Hope Springs Eternal, Or Something
Hope springs eternal. The words roll out of my mouth, without me realizing it. It’s Thursday and I’m out to dinner with a friend after work. We sit over our Tornado Tempeh and our homemade iced teas in hand like a couple of true Zillenials to discuss the day. Every grain of rice listens to the stories we tell about our feelings. We discuss our working day and seamlessly transition to geopolitical tensions, you know how it goes.
It’s raining outside and the restaurant is about to close. The employees seem to want us to leave quickly, or at least that’s what I can tell from the way each plate is removed from the table in the ten seconds after we finish them. We try to end our conversation on a somewhat positive note. I decide to make a list of everything that made this day good. I know, I wouldn’t do it either if I were alone. I quickly wrote down seven things: I called the doctor, I walked a lot, I was having dinner with a friend… I read it out with satisfaction, and then it happens. Like the meaningless wisdom on a tile that hung in my aunt Annie’s toilet: Hope springs eternal.
It’s such an old-fashioned saying. Three words that mean nothing more than “Don’t give up, because then you’ll lose your way for good.” That’s just easier said than done, especially if you are Trans or gender nonconforming. In the United States, Trans people are losing their correct gender marker since Trump took office, because according to him people can only be male or female. This would be established from the moment of conception. He was not aware that everyone would then be female, but that’s besides the point: hatred and fear are more important to him and his conservative and racist clique than what reality looks like.
No, maintaining hope is not that easy. It requires a certain ability to put the world into perspective. I don’t consider myself an expert on hope. That’s why I roam the Internet, wandering through web pages that are supposed to tell me where to find hope and how to hold onto it. The results from my search machine are filled with words like “mindset” and “manifest.” I can’t help but see two stereotypes: on the one hand, you have the bald white guy talking about becoming “your best self,” in other words a “self-made” billionaire, and on the other, a white woman sitting on an olive yoga mat with an array of crystals talking about how we can think our way to a better world. In reality, both address the idea that we have to work with the world that is presented to us right now, but that does not work for Trans people. I add transgender to my search, but then I land on a page with results about transition regret. Wonderful.
It doesn’t help me at all. What does hope actually mean? Hope is “the ability to have positive expectations about the future, even when circumstances are difficult.” Hope seems to be nothing more than a state of delusion. Staying delulu is the solulu, and all that jazz. We should believe that the world is fantastic and perfect. We have to close our eyes and stare at our eyelids to convince ourselves that we have quite a nice life.
The intersectional and decolonial feminist Angela Davis spoke during a speech which she gave last January about hope in times of advancing fascism. We must unite; the fear of conservatives is a response to our power as people who fight for a better and fairer world. We find infinite hope in each other. Although it seems like an open door to some extent, Davis is correct. We have to go back to the beginning to hold on to what and who we do it for. I want to become myself a little more every day, which I do for that little child who was unable to do that. When I use my child-self as a vantage point, everything I do is astonishing. It gives me a warm feeling to know that I am getting stronger because I am getting closer to them. I see people around me doing the same and getting to know themselves a little better every day by expressing themselves in a way that works for them, which is not forced onto them by preconceived notions and rules on gender.
We, as Trans people, are an astonishing force of nature. We discovered that systems do not work for us as individuals. We have built ourselves up, from seeds of wildflowers and willpower, and saw that we are always in motion and transition for as long as we live. We don’t have to question our right to exist or the rights we deserve, because we exist and are no lesser beings than cis people. It’s that simple. It is not easy, but it is important that we continue to realize that hope must first come from within ourselves. Sometimes life isn’t all that fun, and it’s a statement filled with privilege, but despite all attempts to deny our existence, we’re still here. Trans people will always be here. That’s actually quite a hopeful thought, isn’t it?
It is important that we remain combative. This could mean that we demonstrate for our rights, that we correct people around us if they have an distorted view on Trans people, that we are there for each other and will remain so. At the same time, it also means that we sometimes need to block out all the white noise of misery. Make a conscious choice to not go on social media for a day and to sit in the park for a while. Then you will see that the world is not always as against you as you think. And if that doesn’t work, you can always go out to dinner with friends and complain about the government. It won’t change the world, but it will give you strength to keep going. Maybe hope springs eternal, but at the end of the day it’s about letting each other live. Sometimes it means letting go of each other for a moment, so that we can hold ourselves even tighter.