Individuals

God wants individuals. I’ve said that before, but I wanna hit on a little harder before I veer off into some other digression.

As we know from seventh-grade science class, the Earth is eleventy-drillion years old. Life on Earth began about four-hundred-lillion ago. For several hundred-chillion years, the only living things on the planet were single-celled organisms which reproduced asexually and were all exactly the same, unless something in the primordial muck – some external factor – caused them to change. But they were designed to pass along their DNA without alteration. They were made to stay the same. Some of those tiny blobs joined other tiny blobs and became multi-cellular. I think those were more like plants. Blobs of tiny blobs that were more like animals happened later – like after another seventy-nillion years or so. So there was some greater variety, but not as much as there would be after another few twillion years, during which the various species and types of plants and animals spread out, covering the entire surface of the Earth and adapting to different environments. But even then, the differences between individual plants and animals wasn’t great. Saber-toothed squirrels are not exactly like saber-toothed penguins and neither are much like saber-toothed ferns, but there ain’t a lotta difference between one saber-toothed squirrel and another.

Then, along came human beings – another variation on the animal theme, but with ever increasing variations within the species, until we get to when we are now. Everybody is different. Every single human being is – or is capable of being – unique. Creation evolves toward individuality. Evolution is the mechanism God uses to create variety. It follows then, that God wants variety or individuality.

Why? I dunno. Maybe because it’s more interesting that way. Saber-toothed water buffalo are probably pretty cool, but after a few eillion years, anything would get boring. Human beings are the crown of Creation, so it makes sense that we’d be the species who got blessed with the ability to become truly individuals. And I’d say it follows then that God wants to have a unique relationship with each of us.

So why are so many people the same? Because most people are just boring, that’s why. Most people never get up the gumption to become the unique individuals they could be. Most people just identify with whatever herd they’re told to identify with and don’t bother to think about it. I really got nothin’ to say to those sheople. Not that I got anything against them living their lives like conformity drones, but they make things harder than it needs to be for those of us who don’t fit into the pigeonholes. The promised digression is drawing nigh.

Take me, f’r instance. I am a unique specimen among God’s human creatures. I am quite unique. Very unique. And I have spent my life to date figuring out how and in what ways I’m unique, acting out on them and then suffering the consequences. Some of ’em were fairly disastrous – that whole thinking I could drink alcohol without wrecking everything didn’t turn out so well. Others didn’t cause a huge calamity, but possibly impacted my earning potential. And there are others that I’m still trying to get my head around.

An earlier post here dealt with transgenderedism or whatever that’s called. Somebody I know wrote a response to it that was longer than the post itself and then the two of us talked about it briefly and then I spent the whole fuggin’ day thinking about it. See – this person, who I’ma call Dennis because they remind me of Dennis the Menace, said something that seemed to indicate that they considered themself “inside” the transgendered community, as opposed to myself who they considered “outside” it. So I had to correct that notion because I certainly consider myself among the people who got assigned a gender at birth that wasn’t their top choice. I don’t think about it a whole lot, but it does irritate me sometimes that I got a male body. My friend, Dennis, is in open revolt about the gender they were assigned – I’m not that het up about it. Maybe I’m less transgendered, if that’s a thing. Maybe I feel the disconnect less. Maybe – and this seems likely – I grew up in a time when “transgendered” was not a thing. That category simply did not exist in the world where I was a kid. I didn’t even know about it until I was in my mid-twenties, at which point it was fuckin’ obvious to me that, if I was anything, I was a butch dyke in a male body. I tried to talk with a few people about it – they looked at me like I was crazy, which I was. I was on a shitpile of drugs, too. Their reactions ranged from dismissive to aggressively dismissive and I stopped talking about it. I never really considered transitioning. Medical technology can turn a male into a reasonable facsimile of a female, but that never seemed good enough. For a long time, if it’d been possible to magically morph my body into a female one, still keeping my tattoos and other mods, I would’ve done it in a heartbeat. Now – I dunno. I do occasionally feel that I’d rather be a woman, but it passes. I accept things as they are. I have a pretty good body – not in a oh-I’m-sexy way, but in the sense that it does a lotta cool stuff. My immune system is killer. I don’t have back problems. My vision is still pretty decent. For a person almost fifty, I’m doing pretty fuckin’ good. And I’ve come this far with it. It’s kinda like my truck. If somebody offered to trade me a Lexus for my battered ’92 Sonoma, I’d turn ’em down. I like my old truck. And if I did magically morph into a tattooed butch lesbian, I’d just be trading one marginalized position for another. Not much gain, there.

And – here’s a reoccurring theme – the problem ain’t in me. It’s in everybody else. As much as I might occasionally think I’d really prefer to have ovaries and boobs, what bothers me much more is the assumptions people make about me based on the fact that I have a beard and a dick. I kinda hate that. But again, I don’t want to change. What I want to do – and what I will do – is continue to become what I was made to be. And having a relationship with God is a big part of that.

The worst time in my life was the decade when I was cut off from God. It sucked. I was depressed and stoned and/or drunk all the time and every day was a nightmare. I’ve told how that ended in another post. Having a relationship with God is absolutely necessary for me. And I love it. I would change a lotta things about me, but I wouldn’t change that. I honestly feel sorry for atheists. Pathetic fucks. I’m sure that God didn’t make a mistake when I got the Y chromosome that caused my female soul to become housed in a male body. God intended that because that contributed to my uniqueness, which means that God and I have a different relationship than we would otherwise. My butch-dyke-in-a-male-body thing is part of it – and my decision to mostly just play along with society’s stupid stereotypes about males and females – is my decision. I don’t think there’s a Divine direction either way. Some people will transition, more or less; some will identify as non-binary, like Dennis; and some will just mosey along in the body/gender they got. In any case, the experience of the individual will be affected and the relationship of the individual with God will be affected.

To be clear: God doesn’t hate fags or dykes or queers or trannies (that’s right, Dennis, I used that word again). Some people in positions of power within religious institutions hate them, but that’s got nothin’ to do with God. Some people who claim to be religious do all kindsa fucked up shit that their religions specifically forbid. God loves every fuct up one of us infinitely because that is God’s Godness. There ain’t a pea-pickin’ one of us who deserves it, but all of us have it by grace. I’m reconciled to the good and bad aspects of this incarnation. Its a lot easier when I remember how temporary it is. And as much as I might like agitating Dennis, I am really glad that punks like them are living a time when its less difficult to express their individuality. Christ knows, I wouldn’ta survived being open about being transgendered when I was young. I wouldn’t made it out the door alive. Just staying alive long enough to escape my childhood was enough of a challenge. And then I had all I could do to survive being the young adult that I couldn’t help but being. The fact that I’m able to put any thought into any of this is evidence of how good things’ve got.

I do envy those who got female bodies sometimes. And it does sometimes kinda suck. Most of the time, I ain’t bothered. And I really have no interest in having a big ol’ discussion about it with people I know. Unless they’re dealing with the same shit. Explaining things to people who don’t get it is boring.

Writing this, I listened to Team Dresch’s Personal Best, which I’ve considered the best punk LP since I first heard it in the ’90s. Musically, it’s powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline. Lyrically, I identify with every mumblin’ word. “Freewheel” is a hoot.

Become who you were made to be. Create a personal relationship with God – by whatever name works. Go forth and serve the Lord.