Written by: Tamar Simone Weir. 2020 As a child I was constantly told by my parents to be who I wanted to be. They encouraged me to blossom into my own person as I ran around the house naked and asked a million questions. The confidence my parents instilled in me was the core of how I became the person I am today. Not only that but, since I am the youngest child of three, I remember feeling as though questioning my older siblings was the portal to adulthood whatever that meant. The concept of gender and sexuality was never explicitly discussed in the house when I was young but, as I recall with fondness the memories of my childhood, I remember no hostility or reluctance to discuss these identities and topics. In my early years I was fond of being naked, more so than other children. I remember vividly wanting to be naked and dancing around constantly. I had no inhibitions, that was clear! My being was authentic and although I felt I was a young girl, I never questioned my gender because I always felt comfortable and safe with myself and others around me.  I grew up in Napa, California, a small town where diversity was lacking and difference was not encouraged. But my mental capacity grew as I started puberty and my questions only intensified as well. I remember feeling unusually angry, especially towards the people with whom I was closest, and agitated at the most random times. It seemed as though I would intentionally pick fights with my parents, that never went unresolved but caused lots of frustrations. About? I did not know that yet, but I saw and felt my body changing in a momentous way and did not know whether to jump up and down in excitement or cry. I did both, a lot.   As I grew into a young woman I felt this radical change would affect the rest of my life, and even at the time I knew how special this stage in my life was, (probably because my mom reminded me every day). When I was in 6th grade things started to get harder because I lost some of that childhood confidence and worried about people judging me and thinking I was stupid or unpopular. I wanted deeply to look like everyone else and be someone I wasn't. I sadly remember my mom one day hugging me as I cried in her arms shakingly telling her “I'm ugly” and how her immediate reaction was comfort and covering up all the mirrors in the house with sheets so that I could stop being so critical of myself. Although my family and friends were extremely supportive in my journey, becoming a woman was a new unknown territory that made me feel badly about all the aspects of myself I used to love.  In high school my first boyfriend and I were completely inseparable, young love was real for us at the time. I did anything and everything for that boy, so much so that I was blinded by the reality of our relationship. I was in a deeply emotionally abusive relationship that contained heavy amounts of pressure, manipulation, and guilt. After a little over a year I broke up with him and at that moment as he cried into my arms begging me and ensuring me he would change, I felt a specific calmness inside, one that would remain no matter what he said. Sex in that relationship was not for my pleasure, but rather the emphasis was him reaching an orgasm, and me doing all the work. If sex did not go according to that plan there would be serious fights which over time led me to feel unempowered by my body and sexuality. I didn't know what I wanted, but I did know that what I was doing was all for him, and that didn't seem right.  Growing from that experience I learned that I needed to do my own research, touch my own body, and be comfortable in my own sexuality even if I did not have all the answers. My relationships afterwards were much more open and allowed me to explore what kind of sex I liked, reaching orgasm sometimes but not often. I still felt the same feeling of the men's pleasure put before mine a majority of the time. As I talked with my friends, some of them had not reached orgasm yet and also agreed with my experience of having sex with men. Currently as a young college student I am very in touch with who I am. I am a Persian Israeli American woman and have experienced both the negative and positive aspects of getting to know my body. My relationship to my body now is something that I work on every day as I try to be mindful of the fact that there should not be one set standard of beauty. The more I repeat this mantra the more I believe that beauty comes from within. My biggest struggle right now is exploring who I am in the bedroom and what I want sex to look like. In the past I often felt pressured to suck a man’s dick, or to put their orgasm before mine in most cases, and to not speak up clearly about my wants and needs. I’ve felt a lot of shame surrounding the vocalization of my wants, which has led me in the past to be silent. But I have also engaged with partners more recently who are much more open and this has allowed me to feel comfortable enough in my own body to vocalize what feels right for me.  For my experiment I decided to try something new sexually, I pegged a man! I cannot even begin to describe how this made me feel. It made me feel liberated, powerful, sexy, and vulnerable all at the same time. As I put on my strap on I noticed that I felt shy and awkward. Having this phallic, purple, heavy mass situated on my groin area was unfamiliar and exciting. I then went into an alter ego or different version of myself and carried that throughout the whole sexual experience. I found myself more often than not wondering and questioning if what I was doing was pleasurable and enjoyable enough for him. I noticed on the flip side that previously with sex it seemed as though my pleasure had not been considered in this way. I also noticed that I loved being dominant and in control, given that usually I have been put into the submissive role. I have even accepted it and enjoyed this role, but the more I have self reflected the more I have realized that this role was given to me and not chosen by me. I needed to switch things up and thank god I did because the new sensation I received by being the person in control and being the person who is fucking the other person was amazing.   Reflecting on the experience has been beneficial for me because it has allowed me to see all the ways that being a woman has affected the role I have played in my sexual experiences. Being a woman has forced me to fit a certain model of a person during sex and as a consequence has made me feel devalued and less than. I consider myself to be an empowered woman, but up until I had pegged a man I don't think I fully grasped the fact that sex could take many shapes and forms not only conceptually speaking but in my own reality. I am a woman but I can also create and manifest what I want to see and feel. Those moments do not have to be chosen for me by men and do not have to remain fixed. I am constantly growing. And through that knowledge I am slowly, slowly able to heal myself from my past, and manifest a vision that is real and true without feeling my pasts shame, guilt, fear, or helplessness. I am me and that is for me to decide.

