Asexuality is tricky. With a lot of the LGBTQ+ community, you know who you are because of a feeling. Attraction. Dysmorphia. Euphoria. But Asexuality is the lack of sexual attraction. (Hard to pinpoint if you do or don’t feel something you’ve never and will never feel.) Asexuality is invisible. Most queer identities can be, but typically lesbians would like to be with a woman, transmascs want to present male, coming out of the closet is scary and hard and once you’re out it’s near impossible to get back in. But asexuality isn’t important until you’re dating someone, until they’re kissing you over and over and when you move away they kiss your neck, until they’re touching your ass and putting fingers between your breasts and asking please, please, please won’t you send pictures of you in your bathing suit. Asexuality is boring. Representation likes closets to be blown open, big obvious identities and vibrant painted colors. Two men kissing, two women kissing! Binders and polycules and kissing, kissing, kissing—because that’s how you know it’s love, when their tongues are tangled and they’re sharing spit and oh, isn’t it romantic. Asexuality is lack. Awkward relationships and little assaults ignored because it wasn’t that bad and robots and aliens and humans who don’t fuck so they must not be human at all. I am asexual, and it’s hard. (Because it’s not that hard.) I feel out of place in queer communities, like an ally instead of a part. I had two bad relationships but that’s it, and with trans genocide and people barricaded in closets it feels ridiculous to call myself a part of that community just because I don’t want sex—is that really a big deal? But it’s who I am. I never came out, but I’ve used my security in my identity to become a walking pride flag, constantly broadcasting that I am asexual, I am queer, and I am safe to talk to, with my homemade earrings and black ring and purple flannel I wear every chance I get. I’m going to be an author, mostly because I love it. There’s a magic to it, a freedom in exploring inexplorable questions about humanity and identity and religion with a couple fun characters and a sprinkle of the fantastic. Rarely does the world feel as manageable as it does when I’m sitting with my cat, computer in my lap, orchestrating whole worlds I’ll one day get to share with hundreds, maybe thousands of people. I’m in love with the labor of drafting and editing and tearing it all apart to build back better—to do anything else would be to be somebody else. With my writing, I want to spread awareness of asexuality. I want to write the books I never had, of people who find love without sex, connection without touch, books with the promise that asexuality is natural and okay, and doesn’t have to be lonely. I want people to feel confident and comfortable in their identity, or at the very least understand what makes asexuality so amazing. It’s knowing when you love someone it’s for their spirit, not their body, the promise that you’ll find someone who loves you the same. It’s the community of people confused but excited to describe that missing piece that makes them them. It’s the label that’s a beacon of protection, a promise that you will fight for yourself and your people. If I can share that with even one person through my work, then it’s all been worth it. Asexuality is incredible. People need to know that.

I’ve always felt I had a good relationship with Christ. He’s felt like a friend more than the all-powerful, hyper-judgmental beast He’s sometimes characterized as. Over the course of my childhood, I dropped a lot of formalities—instead of praying with a “dear god” and an “amen” with closed eyes and clasped hands, I started journaling to Him, then simply talking to Him whenever I got a second alone. Now we don’t talk as often as I’d like, but He still feels safe, the loving presence always felt as long as you know what to look for. This is not the traditional relationship with Christ, so though I feel closer to God now than I’ve ever been, I feel alienated from the church, scared of Christians and scared to admit that I am one. It’s awful. It’s hard to talk about God without acknowledging how He’s being used as a weapon, to objectify and dehumanize His children who He loves just the same as any of us. It’s hard to think of Him at all without hurting at the knowledge that He is far more likely to terrify people who He’s meant to comfort than offer the sacred safe space He’s always inviting us to. I want to change that. I am going to be an author. And I hope through my work, I can help repair relationships between the trembling sheep and their merciful shepherd, sometimes directly, by addressing questions that plague faithful Christians (if He is so powerful, why is the world like this? If He loves me, why am I hurting? He can help, so why doesn’t He?) but also by simply spreading love. I’ve always believed that no denomination is 100% correct in their understanding of Christ, because God is so great and complex that we can never possibly understand Him. (Which makes church so exciting because yes, as is our nature, we still try to understand.) I’ve also always believed that we don’t have to know God to feel Him. I want people to know His love and where it comes from, but “Jesus” has obtained such an awful connotation. When I say “Jesus loves you,” it no longer means “Jesus loves you,” but that I am not someone to be trusted, I am not safe, that maybe I hate who you are and want you to be someone else (despite the fact that God made you exactly how you are). It sounds crazy, but even I who know the good news to be true recoil at the phrases, “Jesus loves you,” and “I’m praying for you,” and other traditional Christian comfort. Through my career, I hope to spread God to those around me, spread His love and His mercy and His protection not by praying and spreading pain, but by loving and helping now, no strings attached. I hope that when people are near me, they feel Him, even if they do not know Him, and they are encouraged to spread Him the same. My relationship with Christ is simple. I believe He is love. I will do my Christian duty now and until the day I die by loving, helping, protecting, following in his footsteps and encouraging others to do the same. And I will do my best to heal what bad apples have hurt, by addressing painful questions best I can through my writing, promoting connection, peace, and security. I love Jesus. (I’m assuming you do too.) And I hope one day, everyone will be able to feel His kind of love.