Sunday, Jul. 03, 2022 - 9:53 am.
Andrew and I went to the city's Pride yesterday. It was 8°C and raining, but oh well. I thought that not a lot of people showed up. This is understandable because this region is horribly conservative, to say the least. I learned yesterday that there are neonazis who stand outside clubs and bars to harrass and beat up queer people, but thankfully they didn't show up to the march.
Nevertheless, attendance was very good, all things considered. It went without incident and that's plenty for me. There were women on bicycles guarding the crowd. There were also cops guarding the march, and in the meantime there were chants against the police. Fuck the police. Stray dogs that accompanied the march kept barking at them, which is always an amusing sight as well as a tradition. I was carrying a can of dog food and fed the dog from the pack who looked like he needed it the most.
There were mostly young people marching, I suppose the ones who can afford to be out here (of course, not without a cost). Then it was Andrew and I, with a friend of ours (and I'm her advisor for her master's thesis) and a friend of hers, who also has a teenage trans son. It was his first march. Bless these kids. Anyway, the four of us were not only a tiny bi block, but an elder block. We were nearly at the back.
This was indeed a week of celebration and remembrance. My uni had a few events, and I finally made some contacts. I hosted a screening of "Pride" on Tuesday, to which no more than 15 people showed up, including a few friends and my thesis students, but also there were some people genuinely interested.
I could have done a better job at being a hostess and strike some conversations with the audience members. That I regret. The screening was a bit bittersweet because I had a lot of expectations and they were not fulfilled. Part of it was my fault, but a lot of things were out of my control. I can only say that next time will be better. And it *was* good. People loved the movie, and I had the chance to see my thesis students face to face for the first time since we met a year and a half ago.
I brought up this "high expectations and bittersweet results" thing into therapy. My therapist scratched the plan of ending my therapy within the next few weeks because of the conversation we had about this subject. We connected it to how I portray this through my characters in my comic strip. She asked to see some strips for the next session. Oh, don't get me started, lady.
She is right about how I set myself for high expectations which in turn lead me to shoot myself in the foot. That thing of freezing when I have a demanding situation because I can't make up my mind about how's best to act is something that came up in the adoption assessment. Not that specifically, but that's the thing: I have to be spontaneous, follow my gut, act right in that second, respond to the environment and not to my own thoughts. You need to be like this if you're raising a child that's been deeply hurt.
We'll see where these things lead us in therapy, then.
Lastly, in a few weeks I'll be travelling to my home country. I have a lot of things to do at work (important, turning-point kind of things) so I may not focus too much on the trip until it's getting closer. I'm looking forward to seeing friends, family, and Helen, but it might be best to not think too much about it. To not have expectations, to not paint the worst case scenarios. Just go.
Well, time to catch up with life: exercise, vacuuming, monthly back-up of my files, and working on the strip. I'm very excited about yesterday's march and about the things I can do through my work. And about my strip. And about my life in general. It's queer and it's joyous.