On / Off

What I've Written Since Having a Baby

January 25, 2023

Five (long) emails about the baby (featuring photos) so that friends and family can follow along as she grows and changes. These monthly emails are more an...

Mutterschutz

May 16, 2022

Like so many German words, "Mutterschutz" is a decently literal compound word, made up of "Mutter" (mother) and "Schutz" (protection). Mother-protection is...

A Completely Comprehensive and Totally Unbiased Introduction to Romance (the genre) (Part 3)

April 27, 2022

In Part 1 of this newsletter series, I talked about why I love the romance genre so much and in Part 2, I recommended some specific authors and books. I...

A Preview of Tomorrow's Newsletter...

April 26, 2022

Hi friends! This morning, I started working on Part 3 of my Completely Comprehensive and Totally Unbiased Introduction to Romance series, but I wasn't able...

Things I Did Today Instead of Write This Newsletter

April 25, 2022

Y'all, I opened a browser tab to start writing this newsletter over an hour ago, but I just can't think of anything I feel like writing about. I'm not in a...

Letting Myself and Other People Like Stuff

April 21, 2022

There's a woman I went to high school with, but wasn't friends with, whose social media I check regularly. E has never met this person, but knows who she is...

Comfort Speaking German (Part 2)

April 20, 2022

After five days in French-speaking Europe, we found ourselves in Luxembourg, where the official national language is Luxembourgish, and French and German are...

Comfort Speaking German (Part 1)

April 19, 2022

I'm not especially extroverted. I don't like talking to strangers and I tend to get very uncomfortable and embarrassed when I'm in public and I can't figure...

Counting Countries

April 14, 2022

I feel like people who travel a lot tend to say they don't 'count countries,' meaning they don't keep track of the number of countries they've visited....

Filling Our Home with Books!

April 13, 2022

Over the weekend, E and I went on a book buying spree. We mostly read library books that we borrow from the Boston Public Library system in the form of...

This Pregnancy is Kicking My Butt

April 12, 2022

I'm just so tired, y'all. Traveling, specifically road tripping, was really great because it has a particular rhythm to it. We spent two nights in Brussels...

Dead Parents Club

April 11, 2022

E and I got back from our vacation last Wednesday; it was a great trip and I'll probably write about it at some point this week or next. I also plan to...

A Completely Comprehensive and Totally Unbiased Introduction to Romance (the genre) (Part 2)

March 24, 2022

In yesterday's newsletter, I convinced you that romance is a great book genre and that it's totally worth your time. Today I want to share some of my...

A Completely Comprehensive and Totally Unbiased Introduction to Romance (the genre) (Part 1)

March 23, 2022

Since summer 2018, when I started unironically reading romance, I have read over 100 romance novels by 43 different authors. So you could say I have a...

Desirability

March 22, 2022

A few years ago, I don't remember when exactly, a friend told me he was worried he was 'moving away from desirability.' His gender presentation was shifting...

Sonnenschein

March 21, 2022

Spring definitely arrived in Berlin this month. The days have already gotten so much longer and it has been sunny more often than not, which is a nice change...

Writing Prompts

March 17, 2022

I put off writing the newsletter this morning because I wasn't sure what to write about. Every other day this week I've had a specific, concrete topic in...

Worldle

March 16, 2022

When I first tried Wordle, I didn't like it. The answer to one of the first puzzles I tried was "abbey" and I was very annoyed by the double letter, which I...

Abortion Rights

March 15, 2022

I didn't think it was possible, but being pregnant has made me even more pro-choice/pro-abortion than I already was. Maybe in the past you've heard pro-...

My Dad's Birthday

March 14, 2022

This past Saturday (March 12th) would have been my dad's 69th birthday. I've been thinking about my dad more often lately, mostly because of the pregnancy....

Jackson, Mississippi

February 24, 2022

I know, I know, I keep talking about Real Queer America, the audiobook that I've been listening to. It's because I tend to listen to it in the mornings while...

Travel Daydreams

February 22, 2022

For today's newsletter, I feel like daydreaming. Earlier in this newsletter cycle I wrote about my road trip daydreams, and, perhaps unsurprisingly, today's...

~*~just queer things~*~

February 21, 2022

FYI: I don't think this newsletter is super heavy, but it's not as cute as its title implies. I'm still listening to the audiobook Real Queer America, which...

Try Again on Monday

February 17, 2022

During this run of newsletters, there have been a couple of days when I really haven't felt like writing. Today is one of those days. I don't feel...

Assigned Sex

February 16, 2022

My mom didn't know her kids' assigned sexes until we were born. She thought for sure that I was a boy and tells the story like this: the midwife delivered...

