Goth Ball

Oh to be queer!

I can’t begin to tell you how amazing this community has been and how I found it at just the right time … or maybe I can. I have been lucky enough to grow up in two places, a small city nestled in a valley in Western Montana and a town surrounded by farm fields and orchards in Northern California. Montanans have a hearty, straight-to-the-point air about them. They have the cowboy boots like the South—but they trade them for snow boots for a huge percentage of the year. It’s a place where people are kind, not nice, a distinction I first contemplated after living in New York City. There’s no syrupy sweet southern charm or flaky California promises. New Yorkers will carry baby strollers down subway stairs without uttering a word and Montanans will pull your car out of an icy ditch in similar silence. Winters in Northern California are much milder than Montana’s, but still cold and rainy enough that we had an indoor P.E. unit during winter in jr. high (although climate change has made it less rainy). We would change into our uniform gym clothes and learn square and line dances in the gym. Dancer that I am, I loved it—minus the sweaty boy hands. Thinking back… if we could have had female partners it would have been an entirely positive experience. Fast-forward, I’m out of the closet (finally) in New York City and find a huge community of queer people who line dance more days of the week than they don’t. It truly feels like the Universe plopped this into my lap right when it knew I needed it. I couldn’t have blended all these little pieces of culture and my personal history together in a more poetic way and things like this make me believe in a higher power. It’s that deep. It’s that joyful.

It’s magic.

These photos were taken at Goth Ball—a special Halloween edition of the normal line dance night with Stud Country. It was a lot more crowded than usual and I danced a little less than usual, but the outfits made it worth the trek. Look at all these beautiful queers dancing in their country finest!

Sincerely,

your fave lezbo

M

Mountain Dew

I have not sat down and really tried to write a blogpost in a very long time. Being in grad school to become a therapist has meant reevaluating, reimagining my relationship with the internet. When I think of the Internet, capital “I,” I don’t have good associations. But my little corner of the internet, lowercase “i,” has been such a beautiful creative outlet. I originally started blogging because I loved photography and writing and I wanted a page I could curate that would be all my own. Facebook and Myspace were the only social media outlets at the time and bombarding people photos in their feeds felt a little annoying. A blog was somewhere separate people could seek out if they wanted to, but it was mostly for me. My first blog was called If My Fingers Were Feathers - a little phrase that came to me, sitting in my dome (iykyk - UC Davis) in college. I was going to create a podcast with the same name this year but I am unsure how to navigate sharing on the internet if I will have clients that can find me talking about whatever life experiences or opinions I might share there. While it is not mind-blowing that our therapists have lives of their own and I am not one to see what I can find about my own therapist, I know some people are more investigative. Photos are somewhat safe to me. You can imagine what this hike looked like, what happened before and after, how I felt with the mountain dew beneath my bare feet - all without me having to tell you anything. Even though there is more of your imagination involved and I am not setting the record straight, it feels safer. It’s not about me and my opinions, it’s about you and how the photos make you feel. It’s about art. And art will always be top of my priority list. Creating just feeds my soul and I’ll figure out what that looks like moving forward.

A Day

I walked down a familiar street until it wasn’t familiar

A park with a weeping willow, she knows

Charged my camera battery behind the counter and managed not to forget it

Chai tea and heartfelt conversation

Chappell Roan walked by

She made eye contact

Crazy

And then she canceled all her shows

Singular street style photo

Dinner because I love me and I feed me well

Rio de Janeiro | Views From an Ipanema Apt.

What a dream … I have so much to do today, juggling house chores and so much writing and reading for grad school. Looking at these photos makes me take a deep breath though. More photos to come <3

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Que sonho… Tenho tanta coisa para fazer hoje, fazer malabarismos com as tarefas domésticas e tanta escrita e leitura para a pós-graduação. Olhar para essas fotos me faz respirar fundo. Mais fotos virão <3

Mariamma

Dinner Party | Meninas

This was such a lovely evening. We invited a bunch of sapphic couples and threw another lovely dinner party. My favorite part of the evening was how much everyone enjoyed each other’s company. A lot of them exchanged contact information and made plans to hang out again. Our friends became friends!

These dinner parties are a big deal to me because I wanted to build community in New York City for so long. It feels super special to be able to host amazing people and foster connections not just for Liv and I, but for everyone who comes. I feel like we always bask in gratefulness after one of these nights. Thank you to everyone who came!

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Esta foi uma noite adorável. Convidamos um grupo de casais sáficos e organizamos outro lindo jantar. Minha parte favorita da noite foi o quanto todos gostaram da companhia uns dos outros. Todos trocaram informações de contato e planejaram sair novamente. Nossos amigos se tornaram amigos!

Esses jantares são muito importantes para mim porque há muito tempo eu queria construir uma comunidade na cidade de Nova York. É super especial poder receber pessoas incríveis e promover conexões não apenas para Liv e eu, mas para todos que vêm e dedicam um tempo para fazer alguma comida. Sinto que sempre nos deleitamos com gratidão depois de uma dessas noites. Obrigado a todos que vieram!

xo

Mariamma