento the same kind of cyclical “alright, so that food had this amount of protein and carbs . . . so this food needs to have THIS amount of protein and fat . . . now this food should have fat or carbs . . . now this food should be protein based . . . this food needs to be all vegetable focused for fiber . . . .” thought process — that list is just an example.

Normally I have an extremely detailed thought process like that when in the kitchen. I cook a lot, the majority of the time completely from scratch with no recipe. (I’ll use a scale for sauces, because even a few grams of difference can change the whole flavour balance.) So that thought process is how I balance out the basic macros of my home cooking.

But when I do it in a context where I am eating at the SAME TIME as I am balancing, I get . . . realllly stressed out. I also get stressed out because when I’m eating at the same time that I’m trying to balance everything, I end up eating more carbs/less vegetables than I want to and cooking less than I should be (so food costs more). Because if I’m eating at the same time that I’m trying to balance, it is PROBABLY because it’s 4-7pm and I haven’t eaten anything yet and I can’t exactly take a bundle of time to create a sauce & chop everything & marinate it & sautée & serve.

But in the context of making a bento box — once I figure out “where does it go, how do I need to cut my food so that it fits??” for the two 1/2 cup compartments that I have, anyway. — it’s a lot more relaxed. Because I’m not actually eating the food while making it** I can CHANGE MY MIND while weighing my food macro-balance decisions, which gives me results I’m MUCH happier with at the very end . . . and then I get to eat in a controlled environment!! **(though I do get tiny scraps like, “oh this seed didn’t come out of the mixing bowl” “I need to taste test the tempeh” “there was one more cauliflower puff than could fit in the box compartment”)

I also realized . . . the amount of food that I’m making. This amount of food is like . . “ohhhh!!! this is roughly the amount of food that I would normally eat during a full day. It’s just that when I’m eating it all at once while kitchen surfing in distress, feel a MASSIVE amount of unrest about feeling like “ugh I need to eat less tomorrow” becauseeee I have no idea how much I’m actually eating, and when I have no idea how much it is it always feels like WAY more than it actually is.

So . . . when I was in the kitchen, I was actually prepping food for THE ENTIRE REST OF THE DAY. I made a bento box; an accessory box full of vegetables with 2 dipping sauces; and I wrote down a plan for “if I still need more food after that — if I don’t decide to just go to bed instead, because I often prefer to just go to bed instead of eating — this is what that food will be”. (though I may very well end up eating a vegan pizza from a local pizzaria tonight, instead of my book-eared meal? since I’ll probably be going out for swordfighting and eating out after swordfighting is fun.)

Which I know is not a lot!!! But I don’t . . . enjoooooooyyyyy. Eating a lot. And I’ve had a LOT of changes in my body, over the last 3 months . . . which I really like, from an autosexual perspective AND a “WAIT this is actually my body, I haven’t seen this in YEARS, wow!” identity perspective . . . and lot of that was because the quantity of food that I was eating was on-and-off abysmal because of disordered eating issues and cotards delusions that prevented me from eating and more-purposeful body sculpting ideas . . . so I’m trying to figure out how to eat where my MENTAL HEALTH about eating is substantially better, but I can still maintain where I’m at?? Also /laughs/ it means that buying more expensive vegan food doesn’t matter as much since I’m purchasing LESS of it.

wow nobody liked that Read More!! I mean, I liked it, but.

Anyway I’ll post what I cooked next :3

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I think comparing judaism and veganism might be my current special interest, y’all —

(procced by reading more about veganism versus vegan diets and getting really excited about this again)

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Also there is so much about jewish vegetarianism that there is a whole wikipedia page about it

which I think is. _fantastic_ not that I trust wikipedia to represent anything pertinent to a minority group well, not afTER I NOTICED HOW INTERSEXIST IT IS

like, look at this, it’s much longer of a Wikipedia page than I expected, also mentions a documentary that I didn’t know about; I’ve known about “Dominion” for years but I did not know about “If This is Kosher . . .”

here’s another page about jewish vegetarianism which I’m more thrilled about than the Wikipedia page, like we got descriptions of specific Rabbi being leading advocates for vegetarianism in here, this is great

and honestly, the point that “the rules might have been purposefully made so complicated, such as to passively persuade Jews to just become vegetarian because then they can avoid the whole difficult gamut” is so valid and interesting, and — okay if that’s WHY they are so complicated and arbitrary then I’m not even mad?????

