A Grand Quiet

Sorry.

The week before last was pretty rough. Last week was pretty rough. Work has been extremely tiring and outside of that I’ve had no energy to get excited at anything. I’m in one of those phases again where the road ahead seems undefined and endless. When the world seems like that the purpose of each individual step is hard to discern.

I keep looking for something external to motivate me. For something to happen that will fill me with purpose and passion once again. I don’t think it will, I think I’ve exhausted my reserves, and the most terrifying thing is: if I stop again then it will all be meaningless again.

Sure, a rolling stone gathers no moss, but there ain’t nobody looking at a stationary one is there? I’m two steps behind of my life. Don’t know how to not feel overwhelmed. Don’t know how to take control. If I had any less initiative then I’d just be one of those people who lies down until they die. I can get myself up in the mornings, I can keep myself fed. Anything more requires more than I have.

Learning how to wear makeup has been very useful to me at least. It’s one of those things that i started doing thinking that i could keep it respectful. Use it to make myself feel better in the evenings. Go to supportive friends’ houses all prettied up and be able to feel slightly more natural around them. I underestimated exactly how good it would make me feel about how I look.

It’s getting me up earlier in the mornings I guess. Something new to add to the routine, or at least cut into the tossing in bed, browsing the internet, and dreading getting up time. I’m trying to find an acceptable work look at the moment. Sure, it can be obviously queer, I just don’t want to be reaping too much judgement for it. Got my first comments about it today, thankfully just from other co-workers at my level. I think I’m going to hold it right there at the moment.

I suppose maybe that’s where my energy has gone right now. I’m watching youtube tutorials and browsing amazon for deals and I walk around checking out my angles on my phone and I think I look fucking good. Most of the time anyway. So long as you’re focusing on the face and not the rest of the trainwreck. I what with the heat and the exhaustion I ain’t been working out so much. Need to get back on that shit.

I still haven’t heard anything from the gender identity clinic, but that’s just how the way it goes. I’ve been noticing recently how I can barely sit with my legs together any more. I just try not to think about it.

—

I said last time that I’d throw something down about the Queer Eye reboot. Well, I never got around to it but here it is now, in brief.

I like the show, it’s good disposable trash. I think there’s not a single episode that I haven’t watched while doing something else. But that’s kinds what it is intended for: throwing on while doing some admin, or playing a video game on another monitor. The whole thing conforming to these nice comfortable rhythms that lull you across the time. Hopefully, by the end the fab five will have reformed another person’s disastrous living condition into something more respectable and there’ll be some tearful farewell.

It’s a winning formula if you’re only paying half attention.

There’s been a fair amount written about the episode in the middle of the latest season where they makeover a trans guy. And of course the best of it was written by trans men i’ll throw some links below. It’s an unnerving episode in part because it brings to the fore the most boring aspect of the show and recontextualises in a troubling way.

In short, the fab five’s glow-ups aren’t ever really about improving their subjects. it’s always couched in this language, ‘How can we turn you into a more refined, sharper, better version of you?’ Behind those nice words though is the truth that they don’t really mean it. They just want to turn you into a more outwardly respectable, more normative version of yourself.

There’s another episode later on where they meet this handyman who’s a big old burning man fan. Tan (my clear favourite of the guys) notes that his wardrobe is all either burning man costumes or paint spattered work garb. He imagines that there should be middle point between the two that his ideal wardrobe would sit in. A wardrobe to unite the two halves of his existence.

Course it’s fairly obvious that this fantasy wardrobe is just that. He constructs one made up of relaxed linen shirts and deck shoes. It’s a real nice look, but one that is constructed around defining a singular identity for a man who throughout his life deliberately rejected pinning himself down.

And the crime that Johnathan Van Ness does to his beard. Unforgivable.

Anyway, the one that frustrates me consistently the most is Design guy Bobby. He clearly got a clean idea of how to utilise space and how to make it aesthetically pleasing. But so often don’t comprehend the semiotics of a space. Like, how that burner man’s kitchen was scattered with unfinished projects and dismissing them as extraneous when their presence is totally central to telling the story of who this man is.

Likewise with Skyler, the trans man I mentioned earlier, he wanted his space to be one that would be welcoming to a wide range of queer folks. Sure, the living room was a bit of a disaster but it being a disaster makes the space functional. When you throw in a thousand dollar couch then all you’re doing is creating restrictions. Barriers to entry. It can be hard to walk into a well defined space if you aren’t feeling that way inside.

There’s a guy in the first season who had a bedroom full of some real classic film posters: Evil Dead he had there, I wanna say I saw Close Encounters too. The dominated his wall and are, in their own way, total design classics. Where were they when the place was remodelled? Nowhere to be found, some other art was there instead. What’s the point?

I’m probably gonna keep watching it. I like seeing a group of queers being allowed to be happy and friendly and unashamed. I sorta breezed past the point in my life where those kinda connections come easy. I’ll take what I can get, even if it is centring some very cis, very comfortable men. Nothing’s perfect, I just hope they start thinking about what they’re doing more.

The show’s tagline reads ‘more than a makeover’ I don’t think they’ve quite got there yet.

—

I was gonna throw in something here about Glow season 2 cos I devoured that over the course of two evenings. I think I’ve wrote enough for now though, I’ve got work tomorrow anyway.

Stay safe y’all.

Essie
xx

p.s. Here’s some links to writing about that one episode. I’m pretty sure I read a great take on medium if anyone can find it. I’ve tried but that site’s useless for tagging.

I’m on twitter at @qftwk or you can just follow the website @grandquiet.

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