My name is Sollette Savant. I live in Louisiana, with my spouse – who is also Bisexual and Nonbinary. We live with two of our three charming children, and our middle child’s girlfriend. We are a wondrously creative family. We always work hard to remember that we love each other very much, not just in the good times, but in the bad as well. My BI+/Nonbinary spouse, Nihil, is my compass: Nihil keeps me steady and makes sure I do all the sublunary things, like eat and sleep. “Thy firmness makes my circle just / And makes me end, where I’ve begun” as John Donne famously said in the poem “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning”. They claim they are not creative but, even as a novice artist, I am certainly impressed with their paintings. Perhaps more importantly, my spouse is also a storyteller, as the Dungeon Master in one of our Dungeons and Dragons games. (I run another game, from a module which is heavily based on horror and folklore. Caly, my twenty year old is a Trans/Nonbinary Lesbian. And yes, if you do the math that technically makes me a teen mom at nineteen, though I was very fortunate not to be underage at the time of my pregnancy. They are currently in school at McNeese State University, but is interested in changing to Southern New Hampshire University, where I will be getting my MFA in Creative Writing, because they hate going to a physical campus and feel they would be better suited to online classes. Teddy, the baby of the family, is Bi+, as far as he’s figured out at the ripe old age of twelve. He loves drawing monsters and making impressive Lego creations. He has just gone back to public school for sixth grade, after being homeschooled for several years. As for me? I have loved telling stories all my life. Before I could read or write, I would tell stories aloud to unsuspecting victims. When I had insomnia, I told myself stories to help put myself to sleep. (I still do this from time to time, when I need it, like carrying my favorite stuffed animal.) I am indeed passionate about pursuing writing as a career, because I have never loved any specific thing, and hobby or object or job or thought, more in my life than creating. While I do still get nervous when other people consume, that is one of the many reasons I will be attending Southern New Hampshire University to get my MFA in Creative Writing: to become a better writer. Writing is not the only thing I will get out of my MFA, though. I will also be able to become an editor, or a Creative Writing teacher in higher education. I may or may not switch to higher education post MFA, but right now I think I would cry if I had to leave KinderCare, where I am full-time Lead Teacher of the Preschool class. Three-year-olds are such wondrous beings I read once that only sixteen percent of people with bipolar disorder and roughly seventeen percent of LGBTQ+ students graduate with their Bachelor’s degree, though I do not know the specifics of Trans/Nonbinary people like me. I am one of only sixteen or seventeen percent. That gives me all the courage I need to overcome my challenges and get my Masters. Yes, I am a Bi+, Nonbinary, and I have a lot of health issues, both physical and mental. That doesn’t mean I’m out of the ring, though. It just means I need to punch schoolwork a little harder.

I am a published author, and the Director of my own Montessori school.

Sometimes when a person is having trouble making a decision they'll laugh and say, "I'm so Bipolar!" Or, when they're being particular, "I'm so OCD!" Or, when they're distracted, "I'm so ADHD!" I tend to see red when people do that, and give them a lecture about how people's mental health problems are not a joke. I am Bipolar. I have Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. I am ADHD. I have agoraphobia just for fun. I've had to rearrange my entire life, and the way my brain works, to accommodate these issues, and it's neither easy nor fun to do so. The two things I never lose are my eyeglasses and my cell phone, so my Android phone is a major part of my attempts to be a functioning adult. I keep lists in my notes application. My entire day is accounted for in Google Calendar. I use a free phone application "Habitica" to keep track of my important habits (got to drink that water!) and daily tasks. I cycle through these applications frequently to make sure I don't miss anything. I take my medications every night at eight p.m. when my medication alarm goes off, and never miss a day. I not only go to therapy, but I also journal, and use therapeutic workbooks to keep my mental health in check. I have checklists of my telling symptoms at the various stages of mental illness, so I can assess myself as objectively as I can and adjust accordingly. I am constantly on guard for any sign that I might be teetering. It's exhausting, to be honest, but I feel it is just too dangerous to live otherwise, to be any less vigilant. I am currently attending the University of Phoenix online and I am majoring in Early Childhood Education. Learning is a special interest of mine. I want to finish my Bachelor's degree first, then teach preschool, pre-kindergarten, or kindergarten in a public school for a few years while I get my Master's, and possibly my Ph.D, in Education, depending on how well I do up to that point and what my life is like. Then, once I've completed my education and gained practical teaching experience, I want to open my own Montessori school, and use what I've learned in college (and life) to help children get an exemplary education. I envision a school for children age birth to pre-kindergarten, full of play-based, age-appropriate, interest-led learning, utilizing the latest research in child development and learning. That's my dream and, having already overcome so many obstacles already, I don't see why I wouldn't be able to make it a reality.