ALSO ALSO I think it’s REALLY FUNNY that . . . the main argument “against” vegetarianism — that [direct wikipedia copy-paste] According to some interpretations of Jewish law, it is not acceptable for an individual to become a vegetarian if they do so because they believe in animal rights.[57][1][page needed] . . . the main argument STILL DOES NOT refute my own reason for eating vegan /giggles/ and I don’t feel like there are many folks who eat vegan who would be able to still Pass Go, Collect 200 past that. Hehe. hehehe.

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Spouse and I were taking a walk and I was updating him all about veganism & Judaism, and how a vegan diet & following kashrut have so much wonderful overlap

And there are some items that I’m [more likely to not eat because of following a botanophilia-based vegan diet] versus foods I’m [more likely to not eat because acknowledging the extra remaining steps of eating kosher, as a nod to my family]

He was like “you’re going to have to explain that word before vegan” (so I specified that ‘oh yeah, I’m eating no animal products because of my attraction to plants and wanting them to affect my physical body as much as possible, and by cutting animal products I introduce a LOT more plants (& fungi) into my diet which is the biggest thing that affects the body, blahblahblah’) and he pointed out, “wouldn’t that actually be a botanophilic vegan” which YES THANK YOU, that’s such a good way to put that, /relieved screams/ (also I just plan forgot that the suffix -philia could be conjugated into an adjective, rather than a verb, by making it -philic)

—okay okay okay so talking about the differences between what I’d eat based on [being a botanophilic vegan] versus [following kashur as a nod to my jewish family] and how without the core tenants of a vegan diet (just plain not eating animal products at all) I wouldn’t be able to honor kashur (because they are discriminatory about animals in ways that make me irritated) But there is at least one tenant of the vegan diet that as a botanophilic vegan alone, I wouldn’t care about - that I CAN readily honor because of kashur. That one item is gelatin. Adding just one tiny thing to avoid that I wouldn’t do otherwise, because it exists within the overlap of BOTH, is not a huge deal to me — annnnnddddddddd, the contexts that I would ACTUALLY WANT TO EAT GELATIN IN feels so non-existent? since gelatin is in, what? meat products and dairy products? and highly processed candy that doesn’t actually contribute to bringing me feel spiritually closer to belonging to plants at all?? can’t think of any other ingested gelatin cases.

But there are some foodstuffs that don’t have overlap between the two groups. Namely: grapes (kashrut) honey (vegan)

And this really comes down to personal preference because. Grapes are such an obscure kashrut, I have seen multiple Jews have NO IDEA that grapes could be either kosher OR unkosher. But even though they are a plant product, they are still under a kashrut. Honey is such a an obscure non-vegan safe food, I have seen multiple Vegans have NO IDEA that honey wasn’t vegan. But even though honey is a plant-based product it is still a byproduct from a livestock animal.

—okay I’m so glad that I put this side by side into the same sentence structure, because I had no idea how wild or not (negative) saying “honey is just the vegan version of the grapes kashrut”, actually would be. But this is actually very fun & silly.

—anyway my stance on that is like . . . my emotional reaction to “not eating unkosher grapes” makes me giggle; I’m not usually a fan of grapes as often they are WAY too sweet. I don’t use grape jam — I still have a lot of residual instincts to ‘not eat [food type]’ from when I was having to eat like a diabetic pre-surgery and eating super sweet fruit triggers those instincts. I don’t drink alcohol, either. Also I could still eat grapes I’d just have to get kosher grape products. versus my emotional reaction to “not eating honey” makes me anxious; I have considered whether I want to not eat honey simply as a nod to vegans because I absolutely ADORE them . . . but I feel like this is the food that already has the single lowest chance to matter to them?? ESPECIALLY if I’m avoiding gelatin, also a more common to overlook food?? also . . . beeswax (another animal byproduct, though not eaten) is important for Judaism becausseeeee almost every single candle that I can buy for jewish stuff in my area is made out of beeswax, and jewish candles are kiiiiind of. Important.

