Hey there, I’m Jess, a single, white, queer, non-binary lesbian in their mid-30s who lives in the South. I was homeschooled, raised in the evangelical church of the early 2000s, and grew up believing that Christian = Republican. I now identify as a socialist and while I have little use for religion, I do find the principles of Buddhism to be helpful.
I mention all of this because these are my identities, biases, and history. Who I am now and where I came from. The lens through which I see the world and the upbringing that shaped me at my most vulnerable.
I’ve been writing here, in one way or another, for over a decade. When I began, before my frontal lobe had fully developed but when I still had the audacity to think I knew things, I wrote with the aim to convince. Then I wrote to impress, as I used this space as a portfolio in preparation for a career change.
Now, I write for me. I’ve given up the need to convince and am tired of trying to impress. This is less of a journal and more a record of musings, a place for me to set down the questions that rattle through my mind on a never-ending loop.
I have a lot of compassion for all the previous versions of myself that wrote here, which is why I’ve kept up most of the posts from years past. I don’t recommend scrolling back through the archives too far, but if you do, remember that those posts serve as arrows, pointing to who I am becoming. I hope in another 10 years, that the words I write today do the same.
Anyway, thanks for dropping by. I find the comments section of the internet to be one of the lowest rungs of hell, which is why I’ve turned them off. But I’m around on Instagram, Threads, or good old-fashioned email. If you want to subscribe to my posts (you’re certifiably weird but I like weird), you can do that here.