Queer Excellence, Needless Gay Villains, Trans Mums & Naked Olympic Hugs
Prism & Pen Weekly Digest, 11 August 2024
by Kaylin Hamilton and James Finn
Nearly naked men embracing in Paris! Unnecessary gay villains in hit biopics about queer artists! Queer people who can’t choose to become parents! A trans woman fights her way out of suicidal ideation!
What do all these stories have in common? Raw queer authenticity, not filtered to make cis/straight people feel good about themselves in diversity-training classes.
And that’s just the beginning of this week’s storytelling. We offer awesome fiction, a writing prompt about the quest for queer excellence, and highlight a bisexual woman who opens up about her “mixed” marriage with a straight, Christian man.
Prism & Pen brings you authentic queer voices every morning…. Come read with us!👇
Read stories for free by clicking the links that say “Read in P&P.” Want more daily stories from across the rainbow? Follow us on Medium, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, Mastodon, or Bluesky! Want to help support P&P? Join Medium.
* Discover P&P Diversity in Four Stories *
I’m Trans and I Want to Be a Parent, But I Can’t
Being a parent is one of those things most people imagine they’ll do one day — for many it features into their life plans: university, marriage, career, kids (though not necessarily in that order).
It’s part of the heteronormative, a taken-for-granted pronatalism that we’re socialised into — one of life’s almost-obligatory milestones.
It’s something many queer couples (or thruples, or polycules…) also aspire to, despite otherwise not fitting the cis-heternormative mould.
Why Do ‘Rocketman’ and ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ Both Have a Gay Villain?
In 2019, everyone rushed to highlight the similarities and differences in the dueling musical biopics Bohemian Rhapsody and Rocketman, the life stories of Queen’s lead singer Freddie Mercury and Elton John, respectively.
The fundamental similarities are obvious — the standard formula of a young musical artist rising to fame and fortune, undone by a descent into alcohol and drug use, finally overcoming hardships and becoming a legend.
But amidst all the commentaries and video essays … there is one glaring, maddening similarity I never heard anybody acknowledge:
Aside from the iconic protagonists, the only other confirmed gay character with any significant screen-time in either film… is the villain.
A Trans Woman Considers Her Past Suicidal Thoughts
Near the end of my job, I eyed the passing semi-trucks during my morning commute: large, fast, incapable of stopping, and positively destructive. A yellow line was all that sat between my tiny little Hyundai and several tons of speeding metal.
“Time to walk in front of a truck.”
There was a running joke in my department, our office beside a major highway. Whenever someone dumped surprise work on us, cracks about walking into traffic followed — a stress response soaked in gallows humour.
Once I started fantasizing about drifting into the other lane, my coworker’s jokes took on new meaning. I had ignored the unspoken caveat: behind the joking façade there can be a deathly seriousness.
How My Excellent Queer Running Life Shocked Me Into Joy
Running shirtless in a light rain! In the cold! Ten miles behind me, eight to go. Feet so light they barely touch the ground! I sip in crystal air through my nose. I exhale energizing little puffs out my mouth, knowing for sure that I was born to run and that I could run forever for the pure joy of it!
That memory — of training for a marathon in my late 40s — is a happy place, a joyful moment etched deep into my psyche. I go there sometimes when I feel sadness or despair, just like I time-travel back to a green-mossed, icy mountain pool that delighted my baby goat and me when I was 12.
But 12-year-old me could NEVER have imagined 48-year-old me as an athlete.
* This Week’s Essays & Creative Non Fiction *
The Late-Onset Adolescence of a “Middle-Aged” Gay Millennial
My heart sank as I listened to my favorite podcast, and out of the blue, the guest proclaimed “Thirty-eight is not young!” with a biting sardonic edge in his voice that implied any 38-year-old who thinks they’re “young” is a fool.
A few days later, I was having coffee with my best friend, and he reminded me the average life expectancy in America is 76-years-old, which would put me and him, at 38, right smack in the middle of life.
The idea of being “middle-aged” is so hard to accept because it conjures an image that is so different from how I see myself — an image derived from a heterosexist notion of the timeline our lives are “supposed” to adhere to.
Navigating Masculinity and Femininity as a Bisexual Woman
As we all know, the gender identity and sexual exploration journey is such a complex experience.
In a society that craves smooth edges, straight lines, and a binary existence, pushing against those boundaries and coloring outside the lines can be frightening yet liberating.
