Hold tight 🪢

Raising a flag to friends and neighbors while the world is on fire.

When my new neighbors moved in this spring, the very first thing they did was take down the house’s American flag. Then they raised it again—upside down. That’s the vibe. I have no allegiance to the United States of America, to the ideas of the founding fathers. What I feel connected to is the land, the people, the plants and the animals. I pledge allegiance to my friends, my neighbors, my community, to the giant sword ferns and mycelium and cedar trees and crows.

I went over to introduce myself to the new neighbors.

“Is your house the one with the trans flag?” they asked. Yes it is.

Second question: “Do you know if the pole dance studio in the neighborhood is gender inclusive?” I grinned. Yes. Yes it is.

This is what I love. Oregon is a place where the water is clean, where the gardens are plentiful, where the pole-dance studio is trans-friendly.

Nationally, Republicans have vilified queer and trans people, turning us into boogeymen who want to terrorize children with stunning drag shows and good sportsmanship. Similarly, they’ve painted Portland as a dangerous place of protests, dumpster fires, and crime (“an anarchist jurisdiction”). Sure, it’s absolutely true that crime exists. Before I could get the trans flag up last year, someone stole our flagpole—not in a homophobic way, but for metal scrap. Lots of Oregonians are struggling to survive. Prisons and jails are the largest provider of mental health services. That is the reality of our country right now. That is why we’re always protesting. There’s a hell of a lot to be mad about. But in contrast to the scary image right-wingers have created of Portland as a shithole land of mayhem, as a queer, nonbinary person, I feel safer here than in most places in the United States. Oregon has the most LGBTQ people per capita of any state… and it shows.

Oregon is far from perfect—we’re deeply shaped by a white supremacist history and present—but as right-wing attacks have ramped up, so have progressive protections. Recently, our lesbian governor declared an official new Abortion Provider Appreciation Day. The legislature is voting to protect the state’s Medicaid—which I rely on—from federal cuts. We’re living life, despite what the Trump administration wants.

I was biking around on a recent sunny day, I biked past a queer couple at the dog park, a mom gardening, an old guy smoking a joint on his porch, an adorable line of preschoolers holding hands. Amid a national backdrop of “us vs. them” villainy, the city felt joyful and vibrant. We’re literally out here just trying to live. Trying to breathe clean air, to control our own bodies, to love whoever we want, to make our own families. And we’re doing it. That’s beautiful. Raise a flag to that.

This essay was published by The Nation for their current issue, These Disunited States.

Stuff I Made

I’ve been rather quiet online because I’ve been way too busy actually working, making zines and comics.

Portland Mercury Queer Issue: My Favorite Queer Places in Portland That Are Not Gay Bars - This comic started as a collaborative zine that I passed around at an Oregon Queer History Collective meetup. I decided to turn it into a full comic because when people think of “gay places” in a city, often the list is only bars.

Portland Monthly Love Letter: Dyke Hoops - This year I’m doing a series of comics for Portland Monthly magazine about my favorite places and groups in the city. Of course I had to include the queer basketball group I attend every week!

Brooklyn Library Zine - Books Unbanned - The Brooklyn Public Library asked me to make a zine about their very cool program to undermine book bans: any teen in the country can get a digital Brooklyn Library card for free, giving them access to all the ebooks, audiobooks, and magazines the library has. You can download the zine to print and distribute for free here.

Northwest Abortion Access Fund Zine - If you live in Idaho, you can still get an abortion - I made this zine about Idaho, where abortion is severely restricted. You can download the zine to print and distribute for free here.

Book News

My book Making Nonfiction Comics: A Guide for Graphic Narrative comes out in November and I’m planning a book tour! After the release party in Portland, I’m definitely planning to go to Seattle, Boston, Philly, New York, and Burlington. If you live anywhere in the U.S. or Canada and have the connections to invite me to run a workshop or talk about making nonfiction comics in the fall or winter, I’d love to come visit! Hook me up! Book promotion is tough, it feels like asking literally everyone in your life for a favor. Speaking of which, you can preorder the book here. Okay thanks!

Stuff I Love

• The Land is An Ancestor We Refuse to Abandon: I edited this comic for Crucial and I’m obsessed with Ree Artemisa’s innovative approach to creating a nonfiction comic. It’s fluid, it’s flowing, it’s gorgeous.

• Zines about anti-ICE resources: Designer Rara Matter made these printable bilingual mini-zines of resources about ICE specifically for Southern California. I printed a few to put in my zine bike. Thanks to my pal Leila for sending these my way.

• Dots Homestyle Pretzels: I decided that my summer slogan is “bold ‘n savory,” inspired by the pretzels I can’t stop eating.

How People Are Using My Zine Template This Month

Ever since I made this “how to make a zine” template, the ways people use it never cease to delight me. Reading over these answers is a bright spot in every day—look at all these people, out there making stuff despite all the horrors. Here are five ways people used it in June and July.

• Introduced my daughter, 11, to zines online and she loves it. Going to use this as reference for her. Thank you. — Illinois

• Los estoy imprimiendo para los detenidos de ICE en una cárcel local que pidieron cosas para leer. — West Virginia

• I'll be putting it in the zine library I just started at the community college! — The Dalles, Oregon

• This unit I am using this zine for a Civil Rights unit in my class. My students will be creating zines focused on their rights and/ or demands for a better school environment. I want them to feel empowered especially at this point in American history where rights are being stripped away. — Long Beach, CA

• I want to use it for kids to take back home and practice on their own. —India

What I’m Reading

Black Sun - There’s one million fantasy books set in worlds based on Medieval Europe (knights, kings, etc) but it feels rare and refreshing to read a series based on Pre-Colombian Mexico. Author Rebecca Roanhorse spins up this epic tale of magic and power by drawing on indigenous American cultures and folklore.

One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This - I’m reading Omar El Akkad’s new book about protest, media, and empire very slowly, with a highlighter. Take notes! Here’s a line I highlighted: “While the terrible thing is happening—while the land is being stolen and the natives still being killed—any form of opposition is terroristic… but decades, centuries later, when enough of the land has been stolen and enough of the natives killed, it is safe enough to venerate resistance in hindsight.”

Low Orbit - I will tell anyone and everyone that my pal Kazimir Lee is the best colorist in comics. They developed the color palette for Guantanamo Voices and I just love their intuitive, emotionally rich style. Their new graphic novel follows a queer Malaysian kid who moves to a small town in Vermont and struggles to find community. It’s lovely.

Spent - The premise of Alison Bechdel’s new book sounded a little corny to me: it’s a fictionalized version of her current life that brings back characters from Dykes to Watch Out For. But I’ve found it charming—Bechdel feels like she’s having fun, so I’m having fun, too.

Something to Do

Read a poem by Andrea Gibson

My friend Michelle read Andrea Gibson’s poem “Your Life” at a poetry swap in a park a few years ago and I got goosebumps. That’s a common reaction to Andrea Gibson’s work, which dives deep and gets all tingly. Since Andrea was diagnosed with cancer in 2021, they’ve written many beautiful lines about openly facing death: “In the end, I want my heart to be covered in stretch marks.” They died this month. A beautiful way to remember them is to keep reading their poems. Here’s another one I love: Angels of the Get-Through.