The Raifu Rack

I mostly left Tumblr to follow artists to Twitter. Being a writer and not an artist, my "creative contributions" naturally rate much lower on the internet totem pole, so the loss of attention to my own commentary was acceptable. Whatever "community" I had found here in my early to mid 20s had either dissipated or radicalized, which further incentivized me to shift fire to another site.

With Twitter potentially burning down because Elon Musk has an ego the size of Montana, it's not immediately clear where those artists will go. Whether they stay there or come here, I will likely follow them. If I'm being honest, I'd prefer Twitter survive Musk, because I gave it some thought and decided I enjoy having a place where I can share art amongst likeminded people and occasionally add a comment or have a discussion, which precludes the use of DeviantArt, Instagram, and especially TikTok.

(Facebook's fucking dead, lol rip bozo)

Maybe the artists come back here. Maybe they don't. What's more important to me right now is the sudden realization that I have a place where I can talk about things that are on my mind (especially about being trans), in a long-form format, pseudo-anonymously. I have a Medium now, where I've posted one (1) article under a pseudonym because I was so pissed off about something that happened in my community that I had to basically do a journalism to figure out what the fuck happened, but Medium's a bit too public for me to be too personal. Tumblr, by virtue of being a hellsite where most people aren't taken seriously, is actually perfect.

I want to talk about the things I write, and boy oh boy have I written a lot of stuff in the last year. At last check, my personal journal, focused mostly on my journey towards and into my transition, clocked well over 140 pages, single spaced...8 months ago. It isn't growing as much or as often as it used to, but it's still growing. It might never stop.

And I do want to talk about these things, because otherwise these thoughts only live in my head, and occasionally in my therapist's office, even when they're not so in-depth that they demand privacy. I actually think that being more public facing with my musings might even benefit me, or benefit others. This is a decent place to do that.

While this site is nowhere close to what it used to be in activity or quality, a lot of you followed me for different things. I'll stop short of saying all my followers followed a totally different person way back when, because I'm still me, but I'm a different kind of "me." The most honest way to phrase it is that I'm "more of me;" by not hiding my shame or my struggles, a different picture emerges.

I want to write more personal commentary. I want to write long-form essays, share them, get feedback on them, and find different perspectives on my thoughts and struggles. Maybe that's naive, but it's worth a try, because I've never gelled with the trans community as a whole and likely never really will. (Don't get me started on the fucking flag.)

So, while I'll still reblog things that I like, from fandoms and hobbies that I enjoy, I think it's fair to say that if you stick around, you'll find me talking less about guns and anime and more about me, at least for the time being. If those of you reading this decide you won't want to hear a 30-something transitioner talk about her problems and her life, I totally get that. You never signed up for that, and I won't begrudge anyone for wanting to clear their feed of that. My followers don't owe me anything, and I don't owe them anything either. I'd start a "personal" blog outside of this one if I did, but this was always first and foremost a personal blog. No reason to split it.

I will try to keep any of my long form chatter under a Read More so my long-term "legacy" followers who don't want to detach entirely don't have to read it if they don't care to. However, if you never want to see any of that sort of stuff, this is your warning to punch out now before the plane goes down.