Tomato Head

February 15, 2022

This is just a quick, evening edition of On / Off because I had an appointment with my ob-gyn this morning at the time when I normally write this newsletter....

Utah

February 14, 2022

Over the weekend I started listening to the audiobook Real Queer America: LGBT Stories from Red States by Samantha Allen. I first heard about this book from...

Road Trip Daydreams

February 10, 2022

My German driver's license arrived in the mail today! You might recall that I applied to convert my Massachusetts driver's license to a German one back in...

3 Things You Can Read Instead of This Newsletter...

February 9, 2022

...because I wasn't up for writing an issue of On / Off today. These AI-generated Valentine's Day cards from the website AI Weirdness by Janelle ShaneThis...

Organs on the Move

February 8, 2022

At this point, I am 20-weeks pregnant, which means I'm halfway through this strange process and it shows. The bump is still small compared to what it will...

Feeling Ready to Have a Kid

January 18, 2022

Basically everyone we've told about my pregnancy has been congratulatory. A couple of people have asked if it was planned, wanting to get a read on our...

Getting Through January

January 17, 2022

I'm sure there have been years when I've enjoyed January (January 2019 when E and I spent 3 weeks in Kenya springs to mind), but this year I'm just trying to...

The Mystery of the Baking Cookies Smell

January 13, 2022

Back in December, about a week before Christmas, we got a couple of inches of snow, just enough to stick in the trees and fully cover the grass and feel a...

I Wish I Were a Polyglot (Part 3)

January 12, 2022

There's a standard measure of language proficiency that's used in Europe (CEFR) and includes six levels: A1, A2, B1, B2, C1, and C2, with A1 being total...

I Wish I Were a Polyglot (Part 2)

January 11, 2022

My Spanish was rusty when I first started learning German, but Spanish had been carving out space in my brain since I was 14 years old. This meant that, for...

I Wish I Were a Polyglot (Part 1)

January 10, 2022

"I wish I were a polyglot" was a phrase I used to include in my social media bios, gosh, a decade ago at this point. But it's a feeling that has cropped up...

Books!

January 6, 2022

All week, I've been wanting to write a newsletter about some of the media that I enjoyed in 2021 -- books, tv shows, movies, and video games. Throughout the...

Dreams (Part 2)

January 5, 2022

Last night, I dreamed that the baby had arrived, and we weren't prepared. I didn't dream about labor and delivery or bringing the baby home, and I had no...

No Newsletter Today

January 4, 2022

By which I actually mean, a very short newsletter. Yesterday, I spent way more than an hour on the newsletter. This was fine because the one-hour constraint...

A little bit of reflecting on 2021

January 3, 2022

Last week, we had some unseasonably warm days here in Berlin. Temperatures were in the 50's and so E and I took our morning coffees out onto our balcony,...

I Wrote Fiction!?

December 20, 2021

For the last newsletter of 2021, I'm doing something a little bit different. I'm sharing a short piece of fiction that I wrote! But first, a disclaimer,...

My Favorite Christmas Ornament

December 16, 2021

Let's wrap up this week of newsletters on a lighter note. I mentioned in yesterday's newsletter that E and I only have a small box of ornaments here in...

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

December 15, 2021

Alternate title for the issue of the newsletter: "The Most Melancholy, COVID-filled Time of the Year." So, feel free to skip if you're not up for that. <3 E...

The Little Lizard is Looking Good!

December 14, 2021

I didn't write a newsletter this morning because I was busy hearing my future child's heartbeat for the first time! So, yeah, this is just a quick update to...

Herpetology

December 13, 2021

E and I try to start our days by stretching and sharing three things we're grateful for. It's a habit we fall in and out of throughout the year, coming back...

G-G-G-Gender (Part Three)

December 9, 2021

To wrap up this series on my gender presentation, I want to talk about feeling in control of the image I show the world. Now, I know I can't actually control...

G-G-G-Gender (Part Two)

December 8, 2021

Obviously there is more to my gender presentation than my haircut, but that was the starting point for me feeling butch recently. My hair was annoying me and...

G-G-G-Gender (Part One)

December 7, 2021

Back in October, I had a day where I felt pretty butch. I remember it was right after this newsletter cycled 'off' because I started describing my feelings...

Dreams

December 6, 2021

Sometimes E will tell me about his dreams and they will be elaborate science fiction adventures, filled with action sequences and celebrity guest stars. By...

Cycling 'on' again

December 2, 2021

Hello friends, Last time I sent out a newsletter (November 16th), I said I'd check back in again on December 1st. Today is December 2nd... so... oops. I...