also I’ve had the thought that, for honey — if I needed it because I was sick, if I had lived myself into a reality where I WAS avoiding honey as a nod to Vegans — that I would use the same “pikuach nefesh argument” for why taking a medication in a gelatin capsule (if needed to save a life) in Judaism would be okay. I imagine speaking to someone and saying, “I wouldn’t follow that kashrut in that case, so in the same case with honey, I wouldn’t follow the normal vegan thing, either.”

but I actually did just have honey today for the first time in like . . . a several months? which is funny, because I have over 20+ varieties of honey from the time that my sister and I did a group project about her Special Interest (she has a headmate who is a colony of bees). I just frequently overlook that part of the kitchen. and it was nice. so I probably won’t bother avoiding that particular thing. Maybe?? I mean honey was another thing I had to avoid when my body could not process carbs well, prior to my surgery, so I don’t have zero instinct to avoid it. Maybe it’ll be like grapes and I’ll waffle about it and avoid it unless I have a particular hankering for it?? or maybe I won’t, I don’t know. I do refuse to lose sleep over it.

there are some other things I can’t avoid either, like — I had to look for underwear that worked comfortably for me for my whole life, until ~5 months ago, because my junk is weird. I struggled with excessive discomfort from underwear since I was like /signs “child” in ASL, but extra low to the ground./ Finally found a type that works for me. It’s silk. Not really . . . not really up to spending even MORE years looking for underwear that work again . . . I did look into silk replacements though, because with so much underwear difficulties I really NEED to establish my own pattern so I can MAKE them. These underwear aren’t going to last forever: neither the pairs that I own NOR the online listing where I can purchase more. I found something fun while looking for vegan silk replacements. Apparently there are materials like lotus silk!! which is . . . really exciting because I. um. I. okay — I LIKE lotus flower seedpods okay. um. ANYWAY so I kind of laughed at the idea of /snorts/ making underwear out of the silk from that plant. Because I feel like it would be either the funniest thing ever OR the most Unfortunate Arousal Timing experience ever (still funny, but at my expense).

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“Okay listen normally I really appreciate positivity posts for stuff that I am. But this one gives me a migraine so I’m just gonna. Click the ‘Not Interested in This Post’ button. Woo!”

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Wow, apparently seeing things that I’ve intended to interact with gives me anxiety —

. . . even if I already successfully interacted with the thing

Like “what’s that? someone who you really like said a thing and you want to respond to the thing, because you like them, and you resonate with what they said? it is anxiety time.”

obviously this is why making “oh I need to make a journal about this” planned journal pots are so hard /saying this in the tone that I’d say for a facetious statement, but it’s actually a genuine observation/

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It’s very, very funny to me that mere HOURS after I had a spontaneous “WAIT HOW DO I DO THIS JEWISH THING” thought in regards to holiday baking while eating a vegan diet, that my bio-mom and I ended up talking about Judaism for hours.

Because I contacted her about “hey; do you ever have to manually empty out the contents of gelatin medication capsules, in order to take them?”

with my sending-the-message intent being “I am thinking about vegan diet**” but of course she is interpreting it solely as “I am thinking about Judaism” because jewishness is a very important part of her life **but also!! I have been thinking, a nice benefit of a vegan diet is that — by coincidence — it would make eating kosher as a nod to my family _significantly easier_.

—the Jewish answer ended up being: “ultimately, you would ask your rabbi”, (which is a very common answer, by the way). The expression iS “ask two Jews, get three answers”, afterall. but there are actually many arguments why for the sake of _kosher_ eating, for Judiasm, that taking medication contained within gelatin capsules would be fine The primary arguments being, 1. It’s okay because it’s necessary to save a life (pikuach nefesh) but that doesn’t really apply to, say, headache medicine. 2. Gelatin for gel capsules has been so processed that it doesn’t even resemble food anymore, so it’s not pig or not-kosherly slaughtered beef gelatin. 3. Medicine is not food, so the food laws (kashrut) do not apply.

To which, she thought argument 3 was the strongest (it also makes a lot of sense to me) and I also thought argument 1 makes sense. In nearly every case, the code of Jewish law (halacha) is set aside if it is for the sake of pikuach nefesh. I didn’t really like argument 2, but that’s because it tickles my “eating a vegan diet” bones wrong which is utterly irrelevant in a discussion about kashrut.

