Kai Cheng Thom

“I’m okay with waiting. I’ve found what I need to find. Whenever the mood strikes me, I wait until I’m home in my apartment. I put {{w|Enrique Iglesias}} on blast. I close my eyes. And I dance.”

“There are a million tiny privileges that {{w|cisgender}} people take for granted that {{w|trans people}} cannot: access to {{w|public space}}, to physical activity, to taking joy in our own bodies, are among them. Finding a physical activity that I loved came at the cost of putting up with countless small acts of hostility, and finally, I had had enough.”

“On that day beneath the fluorescent lights of the YMCA, I was transcendent.”

“If there is one lesson that I have to teach you, dear reader, remember this: cute boys come and go, but The Dance is forever.”

“When I was a little girl (but being raised as a little boy), what I wanted more than anything was to be a dancer. How I longed for it — the lights, the stage, the gorgeous costumes, most of all for the delivering grace of movement in harmony with a choreography greater than myself. Like a little Chinese {{w|Billy Elliot}}, I had a beautiful, impossible dream. But unlike Billy Elliot’s, mine was never realized. {{w|Transmisogyny}} and two left feet saw to that: I was laughed, bullied, or shamed out of every dance class I attempted.”