SEPT - Redefining Realness

September review for Book Riot's Read Harder 2017: Redefining Realness by Janet Mock, 2014. [book where a character of color goes on a spiritual journey category]

Remember when I mentioned sometimes I stretch the categories a little? This is another one of those times. Janet Mock never refers to her life as undergoing a "spiritual journey," but it seems to me that any journey of self-discovery may qualify as spiritual. I identify as a relatively spiritual person, believing in the universe and something Else out there that gives us meaning, and finding out how we as individuals fit in is highly spiritual to me. But I digress, slightly. 

Redefining Realness is Janet Mock's story, about growing up multiracial, poor, and trans in America. It follows her from her youth to the winter of her gender confirmation surgery. She calls on a number of black women role models such as characters from Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God and the poet Audre Lorde. Janet is raw and holds very little back as she embarks on telling her story, her journey to come to terms with her self and her changing world. Realness as a concept is very particular to humanity, it's just easier for cis people: being Real or being true to oneself makes no waves when you exist comfortably within the lines of the societal binary, but when you exist, as Janet does, in a differently-viewed space, being Real becomes a thousand times harder. 

Janet Mock learned early on that she could live her Truth with a capital T and fought hard for her right to get it. I loved reading her story, although I hate that some of the decisions she had to make were necessary. I have a few trans friends, and they have relayed to me the difficulty of simply existing as a transperson, and I have taken it upon myself as a good ally to learn and advocate and do better in my own life. Janet Mock is inspiring, and humans like her are working hard all over to make this country better: with this week's election, a huge number of trans*folks made history: Lisa Middleton, first transgender person elected to a non-judicial office in California; Andrea Jenkins, first transgender person of color elected to public office in US (Minneapolis City Council); and Danica Roem, first *openly* transgender person elected and seated to a state legislature (Virginia House)--beating out the incumbent who wrote the hurtful trans bathroom bill. People are out there, doing the work, and it is the very least we can do to learn and support them.