And a one, two, three, four....

So here we are, the eve of the departure. The night before we roll out of here.

Soon, many nights will be the night before we roll out of here..

Wherever here happens to be that night...

I'm sitting in the tiny house. The guitar is on my left, along with a fan and a small-window a/c unit to beat the tremendous heat out here. The night is beautiful with a cool breeze coming from the east. On my right, a long, frugal/stately looking desk we built. My clothes for the trip are piled on the south side of the desk. Well, south south-west according to the wonderful compass/bike bell my friend gave me as a gift. Tumbleweed the Cat and Momo are perched up in the loft. She's reading aloud the Arundhati Roy novel Walking With The Comrades; He's not all bitey for a change. We spent the day packing, sharing time with friends, “donating” a few final things, and watching the fireworks explode around the valley from on top of the roof of the house.

It's the perfect evening. 

There are reasons we are leaving, though... 

We're leaving tomorrow. With a sudden lack of compelled responsibility (As of July 4^th, we are both jobless and houseless), it occurred to us that there was no reason not to travel, but a lot of reasons to saddle up and ride out into the sunrise. We'll head out on our respective steeds in the morning as soon as all provisions are made. Destinations? Santa Fe, Denver, Omaha, Chicago, Ann Arbor, and all points of interest in between.

We have no idea where we go from there.

This is the kind of excitement that keeps me up at night.

I think it would be most important now, because this is the first post you are likely to see and because it seems like the time for it, to add a page of acknowledgments and thanks. No one does anything alone. Every individual depends on half the world before breakfast, and I know I have a lot of individuals to thank for a lot of different reasons. Here's a partial list:

My mother and father, my creators, the rents. You have been with me the absolute longest it is possible to have been with me, regardless of where our society or legal system decides when life begins. What a fantastic fact! You have always, always, always, always been my biggest supporters. Thank you for everything. I would literally be nothing without you.

My life partner, comrade, muse, caretaker, one-time warden, and very best friend in the world.

There. There is where we go... Away... That way... After swim, we go.

Oma and Opa, my cousins, my aunts, and the rest of the family spread all over the country and the world.

Andy, the Mister Man Mechanic that keeps everything moving.

Tumbleweed the Cat, who teaches people how to love.

fig 1. This cat is teaching you how to love.

EDIT: 7/14/13 - I had originally written a lengthy list of thank you's naming everyone I could, but I have decided against publishing that for a number of reasons. I have removed it.

I declare today, July 5^th, 2013, the day after Independence Day, to be known as Solidarity Day. To be a day to remember all the people who've stood by you over the years, who fought with you, who cried with you, who helped you try to build the world you'd like to live in. To think about how our struggles are all interconnected and to hold the duality of Yes, I am an individual, I have individual rights and among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness on one hand with An injury to one is an injury to all, we rise or fall together on the other hand. To evaluate how you have treated and stood with others, did you help them build a piece of their world? On what streets will you be holding hands tomorrow, and with whom?

Plus, the world could use more May Days. 
 

I have no way to conclude this article so here is an allegorical picture.

Here is your life in jelly beans.

Do Something.

~Us

And a two..

It should be fitting now that I describe a bit of my experience of being Two-spirited and the ongoing process of coming out and existing as such. I gather that a sizable portion of this blog may be dedicated to this process, as it is one that appears to be almost universally disorienting due to the near total lack of groundwork done towards understanding and the seemingly endless waves of oppressive thought patterns that batter down on the shores of the small island of refuge I have made of my body and mind.

What's two-spirit? Click here to get an idea.

... I don't really know where to start. On May 28th, 2013, my identity was laid bare for me to see. It was not a slow, growing light that filled me with warmth and joy; It was an avalanche coming down around me, washing out my footing and filling every vacant corner of myself with confusion, fear, and coldness. The person I saw in the mirror was not me anymore. Well, it's more accurate to say it never was me. But now, seeing with eyes all of my own, it washed down on me.

My understanding of the world around me multiplied geometrically. I had at an arm's grasp the understanding only gained by living trapped in a man's body for 26 years, bearing all silently, aching to escape. The unpredictable mood swings? Me trying to find my voice. The odd leaps from one interest to another? Me, using his limbs to run and encouraging his torn hands out of a fist and into a caress. Suddenly, I could speak, and he understood. He understood why the bitterness and failure of past loves. He understood what they meant when they pleaded with him in words he could not comprehend.

It began when I decided that I was going to give up apologizing, compromising, and bowing down for 40 days. I decided to take a vacation to go be with myself. I've often heard that we are to do what we love, and I wasn't sure what that was, so I decided that 40 days of doing exactly as I wished were in order.

