Review of the year 2018

During the festive break it customary to look back over the past year and put down a few words. Well one thing I can say about 2018 is that it has been quite a ride this year.
When the year started I had no idea quite the way it was going to pan out, it started innocently enough with just work to think about.
Shortly after returning from a trip to the UK I decided that I was finally ready to do something that I had thought about for quite a while, and I announced on April 1st of all dates that I had decided to write a memoir of my life and experiences, I set myself the goal of completing it for the following year and after a bit of research, decided that I would aim for a figure of around 100 thousand words.
I had only just started to write some basic word bits and pieces while staying at a hotel to celebrate Helens birthday I decided to just check up on family on Facebook, I wasn’t friends with my sister on Facebook but I knew how to find her profile through the search. From there I could jump off to other family members to see what was going on, when I did this I got a shock, there was a picture of Sarah in a wedding dress, I knew this photo was a couple of years old as it was what she wore when she renewed her vows a couple of years previously. This piqued my interest so I clicked on the comments, as I read them my heart sank, it was all “we are sorry for your loss” and other platitudes like that, the sort of thing you would write if someone had died. So I reached out to make contact, my fears were confirmed, my sister had collapsed a day or so previously and had died.
A few days later I was back on the plane to the UK, not knowing when I was coming back or what would happen there in the UK, by this time I was back into contact with several members of my family that I hadn’t spoken to in 20 years.
Over the next few days I had several tense and nervous reunions with long lost family members and catching up on the past 20 years, it was a period of very mixed emotions. I also a had a very brief encounter with my step mother, who now suffers from dementia and most of the time wasn’t even aware of who I was, then just for one brief moment there was like a flash of clarity and she said “Oh so your a woman now”, the patronising tone of voice and the inflections were there and instantly I was transported back to being a teenager. Then like a fleeting summer shower it was gone and she was back to asking where I lived again for the tenth time.
During this period I got to take a little break for myself in Brighton and was able to meet up with one or two people that I had only know on twitter, or I hadn’t met in a long time, the night ended with me escorting a distinguished trans author bake to her hotel via the search for chips.
Sarah’s funeral was hard, on so many levels, and at the reception afterwards I felt a little uncomfortable, nobody was outwardly transphobic to my face but I know there were whispers and comments made while I was out of earshot.
I had no sooner got back to La Palma when I was off on a mother plane this time just across the water to Tenerife to go and see Status Quo in concert.
June and July were filled with Pride related events, such as painting one of the benches in the town square with the pride flag colours to match the trans flag bench we had painted previously. Then there was the big parade, and me speaking to the assembled crown of a few hundred from the balcony, one of the proudest moments of the year, this year I really upped my trans activism, and it felt good to be doing things again. I had wanted to be able to get to the Uk and go to the Trans Pride event in Brighton but logistics wasn’t easy, so I had to unfortunately miss it this year.
In October I sent Helen off to help her daughter Rachel out in New Zealand and a month or so later I two joined her there and spent a few weeks in New Zealand, including a train journey across the north island.
Even with all this global travel I continued to write the book which I finished the 1st draft at the beginning of December, I then put it to one side so that I could start editing in the New Year. But I didn’t get a chance to rest on my laurels as I was required to don my activists hat ( and one of my acquisitions this year was a very nice purple fedora hat, which incidentally has it’s own twitter account @goodtranshat ) and I will be representing trans people at a roundtable discussion tomorrow night, that is after I appeared on the radio yesterday to promote the event.
What will 2019 hold? well that could be the source of another whole blog post, I want to improve the way I work to make it less taxing on my mental health, and of course edit and publish the book.