Rory Rants: By Kilian's Rose Oud ushers in 2015, via queerness, creativity, and a eulogy for Leelah

By Kilian Rose Oud

Calice Becker's Rose Oud is a decadent celebration of pure Turkish rose and oud, with a dash of saffron and cardamom.  Oud, or agarwood, has become something of a trend the past few years, but it was once a rather unusual note reserved for daring men's fragrances, like Tom Ford's M7 for Yves Saint Laurent released in 2002.  To me, Rose Oud represents the perfect grace of holding tension between the masculine and the feminine, the result of which is a magnificently transcendent and whole queer space.  The scent radiates warmth, and as the NonBlonde describes, "It has a very sensual quality, even if it's not really feminine."  It is, in a perfume, what I strive to embody in 2015: the perfect tomboy-femme attitude.  The marriage of rose and oud, which Lucky Scent defines as unisex, is the spectrum of masculine and feminine that I embody every day.  These differing notes harmoniously unify in a composition that is androgynous, dark, light, smoky, floral, masculine, feminine, and altogether gorgeous.

The discussion of a perfume to embody a nonbinary space has been colored for me by the recent, tragic suicide of Leelah Alcorn.  There is a lot of emphasis in the gay community on how "it gets better," a sentiment that inspired the hashtag #RealLifeTransAdult in response to this terrible tragedy.  This is important.  As a community we must uplift each other, be proactive in changing the world, and continue to live our lives out loud.  The trouble is that sometimes we are so focused on how it gets better, that we forget to honor how unbearably bad it really is for nonbinary, queer, and trans lives.  It's like, if only we could win rights through legislation, or be the focus of a TV show, or erect a monument, this collective trauma could be absolved.  I think we're afraid that if we stop and recognize that pain, it would consume us.  We would fall into a void of darkness so deep that the only relief would be to extinguish life as we know it.  Yet, it is our responsibility to face this anguish, just as it is our responsibility to advocate for change.  It is incredibly hard to do both, which is why we often don't: we either plug our ears and move forward, or simply cease to be.  I hope that Leelah's spirit has found peace, and my prayers are with all the other LGBTQ youth whose hearts are so big that they can't bear to go on.

RIP Leelah Alcorn.  via Original Plumbing. art by wunking.

For myself, being queer and bisexual, or nonbinary and pansexual, has been a study in hiding.  I am truly heartened to see the advances being made in society for trans people, but feel frustrated that the same social progress is not being made for queer people.  The "Q" is conveniently dropped from the "LGBT" in many organizations, as if we are an optional add-on rather than real human beings in need of rights.  For bodies that are not in transition, social acceptance can come in the cis community, but under the pretense of existing within their determined binary, which is psychologically harmful.  This has been a source of great agony for me, for many years.  When I was with my ex-girlfriend, a transwoman, I was seen as queer, but alone, my identity was nullified.  My name is constantly questioned, and though it accurately expresses my identity as a queer person, it has been often defined as "fake." For a long time, I suffered alone, feeling that there was no space for me in society and that my identity was the domain of others, subject to their definitions.  This year, my mindset shifted, and I began to find within myself an inalienable sense of identity and worth.  It was a convergence of many factors, personal and professional, that lead me to this inner awakening.

"We take our shape, it is true, within and against that cage of reality bequeathed us at our birth; and yet it is precisely through our dependence on this reality that we are most endlessly betrayed." James Baldwin

2014 began with great disappointment in the lack of reception for my first film on the festival circuit. My art was an escape where I could express my nonbinary existence, yet I concluded from that rejection that no one wanted to support my queer vision.  I was ignorant to the process of film finance, distribution, and marketing, and felt that I didn't have enough wealth or privilege to break into the industry.  As a result, I moved to the West Coast and found myself selling cars in the desert.  A boss of mine insisted that the most important characteristic of a good salesperson was the ability to enter each day as if nothing had come before it.  If you thought about how much you needed to make a sale, or how many days you'd gone without selling, or the deal you'd botched the previous week, you wouldn't have the boundless enthusiasm and contagious optimism needed to land a sale today.  It struck me that this idea was not just applicable to sales, but to matters of creativity and of the heart.  The key to making good art is to be able to take creative risks as though you've never failed, and the key to loving with an open heart is to give to others as if you'd never been hurt.  After a script-worthy few months, I left that job and resumed my creative path.

"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one." - Albert Einstein

I have a limited amount of influence over how my queerness, or my art, is received.  Creativity is a dance between that which exists- your resources, your skills, your context- and that which does not exist- your ideas, your dreams, your vision.  We cling dearly to that which exists, to ground us and to affirm our reality.  Meanwhile, that which never existed before comes into being, replacing that which is.  We find that the ground under our feet is constantly shifting.  My hopes of controlling my expectations and curtailing disappointment by embedding myself in the realistic was a short-lived solution. In searching for others' definitive rules by which to structure my life, I found only open-ended questions.  The reality is that no one has the answers: as William Goldman says, "Nobody knows anything."

At the end of 2014, I'm beginning to see that reception is simply part of the risk of creation, and that to ground yourself in assumed reality, or the rules by which past work was created, is simply a defense mechanism to prevent oneself from rejection and failure.  Yet nothing truly original can be created without taking that risk, and while playing it safe may reduce the chance of rejection, it doesn't eliminate it.  Your work can still fail to resonate even if you follow all the rules.  You can still feel alienated even if you conform to all social standards.  I sought sanctuary in stability this year, but found it still fraught with uncertainty.  What once was standard in the film industry is shifting.  Social norms are being reinvented.  There is no sanctuary from change.  Stability, it seems, is not so much a static plane of existence but rather a constantly evolving positive average of wins and loses: a dependable consistency, perhaps, but not infallibility.

Centre Triptych, Rothko Chapel Public domain

Perception begins with primary colors, that expand to different shades and pastels, but eventually find their way to murky grays, muddy browns, and nihilistic blacks that can easily overpower the palette.  Yet to create beautiful work, you cannot simply repress half of the colors, insisting on only using the few that you began with.  Rather, seek to transcend the ever expanding palette, without painting the whole thing one color, whether white washing or mixing everything to brown.  Hold the tension between these differences, and appreciate the symphonic compositions such a range allows.  This year, I've sought to accept the colors in my palette as reality, while also acknowledging my own power to control their application in service of my vision, whose realization will then influence what I accept in the future as my reality.

Still Life with Flowers, Insects and a Shell, 1689, Maria van Oosterwijck

I usher in 2015 with Rose Oud as a testament to blissful balance.  Rose personifies the feminine queer, in that it is both expressively beautiful and historically used to alleviate grief, while the smoky, leathery oud adds strength to the presentation.  Though my life is constrained by very real and often frustrating limitations, my dreams do not have to be.  In terms of my art and my self expression, I alone am the creator, and my creations will influence what is accepted as standard.  2014 was a time of coming up against barriers, of reckoning with the mechanics of my industry and the gay community, and of calculating my own place in relation to this reality.  The key is to see myself from both sides: how I am perceived and how I feel, what is available to me and what I dream of, what exists and what I bring into existence.  2014 was focused on the former of each of those dichotomies, and 2015 will be focused on the later.  2015 is a year to follow my bliss, despite physical and social limitations, and by doing so, I may find those limitations are not as concrete as they first appeared.

Black Marble- A Great Design