I originally wasn’t going to do a review post this year. It can feel a bit unnecessarily self-aggrandizing. But, late 2022 and January 2023 have been rough! Sometimes looking back is a great way to realign yourself, remind yourself of your goals, and celebrate what you’ve accomplished in the face of so much hardship. This post is serving those purposes for me!

Let’s get into it: from hosting parties to speaking engagements, published work, and even my first-ever keynote speeches (I gave two keynotes this year!), here’s my 2022 in Review!

February

On February 1st, I was the Black History Month Keynote Speaker at NEOMED. You can find the official write-up here. This was indeed one of my favorite lectures I’ve ever given. The students and faculty were very interactive; we learned and laughed together. A staff member in attendance for the lecture wrote the following:

In February, we also announced that Mx. Juneteenth: A Black & Queer Liberation Celebration would be returning for its second year. Mx. Juneteenth is a community festival I founded in 2021 that is built of an abolitionist, liberating, and celebratory foundation. With a help of an amazing leadership team, Zoe Bryon, DeNavya Tolbert, and Alex Frazier, we announced and started planning for Mx. Juneteenth 2022!

March

The first weekend of March we held our first fundraiser for Mx. Juneteenth 2022: Party with a Pisces. This doubled as a birthday celebration for myself and Zoe. And, I can say without bias, it was a great time!

Party with a Pisces was the first party I ever hosted. I was just having a good time, it turns out I was actually good at it. This opened the door for me to start working in nightlife as a host and MC. The first official gig I hosted was HUNNY, presented by Broken Aracde Media Production.

Also in March, I gave my second keynote of the year at OACAC Guiding The Way to Inclusion Annual Conference! Another life-changing experience for me!

April

Thankfully, April was a quiet month. I needed the time to focus on planning Mx. Juneteenth!

May

I hosted another party with Broken Arcade Media Production titled Trash and Thrash!

That same weekend, I was at Creation 4.0: Revival to promote Mx. Juneteenth. I also gave a small educational segment about the history of Juneteenth, what it actually commemorates, and debunked some common historical misconceptions & misinformation when it comes to the Civil War, enslavement, the Emancipation Proclamation, and “freedom” (remember y’all, I was a history professor not too long ago). Also, my outfit was on point that night!

June

Between Pride and Juneteenth, June is easily the busiest month of the year!

I started the month with Twist Night Club; fundraising for Mx. Juneteenth at their Pride Drag Bingo. Thanks to the wonderful Malibu Peru, we raised about $700 that night!

That same weekend was Cleveland Pride. I failed to get a picture there, but I did give a short speech on Juneteenth and promoted Mx. Juneteenth.

A few days later, I sat down with Cleveland Public Library to discuss “Commercializing Culture” hosted by the amazing Chris Tanaka! You can watch it here.

Right after that, I sat down for an interview with Cleveland.com to discuss the importance of Juneteenth and to promote Mx. Juneteenth. Check it out here.

Shortly after that, I participated in a News segment with Fox19 concerning the commercialization of Juneteenth and Pride. I can’t locate my interview portion, but check out the article here!

The day before Mx. Juneteenth, I was on a panel hosted by the incomparable Eris Eady on the topic of Abortion as Liberation. I was on the panel alongside Lique Gates and Traci Person.

Then, it was time for the big day. Mx. Juneteenth 2022 was here! We served 100s of attendees, presented an amazing cast of performances, provided vaccines and booster shots, Central Office tested about 70 attendees for HIV and STI screening, and more. It was truly amazing!

July – August

July & August were a much-needed months off!

September

I got back in my writing bag this month. I published an essay with Belt Magazine about the absurdity of the phrase “police accountability.” Check it out here.

October

This month, I had the pleasure of MC’ing the party of the year: Freak Lick: Taste Like Beyonce. A night full of Beyonce with an amazing cast of Cleveland’s most talented drag artists and go-gos: Kardi Redd Diamond, Joliee Blak, Dakota Cox, Nintedou Arcade, and Queue!

Later that month, I hosted a Halloween party with Broken Arcade titled HUNNY: Scream Queen!

The morning of HUNNY, I had the immense pleasure to interview the LEGEND herself: Latrice Royale as a part of the grand opening of Studio West 117 Fieldhouse. It was a pleasure and it started my interview series: Drag With A Leftist. The child of a podcast I founded and co-hosted: Drag From The Left. You can listen to my interview with Latrice here.

November

Unfortunately, I had to speak at a Candlelight Vigil for the victims of Club Q in Colorado Springs. I hate that we get having to have these; we HAVE to deal with this white supremacist violence is dealt with head-on!

