emotional freedom

so Total Freedom and i are talking about starting another party... hope it works out! it feels weirdly athletic for me - every tuesday for 2 yrs kinda gets into yr body like clockwork. this would NOT be another wildness. we were discussing it in terms of performers and of course the question came up: would we charge a cover? wildness was always free, but what made it sustainable was the fact that the Silver Platter gave us a percentage of their alcohol sales (usually between $50-250 depending on the night). it was really like making no money at all, but at the same time it made everything possible. i SERIOUSLY DOUBT we will ever find another bar willing to do that. usually the way it works is that the bar keeps the alcohol sales and you make money off the door. these may seem like minor details but they really affect the quality of the night. so REALLY the question was, are we gonna start like a business venture or another soul partnership? reflecting on the relationships i've built at the silver platter, and all the amazing stuff that's come out of it, i realize i just don't have the energy to start another thing right now. not for a long time.

makes me think about the fact that FREE is an elusive concept. truly, a free flowing exchange of resources depends on emotional bonds - like building a family, looking out for each other etc. being gay i think this ultimately is like a sexual thing, like trading on mutual desire and energy. for me it's also a boundary thing, like having boundaries between money and emotional life. i both seek and struggle with these kinds of arrangements. it also makes me realize i particularly hated doing the last wildness at Grand Star because there were boundaries (not being allowed behind the bar for example). in other words, what we traded to make wildness free was our deep emotional investment. and that takes A LOT of energy. it was also the cause of our ending. because if we didn't care so much about the people we worked with we's still be there.

something my friend Leilah Weinraub once said to me that i always reflect on when i'm doing CLASS is about the word TRICK. it's a word that has so much complex meaning in communities of color that doesn't really translate into white/mainstream culture. TRICK it's not exactly sex for money but more like an explicit reference to the role that money plays in sex. it's something that gets talked about a lot at silver platter- like the difference between being a sex worker and simply being trans feminine. the ambiguity between dressing up for attention, a free drink, someone buying you something, taking you out, fucking etc. it's like a POSITION. and how is that not a part of every relationship??? just sayin...