Gmorning–how are you doing? A beloved housemate asked me over dinner the other night: What is trikeslutting?
I awkwardly explained to her: I live at the intersection of disability and sexuality. Culture says disabled people and fat people aren’t supposed to be sexy or really even have a sexuality. That’s about power and fear. I say no and need to subvert all that. And I do it riding trike.
how it came to be
I remember when trikeslutting first began. Ah, lovely day. What a good idea.
I had wanted to ride trike for a long time. Finally I bought a trike, with some money I received after my mom’s death. Ming assembled the trike for me and maintained it. We began our daily dawn trike rides.
I asked Ming to take my picture every day as spiritual practice of allowing myself to be seen, after a life time of wanting to be invisible. This trikeslutting documentation was a way to invite the world into my healing journey.
wholesome
I had new clothes, which was no coincidence. My mom had bought me almost all of my clothes, my whole life–I hated clothes shopping that bad.
When she died, I had to start buying my own clothes. I found new freedom in making a more intentional choice about how to market my body. Hmm, market is a weird word there. But package would be too.
I am very wholesome and have a hard time visually portraying myself as the sexual being that I am. What our culture calls sexy in appearance is not easy for me to perform.
But just trust me. Sexual pleasure is one of my favorite types of pleasure and connecting with the Divine. In private with lots of freedom, I can do it in my own way.
I don’t need to do sexy in a regular way. In fact, I do most things in a non-regular way. So that’s cool.
trikeslutting
Trikeslutting is a type of liberation. I’m willing to be seen having fun in my fat, disabled body. I’m good right now–it’s not contingent on me being in less pain, weighing fewer pounds, looking young or carefree, having more conventional sensory processing, or having more commonplace social needs. All bodies are valid bodies, even mine.
Modeling fat disabled sexuality is a way I’m trying to help the world. I’m a good example, demonstrating that pleasure isn’t something only for abled people who look like a magazine person.
Pleasure is for everyone, and power is too. My hope is that this joy repeated often is a way to change culture. Not through organized policy efforts or revolt, but through realistic everyday pleasure-happiness. I let myself be perceived as a happy animal who needs to move.
ritual
Riding trike, I stay in motion. It’s like ecstatic dance, but ecstatic trike. My feelings can move around in me. I’m grateful for anything I can do so my energy doesn’t get stuck.
When I do ritual, I’m asking all of me to be on the same page. My body, mind, and soul are all showing up at the same time to do the same thing. That’s pretty rare! Usually my mind is churning on something, my body is on autopilot, and my soul might be tucked up under a rib hiding out, depending on my feeling state, how safe I am, and what’s going on that day.
During ritual, I feel safe and relaxed enough to let all of me show up fully to do some important work. Trikeslutting feels that way too. It’s a ritual on wheels.
thank you
Thank you to my housemates who are so brilliant in a thousand ways and respectful of my fat, sacred body. How refulgent you are. I appreciate how you make a house a home.
