That’s nice

There is a lot online about gender dysphoria, the discomfort or even horror some trans people have about the gender they were assigned at birth. But there’s a flip side when you get to be your real self: gender euphoria, the feeling that at least for the moment, everything is the way it should be.

I’m writing this sat on a bench on a sunny spring morning in Glasgow, the city I love. Because it’s Glasgow it’s still cold, but the sun is warm on my skin. The colours are spectacular: the blue of the sky, the white of the clouds, the bright green of new leaves and new grass. I’m dressed for the season, bare-legged in a fun, flippy floral skirt teamed up with a plain t-shirt and a cardigan; today is a good makeup day, simple rather than striking or spectacularly hopeless, and for once I’m feeling pretty good about my appearance. I’m doing one of my favourite things: people-watching, enjoying the simple pleasure of seeing the world walk by and wondering what each stranger’s story is.

The late Kurt Vonnegut wrote of a relative who would often exclaim: if this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is. Vonnegut urges all of us to do the same, to recognise the little moments of happiness, to celebrate life’s joys, big and small.

If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.


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