My legal name is Erin Doucet, but I am more commonly known as Sollette. I am a thirty-seven year old bisexual, demi-sexual, polyamorous demi-woman getting my Bachelor's in Early Childhood Education from the University of Phoenix online, and I never thought I would make it this far. I went to college at McNeese State University when I was seventeen on an early admissions program. I had been in a gifted program since I was in second grade, and I was accustomed to being bored in school. College was amazing in that regard: I was never bored in class. I was brilliant, and had a "great" boyfriend, and my parents gave me an enormous allowance so I would resist the temptation to get a job for money, so all I really had to focus on was school. On paper, everything looked great. The reality, what was going on inside, told a much different story. About halfway through the first semester, I took two bottles of over the counter sleeping pills, and tried to slit one of my wrists. I knew, I just knew, that my life was pointless and no one would ever love me. I was a bisexual, polyamorous, genderqueer atheist witch and my heart was too soft. I was convinced my parents would disown me if they found out anything about who I really was inside. I knew that no one could love me. None of that was true. I had yet to meet all the people who would love me over the next twenty years, and there have been more than enough to make my cup runneth over, as my mother would say. My mother, who posts LGBTQ+ ally memes on her Facebook now! My parents never disowned me. How could they? I am, as I am constantly reminding them, the light of their lives. I have Bipolar Disorder. Depression will always come for me -- along with bouts of mania, and occasional breaks of normality for good behavior -- but it will not get me in the end because I know I haven't met all the people I will love, or all the people who will love me. I know now that, even though this sounds frightfully cliché, it's true: it gets better. If I could tell every queer child one thing and have them believe me, I would tell them that it gets better. Sometimes you have to fight for it, though, and goodness knows I have fought, I fight still.

My chosen name is Sollette Doucet, and my pronouns are she/they. I am a thirty-seven year old bisexual, demi-sexual, polyamorous demi-woman (under the nonbinary umbrella) and I am currently attending the University of Phoenix online, where I am pursuing my Bachelor's in Early Childhood Education. I have less than two years to go, and I couldn’t be more excited. I already know what I want to do after I graduate. I will work as a public school teacher for a few years while I get my Master's (and possibly a Ph.D) in Education. Once my education is taken care of, I want to found an inclusive Montessori school for ages birth through pre-kindergarten, where children can receive a comprehensive, age-appropriate education based on the latest research in Early Childhood Education. I believe that children learn best through play, and that every child deserves their best chance at life, and that is what I want to give back to my community: a school where people like me, the outsiders, the marginalized, can feel their children are safe to grow and learn, yes their ABC's and 123's, but also who they are and who they want to be. So many LGBTQ+ children are well into adulthood before they develop healthy psychological habits and figure out who they are, because they had to spend their childhoods in the closet to protect themselves. I should know, I was one of them. I never want another child to feel that way, and that's what I want to do with my education. I want to create a safe environment where I can teach, and learn, and grow, and help others grow. Much like when my friend and I founded, and continue to perpetuate, our local Pride organization, I am clearly not going into Early Childhood Education for the money. People don't ever become teachers for the pay, because education is sorely underfunded in the United States. I am getting my education and making all these plans because I want to make a positive impact in this world. I want to see children's eyes light up with understanding as they learn something new, something that can only happen when they feel safe and loved. I want to be that safe, loving space where they can feel free to show the world the deep, insistent quiddity of their souls, the things inside them that my parents' and grandparents' generations insisted we hide away "for our own good." I want to create a new, safe, beautiful world for (and with) them.

My chosen name is Sollette Doucet, though my legal name is Erin. I am a thirty-seven year old bisexual, demi-sexual, polyamorous, demi-woman (under the Nonbinary umbrella) whose pronouns are she/her or they/them. I am attending University of Phoenix, where my major is Early Childhood Education. I am also a full-time preschool teacher, wife, and mother. In my spare time, I am Assistant Director of SWLA Pride, our local Pride organization, and have helped organize Pride events in Southwest Louisiana since 2020. We started in 2020 by donating our time during Pride month to march and raise awareness for Black Lives Matter. The next year, in 2021, we organized SWLA Pride and raised almost a thousand dollars in less than a week to start PrideFest at a local queer event hall, Castaways. We have hosted PrideFest there for the last three years, and every year it gets bigger . Last year, we also had a Pride Prom at a local bar (half queer-owned) and a drag show at another, owned by allies to the community. My favorite event, possibly because it was my idea and I did all the work for it myself, was the Queer Clothing Swap SWLA Pride hosted outside our local coffee shop, Stellar Beans last June. It was a totally free event where people traded clothes, and had the option to buy the best coffee in town, and met others in the community. I can’t wait to see what we'll come up with next year! I think it is terribly important for LGBTQ+ people to get our educations, because education is the ticket out of ignorance and poverty. It's more difficult for those of us in the LGBTQ+ community to get higher education, or to get and keep good jobs where we are valued, respected, and paid well, with benefits, for our time and efforts. I chose Early Childhood Education for my major because learning is a special interest of mine, and I find early childhood learning most fascinating. Every child is a scientist and an artist and whatever else they want to be, until some adult tells them they can't any more. Children are in the process of discovering who they are, of learning to be people at all, and I want to help them through that process in a way that is gentle and loving, the way people did not help me. The joke in the LGBTQ+ community is that our twenties are the new teens, because most of us spent our teen years deep in the proverbial closet, if we weren't being actively hate-crimed. I want my students to live their lives the first time. I want to be the person who tells them they can be whomever they want to be, and to do that, I need to finish my education. I hope, sincerely, that you can help me.