It’s a big world out there, and we all want to belong somewhere, preferably among those who will make us feel safe and be who we are.
Between societal expectations, private Catholic school teaching, and equally confused fellow teenagers and young adults, it wasn’t any easier to understand my truth.
Was I straight? Gay? Bi? Some mish-mash of something in between?
The Pigeon Story: That Time A Pigeon Laid An Egg On Our Queer Couch
I lived in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada for six years as a young adult. They were six extremely messy, extremely closeted, extremely destitute, extremely youthful years. The Pigeon Story is one of what I think of as a small collection of my most Extremely Victoria stories. One of the handful of tales that really just sort of epitomize the general vibe of that time.
Male Anatomy Causes Sports Incident at the 2024 Summer Olympics
Although I normally have little interest in watching sports events, I do occasionally take a peep at what’s going on in the Olympics. Like many in the gay community, my pleasure in such activity resides mainly in appreciating the handsome and well-developed bodies everywhere in evidence.
To tell the truth, I know little about the rules of most sports, and nothing at all about pole vaulting. On the other hand, I confess I do have a certain amount of experience dealing with poles of various descriptions.
Recently I was surprised and sorry to hear how a superb athlete was penilized (as we might say) for the inordinate size of his penile member.
Transgender Life at Odds with Your Old Life: I Am a Woman
As a young man, person, whatever the heck I was, I was never comfortable. Still, I learned how to be the person I needed to be to become invisible. I adopted a persona that was acceptable. I donned a mask every day. I did this so consistently, so often I didn’t know what part of the mask was the real me, and what part was invented.
The trouble is, more often than not, the mask is both an invention and you.
My First Pride Outside the US
I originally reached out to my Swedish guy after my late husband suddenly and tragically died. I was looking for any sort of wisdom or support my guy could provide since, a few years previous, he lost his partner in similar circumstances. He had a couple more years of widower-ness under his belt, so we began WhatsApp texting and occasionally video chatting. The texts and calls became more frequent until the texting was every day and the video calls weekly.
Two years ago, I had finished a teaching degree and decided to celebrate by visiting him in Sweden for Midsommar. And after I arrived, we fell into this shockingly easy co-existence.
Wedding Season is a Little Hard for a Black Queer Person Like Myself
Last night, I had a dream. I was walking around my old college campus and ran into some peers. One of them in particular recently got married so I ran into her and her husband. And internally, instead of feeling happy for them, I felt jealous.
When I woke up, I started thinking about how, in the last six months alone, three of my former college friends have gotten married in nice, white traditional weddings. And three more have gotten engaged. And while I’m in a happy relationship with my partner, I wonder if I’ll ever get the same bliss.
The One Thing I Couldn’t Change About Myself After Coming Out
My coming out was fairly gradual. I told my best friends, separately, over the span of a year or so, then I told my brother and cousin, and later to the rest of my friends and family. The entire process took three or four years. I was in high school when I started coming out and I had just finished my first year of university when I could consider myself fully out.
There was no real finish line …
Ever since I realised I was queer I have had trouble trusting people fully.
Nobody’s Squawking About Nearly Naked Men Embracing in Paris
“Man hug,” proposes my friend Jeff, smiling and opening his arms for a welcoming embrace.
With this, Jeff is saying that he’s happy to see me — for the first time in decades. But, in the same breath, he’s also making sure I’m aware there is nothing of a sexual nature in this reunion greeting.
I’m queer. And he’s cool with that. Jeff, however, is reminding me that he’s straight. And, by tagging our impending embrace with the “man-hug” label, he’s making sure there’s no confusion about where we both stand.
Being Queer and Non-Religious While Married to a Straight Christian Man
Marriage was the last thing on my mind in my 20s. On top of that, I was with women for years before my husband. I had one or two male lovers in between, but a commitment with a man? I found the very idea terrifying.
Men frightened me. I had heard horror stories from personal friends and all over social media regarding terrible relationships with straight men.
Abuse of all kinds, mental, physical, financial, and/or verbal …
Society expects women to work as if they don’t have responsibilities at home but maintain the home as if they don’t work.
No thanks.
The LGBTQ Community Needs To Be Smart. We All Need to Vote
Like many in the LGBTQ community, as well as those in this country who believe in freedom, liberty and the US Constitution, I held my breath until the day that President Biden withdrew from the 2024 Presidential race.