I ended the year by interviewing my second guest for my interview series, the multi-talented Aaron Williams. We talked about artistry, ballroom, appropriation, religion, manifestation, and more! Check it out here.

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There you have it, a glimpse into my 2022. What this year shows is the complexity & manifoldness (is that a word?) of my person and me as an artist. I host parties, give keynotes, write, organize community festivals, and more. No box can contain me. I’m taking that energy into the rest of 2023.

Watch me work!

There have been some things that have recently transpired in my person life that I have A LOT of feelings about, and I feel compelled to get them out. And since I’m not in therapy anymore … here we go

More recently, I have found myself in contentious situations that have resulted in curse words, elevated tones, neck rollin’, and the like. I am no stranger to confrontation, but as I’ve grown older I try to find myself in those situations less often.

There is this thing that people who specialize in manipulation, abuse, and lying do. They start mess, then play the victim when their mess is responded to. They cause disruption in your life and cry when you try to put it back in order. They do something wrong, and instead of owning their wrongdoing, they’ll attempt to create a situation that transfers the blame onto you (and in some twisted way, relieve their guilt of what they’ve done to you).

These are some of the matters I have found myself in recently. And after some reflection, I realize this is something that has been happening to me my entire life. I’m quite a target for it.

I am a Black, queer, undesirable person that is super emotional and often empathetic to the people around me. I move with a humanity and intergrity so it’s hard for me to purposely harm folk in my communities (this is generally speaking. I’m not perfect. Sometimes I do and say that wrong things – which we’ll get to).

That puts a wide target on me that welcomes unfavorable people and situations. And on top of all of that, I have a tendency to turn up. My “0 to 100” can take off at lighting speed if I’m not careful and chaos and destruction are sure to follow. So when I’m responding to unfavorable scheming behavior, it’s mad easy for the opposing party to aptly take the victim role. It’s equally as easy for onlookers to think the same thing – that I’m acting out or cause conflict.

My identity also plays a major role in this, too. It’s easy to paint a big dark-skinned Black person, who is read as male, as “aggressive” or an “abuser”. It fits neatly within racialized stereotypes of people who look like me and it is quickly weaponized against me – this has happened to me by other Black folks, too.

This has also been a theme in my life. As early as I can remember, I was routinely punished for responding to harm instead of the harm being addressed. As a result, I am deemed “crazy”, my person is promptly criminalized, and I am regulated to the shadows as someone unworthy of care or attention (wow, that sounds mad dramatic, but it’s also my experience).

And, on a very different scale, we have seen this happen in popular culture recently. People like Simone Biles, Lil Nas X, Naomi Osaka are being scrutinized and demonized for responding to harm done to them, as opposed to addressing the harm that resulted in them doing what’s best for them.

Additionally, this is the basis for the social construction of what is “crime” and who is deemed “criminals”. The responsibility falls on the individual(s) and not harmful, inequitable systems.

This is not to magnify my interpersonal problems or put them on the same scale as macro-level issues, but to draw the connections that the way to cultivate and maintain interpersonal relationships are directly related to systems of power and influence. Nothing happens in a vacuum.

Anyway, back to me.

In the spirit and politic of accountability, every instance of disrespect or wrongdoing does not require an immediate cussing out. I fully acknowledge that my temper can use some work and everything I’m called to doesn’t need or deserve a response. I am actively working on protecting my peace and controlling the urge to choose violence posthaste. I have faith in a good therapist, the Lord, and I will get there soon. But in the meantime, who you won’t try is me. And if you do, be ready for the response.

I felt compelled to share this for two reasons. 1) Selfishly, to get this out of my head and onto the page in hopes of feeling better (I mean, I am a writer. That’s kinda what we do). 2) To speak to folk who might find themselves in similar situations.

You are not crazy. You’re not difficult to deal with. You’re not hard to love. You’re likely a sensitive soul that people take advantage of. People are drawn to you for the same reasons they feel like they can disrespect you without consequence. You are likely responding to the harm that is done to you in whichever way you deem necessary.

For people like us, it’s our responsibility to respond “appropriately” – I use that word very loosely because it easily falls within the bounds of respectability politics and American politeness culture that I detest. But it is our responsibility, and within our authority, to draw boundaries and protect ourselves from harm.

Sometimes the appropriate acknowledgment to disrespect is an altercation (part of protecting your peace is letting folk know how they won’t treat you). And, sometimes it’s knowing what’s not worth it and removing yourself. What’s always needed is being gracious with yourself and knowing that you deserve to be in community with folk who won’t cause you harm. And if they do, because we are all human, active accountability is centered in the wake.

This goal of this post was not a give a ‘woe-as-me’ realness or a poly to victimize myself. It is rather an attempt to speak truth to my experiences and make adjustments of how I handle myself with care moving foward.