It is a decision so difficult it actually pains me, but if I could have everyone in the world read one book, I would choose "A Wrinkle in Time" by Madeleine L'Engle. I know I should probably choose a more adult book, and probably not a genre-defying sci-fi/fantasy with a dash of teen romance, but this is my honest answer, and it's a hill I am prepared to die on. They have never made a good, true movie of that book, though Disney has tried at least twice, so the best way to experience it is to just jump in and read it. It's been one of my favorite books since elementary school, when my age had only one digit. I really saw myself in Meg Murry, an intelligent oddball with a temper problem who just wants to be loved. And love is one of the most important lessons "A Wrinkle in Time" teaches. From the beginning chapter, when the whole Murry family is missing Mr. Murry, Meg's father, to the climax, when Meg has to figure out what weapon she has that her enemy does not in order to free her beloved youngest brother from an alien's mind control, to the end, when the Murry family is reunited, the answer is always love. I think that's true in the real world too, and the world would be better off if more people understood that and acted accordingly. That is why I recommend that everyone read "A Wrinkle in Time" by Madeleine L'Engle.

My mother would say that I am all about being non-traditional, so please don't ask her! I am, however, a thirty-seven year old undergraduate student, trying to earn my degree in Early Childhood Education from the University of Phoenix. I began college as a psychology major at age seventeen, through the early admissions program, but I quickly switched to English, and not long after I had to drop out when I became a single mother to my firstborn, Finnick Atticus. I went back eight years later to finish my English degree, but had to drop out when I became pregnant with the family baby, Theodore Phineas. I'm too old to have children, now, and I have come so far in Early Childhood Education. I first became interested in education as a subject for me to study when Finn had to be homeschooled in fifth grade due to health issues. Not long after that, Teddy was born and my interest in childhood learning grew as I watched the two of them grow and learn at their different stages of childhood. I had to go back to work about three years later, around the time Teddy was entering pre-kindergarten, because my husband became disabled and could no longer work any job he had previously been qualified for, nor any job that is physically taxing. I found myself working minimum wage retail jobs just to make ends meet, but I always dreamed of giving my family more than poverty and ignorance. I saw an advertisement for a job at KinderCare, an early learning facility near my house that my nephews and niece had attended, and my sister spoke well of. They were looking for teachers, no experience required. I looked around at my life. I talked to my husband -- who is in college now too, for accounting -- about it. We agreed I should give it a shot. A year and a half later, I'm Lead Preschool teacher, I have my CDA (Child Development Associate), I'm less than two years away from my Bachelor's in Early Childhood Education, and I've never been happier, or more sure about my purpose. I don't want to be a teacher -- I am one already. I want a degree so I can go further in that career, because the further I go, the more it helps my family. If I had finished college the traditional way, when I was twenty-one, I wouldn't be the person, or the parent, I am today. Still, it's important to me that I finish my degree now. I want to show my children what it looks like when you work hard, what it looks like to finish what you have started, and what it means to screw your courage to the sticking place. I want to make something of myself, and use that leverage to take care of my family. I want us in a house we own, with enough real food that nobody feels insecure, with one working, modern vehicle for each adult in the household. I am not just a parent, though, I am also someone's child. My father, who got me as a "happy surprise" instead of his Ph.d in Pharmacy, has always wanted to see me get my degree. I thought I had all the time in the world, because I was young and ignorant. Now my father has Alzheimer's, and we don't know what he'll forget or when. It's vital that I finish my degree while he can still remember to be proud of me. I hope you can help me reach my goals.