Brown sweet yucky-ness, it’s sticky and it was icky and wasn’t fragile and fruity-red or popping-pink. Brown wrinkled textured sugar-sweet like something I didn’t know how to taste. Elementary school was filled with chunky lunch tables and girls who only ate apples or strawberries or sweet cut-up triangles of watermelon from mommy in baggies, but my name means date. The kinda date that you eat when taste buds mature and the color is not the only thing that pzasses or shines. The kinda date that grows in the middle east far away from here, where it’s tropical and humid and skin shines from constant sweat and sweet. The kinda date that’s harvested in 100-degree weather, a man harnessed to the tall palm tree’s slim structure. The kinda date that you never knew needs to be hand-pollinated through collecting that precious male sheaths and hand dusting the female hearty trees. The kinda date that is labor-intensive and fruits with an abundant harvest, or so I’ve been told. At the bars I'll scatter stories, wheel them in, eye contact, pretend meaning, I want my name to be fun and flirty, like the romance in hangouts that are called dates. what does your name mean?,  how exotic!  what an interesting name!  What culture is your name from?  Persian. Israeli. Silence. Drop. Lip pops… “Tamar  the G_R_E_A_T” “Tamar’s  thrown around with Persian-type ideals of female beauty”. “Endowed with the intelligence and courage of a man". “ Tamar  (თამარი) – Goddess who enslaved the Morning Star  and controlled  the weather patterns; was called "eye of the earth" and rode a serpent .” Tamar  like  (Genesis) , daughter-in-law of Judah  in the Bible Tamar  like biblical narratives, pounding,  the daughter of king david, raped by her half brother Amnon. Tamar like Georgian queen of 1160–1213  Tamar  Imereti  Georgian princess, died sometime after? Tamar  Abakelia  Georgian artist in the 20th century  Tamar Ariav  ~ Israeli professor  Tamar Beruchashvili  ~ Georgian politician Tamar Braxton  ~ American singer Tamar Eilam ~ Israeli American computer scientist Tamar  Gendler  ~ American philosopher Tamar  Gozansky  ~ Israeli politician Tamar Halperin  ~ Israeli musician Tamar Jacoby  ~ American writer Tamar  Katz  ~ Israeli figure skater Tamar Simon Hoffs  ~ American film director Tamar  Slay  ~ American basketball player Tamar Tatuashvili  ~ Georgian football player Tamar Hodel  like daughter of Black Dahlia murder  suspect (named after Robinson Jeffers' poem, "Tamar") All these energies in body and shape, i think i'm something like candy and song. My name isn’t easy for anyone but sometimes when I’m alone, it’s easy for me. SO sweet in your mouth falls right off the tongue, not in an easy way, in a kinda-kinky exotified mystified romanticized signified singular sound, two syllables, TA- MAR, big lips round word with feeling.

As I delved into what we call "art" I unpacked the messages of being a "good artist" and of the labeling we and others place onto people. As a self identified artist, i now use that word, but beyond labels and identity, I place emphasis on the erotic, the sensual, and the juicy, because without it, where would we be today? and without eroticism there would be no rain, no sun, no soil, and lastly no fruit.