Speaking of eating kosher, by the way . . . I found out that eating a vegan diet is not _necessarily_ a 1:1 shortcut for “basically” following kashrut. It certainly makes it EASIER, because the majority of kashrut have to do with “eat this species, not that species” or “keep your meat and your milk completely separate” or “eat this flesh of the animal, not that flesh of the animal”. Which are always kashrut I took issue with — I would never be following those kashrut strictly from my heart, and so I would never willingly impose them upon my daily life. However, I can eat a vegan diet strictly from my heart, and so I WOULD (and am) willingly imposing it upon my daily life. But there are other parts of eating kosher, too.

Like . . . factory processed food will have a ‘kosher symbol’ (hechsher) on it, and that’s not just a “shortcut icon so that you don’t have to scrutinize the ingredients on everything **”. It’s because the actual processing equipment itself can be either kosher or unkosher. Which is super interesting to think about! There’s also kashrut about non-Jewish grape products. **which is absolutely exhausting to have to do for vegan foods, I’m always soo glad when the Vegan symbol IS on those . . . also the Contains: [allergies] section at the end of the ingredients list. That’s a great timesaver for checking ingredients, too.

It can become steeply difficult to manage if you’re trying to do everything from a strict Orthodox perspective, especially if you live and share a kitchen with someone who doesn’t observe at all like I do (then it is basically impossible) but Orthodox is not what my family is.

Ultimately I feel really happy about how my current diet brings me “so close already” with the huge overlap there is, so that’s really encouraging to just reach over the rest of the way.

Actually, the overlap does not only bring me closer to kosher eating. It ALSO brings me closer to “normal” vegan eating?

The reason that I’m avoiding eating animal products is because I’m a botanophile and I have a deeply potent desire for plants to affect my physical body as much as possible. I think vegans are absolutely beautiful, I’m enamored by their care about pointing out hypocrisy in the culture of our world and for standing up for the subjugated group that they care about through the way that they live their life every day green is just me being really gay for a while — and when they point this out everyone hates them for it —because it points out to folks that, according to their very own expressed values (pretty much anyone will say that they like and care about animals), they live their life Doing Bad Thing. “There is no ethical consumption under capitalism” but with animals, it is literally impossible to victim-blame or to mental gymnastics about how “yeah but they still have to do it to survive” like people are want to do with other subjugated groups. So there is no space for the grief to go EXCEPT for bouncing back to the vegan.

I can ABSOLUTELY relate because of caring about youth liberation, and I mean honestly I think the questions that vegans ask people when they say ridiculous stuff like “I love all animals” right before smashing an arthropod who was minding his own business are _the correct questions to be asking people_??? I literally wrote a creative paper about that in college. Suns, vegans are beautiful. Oh talking with them about food, too — THEIR food — is so bright. They’re so bright. Like — like they shine it’s this whole little hidden beautiful culture of food that they have. And if you ask them about their food because you’re getting it, too it’s just —/huge massive smiles/ — oh they’re so excited and I absolutely adore them ARGHGGG they’re so good. And by eating the same food as them I learn so much about it and I want to cook for them SO BAD I adore vegans I’m like “hmmm I could cut out this one little extra tiny thing from my diet that I wouldn’t do otherwise — because it’s not botanophile-sensible AND it’s not kashrut — but I just want to see the vegans happy — I imagine interacting with them and doing or eating something that makes them sad, and that makes me sad, I don’t want them to be sad because they are sO BEAUTIFUL —

Wow this journal wasn’t supposed to be this gay, like it got REALLY gay; why am I writing this at 4am. Uhhhhh. Okay uh this next paragraph was supposed to be, like, 3 paragraphs ago. Let’s just. Let’s just pretend I stayed on topic.