I still remember when my parents took me to see "Beauty and the Beast" in theaters, when it first came out in 1991. I was five years old, and I saw myself in a character for the first time in my life when I saw Belle. It wasn’t love -- I knew what falling in love was, because I had previously seen "The Little Mermaid" in theaters when I was three and fallen in love with the titular character, red-haired Ariel. She was my first crush. This was not love like that though. I loved Belle the way I loved myself. She loved to read, and read quickly, like me. She was seen as odd by everyone around her, like me. She was sensitive and kind-hearted, but a little mischievous too, like me. She even had brown curls and brown eyes like me! Best of all, if there was someone out there who could look at her, really see her, and still love her, like the Beast could, then there was certainly hope for me. I have always greatly identified with the G.K. Chesterton quote, "There is the great lesson of 'Beauty and the Beast,' that a thing must be loved before it is lovable." Still, even as a child, I knew I had to be cautious about giving my heart away. Marriage has always been a very serious oath to me. So I, in my childlike wisdom, told my mother that I would only marry a man if he gave me a library first. That scene was always so moving to me, and the library so beautiful. (The library in the Beast's castle supposedly is based on the Oval Reading Room of the Richelieu Building, at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, in Paris, France. Knowing that, I've always had a reason to want to visit Paris, as if anybody ever needed one!) It seemed like a win-win situation for me, and a super great weeding process. If a man couldn't or wouldn't get me a library, then he wasn't marriage material. Not for me, at least. Cut to seventeen years later, and I did get married, to my wonderful husband, Joseph, no library required. On our first anniversary, he bought me a present. He was nervous to present it to me, and I could not persuade him to tell me what it was or why. "It's not paper," he finally said, citing the traditional first anniversary gift, "and I can’t afford to give you a library yet. But I can give you this." "This" was a brand new second generation Kindle, back in 2009 when e-readers were new and expensive to own. He had budgeted for me to get a couple of books on it, too, though we've always been very poor. I didn't even buy any books that night, however, because I was too busy downloading free books, stories in the public domain, including -- you guessed it -- "Beauty and the Beast." To this date, my "library" is the most thoughtful, most romantic gift I have ever been given. That particular Kindle is long dead, though it lasted me quite a while, and now the Kindle app is on my phone, in dark mode, so I can read whenever I want to. But every time I buy a book -- be it physical, e-book, or audiobook -- I tell my husband I am adding to our library. And he will usually laugh, and say, "Okay, Belle."

Taylor Swift's fifth album – titled "1989" – is more than just a pop album, more than even a country star's transition to mainstream pop. At least it is to me -- I'm a Swiftie. My name is Erin Doucet, but people call me Sollette. It means little sunshine, and I think that tells a lot about my personality. For me, the album "1989" is a typical Tylor Swift album, in that it is full of beautiful, moving tracks. Her words are poetry at their best. My favorite song, however, would have to be track three, "Style". Everyone knows that, when it comes to poetry, Taylor Swift is the confessional sort. Much like Sylvia Plath, she writes about her life in words that are beautiful but raw in their honesty. This particular song is about a brief relationship Ms. Swift had with pop icon Harry Styles. It talks about reconnecting with a flame and knowing it's probably not a good idea, but loving it (and/or him) anyway. When I was seventeen, I met the love of my life, Joseph Doucet. (I say the name to clue you in that this is a happy ending type of story.) He was dating someone else, though, and though they were meant to be in a polyamorous relationship, she was jealous of me, and would never let him date anyone else, so I had to settle for being his best friend. For four years we stayed that way, just friends. I was there for him when he needed someone to bring him to the car dealership to buy a cherry red Yaris, which he named Maraschino. He was there for me, with long drives and grocery shopping and trips to the dollar theater, when my love life was less than satisfying. Until one day, about six months after the jealous girlfriend finally left him to go be monogamous with someone else, my James Dean daydream looked in my eyes, and kissed me. He was single, and I knew I was never going to love anyone else as much as I loved him, so I called off my wedding. (Two weeks before the date, I might add – talk about Speak Now!) We've been together since, through the good times and the bad. Like the song says, "when we go crashing down, we come back every time, cause we never go out of style." "This Love" reminds me of my ex-boyfriend. "Bad Blood" reminds me of my ex-best friend. "Out of the Woods" reminds me of my ex-girlfriend. I guess I have a lot of exes. "Shake It Off" is one of my personal anthems, and "Blank Space" reminds me of how misogynistically people have always treated me about my love life, even before I had one. But "Style" … "Style" reminds me of falling in love, and New Relationship Energy, and sparks flying, and dancing at the club, and having a little too much to drink but knowing I'm was safe with him, and fights that turned into making love, and making love that turned into building a life together. Through it all, we never go out of style, and I wouldn't have it any other way.