Laughs and Lobotomies

I had a friend. We aren’t friends anymore, but that’s a separate story. We were friends for 20 years. And that friend is trans. And he told me once that no trans woman stops being trans because they were confused, or changed their mind. They just couldn’t deal with how fucking hard it is to be a trans woman in this world. He said it was easier to be a trans man. But it still wore at him.

I have this dream in my head, because I don’t know if it would be true because my grandfather died when I was a child.

That the man who fought for special needs rowing, and desegregation, and women in rowing.

That he would’ve fought for trans women to row too.

I don’t know. But I need to believe that one person in this whole family had a goddamn soul.

So here’s to Chuck Colgan, 3 days short of 24 years since his passing. Whose funeral I insisted on wearing pink florals to instead of black, because I thought he would’ve liked it.

Here’s to a man I barely got to know.