Loneliness is an old bedfellow of mine; despair, my oldest friend. If I can come to embrace those parts of myself I’ve always tried to push away — perhaps, that is the only lifelong love I can count on.

I don’t want to be caught parading around in last generation’s false sense of security. I’m kicking off Autostraddle’s first Asian Pacific Islander American (APIA) Heritage month by exploring the values my own South Asian and Japanese American parents and grandparents imparted to me, to learn to carry them forward.

“This is the root of the problem with fat shamers such as Kelsey. They are not worried about the health of others, they are angry that they must worry and we do not. They are people who fear becoming fat, have been fat or feel fat right now and can’t stand that there are fat people in the world that seem carefree. Don’t you know you are disgusting!!?!?!? You’re supposed to be unhappy being fat!! That’s why I work so hard to stay thin; because fat people should be unhappy!!! WHY CAN’T I HAVE MORE MCDONALDS??? The reason I know this is because I was one of these people for a very long time.”

“The observation of white people actually grappling with ideas of class amongst each other empowers me, but it empowers me even more when I know they’re having the same conversation even when I’m NOT in the room.”

We wanted to sit down and share stories with you around this virtual campfire to somehow express one little piece of what it means to be queer and a person of color in this crazy, crazy world.

“When they see you happy, they’ll accept it,” someone told me once. When there are tears about something unchangeable, people can only be optimistic. It’s the only thing that is left.

“What exactly does ‘success’ mean for OWS? It could mean giving power to conversations and movements that activists, organizers and thinkers have been having for years.”