Queer Sex

A Trans and Non-Binary Guide to Intimacy, Pleasure and Relationships

Juno Roche

• Éditeur: Jessica Kingsley Publishers
• Année: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781784507701
• Sujet: Sciences sociales
• Sous-sujet: Études LGBT

'Queer Sex is simply phenomenal'. - Bitch Media

In this frank, funny and poignant book, transgender activist Juno Roche discusses sex, desire and dating with leading figures from the trans and non-binary community. Calling out prejudices and inspiring readers to explore their own concepts of intimacy and sexuality, the first-hand accounts celebrate the wonder and potential of trans bodies and push at the boundaries of how society views gender, sexuality and relationships. Empowering and necessary, this collection shows all trans people deserve to feel brave, beautiful and sexy.

THE
INTERVIEWS

FOX FISHER AND OWL

‘A premonition of our relationship happened a long time ago when we were making a film about a spiritual medium in Essex. She was doing a session in a crowded room; we had cameras out and were filming. She started describing a person and, as she did, I realised that it sounded just like my late granddad. I put the camera down and stopped filming and said that I felt she was talking about my granddad. The message was that I was living a brave life and that soon you will meet the right bird, which was exactly how he talked. I think the person he was talking about was Owl.’

It’s a seasonally apt cold, rainy and grey day as I make my way down to interview Owl and Fox in Brighton on the south coast of England. At my Buckinghamshire train station I photograph my feet as I wait for the train. I realise that I have an interviewing outfit: double denim (old, faded and slightly torn), high-gloss silver sandals and matt-grey painted toenails. On some level I think I look cool and, for some tenuous reason, edgy. I always think that I’m edgy, which is slightly ridiculous because if you were to look at me I’m sure you’d see femme conformity and comfortable middle-age. I decide to try and flirt my way to Brighton via London Victoria station. The rain comes down heavier and threatens to put paid to any flirting as my high-gloss silver sandals have absolutely no grip, so to stop myself falling arse over arse I have to walk like I am a tipsy pensioner. I see people looking at me wondering if I might need a hand – age can be incredibly harsh. My edginess isn’t really working for me and I doubt that my overly intense fearful stares resemble anything like flirting. I almost have to crawl up the highest hill in Brighton to get to their house, staying low to try and prevent myself from tumbling down like a character from a nursery rhyme. The umbrella is keeping me somewhat dry but isn’t doing anything to stop my hair from desperately starting to frizz. I am coming undone at the seams as I ring the bell, eager to get in and out of the rain, which is now torrential. Owl answers looking simply beautiful, almost ethereal, and it’s not quite lunchtime. Ethereal would take me about a month to perfect and then there would always be slightly too much evidence of product. Owl wears not a scrap of makeup and an outfit that seems thrown together but still looks ‘edgy-proper’. They are wearing shorts that show pale, elegant legs that actually do go on forever. I have the proportions of a Jack Russell, I’m damp, frizzy and desperate for a cup of tea.

Owl is a nonbinary trans activist and writer, 26 years old. They come from Iceland, where they were born on a farm, an incredibly isolated dairy farm. Owl said that they spent much time during their childhood talking to the cows and playing video and computer games. Owl started to transition at the age of 17. They recently moved to Brighton to be with their partner Fox. Together they make films and do amazing activism, which sometimes involves television and radio interviews with Piers Morgan. Their Icelandic name is Ugla, which means ‘Owl’.

Owl takes me up to their sitting room, where Fox is lounging on a daybed in grey, oversized sweat pants, and a college-grey sweatshirt. They are incredible athletic-attractive. Big, green-brown eyes engage you instantly. Fox also defines as a nonbinary trans person and was assigned female at birth. They spend most of their time – certainly solidly for the past five years – doing filmmaking as a form of activism: trans activism. They are also an incredibly accomplished artist, working mainly with screen-printing. Two pieces of their work hang in my bedroom in Spain on my wall of mothers. Their output and combined impact across the community is both deep and meaningful. They make an utterly beautiful twosome.

I compose myself in double denim on a large floor cushion, switch on the app and start recording.

Fox, how did you meet Owl?

Owl: That’s a great story, well, sort of a funny story.

Fox: We met just over a year ago. May or June last year.

Have you celebrated an anniversary then?

Fox: We have but we didn’t do much.

Owl: We went out for a dinner I think?

Fox: So our first meeting is a good story, which I’m not sure many people have ever heard. Just a bit before we met, I ran a charity marathon; and a week after that, I went to a secret place and did a three-day ritual ceremony with a special tea and meditation, which allowed me to just stop and break free of myself. It was a real turning point in my life and probably more impactful than my transition. It was the most scary and incredible thing I have ever done. It was spiritual, cleansing and completely life-changing.

