Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Andi: Toronto Mike'd #1283

Episode Date: June 30, 2023

In this 1283rd episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike chats with Andi, a listener who recently came out as trans. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, the Yes We Are Open podcast from Moneris, The Moment Lab, Ridley Funeral Home and Electronic Products Recycling Association.

Welcome to episode 1,283 of Toronto Mic'd. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery. A fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times, and brewing amazing beer. Order online for free local home delivery in the GTA. online for free local home delivery in the GTA. Palma Pasta. Enjoy the taste of fresh, homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. Season 4 of Yes, We Are Open,

the award-winning podcast from Moneris, hosted by FOTM Al Grego. RecycleMyElectronics.ca. Committing to our planet's future means properly recycling our electronics of the past. The Moment Lab. Brand marketing and strategy. PR.

Advertising and production. You need The Moment Lab and Ridley Funeral Home, pillars of the community since 1921. Today, making their Toronto Mike debut is Andy. Andy, welcome to Toronto Mike. Thanks, Mike. I appreciate you having me. You've been to a TMLX event, haven't you? I have, yeah. TMLX...

Eight? Eight. The final Pandemic Fridays at Great Lakes Brewery. Yeah, the Pandemic Friday finale. That was a fun day. It was a great day. Yeah, it was a lot of fun. It was interesting to meet a lot of the folks who I'd heard over the last couple years over the podcast. And so to get the opportunity to see people in person was

a bit surreal for me. Was Stewstone as advertised? As advertised and better. Okay. Alright, so Andy, we're going to absorb your story. I'm going to have questions along the way. I want your complete story, but before we begin,

let's crack open a cold, fresh Great Lakes beer. You've got a burst. I've got a sunny side. So let's hear it right on the mic there. Here we go. See, Andy, you were about,

you know, six inches below the mic. you got to get right in front here i'll show you how it's done for next time okay don't worry i'll see you in the professional all right cheers to you andy cheers thank you for having me and thanks to great lakes for the fantastic products oh you're gonna bring some home with you do you like italian food uh if it's okay well you got palm in this andy knows the drill okay so i got a lasagna for you in the freezer so you got your lasagna you got your fresh great lakes beer you've got your wireless speaker courtesy of manaris so you know what to do with

that you can listen to season four of yes we are open which is an inspiring podcast hosted by fotm al grego who you probably met at tmlx8 And I have a flashlight for you from Ridley Funeral Home, so you're not going home empty-handed. This will be helpful if I have to do some grave digging. So how many tattoos do you have, Andy? I can't answer that question. I've lost count, and I think that it would depend on what you saw as one or many tattoos.

So I would just like to talk about a percentage of my body. Okay, let's hear it. I would say I'm at about 42% of my body. Was it painful? You got a high pain threshold? I mean, I would say it's based on a lot of different factors in terms of where you're being tattooed, what kind of tattoo style it's going to be,

the hours of the sitting. But I would say overall it's been worth it. You're happy with your decisions in life to get all this ink, 42% of your body. Yeah, and I have kept going. So I'm at almost 20 years and I'll probably be getting tattooed for the next 20 so well i was gonna say you're at 42 you stay there because that's the answer

to all of life's mysteries right that's the hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy magic number 42 i'm 37 so i've got five more years uh so let's burn it out okay so you're 37 years old and eat now i'm uh gonna sit back and do a lot of listening now so now that you're 37 years old and eat. Now I'm going to sit back and do a lot of listening now. So now that you're comfortable, you've had a couple of sips of your delicious IPA from Great Lakes Brewery. Yeah, start in like the, you start where you're comfortable starting

and I want the full and complete story. Sure, sure. So I guess helpful to understand about me is I've been working as a social worker for a number of years. I work in community mental health, specifically like in an early intervention psychosis program. Been doing that at Church and Wellesley in various roles for the last, there are seven years. And then pre that I worked at Covenant House.

Can you just give us a little detail what that entails? Because those are kind of like fancy big names and i just like dumb it down for me i'm not as smart as you and so well beg to differ but um what i do typically is when a person uh experiences a first episode psychosis and there's a hospitalization uh typically uh that person will be released from hospital and require some sort of outpatient supports. And so we work specifically with youth ages, our program, 14 to 24. And then we kind of help them and their families in a recovery process, reconnecting to services, figuring out school pieces, work pieces and helping people to kind of live their best lives.

