My Name is Jasper Moon

Introductions. Where does one even begin? I suppose names are a good place, though the title already covers that: my name is Jasper Moon. At the time of writing this, I'm just under a week away from my nineteenth birthday; I'm nearly a month into the second semester of my freshman year of college, where I'm currently majoring in film. I'm a writer and an artist, and I'm starting this blog so I can have somewhere to write with no pressure (besides from myself).

Now, "what will you be writing?" you may ask — why, that is a fantastic question! I intend for this to be a collection of various ramblings; nearly everything here will likely be related to some form of art, whether that be books, movies, music, etc. And if not art, then some rambling about something I find important. Essentially, this blog will be a collection of my thoughts and experiences of the world. Though I have low expectations that I will be consistent in any regard, I do intend on posting when I can — i.e. if I seemingly disappear for weeks or months, I likely am busy, procrastinating, or desperately pushing through my mental health to get myself to write.

To elaborate more on who I am: I'm a genderqueer trans man — I use he/him pronouns — and because being queer is so fundamentally important to my being, it will likely come up an astronomical amount of times in my writings, so either get used to it or leave (genuinely, if you have a problem, this is not the place for you). And because saying that I'm a genderqueer trans man may be a wee bit confusing to some, I feel I should explain that to the best of my ability. My gender has always been hard for me to decipher, and, as of most recently, I have landed on "genderqueer trans man." To me, that means that, while my gender most closely aligns with male, I am still not fully male, and additionally, being trans is a vital piece of my gender identity.

I'm not sure how I feel about being called a man sometimes. It doesn't feel quite right. I don't mind it when it comes out as a joke or when playing around, but I don't like to be told that I am definitively a man — because that's not how I view myself; I'm still somewhere on the outskirts of male. Sometimes, however, I question if that is because I'm not truly a man or if I simply don't feel that way yet. Regardless, I know one thing for certain: I am not a girl. Like I said, my gender has been hard to decipher — it feels like a language I can't quite grasp, can't quite understand. And yet I still try to plead the world to understand anyway.

In addition to my gender, I am also asexual and queer (though I have all but given up on labeling my sexuality with any more specificity than that). A side tangent in relation to both this and my enjoyment of film: diversity is so very deeply important. The first time I saw an asexual character on screen was Heartstopper. Seeing Isaac be able to explore his asexuality — seeing my own experiences reflected back to me — was so much more important to me than I ever would have realized, had I not experienced it first hand. Being able to watch a character experience feelings I have felt in private experience those same feelings on screen brought me to tears.

As I so vaguely mentioned at the beginning of this, I am a writer and an artist. By that I mean that I do many different types of art. I am, first and foremost, a writer — I write poetry, I've been working on novels (more specifically ideas for novels), and, in majoring in film, I've grown much more fond of screenwriting. I also draw and, on occasion, paint; this was where my artistic love started. I am essentially completely self-taught (and I feel as though I brag about that a lot, but I'm incredibly proud of my abilities for teaching myself from YouTube videos). I grew up doing ballet — I started when I was five — and I did a year of modern dance before I stopped dance classes at the end of my junior year. I started playing violin in the fourth grade, and, while I've picked up my violin a very small number of times since graduating high school, I do still technically play. And on another instrumental note, I can play guitar, although I'm still learning, and I'm not particularly talented at it. I can also sing (as my dear friend so very much likes to brag about my voice on my behalf) and I enjoy acting despite not having many opportunities for it. Though I'm currently majoring in film, I plan to transfer to do creative writing and musical theatre. I've come to realize I want to focus on my writing, and, after having the opportunity to sing at an open mic last semester, I discovered I want performance in my life much more than I originally thought.

Long story short, I am a jack of all trades but a master of none. But as the saying continues, "though oftentimes better than master of one." It's hard to feel as though my lack of passion for one particular type of art is a good thing, but I wouldn't change my mix of artistic abilities and passions for the universe. In other words, there is literally nothing other than my ability to create that I would be willing to do. Maybe that's stupid on my part, but not many rational individuals made their name known.