.On day one, I took a vow of silence. It was an unpopular move with everyone who needed from me. My mother, my employers, my partner. A one day vow turned into ten. I would not even get to day two...
..On day two, I emerged from my womb, a bathtub filled with hair and shaving cream, a newly bald and bloodied woman crawling from out of the clawfoot bathtub, sealing the door behind her, pushing her own afterbirth into a room which she has no claim to. Exhaused, I wept and waited for our partner to return home, to help us, to tell us that it would be okay.
...On day three, I quit my job. They used my care and love for others to make me do more and more work for less and less pay. I demanded a raise for the last time and was denied. I told them in writing that I shant return to work without being properly remunerated.
....On day four I left without knowing where I was going...
.....On day five, I was in in police custody...
......On day six, I was in a mental institution...
.......On the seventh day, I rested...
My choices were not popular. I nearly died for them. Both of us nearly died.

I began to understand many things about myself. Why I medicated myself so heavily as a youth. Why I could never quite put a finger on my gender or my sexuality. Why every time I was turned away at a door or given a harsher touch because of my perceived gender or sexuality, it cut me in a way so deep as to be unreachable without a paradigm shift. I knew how the person inhabiting this body could be both deeply spiritual and devoutly atheist. I knew how I could identify with both cis and trans, man and woman, and how those lines immediately and swiftly began blurring, blowing away like the jet trail from an airplane.

We are still a work very much in progress. It is a very difficult road to walk when you hold fear so close: Fear of being judged a defective person, doubted and cast into the realms of madness or worthlessness. Or, on the other hand, the fear that no one will believe that you even exist. The latter is the far worse option.

Here's me existing on a mountain ridge.

To live our lives in current, we have split everything in two. Like the most amicable of divorces, we both care deeply for the other's survival and will do anything to ensure the other lives a happy, healthy, full life, even though it means we must part ways. We split the heavens; He gets the day and I get the night. We split our temple into pieces; He gets the jawline, the right hand and arm, the biceps, the chest, the feet, the thighs, and the stomach; I got the left hand and arm, my own walk and language, my hips and calves, eyes that look beautiful with eyeliner, hair that in two years will be a flowing, silken security blanket. He got the most obviously sexed parts, but I use them from time to time.

Like most situations in this world, the man got more than his fair share. He is stronger, more entrenched in this body and in this world. He can take what he wants and there is little I can do to stop him even if I tried. He gets most of the friends, the ones who have stayed around after these rocky times. While everyone is comfortable interacting with him, I am abandoned by all but a small few, and for that I am grateful. I have lived 26 years behind this mortal and shambling cage, and though I remain momentarily confined behind the stubble and the genitals and the smell, I have found my voice, I have a friend, and as god as my witness I will not be held back!

My dualistic nature was revealed to me. I was, and am, two people, not one. We posses everything two people would except for the additional body: Two ways of walking and talking, two ways of problem solving, we respond to chemicals differently, we respond to people and animals differently, we love differently, we fight differently, we fuck differently. The way we bathe, eat, cook, sleep, clean, care, dance, sing, play, build, plan, write, climb... it has always been on two different wavelengths. Day and night, yin and yang, fire and water, air and earth. We are flowing and we are solid. We are yielding, even as we hold our ground. I exist not as one solitary note, but as an octave; two pitches vibrating in harmony and discord but given the same name. 

Therefore, let me give you our names, so you may call upon us correctly, and acknowledge us as equals.

He is Nicholas Robert Dehning
Born March 26th, 1987
Star sign: Aries

She is Savannah Atamansha Marks
Born May 28th, 2013
Star sign: Gemini

Address us separately, or address us together. We each give our own answers.

We all take non-gendered pluralized pronouns (we, us, them) when being spoken about in general.

If anyone reading this is or knows anyone who identifies similarly to us, please let them come forth in the comments or message me. I know there are some paths we must walk alone, but I refuse to believe this is one of them...

Woah, okay, heavy stuff for tonight. Here's a Macklemore video.

If that's not your speed, here's George Carlin talking about stuff.

- Savannah

And a one.

It seems everyone these days is interested in our business (though I will admit that said business has been interesting lately) and, because we have so much to say to everyone and can't say it as many times as there are people I care about, I decided to start up a blog. So, to all those who care about us or what we have to say, "Hi, thanks for coming and thanks for caring. It is my hope that this blog may put many ideas in your head and feelings in your heart."

It's going to be about our travels and trials. It's going to have suggested reading and interesting links. Philosophies and assumptions will be questioned. Rants will be raved and fun will be had, damnit!

For a good jump start toward understanding writings that will occur in the future, please read this article on AlterNet entitled "Are the Young People That Shrinks Label as Disruptive Really Anarchists with a Healthy Resistance to Oppressive Authority?"

Nobel Peace Prize recipient Albert Schweitzer has been quoted as saying, "The only escape from the miseries of life are music and cats." I submit bubble baths as a third option despite my belief that cat would almost certainly disagree.