But I do not share the core-est tenant of them: the specific downtrodden group that I’m concerned about is NOT animals. I get annoyed at people’s hypocrisy, yes, but . . . I wouldn’t describe myself as someone who likes animals. I just want to belong to plants. Like I’d do the whole vivipary thing if I could; I’ve done so in headspace. That puts me in a weird spot, where I’m technically “a vegetarian that eats neither eggs nor milk” but other than “vegan” there is no word for that. Vegan is not just a diet, but I still can’t eat food labeled as “vegetarian” INSTEAD of “vegan”. There are some vegan unfriendly foods that without the Jewish aspect I would not be concerned about — like gelatin. Not that something so heavily processed as gelatin brings me any closer to plants, EITHER. It wouldn’t be something I’d feel “accomplishes” anything for me by eating. So from a “botanophile vegan” perspective, I am not concerned about gelatin . . . but from a kashrut perspective, I AM concerned about gelatin. Bringing me closer to . . . both judaism AND veganism? The two of them just pair together quite nicely.

. . . or I guess I could have still be concerned about them, but only because I’m really really gay. But already being happy about kashrut and a vegan diet is the catalyst for me connecting being happy about a vegan diet and. uh. vegans. themselves. very gay. I’m gonna keep digging myself into this hole because it’s hilarious.

/abruptly freezes what I was doing/

“Wait, how am I supposed to bake hamantaschen for Purim next year? Those are almost entirely butter.”

/clicks tongue/ I suppose I will have to figure it out.

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I’m cleaning the handwash dishes tonight, and I’m on the step where I’m rinsing the cast iron.

My spouse has been cooking bacon a lot recently, previously he was not at all . . . nooot really sure why he chose to suddenly start cooking bacon around the time when I’m both talking about Judiasm a lot more with my mom AND ALSO now eating vegan . . . . /dry entertained chuckles, because I know it has nothing to do with me — it’s just ironic timing/

—so I’m rinsing the bacon off of one of these pans, and it’s rinsed but I’m still wrinkling my nose at the stench of the animal oil

and it’s funny: I’m here like . . . “ugh I hate that this pan** still reeks of bacon . . . not from an eating vegan perspective***, but from a this pan is so unkosher perspective”.

**the pan is formally mine, by the way, making this worse ***though it IS a cast iron so it’s like. still just a few hairs raised at this. haha.

They are very . . . funny intermingled topics.

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I had the ‘brilliant idea’ of using my soft flex cup (groin protection for swordfighting) as a “drying stand” for the little plastic squeeze-vacuum pump that I’ve been using whenever I apply my DHT for bottom growth (been doing that the last few days, which has been working well; I’ve been very happy with it) and I think it’s so funny because — not only does it actually work very well (the interior shape of the soft flex cup, when upside down, caresses the squeeze-vacuum pump pretty perfectly so that it’s held up at a roughly 60 degree angle and the interior can dry out) it also takes up very little space, consolidates two of my items together for more regular storage, — AND BOTH OF THEM are items for groin /snorts/ /laughs/

so yes I feel very clever

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“Give me the migratory rice scoop!” ”He will be THERE now!!!” ”His power is UNLIMITED AND GROWING—“

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me, who walk-marched around for 5 miles yesterday, the majority of that distance being with groceries in my cooler backpack: wow. I sure am slowly finding out, as I move this morning, that various spots of my body feel heavy or stiff. I wonder why?

. . . oh, right.

ugughgh doing all this processing recently means I have to catch up on housework because taking care of my sprouts this morning was more difficult, since this is the first morning in a long time that I hadn’t ensured the sink was clear the night beforeeeeee

I do all this journaling and processing and still constantly feel like I have other journals I haven’t done (that I need to record) and socializing that I haven’t done (because I want to make sure that my thoughts that I have about others reach them)

akjdsnsg.

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. . . /comes back to this/

I’ve been thinking about, since I am only having sex with my headmates, and my gender is sexuality based — what do I want them to do? since I mentioned being very interested in mirror pronouns in concept, and I do experience emotional empathy with my headmates, which would make me “more” mirror-y with them.

hmmmm . . .

