Melissa Etheridge

It certainly helped - I am feeling much better, now that I have come back from a wonderful evening with Melissa Etheridge.

In regards to the novel, I was constantly thinking of my previous Melissa experiences - and how Sarah would feel at those very experiences. The first would be an August 1999 free concert at San Francisco City Hall, which was my first (and only other) in-person experience; I am planning on sending Sarah there as well, to boost her identity and pride as a lesbian. Who would she attend the concert with, and what would she think of then-Mayor Willie Brown making a quick speech to honor Melissa?

Melissa will surface again in December of the same year, as Sarah works her first international flight; during her break, she'll plug into the inflight audio program, which had one entire channel playing nothing but Melissa. I still remember Melissa talking about her family and beliefs during this holiday-themed programming; Sarah must feel very proud that her employer is showing such overt support for LGBT families. As I closed my eyes, I could indeed picture an airplane, with me and Sarah aboard (and plugging away to Melissa), flying across the Atlantic. Actually, I wrote a sound-themed scene of this flight, for a class several years ago. Time to dig it up and develop it.

The crowd was good, predominantly lesbian but plenty of straights and men too, though overwhelmingly white. No luck finding a tall redheaded young woman tonight, however!

I am feeling the lesbian power now, and I need to carry it right over to Sarah.

Currently stressed out

I am currently having withdrawal symptoms as I discontinued a medication a few weeks ago; it was doing more harm than good to me. The withdrawal symptoms are really burning me out, however.

Right now, I am trying my best to ride out the withdrawal symptoms. In the meantime, not much progress is to be expected with my personal life or my novel. I'll head for a Melissa Etheridge (a lesbian pride icon for Sarah) concert tomorrow night, and hope it helps.

I truly look forward to my retreat, as I won't have to concern myself with the daily grind of my work. I will look forward to getting a lot of writing done during my spare time. As long as I don't involve myself too much with South Korea's new homophobic right-wing government (and its alliance to the US conservative movement) I should be fine.

Some South Korean transpeople

As I will be headed for Seoul before long, I am picking up an obscene amount of South Korean trivia on Wikipedia.

This includes LGBT people, under the Wikipedia category shown below. There are four entries, and aside from Hong Seok-cheon, who is a gay man, all the entries are transwomen (though none are lesbians, I am afraid).

These will be the people I will be paying attention to during my stay. I doubt Sarah would hear about these people though, when she first flies into Seoul in 2000 (when legal gender changes were not even possible).

Wikipedia: LGBT People from Korea

America's Next Top Model...

... may be transgender.

The 11th season has 14 women, among whom is 22-year-old Isis, who is trans.

Here's MSN TV's coverage:

MSN

A retreat for me

I will be leaving the US for at least a month, starting sometime in September. I will be attending a meditation retreat in Seoul, South Korea.

The retreat itself should take only a few hours per day in a secluded scenic neighborhood just north of downtown Seoul. Even after the retreat activities and sightseeing, I see enough time to work on my writing.

I might even come up with new ideas on what Sarah would be doing during her Seoul layovers, as I explore more of the city.

At first, as necessary as this retreat was, I was against it - due to the rampant Confucio-Christian fundamentalism and homophobia in South Korea. But the retreat will have nothing to do with Confucianism, Christianity, or the Moonies, and will be metaphysical/sort of New Age in content. That's why I have agreed to go - and also give myself enough time away from work to concentrate more on my writing.

Hoping to make some good progress during my month-plus in Seoul. As usual, political commentaries (Korean, American, or otherwise) will be on my other blog, and commentaries on writing, transgender, and other relevant topics will be here.

P.S. Regrettably, I will not be flying with Sarah this time. While United offered the cheapest fare to Seoul, I couldn't take it, because I don't know exactly how long my stay will be. United's partner airline, Asiana, did offer me an open-return ticket at a slightly higher fare, and as a result, I will be flying Asiana.

Progress update

As a followup to last spring's (and 2005's) memoir classes, I have ordered a memoir guidebook written by Lisa Dale Norton, who had taught both of those classes. I need to work on my memoir as a concurrent project, as a tool to getting Sarah's story right.

And I will soon start doing the very structural exercises that I had done in that spring class - this time, from Sarah's viewpoint. It will at least give me an idea on how to proceed with telling her story - and which pieces will be important.

In the meantime, I expect to return to solitude later this month, enabling me to hit my favorite hangouts (and the Unitarian church) again. Eventually, this should become regular occurrence, as I am planning to buy my own condo in a year.