I already said goodbye once, left the lesben.nest column and then I just moved to another page in this glorious magazine. This time however, I’m saying, “Ciao bellissimas!!” and I am leaving an.schläge and writing for good. This will be the last column I write. Ever.
It has been twelve years … Can you believe it??? Twelve fucking amazing years!!!
Twelve years ago I had not yet discovered the performance stage for me. I had a lesbian country band, was doing some amateur dj-ing and I was good at socialising at parties and bringing people together; that was my “career”.
Then that email came asking me if I wanted to write for an.schläge, and it changed my life. All of a sudden I could reach people and people reached out to me. (This was all pre-social media; there were bloggers but I was too lazy to blog). I shared personal stories from my life and people wrote me and told me that it made them feel less alone and I felt like I had won a million bucks. It was my column, I wrote it, but it felt like we were in constant dialogue with each other. We talked about being femme, open relationships, going back to monogamy, trans_* identities and the rise of non-binary, racism in the queer scene, cross-generational desires, resisting the mainstream straight society and of course my endless quest of searching for love. I did my best at trying to entertain you while being political. I sometimes failed, and after crying a bit about it, I learned that that was ok as well. It hurt, but it was very liberating to realise that not every text had to be brilliant.
But I am done now and it’s time you met someone new. Why? “Because I truly have nothing more to say”, she said and laughed her much too loud, cigarette-stained laugh.
And listen, I know that the world seems ugly and is literally on fire and that there is still so much hate, yes.
However, I want you to remember this:
The queer universe today is very different from what it was in 2008 when we first met; it’s bigger, brighter and broader. We continue daily to move forward and nobody can ever put that baby back in a corner.
Thank you. Like (almost) all of my ex-lovers, you will always have a place in my heart.
Au revoir, honeys … Denice Bourbon is saying goodbye to writing overall. And what better place to do that than where it all began?
