I’m Britta Alford—an English major/Journalism minor from Conway, South Carolina. I am a nonbinary, pansexual writer, poet, painter, designer, social activist, and overall balancing-act creative: A survivor; a fighter. My pronouns are they/them.

I started this project identifying by the name on my birth certificate… A name that tastes like tinfoil in my mouth, and brings flashbacks of isolation, backhanded lullabies, and poisonous fingers reaching into my throat—ripping out my tongue altogether; silencing me. A name I wish wasn’t so hard to bury.

When I was invited to join the Athenaeum Press in the beginning stages of the process, I was deep in my own questioning of the confines of gender, and deconstructing my own. Somewhere between sharing intimate moments of similar experiences during the interview process of friends and colleagues, and seeing through the archiving work this similar echo of individuality at the forefront—no matter what specifics follow—I was able to morph into a more true Me, with the support of the gender-bending community. I am also in a transition not unlike the ones the people in this book have gone through, and still are going through on a daily basis. It’s a slow process to become the person I’ve always wanted to see looking back in the mirror. It’s a journey; one that I know I will be able to live through, and work my own way around. We all constantly shift ourselves and mold our identities, our minds, and sometimes our bodies, to be more akin to the image of ourselves we want to see—and fit our outside images to the ideas we hold within us. We are all on a journey to find ourselves. Sometimes that means deconstructing everything you once firmly believed you were, and starting again in the dark.

Through these pages, I hope you—dear reader—will open your heart to the same kind of conversation that I have welcomed into mine. I hope the stories of resilience inspire you to live your best, most honest life, and not let the oppressive voices around you keep you in the shade.   I hope your heartstrings get stuck on the corners of this book, and please, let the blooming bodies and voices in this binding act as ghosts to cradle you into a higher realm of humanity. I hope this brings the same community feeling as I have experienced while working on this project to those who need it—a tangible beacon for self-discovery. It’s important that we popularize the narratives of the margins, so our society can one day be more inclusive of everybody outside of these constructed social norms. Let’s break them all, and sunbathe unchained in the light.