Long Time Caller, First Time Listener #35

Welcome to Long Time Caller, First Time Listener, a column where we, Trixie and Katya, give you, the reader, advice. Our answers may not be valuable, but they will definitely be irrelevant. 

---

---

Question 1: Dear Trixie and Katya,

Since both of you are very active women like Trixie you run and Katya you literally do insane things on Instagram… I was wondering what was it like starting out regular exercise? I want to get into running and proper stretching/planking but i’m not sure where or how to start. Any beginner tips and advice from two bald athletes to another? 

- Jesse

Trixie: running is amazing because it’s self guided, it’s free, and you can do it anywhere. So much of exercise is commodified and put behind financial barriers to make people feel poor. 

Running is also great because you get to slowly build confidence in something privately without the judgment of others. Also- your body was meant to run so it’s not like you’re asking it to do something insane.

Planking is psychotic and I’ll let the other person tell you more about that:

Katya: Hi Jesse! What I’ve found beneficial over my many years in this body bag I’m currently inhabiting is to eliminate the idea of “exercise”. That sounds dull and laborious and it’s a thing that many people famously loathe but feel compelled to suffer through. 

If you find something you like, which is key, then seek out a way to do it under the guidance of a good teacher and other students. I don’t like team sports, so when I found yoga I was thrilled because I was alone on my mat with other people that I didn’t have to interact with. 

I can’t stress how important it is to have a good teacher, and luckily there are a million low to no-cost ways to receive guidance from experts online through YouTube, podcasts, etc. With activities like bodybuilding, proper technique is so important that you’re better off just doing something else rather than go to the gym and fling weights around blindly. The greatest joy in my life comes from working out (yoga, acrobatics, strength training, etc) with talented people who know what they’re doing. 

Question 2: Hi gals.

I am a 22 year-old lady who is dealing with a particularly aggressive bout of adult acne. I’ve tried a variety of prescriptions given by the derm, but it always comes back! I think it’s clearing up? Boom, I get my period and my face looks like it was used as a dart board. It’s just hard to feel pretty when you have acne and id love some confidence boosting tips. 

Thanks I love you both!!! 

Sorry for creepily waiting in the rain for 2 hours after your Philly show but thank you Trixie for coming to say hi it made our night!

All the best,

Liv Laugh Love 

Trixie:  I had acne as a teen and I felt embarrassed of my face all the time. It felt like whenever people were talking to me I was mentally certain that they were only staring at my skin.

The main gig is… don’t pick or pop. It’s so satisfying in the moment but you’re only further traumatizing the skin.

Katya:  Acne is no fucking joke, so I deeply sympathize and I’m so sorry for your plight. I had moderate acne in high school and begged my parents and doctor to get me a prescription for Accutane. It was a harrowing experience, and I vividly recall peeling off an entire layer of dead skin on my lower lip in one sheet every few days. I also had back pain, and a bunch of other side effects but at the time I would have endured anything to have clear skin. And I wasn’t even that cute. I get weird skin from doing drag often, and the only real advice I have is the less you do, the better it usually is. I would recommend the book Clean by James Hamblin. Also, and this might sound patronizing but avoid mirrors. We are the harshest judges of our imperfect skin—everyone else is too busy judging their own imperfections. Also, so many of my friends who get their periods experience so much pain and bodily aggravation every month, and it seems like it just takes years of trial and error. If I had to menstruate I probably would have flung myself off a cliff at 19. Good luck! 

Question 3: Hey Divas,

I think I'm in my flop era. Not the kind of confidence I should be leading in with, but it's true. The past year has been a slap to the face and honestly, I'm (almost) over coping with dark humour. I'm also a student at a (relatively) well-respected university, and in selling my soul to NSLSC (Canadian FASFA) to attend said school, I thought there would be some payoff, and yet, the last two months have solely consisted of rejections from entry-level jobs, even though I've been working since I was 13. These rejections aren't even the worst thing to happen to me in the past few months, but it's my first full year of being an adult/on my own, and not being able to find work while coming to terms with the fact that my staggering debt is only going to get worse is causing me the most real stress I've ever had. Maybe you can understand why I think my flop era is upon me. 

Here's the tea: I know I'm a diva, but my confidence, positivity and will to be #fierce are dwindling. These rejections have me feeling like I'm a shit person with a shit personality with nothing to bring to the table, and it's like I'm falling behind before having the chance to get started. With that being said, what advice would you give to your 19-year-old selves (you can pretend I'm RuPaul holding up a picture from your high school graduation or something)? Follow-up question: how have you bounced back from unglamorous times in your lives?  

Much love,

A hot mess 

Trixie: it’s all about perspective. UnGlamorous part of your life? According to who? Flop era? Based on whose standards?

The happiest times in my life were when I was in my early 20s and I was dirt broke. $40 drag show paychecks, taking the bus in drag, and regularly lipsyncing on a weeknight for under fifteen audience members, I was in a state of bliss. I was so proud to be performing and so proud to pay my bills (I also was a server and worked front desk at a salon during the day.)

I guess by many peoples standards I was a broke freak but I felt like an “it” girl. In Romy And Michele, there’s this fierce moment when they’re been humiliated at their own reunion and they are having a private moment togeher. Romy is like “we failed at showing them that we aren’t losers anymore like we were in high school.” And Michele is like “to be honest bitch I never thought we were! We had so much fun together and I always thought we were cool.”

Don’t let your inner Romy talk over your inner Michele!

Also girl not to be OK boomer but bitch you are nineteen years old. I have this song called Soldier where the lyric is “you got time to grow.” You’re just a condensed version of who you’ll be in the future. 

Katya: I’m gonna double down on Trixie’s response because it’s just spot on. It’s up to you every day and every moment to decide whether it’s a bop or a flop. Sometimes it’s gonna take some intermediate mental gymnastics to make it a bop, other times it will take a grizzled NASA engineer. 

Student loan debt is no fucking joke, and looking for jobs sucks shit, but I relate to Trixie’s experience of being the happiest when I had no economic security and was actually in serious debt. I learned the difference between freedom from economic insecurity and the freedom from the fear of economic insecurity. Only the latter is possible because we are all, even those lucky and privileged enough to have more than $10,000 in the bank with no debt (To me that’s a rich person).

I won’t patronize you with the assurance that things will get better with time because you’re so young, but just remember—we’re on a rock floating in space. Time isn’t real and nothing matters. Good luck! 😎