The Unbearable Lightness of Being

The Unbearable Lightness of Being was originally an existential book in Czech, by an existential author named Milan Kundera. God help me if I’m going to talk about that today! I’m sure it was super and all, and you should probably go read it, but all I wanted to do was plagiarize the title for today’s post. Chances are Mr. Kundera’s hotshot legal team is scouring the internet every waking minute to sue the bajeebers out of shitty bloggers who co-opt his stuff, but until you see a post urging contribution to my defense fund, don’t worry too much about me. Worse comes to worse, I’ve always wanted to see Prague in spring anyhow.

Instead of dreary Slavs bemoaning the Soviet boot, I want to apply the concept to my own situation. Anyone familiar with the trans experience understands there is a certain weight we carry around for a good long time. It’s the stuff of anxieties and nightmares. It slows us down and gradually makes it hard to think of anything else at all. Even chocolate. That was the last straw for me by the way. I’m not exactly sure anymore why we think we have to do this for so long, but we do (except for the cute little trans kids on Nightline everyone likes to bring up and compare us to, like trucking out the Mozart example to your 5 year old wailing about his piano lessons).

 Ironically, I always thought the myth of Sisyphus was incomprehensible, rolling a giant stone up a hill just to have it roll back down again, over and over again, for eternity. Why didn’t he just let that mother roll, sit down on the peak and let be what may? Doing the same thing ad nauseum and expecting better results was something old Sys and I had in common, even if I couldn’t see it. As far as I know, he’s still at it even though his dark underworld of torment has been built up and renamed Newark, NJ. I on the other hand, put my load down, come what may. Look, it was either that or I was going to drop it and I just had my toes done. I hadn’t realized how heavy that was!

Now of course I’m on to the “unbearable lightness of being” part. All those things I was horribly anxious about for so long are just done. Everyone knows, and I’m perfectly comfortable simply being myself. Love me, hate me, be gloriously indifferent all together and it’s all good. Somehow the world didn’t end, a mob of old timey style villagers with forks and pitchforks all fresh out of Frankensteins to chase didn’t appear to flush me up some crumbling gothic edifice, and Interpol still won’t return my calls about those varmints eating my baby lettuce. Oooo, I hates rabbits! I digress, because I can now. It’s part of the whole “lightness” thing, trust me.

Yes, it is going to take some time getting used to being no longer hobbled, but never you worry, I think I’ll learn to adjust just fine. In the mean time I still have to right a few things. Setting down a heavy load, a real groin puller being carried, is that it becomes a rolling juggernaut of destruction on the way back down the hill. Once I help them up though, skies the limit.

michellelianna