Wow, that's important work. So when you talk about psychosis, this is like delusions? Well, psychosis is a broad term, right? So psychosis is a set of, we look at psychosis as a symptom, right? And so psychosis can often be associated with schizophrenia, but also things like bipolar and trauma, substance induced. So it really is more of a descriptor of what people would see as often active symptoms. But it is a broader thing, I think, often misunderstood. So our team works specifically with folks who have kind of gone through this process. And we bring, I think, an interesting perspective to the work. What made you want to get into that line of work?

So my own experience of being a closeted trans person for a long time, my own experiences with mental health. Spoiler alert, Andy. Yeah, my own experiences with mental health. I've struggled a lot. I was diagnosed with ADHD or assessed with ADHD at a very young age and didn't really have any proper treatment. And so for me, I've struggled a lot, but have kind of overcome a lot of those struggles. completed my undergrad. I did a post-grad certificate. I did a master's degree and did so with understanding or thinking that life was hard, like had to be this hard. And so for me, I kind of felt that I understood a struggle that some of our clients might face. Well, not the same,

but I'm able to build like a lot of empathy for people. And so I think it's kind of what put me in that field, specifically feeling misunderstood and feeling like people didn't see who I was. Well, good on you, because that's important work you're doing. And this is young people at a, you know, they're most vulnerable, right? When, you know, as I understand it, be it schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, like it typically arises when somebody is like a teenager or in their early twenties, right? That's when it's like, yeah. So you're there to help with the, just, I guess, transition back to, you know, back to life, back to reality. Shout out to FOTM Simon Law from Soul to Soul.

Yeah, exactly. And I think it's part of too, just thinking that there's a lot of stigma around what these things mean. Right. And so I think sometimes having people to share that just because somebody may have a diagnosis of schizophrenia doesn't mean that their life is over. It doesn't mean that it's all scary,

that a lot of beautiful people have what we call these diagnoses and still do amazing things things oh without a doubt so yeah thank you for your efforts there now so you dropped the term uh closeted trans person so we will absolutely be you know diving into that and i have questions but on our way to that you wrote me an email this is why you uh you showed up and jumped on the mic at tmlx8 uh let's assume that the listenership for this episode has not heard that frenetic three hours i recorded from tmlx8 so if you don't mind share that story with me and then we'll discuss what's what's new with you andy sure sure so uh. So during that time, I was pretty isolated.

I think a lot of us, a lot of my friends, a lot of people that I connected with were experiencing such a change in the way we lived. For me in particular, a lot of the ways that I had kind of coped through my mental health and the things that were happening for me of coped through my mental health and the things that were happening for me was being outside, was being around people. That's always kind of been my strong suit. I've always kind of been a people person. And I think that over that period of time, I really felt disconnected from the world. There was a lot of things in my life that were going on. There was some challenges with some grief and some loss from a family member. There was a difficult relationship, some financial issues, major work changes, and it was kind of like all coming down. So I was in this situation where over the pandemic, I would kind of wake up and I'd really just walk 10 hours a day sometimes or eight hours a day.

People would, you know, often joke that I was the quote unquote walking guy. Well, that's Ben Rayner-esque. Yeah. What I'm hearing here. Yeah, I hear similarities when he talks about it, right? I just walk. I felt like I had, I didn't know, I didn't have a lot of purpose. I just had. I felt like I had, I didn't know, I didn't have a lot of purpose. I just had to get out. And so I had found your podcast probably in December of 2018

and started to listen, but wasn't listening kind of every week. I wouldn't say- Shame on you. Well, it's sometimes love takes work, right? Love takes time to heal when it hurts so much. And yeah, I remember listening to the first Pandemic Fridays and I didn't know who Cam was or Stu was and had listened to your voice, but immediately there was something that stuck in. I felt like I kind

of had people I was going along the ride with. And so it really, what it did for me was it really brought, like every Friday there was this thing where I was so excited and I would get the podcast ready. And I knew that if I had a seven hour walk for the day, that three hours would be with like, with you guys. All right. So along this way way as we chat about everything i will interject and it's fascinating for me to hear your story with regards to pandemic fridays because that's literally our vision at the time so we were all in it together and none of us knew what the fuck was going on so uh it was friday the 13th of march 2020 school was going to be out for the march break uh little did we know i guess but yeah we knew it would be longer than

the march break but uh you know that was the whole like social isolation stop going to work stop going to school what's going on what do you mean i can't have guests in the basement you and i are what like three feet apart here chatting this was i remember peter gross came over on the monday and i'm like peter because every monday he'd come over to do down the stretch and i remember telling peter i don't think you can come over anymore like i don't think i'm allowed to it felt like i'd be breaking some law if a human was in this basement with me that didn't live with me like it was really scary times and i do recall uh Gordon, Stu Stone, and I had like an emergency summit.

