Emerging from the Ninth Wave
She asked me what sorts of interpersonal connections I think I might find easier as my feelings of gender dysphoria are alleviated.
This is what I said, turning to song as I often (perhaps too often) do:
Really, I think that all my connections have the potential to be a bit deeper and more real as my feelings of gender dysphoria are alleviated. On one of my favorite albums, Hounds of Love by Kate Bush, the last seven songs make up a sort of abstract story called “The Ninth Wave,” which I’ve always interpreted as being about someone sort of confronting and dispelling some of her demons, and coming away from the experience better able to be in the world and connect with and love other people. The lyrics to the last song, “The Morning Fog,” go like this:—The lightBegin to bleed
Begin to breathe
Begin to speak
Do you know what? I love you better now.I am falling
Like a stone
Like a storm
Being born again
Into the sweet morning fog.Do you know what? I love you better now.I’m falling, and I’d love to hold you now.
I kiss the ground.
I tell my mother
I tell my father
I tell my loved one
I tell my brothers
How much I love them.—And I don’t know, I just feel like all of my connections with others have been to some degree compromised by my gender dysphoria, and that they can all benefit from me lessening the shadow that dysphoria casts on my internal world. I’ve always found plenty of value in solitary experiences and no doubt I will continue to do so, but as I get (a little) older, I increasingly have the feeling that, more than anything else, it’s the connections we form with others that can truly make life mean something.
But of course, perhaps there are certain types of connections that have been particularly difficult all these years. Things I don’t want to hide from anymore.
“I found a fox
Caught by dogs
He let me take him in my hands
His little heart
It beat so fast
And I’m ashamed of running away
From nothing real
I just can’t deal with this
I’m still afraid to be there
Among your hounds of love
And feel your arms around me”
Kate Bush, “Hounds of Love”
—
Do you know what I really need?
Notes
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