Who Do You Meet On the Greyhound?
A teen dyke wanders around the country in the early 2000’s, armed with an Ameripass and a journal.
Issues
Like a House on Fire
Everything looks better when you’re in love, and Nevada City was no exception.
An Invisible Stranger in My Home
You’ve probably seen billboards advertising an exotic trip to the country where I was born. In those pictures, the sea is always a clear turquoise – like glass – and the sand is always blinding white, and the sky is always a clear stretch of blue that takes your breath away.
Where Road Trips Meet Rituals
Once the itinerary is printed and your bag is packed, travel forces us out of our own limitations, the boundaries we create in our heads.
The Worst Weekend
One time my ex took us on a weekend getaway to a notorious suicide hotspot so that I could take a video of them breaking rocks on the beach with a very small hammer.
When Your Face Reflects the Mirror
Traveling to see family in Taiwan, the sudden change in beauty standards forced me to contemplate my own. The same features that made me so ordinary at home made me extraordinary in Taiwan. The things that pushed me away from the American feminine ideal brought me closer to the “perfect” Taiwanese woman.
Being Queer in My Mother Tongue
I keep looking for labels. When I first read about nonbinary identities, I think of my family, and whether there might exist a word in Polish that means the same thing.
Bites
“I ate lemon-filled doughnuts with a woman who made my head spin. I decided that it was her commitment to eating good food, like me, that drew me to her. Every bite was sour-sweet.”
Austin City Limits
When my wife walked out on me, we’d had a trip to Austin booked for months. We decided to take it anyway, and this is how I remember it — and us.
Long Distance
We wanted to learn all there was to learn about each other, as crushes do — but the distance meant we actually did!
How to Care for an Air Plant
I suppose the truth is my home, then, is in transition — in the in-between of leaving home, and finding another, in that bittersweet knowledge that nothing is forever.
The Travel Issue: Letter From The Editor
These are stories of risk and growth, building connections and realizing when they’re ending — all the places we think are worth moving toward and the things worth returning to.
The Land Dykes Of Southern Oregon Saved My Life
In the summer of 2014 I was broken. Living in community with my queer elders put me back together.
Behind the Scenes With REI’s Force of Nature Initiative
REI is doing so much to change the reality of being a human outside! Including sponsoring this very issue! Here’s everything you ever wanted to know about their Force Of Nature initiative and so much more!
PHOTOESSAY: Merqueen of the Springs
Dive into this fantasy based world where the merqueen of the springs spreads her wings and takes up space.
What the Border Wall Destroys
A border wall further fragments and disrupts nature, the land, and the people who are intricately woven into the Rio Grande Valley’s natural ecosystem. With increased militarization on the border, who has access to the land? Who is allowed to enjoy the land?
PHOTOESSAY: Taking My Chosen Body Outdoors
I decided to meet Syd in Oakland to celebrate my newly healed chest. We hiked out into the Happy Boulders, selected our first climb and immediately took off our shirts. It was glorious, but also terrifying and vulnerable.
Perfectionism and the Art of Rock Climbing
As a perfectionist, I’ll always be more comfortable sharing my shiny conclusions than my messy processes. And the best thing about climbing, for me, is that it’s pure process.
Where Can You Take a Walk in the Park?
Most of my old hiking companions from Los Angeles are queer. Now I have Goldie, who takes breaks while we walk, just to jump up and kiss me. She places her paws just over my heart.
What Happened When I Began to Dig
“I’ve grown physically stronger through trail work than I ever thought possible, but there’s that different kind of strength that trail work has fostered in me that I believe to be a lot more important.”