(I changed names in the book -subject to change-for privacy from the public for the people in my life.)

Chapter 1: Who I Was

February 2021

 A single, 22-year-old bartender at a small local pub tattoos littered my pale skin and I had recently embraced bright and exciting makeup choices. Blues, oranges, pinks, and greens colored my eyelids daily, framed by eyeliner and mascara that highlighted my favorite feature of my round face…a little filler on the brows. I had cut my hair off in January for a fresh start…I had grown a lot in a year. I finally embraced my body for how it was and stopped trying to shape it into something it wasn’t. Being fat in high school was rough…emotionally and physically. After losing a ton of weight over the span of three years I was by no means skinny but I was healthy. It took a few more years to lose the voices in my head from fat comments, religious antidotes, and frankly myself to feel comfortable in a regular attire of shorts and tanks, highlighting what my mother gave me and showing off what I bought from tattoo parlors. Cheap rings riddled my fingers and my nose. An ear cuff and some dangly earrings often made an appearance as well. 

As a bartender, I didn’t look like the bookworm and writer I aspired to be. I was a regular in my own kitchen living on a plant-based diet and aspiring to someday make a cookbook. I survived unironically on coffee- cold brew, splash of dairy-free creamer, and coconut milk. But I wouldn’t say no to a nice cup of tea if given the chance. Water was completely optional. My endocrinologist recommends that I make it less optional and more mandatory as hydration is not only important as a human but also as a Type One Diabetic. She had been my doctor for about 21 years now and was a regular customer at the pub- so I hope buying her a beer here and there will ease the speech when I am her patient and not her bartender. She was like a mother that was really good with numbers to me and a really good doctor…so I should probably listen to her. 

My best friends were a 24-year-old free spirit named Nat and her fiance Wren…who was quiet but his presence would be missed. I had known her since 2016 and she was a wild card. We had been through great times and hell together, shared two jobs, rooms, a social life, and friends, and we still managed to stay close despite losing some of those friends, changing and growing as people, and moving to different cities and countries. 

Balt, a very complicated friendship to say the least. I had been in love with him for nearly six years and last year during the very infamous Covid 19 pandemic we confessed mutual feelings we had for each other while we worked 11 to 16 hour shifts together. This would be a dream come true if it was a romance movie – but alas, he was married and I had a boyfriend…so it was complicated. Over the last year, we had some really great ups and very weird downs. Now, I think we finally found a groove. I had been working on myself, my morals, and my priorities and I was finally ready to let go of this never-ending star-crossed lover story- and be okay and even happy that we are simply friends. So yes…again, very complicated. 

And you can’t forget Mick. A 57-year-old regular at the pub who turned into a dear friend and father figure. The previous December they had decided to get matching tattoos of an alien robot throwing up a peace sign and drinking a beer. It was the first-ever picture drawn on the back of a receipt I had given to  Mick as a silly moment and now that moment is tattooed on my ankle and his forearm. Our relationship was simple. I poured him beers, swapped stories, and made fun of the other customers. Sometimes we even swapped some good advice when we needed a reset. 

This was the first time in a really long time…maybe even in my whole life that I felt good. I had a good job and amazing friends, I had two great pets: Chonk and Charles. Chonk, an old cat that had the soul of a sick victorian child, and an old Russian woman’s love child trapped in her strange and lumpy body. Charles was a lone guinea pig that nobody else wanted to adopt because he was abnormally aggressive to his fellow guinea brothers and sisters. But he was nice to me and the three of us made a very odd and loving family. 

This was the first time since I was 17 that I stayed put in one place for a long time…in my old hometown of all places. I think I had finally stopped running from my past and was working on healing instead. But running had taken me to many cool places, Portland, Oregon, Venice Beach, California, Dallas, Texas, and Chicago, Illinois….Savusavu, Fiji…and some places in between. I also had a really odd run in with an old lady that told me if I stay I choose love or if I go to Texas I will have money. I didn’t want to be the asshole that chose money over love so I stayed. Part of me had thought the love was related to Jesse…but I don’t think I was right about that. But hey- you got to be wrong to eventually figure out what’s right…right?

 I was a sister to a spicy 12-year-old named Kae, a 7-year-old named TJ, and the infamous 4-year-old named Marlee. They were technically half-siblings as they were born to my father Maurice and my stepmother, Mari but technicalities don’t matter, because they are my full siblings. 

I was the only child between my dad and my mother, Celeste. I was technically a step-sister to 5 Russian brothers, two of them I never met, and one accidentally hit on me not realizing I was the daughter of the bride at this rushed but beautiful wedding that had happened about a month after the meeting. Honest mistake, but it made life weirder for a moment. Weird even for a Russian wedding celebrating your mother and some guy named Konstatin you had met twice. They were really good for about a year but then things started getting rocky. So when I say technically I am still a step-sister…I mean they are technically still married but she moved back to Arkansas to live in the middle of the Ozarks and he stayed and licked his wounds here in Idaho. They still sneakily visit each other for a week or two until the past ruins the present and they separate again. I am sure they will figure it out sooner than later. Although…it’s been four years since the wedding so no promises. 

My free time is consumed, as I said before, by reading and writing. But also creating in any way I could. The amount of craft and art supplies I own is outrageous. I spent my night under the influence of my favorite plant with 5 to 7 leaves, painting and or drawing. Humans for the most part. Women if we were being specific and naked women if we were getting really specific. Listen the human body is beautiful and as someone who has enjoyed viewing both…I naturally wanted to paint what was the most mesmerizing to me. Boobs. I had finally come to terms that I was a raging bisexual, but coming to that realization was a wild ride. A few years ago I had the belief I had to choose a side. So I came out to my extremely religious parents as a lesbian. Which made panicking, backtracking and bringing home a man a few months later really interesting. I had told my mom I liked girls when I was 15 and she made me a rainbow cake. My dad and step-mom were less interested in my interest in women…but they were shocking…” nice” about it. They didn’t accept it…but they loved me…so, you know it was better than I expected. Anyway, I finally got comfortable with my parents being uncomfortable. So…even if they didn’t understand it…the simple fact is…I like both men and women. I just wanted that to be clear in case you didn’t pick that up from my heavily “Portlandesk” appearance, the fact I was vegan, and I painted boobs while I was high. 

My Spotify playlist had Florence + The Machine, Lord Huron, Hozier, Tash Sultana, The Used, Sticky Fingers, as well as Shawn Mendez, Tayler Swift, and Justin Beiber, to strange Indie music and piano solos. When people asked me what I listened to, I literally just: Uhhhh….a little bit of everything? Yeah, I am that person…

Anyway, that was me in February of 2021. You would not believe what I was doing in February of 2022.