Thank God! I was running out of air.
For the first time in my life I started actively looking for another country I could live in. Ultimately, I decided that would be my Plan D. Also, for the first time I started to secretly hate neighbors and friends for their very vocal political beliefs.
I kept my political beliefs to myself.
Why?
* Fiction Shorts*
The Gay Detective: Death — the Final Frontier
Dark red stained the bottom of the pod housing where the feed pipes were contained. “Shit, a seal’s broken.”
She toggled her helmet mic. “Rudy, we have to replace a housing in the Ag lab.” She listened for a moment. “I know it’s a pain in the ass, but it has to be done.”
Keillor prodded the stain. The seam gave under her touch. A gout of darkish fluid spewed from the opening, splattering everything in range.
The doctor wiped her faceplate. Stared at the fine mist of red droplets floating in front of her. Around a severed human hand.
Liquid: A Magical LGBTQ+ Short Story about Discovering Self
In the witching hour, moonlight skates over the gentle waters of the pond and touches on the weeping man on the bank. It swirls through algae, over sleeping fish, down to the heart of the waters.
The heart beats — once, twice. A shape emerges from the fluid, blinking midnight eyes, tossing back hair as dark as the oily tadpoles which float near the meniscus of the surface. Arms, breasts, toes, are birthed steaming into the cold night air.
When the man sees her, she draws him, unresisting, to her newborn body. With midnight magic, he is healed.
She is riven in two.
The Last Summer I Could Love Another Man
I remember the weeks of scorching hot weather that year. It was impossible to survive under the sun; you’d have to hide in the shade, find a neck of woods for relief or jump into the waters of a spring — which was mine and Miko’s favorite activity.
We would run away from Budapest into the countryside, since the city was getting more and more dangerous for us. It’s not like it never was, at least to some extent.
We were not holding hands as we walked down the streets, at least not during the day. At night, when we thought no one was looking, Miko would grab my hand, tickle my fingers and squeeze them so hard I’d thought they’d break, and then he’d release it and run away from me a few steps, so it would seem like that was just a joke between friends.
* Fiction Series *
The Medellan Conspiracy
Jevan and Ardyn are invited to a special celebration. Afterwards, Jevan, Ardyn, and Camran head off on their next adventure on Aria’naa.
When Jevan and Ardyn returned home, they found an envelope lying on the kitchen counter. “Hey, what’s this?” Jevan asked as he went to pick it up. In the modern Aterian script was written Ardyn and Jevan. He showed it to Ardyn before opening it.
Inside was a card with a note.
You are cordially invited to attend the pair-bonding ceremony of Andreesen and Marta of Donarvon.
Below was the day and time of the ceremony, scheduled to take place at the Chancellor’s estate in two days.
“Finally!” Ardyn exclaimed with a laugh. “I was worried they were going to run out of time.”
Read Episode 89: Celebration
Read Episode 90: New Beginnings
Her Witch, Her Demon
The effects of the fated bond worsen. Nyx meets the Demon Circle.
Meredith watched Nyx’s lips with hunger. The thought of Nyx’s tongue exploring her body got her all hot and bothered. God, she wanted this woman. And from the way Nyx gazed at her, she knew the demon wanted her too.
Yet, Meredith saw the hesitation in Nyx’s hazel eyes. It was almost like the demon was controlling herself to not give in to her desires. Without a moment’s thought, Meredith captured Nyx’s lips, deeply kissing her with heated passion. At first, she thought Nyx would stop her, but the woman responded to the kiss, her hands snaking along Meredith’s back before grabbing her ass and squeezing it. Meredith moaned into the kiss as she wrapped her hands around Nyx’s neck.
Suddenly, Nyx got up, lifting Meredith like she weighed nothing at all. She expected that the demon would take her to the bedroom and ravish her over and over again, but instead, with trembling arms, Nyx put her back on the couch. She staggered to the wall and leaned against it, trembling.
“Nyx,” Meredith gasped. “What’s wrong? Are you alright?”
Read Episode 10 & Episode 11
That’s it for this week!
Happy reading! Keep shining the love, and send your stories to Prism & Pen.
And don’t forget our “excellent” writing prompt, Pursuing Personal Queer Excellence! Thrill of Victory? Agony of Defeat?