Well, I don’t want any of my headmates — either Itov (who uses he/him and is distinctly a guy) OR Aurix (who uses she/her and is distinctly a girl) — to use their respective “boy” or “girl” titles for me . . . —I would pretty much always be happy with the title of “mage” instead of “boy” or “girl”. It’s cool because it reflects how mages are ever-changing and absorbing/being affected by the world. It reflects that mirror-y nature despite being the word mage instead of mirror. (Also mirror in my system is associated with a little bit of baggage?? The first time Itov ever talked about system-sexual-trauma with me, he referred to me as a little clipped mirror. clipped as in, how a mirror can be chipped; clipped as in, how the wings of a bird can be clipped so that it cannot fly anymore. It was referring to how by doing so much reflecting of other headmates all the time, I could not really be my own mage. Aurix wasn’t allowing me to work on unsuppressing memories at the time . . .) —it feels . . . well it feels detached if my headmates use the body name for me, but that’s because it’s not “my” name — I don’t really HAVE a name. I have titles. Everyone kind of calls me their own thing. And I like those! they’re really intimate and . . . inherently carry “this is how you are most related to me”. I am Uriel’s [blah], I am Sumatra’s [twin’s blah], I am Itov’s [blah], I am [blah] to Aurix. —Actually, I suppose that whenever others ask me about “what should I call you” — I also tell them, “you can name me whatever you’d like, as long as its based on something from where we met. So if we met on tumblr — anything you can come up with based on my tumblr or how we interact on tumblr, you can use that — but don’t start calling me by my discord name or whatever.” And I suppose that’s like . . . I want what others call me, to carry what their feelings for me are.

No wonder I get so caught up in “I really really want to know what [mage] actually thinks of me”, it’s like an identity thing. I didn’t really realize that.

And I guess that’s . . that’s not quite mirror pronouns, because mirror pronouns are based on “this is how I perceive myself, and I am bestowing that upon you”. But what I have going on is “this is how I perceive you, and I am bestowing that upon you”. Which I guess would be more like [any pronouns]? But not in the [any pronouns] way of “she/he/they are fine” and you’re secretly wondering if it’s ACTUALLY okay to call them any pronoun, like ANY pronoun. Like could you use pup/pups or star/stars for them?? Or would fae freak out?? /thoughtful furrow/ But instead it’s [any pronouns] in the way of “I want to learn more about you, by learning what you think about me. I want you to call me tail/tails, because you think of me and you think about the tail on my avatar. I want you to call me bird/birds, because you think of me and you think of the whisk of wind that is created when birds lift into the sky. I want you to call me it/its becuse you think of me and you think of reclaiming old neutral pronouns. I want you to call me pup/pups because you think of me and it makes you think of YOU, because you see you IN me and you use pup/pups. I want you to call me river/rivers, because you think of me and you think of how I look unassuming and clear on the surface, but am actually in constant changes of flow.

hehe . . . that’s really sweet.

Maybe that’s like [any pronouns except for he/she/they]. “Wait, aren’t those all the pronouns?” /giggles/ Get creative my dear! Teach me about you, by showing me the ideas and connections inside your mind. What is it that makes you think of me; what do you end up choosing?

. . . I think that is the most Nülïx coded thing that I have ever said. Nunu ALWAYS has used [all pronouns] but in the “get super creative!!!!” way. I really DO have a lot of plants growing up in here [Nülïx is a plant]. That ah . . . makes me feel spiritually successful, haha.

. . . also . . . . . . . . . I think this is a very interesting . . . . “other reason” to be celibate ??? because I KNOW that my gender is heavily tied to my sexuality. and . . . currently, I have a big theme of wanting myself to be consistent. If there is a place that I always return to . . . I feel like that “always return to” space is probably the true me. Where I go up to in spikes are affected by and contaminated by outside forces.

I always return to “not wanting to have sex anymore”, I always return to “not wanting to have romantic relationships”, I always return to “wanting to connect to judiasm more with my biological mother”, I always return to “wanting to have no perceivable sex traits, to have a neuter body”, I always return to “wanting to know sign language”, I always return to “wanting to sew and create my own clothes”, I always return to “being passionate about what nutrients & food I put in my body”, I always return to “cooking food and feeding mages I care about”, I always return to “wanting to make mages feel loved by somebody”, I always return to “wanting to master some new thing about how to physically coordinate my body”. I should probably focus on those things. I suppose that is already what I am doing. Well. I suppose the OTHER thing I always return to is constantly changing, and reflecting other beings — that’s the only reason why I don’t have a name (despite my other headmates having names) and why I don’t have a pronoun that’s stuck (depsite my other headmates having that) and why I don’t have a consistent headspace body (despite my other headmates having that). My fluidity is my other consistent thing. But ah . . . well I’m just really tired of dissociating all the time. I want to improve the “chronically negative to my mental health” issues.

