Before I start this update in earnest, I have some events to announce!

A few weeks from now, I'm headed to Sweden and Denmark for two events themed around my video essay Trans Day of Vanishing (Notes on Vanishing? whatever).

In Malmö, on August 8th, we'll screen the project and have a discussion about trans visibility and surveillance. I'm really curious to see how European perspectives on these topics differ from my North American one.

In Copenhagen, on August 9th, we'll approach the project from a different angle: queer & trans history. I'll be arriving fresh off weeks of trans history research that I'll surely be desperate to share with anyone willing to listen.

Both events are free, and both will have time for audience questions!

For more info, check out the Instagram post from PAGE 28, Malmö's LGBTQ independent bookstore (and my gracious hosts).

With that out of the way, here's what's been up since we last spoke:

How it's going

As I write this, I'm sitting in the backyard of my new apartment, sipping cold coffee, completely shaded by a few maple trees. We've been living here for almost a month now, and I love it. We really lucked out – I haven't figured out how to talk about it without sounding like I'm bragging – so I'll keep it brief and say: I have an office now!!

If you watched the latest Additionalily video, you've already seen it. It's pretty bare-bones at the moment, but already much more pleasant than the shaky desk at the edge of my bedroom. Before long it'll be decorated, sound-treated, and so on; then, we'll really be cooking.

The move itself, though, took a lot out of me. I finished three weeks of script crunch (writing the first two episodes of my Nebula miniseries) and dove straight into three weeks of non-stop painting, packing, and logistics. On top of the heavy workload, I was processing some big-picture "so THAT'S why I'm like this" mental health stuff.

One day, I'm sure I'll thank myself for taking these commitments so seriously, but that day hasn't yet arrived. In the meantime, the stress has been too much to bear. I've been eating worse, judging myself more harshly, working through weekends. I let most of my plants die.

I went into 2026 looking for a way to keep doing this job sustainably, and I actually think I found it – then, in the early summer, I lost it again. July has been about finding my way back. Some things that have helped:

Cooking at home. Oh my GOD, I missed having a functional kitchen. Homemade meals are such a simple comfort, and remind me that life's for the living. Put a little extra butter in there, diva!! What's the hurt!!

Doing things for people I love. When I have the time, it feels so good to be there for people who need it. Overworking myself deprives me of this joy.

Small, fun projects. I've filmed three Additionalily videos this month. They feel so good to make, as do the poems and short stories I've been writing in my free time. Maybe I'll share some of them one day... or maybe they're just for me :)

From here, let's talk about something bigger!

New video: The Three-Gender Problem

For as long as I can remember, Western trans people and our allies have tried to discredit the gender binary by pointing to a set of supposed "third genders": hijras in India, muxes in Mexico, two-spirit in the US and Canada. People see these identities as ancient analogs to the Western concept of "nonbinary", and argue that Indigenous cultures worldwide not only recognize, but revere people of such genders – so why shouldn't we?

Over the past year, however, this idea has started to see more resistance. I've heard plenty of people counter-argue that most of the global "third genders" are just trans women, and that non-English terms for these people are their cultures' equivalent of the T-slur.

I've found the whole debate really confusing. Almost nobody involved has the sources to back up their takes, and almost everybody winds up getting at pretty racist with it. So my next video essay will aim to get to the bottom of things: how do "third-gendered" people think about themselves? What do their lives look like, and what do we miss when we deploy them to validate our lives?

I used to make videos like this all the time – "Let's think about gender" videos. They're research-heavy, and often unbearably nuanced, but I'm really enjoying the process. So much to say! I think it'll be finished in September.

TLDR (Time Lily Does Reviews)

This month, I only have one thing to recommend: my favourite thing I've read in ages.

"Extermination of the Joyas: Gendercide in Spanish California" by Deborah A. Miranda

A brief history of the third-gender in Chumash culture, 'aqi: people assigned male who lived and dressed as women, and who were the only people permitted to serve as undertakers for the dead.

When Spanish missionaries arrived in California, they viewed the 'aqi as abhorrent. Communities were forced, under penalty of total extermination, to turn over all of their 'aqi to be brutally killed. The author, who is herself Chumash, works from a sparse historical record and attempts to piece together how Chumash people reacted to this enormous loss, and how they tried to fill the void their friends and partners left behind.

This is a heartbreaking read, but absolutely beautiful, both in prose and intention. The author recovers a history of gender variance in her own family tree, and argues that despite the missionaries' mass killings, the legacy of 'aqi actually survives through two-spirit people today:

A Two-Spirit person is born regardless of biological genealogy. Thus we will always be with you. We are you. We are not outsiders, some other community that can be wiped out. We come from you, and we return to you.

I can't recommend it enough.

To close things out for today:

Overheard

I've been keeping a list of striking things I overhear in public. Here are a few recent faves – Google-translate as needed:

"The idea of mapping a memory... you know..."

"Controversial household, ooh la la!"

« Montréal, c'est pour les riches, là. Pollution! Pollution! Pollution! Tu comprends? »

"Wait, wait, wait. Everything's numbered. Don't do that."

« Ses lunchs, c'est juste du ground beef avec du sour cream. »