And in this conversation, it might've been Stu, but somebody said, we need to do something this Friday to kind of just to keep the FOTMs, give them hope and just give some people something to look forward to. And then we quickly decided that we should do it every Friday until the end of the pandemic. And as you know, that ended up being, people something to look forward to and then we quickly decided that we should do it every friday until the end of the pandemic and as you know that ended up being i think we we couldn't make it to the end of the pandemic i don't even know is it over now uh maybe well there's pommas pasta

here so so we yeah and i'm just like so happy to hear that there was somebody out there who kind of leaned in on the pandemic Fridays and kind of joined us because we were all lost and we all, we were all confused and what's next and are we going to die from this COVID and what do we do now? And so, I mean, it's amazing you were there for that journey. Yeah, it was an unlikely find, right? You know, when you kind of listen to a podcast for the first time years ago, and then listen to this first Pandemic Fridays, then there's this point at which you're back on a show. It's never what you expect, right? It's kind of sometimes, sometimes things just come full circle. And so in that, I think when I wrote you the letter, like part of what I had talked about was that over this time, you know, things were really, really tough. And so I was kind of looking for things that brought comfort. And when I think back to like kind of a young punk rock Canadian, like much music kid watching TV and the top 30 countdown every day after school, a lot of the music was of that elk, right? So it was of that same kind of vintage where we're talking a lot about like the Killjoys and 5440, Tragically Hip, things that we would like regularly watch, right? And so being able to kind of engage again with that music during that time in particular really brought me a lot of joy.

And it kind of gave me a sense of connection that I was lacking elsewhere, which was really powerful for me. And so I think, you know, when I wrote you that letter, I didn't really think that it would be a big deal to you. really think that it would be a big deal to you uh not to be um to be rude but just the sense that like i just didn't think that i thought lots of people were touched this way and lots of people had maybe written a letter like this right and so i think when i um heard back kind of some of the response from it i realized oh you know there is kind of a special connection to this show. Well, am I allowed to read from the letter? Sure. Okay.

So this is, Andy wrote this. Pre-pandemic, I was a regular listener, definitely more than a cherry picker. And at the beginning of the pandemic, with nothing to do and a great deal of uncertainty and anxiety, I dug into your podcast. I still remember the first episode of Pandemic Fridays. That was March 20th, by the way, 2020. And thinking this might be a fun thing for the next few weeks until all this blows over. During the pandemic, like many,

I experienced a great deal of loss, passing of a cherished family member, loss of social circles, regular ways of coping, et cetera, et cetera. Your podcast, particularly Pandemic Fridays, has kept me going the last 16 months. So that's when you wrote this. Knowing that each and every Friday, no matter how rough or crappy of a week, and you put Friday in quotes because we did move it to

Thursdays and it kind of bounced, but it came Thursdays. But yeah, we still called it Pandemic Fridays. I would have a new episode to listen to. It brought a ton of joy laughs occasional tears memories and reflection it it's helped me reconnect with parts of myself from the past particularly my 13 year old self that sat in front of the tv for hours watching much music soaking up whatever can rock i could you obviously uh you mentioned that the kill joys was a personal favorite and you were at their show at the horseshoe a couple years back i could go on forever but i want to say thank you to yourself stew and cam for creating something that has been an anchor during a rough period i will miss the show dearly but i'm hopeful for the periodic reunions uh i'm in the city okay so you did

show up for the finale at great lakes Brewery. I did, yeah. And that's awesome. You know, we did bring it back as Toast. And I don't know, did you listen to any Toast episodes? Yeah, yeah, I have listened to Toast. I still listen to Toast, occasional Toast. I mean, Toast was initially, I think, Cam and Stu, and then there's been some trade-offs.

I ran into Stu at Absolute Comedy probably like six weeks ago and i was like wow so he's in the country uh maybe yeah probably like may late april early may and i was like stew what's going on with the show um what did he say because i haven't had this combo he said he couldn't he couldn't tell he said don't worry about it um it's very tight very stew you know professional now stew i will say uh because i've been following stew's adventures he spent the vast majority of the time uh this year in the states filming that uh dark side of the ring right right which is great for him it's an awesome opportunity yeah it's good for him bad for me but okay so but then coinciding with stew stone being busy uh I don't know, filming the Dark Side of the Ring, Cam Gordon got a new job and he was laying low and he's still laying low.