So ah . . . if I want to be where I return to, and that includes what gender I return to . . . yes, I probably shouldn’t “contaminate” my gender again by having sex in . . contexts where . . . well, perhaps the only exception would be, except for contexts in which I get the SAME gender as I do when I have sex with my headmates or plants or when I am experiencing autosexual attraction. It’s just that trial-and-erroring that without risking “contamination” is ah . . . not possible.

And . . I am once again ignoring the fact that I am so touch averse to incidental contact that I do not even want to accidentally brush someone’s arm when sitting at a table with them. And I dissociate during sex at minimum 70% of the time so I must consent to dissociation in order to consent to sex and I would not wish to do that in any context I can imagine. And I also dissociate during extended physical contact, such as with long cuddle sessions. And I don’t really want mages to touch me unless it is “for a reason”. /soft laughs/ that is really easy to forget.

[xweetok-starmap]

I can’t remember the full context anymore, but I was cooking a stir fry earlier — and I* was talking to myself and referred to myself as a “silly boy” as a joke because I did something. silly while cooking *(or a headmate was talking to me? it’s hard to tell sometimes.)

and it was really awkward, because it felt like I was misgendering myself

. . . so I was like “you know what? I should just call myself a mage all the time. ‘oh yes, [xweetok-starmap] was cooking and let me tell you, that mage did something really silly.’ — example sentence”

which feels related to another random thought I had ALSO TODAY, of ”man, I should really change my pronoun.” since I’ve been using he/him for a while. Like a year? Before that I was using [no pronouns], before THAT I was using it/its for over 10 years, before that I was using he/him too . . . there have been many pronoun changes within my life.

But /loud exhale/ it’s started to feel wrong (again). Mentally experiencing any semblance of gender, and using specific pronouns, is heavily tied to my sexuality. And with the whole “being celibate thing” that kiiiind of greatly reduces my opportunities to have my gender as it has been existing this past year to be “re-upped”, so to say. I just end up existing so much more in neuter land. Previously, the way it worked for me was: If we are having sex then I want you to use he/him pronouns for me. If I feel close enough to you that I want to be vulnerable with you, and I care about what you think of me, then I want you to use he/him pronouns for me. And: if someone is closely networked with someone who I DO care about using he/him for me, then I will be annoyed if that mage does not use he/him for me, as well — because being around ‘wrong’ pronoun usage all the time like that is probably the number one cognitohazard for pronoun slip ups. Otherwise . . . I genuinely do not care and will never be offended at pronoun use.”

Now I’m not having sex with (non-headmate) other people anymore and the first point isn’t relevant anymore . . . and apparently that was really important . . . because now I both care a lot more all the time and . . . — well I guess it’s ultimately because my gender is not “the same” anymore.

>and like. I like mirror pronoun as a concept a lot {someone uses the same pronouns for me, as they use for themself.} but in practice it would be really messy given that most folks will hear/see a pronoun get used, go “oh okay that one!”, and mimic it. >and I like [no pronouns] as a concept but — see my mental default actually is to use “no pronouns” for mages. and what that actually ends up MEANING is that I GRAMATICALLY am using pronouns for them still . . . it’s just that I’m using their NAME or shortenings of their name as a pronoun. I basically just invent neopronouns for everyone. I’ll be like “oh this is Upatan and upa is wonderful!! Upatan is orange and upa is also pink. :3” just inventing neos in the form of “nicknames”. And I know this is a thing because I had one headmate who was SO SEVERELY NO PRONOUNS that in order to refer to that headmate, I actually had to entirely change my sentence structure to make proper accomodations. I had to do it there, too. I couldn’t say “I had to change my sentence structure in order to make accomodations FOR” because the word that comes after “for” will always gramatically be a pronoun — whether using their actual full name as a pronoun, or a nickname as a pronoun, or a neo, or a normative pronoun . . .” — uh that kind of got away from me. anyway, so [no pronouns] to me either means very VERY seriously no third-person pronouns grammatically (which I am not going to pretend is easy) OR just . . . [name pronouns]. >I haven’t considered going back to it/its actually. I don’t know if I’d want to and I find myself not wanting to think about that.

