a word. Tamara Leigh

a word.

Whew... it's 4th of July.

It's feeling very "what to the slave is the 4th of July"-ish outside. The way government is trending right now and the country is set-up, there isn't much freedom to celebrate. I wanted to check in excited about having met and hung out with Ts Madison on Juneteenth. But to be honest, I don't have it to do right now. I'm thinking about the fight. About resistance. My inner activist is fighting her way back to the surface. I wanted to bask in the glow of my first ever St. Pete Pride party and what an incredible success it was to have 300+ Black & Brown Queer folks in one room. But honestly I'm sad, fed up, frustrated and afraid. For what's already happening, for what is gonna happen next. I felt like entitling this months issue "The Handmaid's Tale: The Reality Show" but instead I took two absolutely beautiful Black, Queer beings and asked them to wade into the ocean naked and FREE. You gotta get your freedom where you can find it right now. This month's issue is entitled, fondly and defiantly, GET FREE. I spent a decade as an advocate and activist up North and needed to break free. And did. The year of anonymity felt amazing but lonely. I needed community and created a community of Black & Brown Lesbians, despite the fact that I don't particularly identify as a Lesbian. What I identify as doesn't really exist yet outside of my head so I settle with Queer. And Lesbian circles allow me to spend my time with amazing beautiful Black Queer women such as myself. And I am grateful for them. It was with them that I lay covered in fake blood with rain pouring down on my face during the 1st protest that I initiated since living down South yesterday. Everyone else had stood up and I just slayed there, sticky and rained on amongst screaming Roe vs. Wade protestors. It was the freest I had felt in a very long time. There is freedom in taking your hands off and there is freedom in the fight. We as a people have always found freedom where we found it. So on this day that rests on the irony that is America celebrating any kind of freedom because I'm honestly losing track if ANYBODY is at this point. I implore you to do one thing, one. GET FREE.

Tamara Sanaa Leigh, Editor-In-Chief