The Gift of Sharing

 This weekend I realized just how important sharing is for me to feel joy. That's part of my trans ontology: "to be queer is always to become queer with many" (Nuñez, 2021). In my experience, I feel like I am re-born when I share who I am with people who can see me as I want them to see me. My non-binary journey of being many people ("to be non-binary is to become as many") relies on me finding affirming to share myself with. I need to share myself to feel like myself because gender is always collective.

I realized the importance of sharing this weekend when I briefly shut away someone I share a lot of my life with. I felt pain grieving the opportunity to share my everyday with them and, when I finally changed my mind and appreciated what sharing gives me in my life, I felt so much joy literally come back to my body.  Giving is always receiving, sharing establishes reciprocity. 

My experience of being an Arsenal changed drastically when I began sharing it with my partner (and others) over the last year or so.  It literally meant sharing a part of me, my emotions, a refuge in my life, and a narrative journey too. 

This morning, excited after Spurs drew to Southampton, I bought a ticket for my anchor partner, who will be in London at the time, to go to the NLD in Spurs territory on January 16. I am extremely excited for them. In sharing my resources, I get to share that experience with them in a way that will bring me joy. Sharing what I love about myself is a source of joy. Preparing for, hearing about, and reflecting on their experience and having them share that with me is gonna give me—and is already giving me—joy too. 

Will this be the most important game of the season? Maybe, maybe not. But it will be one that I will experience collectively and I'm really hyped about that. I do think it will be the most important game of the season though. If Arsenal win, we'll have a major boost in the journey to being 4th place, Spurs—the villain—will be defeated, and my partner will experience so much euphoria in their first time ever in an Arsenal game (or maybe even any football game too!). This game can literally signify a coming-of-age transition in the 5-year journey I have embarked with Arsenal on our way back to the Champions League too. This game could be the beginning of a new chapter.

I'm also slightly worried - how will a body that is not white, not British, not cisgender and not straight, and not a Tottenham fan be read in that space? Will they be able to express their joy when Martinelli inevitably scores a hat-trick? They can always text me about it and we can express our joy with each other instead. Excitement exceeds worry by miles though.

Citation:

Nuñez, Isabella B. (2021). Ex-Partners: Kombucha Scoby and Queer Companionship. YID2207 Social Theory and the Environment, Yale-NUS College, Singapore. 1-6.