—anyway, so while I was being silly in the kitchen, I was like ”obviously I should just use mage all the time. but like, ALL THE TIME. just use mage as a pronoun. can you use mage as a pronoun? that’s a rhetorical question, you can use ANYTHING as a pronoun.” like ah yes “This is [xweetok-stamap] and let me tell you, [xweetok-starmap] is a very silly mage. Anyway, mage went to the store today, and when mage got there mage thought to mageself — “WHERE IS THE NUTRITIONAL YEAST” actually /snorts/ it looks completely rediculous. Not mage/mage/mage’s/mageself that is fine but like. the fact that I can’t say [xweetok-starmap] is a very silly mage, and mage went to the store today.” without feeling silly. Maybe if it’s spelt different I’unnno. Like “this silly mage went to the store and when mg got there mg thought NUTRITIONAL YEAST??” which. I guess mg would be said more like ‘mege’ than ‘mage’ — quicker and a little bit softer ???

. . . this reminds me of the time I wanted to use sie/sier/siers/sierself (because it’s phonetically a nice blend of he and she) but I got too confused when my spouse did it for me, because the way he said it made it sound like Sierh, the name of one of my sister’s headmates. And I was like “wait what about Blue???” (my nickname for him)

/isn’t really happy with any of this, unfortunately/

/abrupt thought end/

[xweetok-starmap]

/absolutely inpromptu idea slams into my head while looking at a moot’s bio and realizing “man, knowing someone’s chronoage when they don’t have it listed anymore — because you’ve followed ‘em for a while — is a funny feeling” “chrono age feels like such a weird term to me, it feels . . . inherently unintuitive for not slipping up on respecting folks’ trans age?”/

/BREAKS THROUGH THE DOOR/

WHAT DO FOLKS THINK ABOUT USING ATOB (assigned time of birth) FOR TRANSAGE or uh well I guess it’d be AYOB (assigned year of birth) actually since most people don’t know the assigned time of birth; I know mine it’s 3:14am; but that also uhhh isn’t the relevant information actually

/signed someone who is constantly furious about intersexism and doesn’t ?really know how I feel about the suggestion even if it’s my own, tbh I would want more feedback?; because transgender folks using assigned gender at birth leads to a whole bunch of intersexist language & arguments and it is kind of a big problem how that trans group has treated it honestly, actually — BUT IT HAPPENED IN MY HEAD SO I WANTED TO SHARE/

. . . also (aside from odd fluid moments) I’ve never felt comfortable saying “my cisage is __” or “my chronoage is __” but I feel like saying “my body was born in [year] (or even like, [year range])” is something I’d be a lot more comfortable with cause it’s more like. removed I guess — because I’m not saying something about ME I’m saying something about my body. ALSO IT DOESN’T HAVE TO BE MANUALLY UPDATED EVERY YEAR so there’s no like accidental privacy leak of “oh XYZ mage just updated their cisage so it’s probably their birthday, or at least it [was recent | is soon] aaaaa

. . .. I don’t know any tags, trief.

[xweetok-starmap]

Suns, I still can’t read the word ‘genocide’ without the melody of tsvey taybelekh haunting my head I don’t think I ever will

[some context is in the booklet for this album; it’s song 9.]

[xweetok-starmap]

Okay I have a lot going on that is new developments [topics of: judiasm and veganism] [which have ended up being weirdly intertwined for me for SOME REASON] and so I need to write journals about them to represent this processing, because this is important

but Iiiiiiiii

am so exhausted from walking 5 miles [to the co-op] & then [to a store that ended up being closed 4 minutes prior to me getting there] & then [to a store that I forgot was going to be closed since it’s Sunday], all while carrying groceries from the first store that whole time (in a cooler backpack don’t worry the groceries and me are fine I’m used to carrying weight like this I’m used to rucking)

so I’m gonna

lie dowwwwwwwwnnnnn

. . . yeah I’ll save gushing about my experience at the co-op with all the cool mages who just know about vegan food because so many mages at the co-op just know about vegan food /exhausted but thrilled jibberish sounds/