You don’t walk away from this the same person. It allows personal exploration. It allows you to face your fears and explore them in a nurturing environment with other people – up to 20 people, who all wear white robes. It sounds a little like a cult, but it is an incredibly safe space. But you are supposed to prepare for this by doing a whole range of things: not having sex for two weeks; no vitamins or headache pills; you have to eat good simple food and stay right away from computers and phones.

Because my focus had been the marathon the week before, I’d been eating terrible food like jelly beans. I had a lot of sugar and crap in my system, so the first night was like a terrible purge where my body was puking up all the toxic stuff inside me. I came away feeling enlightened, and when I returned to Brighton I felt that I had shifted so much crap out of my body that the physical space actually felt different and I felt different. It was life-changing. Before that I had been single for three years. My past relationship broke down about a year after starting testosterone and just after getting my top surgery. I’m best friends with that person now, but then we realised that we couldn’t be together as they define as a lesbian.

Just to put it in context, did that relationship end because of you starting to transition solely or were there other reasons?

Fox: I think there were a number of factors, my top surgery maybe, but also I just couldn’t be there for them when I was going through the process of transitioning. It’s quite a selfish process where you really need to focus on yourself, just yourself. Those first few years are like puberty all over again. I grieved quite a lot. I realised that I didn’t want to just sleep around with people, so I tried to really work on myself, on self-improvement and development. I felt like I wanted to make myself a better person in many different ways, including spiritual.

Did you feel going on a retreat marked a point in your journey?

Fox: Yes I feel that in my early 20s I frequently wondered why I couldn’t just be happy in my body. I did a lot of soul-searching because I wanted to be anything other than trans. I thought, ‘Why can’t I just appreciate this body? Women are amazing.’ I then admitted I was trans and started down the journey of self-discovery, and the retreat marked a point in that journey.

It’s nice for people to read that your journey started out with a struggle – you both are so present and seemingly complete now. Thank you for sharing that.

Fox: The retreat shifted a lot for me, a lot of negative emotions. It was a release and I felt utterly different. It seemed to manifest in my seeing an advertisement from Transgender Europe who were looking for a filmmaker to document their upcoming conference in Bologna. They wanted five short films made. It was a project that was actually paying decent money. I had been working for very little or no money, so it felt that my career was taking a really positive direction. I got the job and headed to meet them in Berlin and then headed to Bologna to start the project. On the first night there was a social event to open the conference.

Are we getting to the nitty gritty now?

Fox: We are, and I will get Owl to take over at some point. I was being introduced to people who they wanted me to include in the films – it was a really interesting, diverse range of people, Owl was on my hit list of people that I had to interview as they were very prominent in Iceland as an activist. I was introduced to Owl at least four times that night, which became quite funny as each successive time we pretended that we didn’t know each other and were introduced again. People kept asking me, ‘Have you met Owl?’

Owl, had you heard of Fox before?

Owl: When I first saw Fox I thought that they looked familiar, but I didn’t realise who they were. I did watch My Transsexual Summer back in the day and saw Fox all through the show. But when I saw them, I didn’t make the connection straightaway but then I thought, ‘Oh I remember this person,’ as we were introduced four times. As Fox said, we pretended we hadn’t met and just said, ‘Nice to meet you.’

Fox: I could tell that Owl had a good sense of humour, similar to mine. Nothing really happened that first night, apart from repeat first meetings. I went back to my hotel, where I was sharing a room with a friend who was helping out with the filming. I said to my friend that I thought Ugla (Owl’s Icelandic name) was really amazing and cool and that I thought this trip was going to be really great. The next day my focus was just on filming and doing a good job, but whenever I saw Owl I knew that we had a connection.

Did you feel that, Owl?

Owl: I did think it was nice to meet you [they turn and talk to Fox, and instantly they fix on each like two shapes that fit] and when I spoke with my friends I said that it was nice to meet Fox, they stuck with me.

Did either of you think sex?

Fox: I thought Ugla was really hot.

Owl: I thought I would definitely want to get to know Fox better – maybe in that way – but I was in a weird space because I had just come out of a long relationship, and I had only really been single for four months. So when I came to the conference I came to meet my friends. I honestly wanted to have ice cream, fun and catch up.

You’re 26. That makes complete sense. [It’s easy to forget that this completely self-assured person is 26, the age at which I was entering my first rehab.] At what age did you start to transition, Owl?

Owl: I officially started when I was 18, so in 2010 I think.

That’s incredi...