So here we are chatting in late June, the last day of June, 2023, and neither Stu nor Cam have been on Toronto Mic'd in this calendar year. Shocking, right? Well, I think sometimes, you know, you kind of just appreciate what you have in the moment, right? And nothing is guaranteed. And I think it's one of those things where you look back and you think, you know, that show is over, but it doesn't mean it's, you know, not part of my life and didn't impact me the way it did.

And they will be back, you know, eventually. But I will just shout out Rob Pruess and Bob Ouellette because they will actually be in this basement Sunday at 11 a.m. for a new episode of Toast because, well, because they actually will do it where Kevin Stu won't. So I have Rob Pruess

and we're going to kick out Quintessential Canadian Jam. So that's I hope you tune in, Andy. Okay. So pick up the story. I read your letter at the time pandemic fridays came to an end that glorious uh evening on the patio of great lakes brewery that was uh i'm gonna say early september maybe uh late was it late august maybe late august yeah kind of like right at that till by the way we'll be back so i'll just let you know tmlx 13 will be at great lakes brewery again uh it'll be the last day of august so august 31st 2023 so i hope to see you there we'll be there um so uh yeah i guess from there um i think after that work started to

kind of reopen again and that's that year year I was finishing up my master's in social work, doing like just busy, busy, busy. And shortly after that episode, I had some major life changes. And so one was kind of like an ending of a long, long relationship and kind of a re-sense of self and looking at who I am and the kinds of people that I want to continue in that sort of relationship with. And around that time I met my fiance. So we're now engaged. Congratulations. Thank you. You've also met my fiance. Here's a... Okay. I'm bracing myself here's a bit of a of an interesting uh story that you

don't know um so uh we went to the uh rusty show at sneaky d's uh and my fiancee was taking a film of a rusty song where you were announced in the song empty cell empty cell and asked her for um the video so we were listening to to toast or i think it was toast or they were cam and stew were both on afterwards and they're talking about how how they're like did you harass some woman at the show well okay so yeah so just to catch up here this is mind blow i had no idea this was coming but that's my fiancee oh my god okay so i saw a young woman recording the empty cell and i desperately wanted to have a copy so i think i approached your uh fiancee yeah uh who i didn't know was your fiancee obviously but i'm like i'm i don't know i might have said something like i'm mike at toronto mike.com can you email me that

file or share that file with me? I'll just let you know your fiance never did share that file with me. No, so here's the story is she knows who you are because we listen together. So then I'm like, oh shit, like they don't recognize me. Like I got to like get out of here. Like you go have this conversation. They don't remember me from back then. And what was funny was when we were thinking about why you were asking for it, we realized that you wanted the shout-out.

Yes, of course. And so when we went to go pull the video up, there was only four seconds. She only had like 10 seconds of the song. Oh, I thought she had. And she didn't have the shout-out. So I was like, well, how do we send him the video that doesn't even have the shout-out in it?

So that's why the video never came up. And that's the story. So I did get it. Somebody else recorded and put it on uh youtube and then i i so i eventually did get that audio if i had known the story i might have pulled it up right now but yeah so i do have empty cell live at sneaky d's with the toronto mike shout out in the middle from ken uh fotm ken from rusty and i love the shout out and that is wild to me that this small world story here, that the woman I asked for the video,

because Cam witnessed this. That's how it came up on television. They were talking about it on the air and we're lying in bed listening to it. I'm like, oh my God, that's us. That's fair game, right? To politely ask somebody. Oh, no, no, no.

Because Cam harassing this young woman. Yeah, yeah, no, no. It's like, I want the video and I'm like, email me the video if you took video of it. So just for all points, we thought that the descriptor

that was used in that episode was not really accurate. It was a very- What did they say? It was creepy or something? What did they call it? Yeah, I don't know, but it was.

Bullshit. And the funny thing was that she knows who you are because we listened to it. What's her name? Her name's Christina. Okay, hi, Christina and christina helps me run uh our initiative now so we run this together christina just said mike do you know who i am and then told me this uh reminded me that uh andy and then blah blah blah but please continue yeah so that's a funny mind blow and i told christina that's good i told christina we'd share this one

on the air uh so that you could hear. That was a great show, right? It was a great show. I love Rusty. Me too. And I love that venue for Rusty because it's so intimate. Yeah. I almost jumped on stage with them.

I loved it. I had a great night. So Cam was there with his fiance and they're getting married in less than two weeks. Amazing. I think a week today, to be honest with you. And I do not believe Stew Stone will be at this wedding. I think a week today, to be honest with you. And I do not believe Stu Stone will be at this wedding.

There's a mind blow for everybody. But I do believe I will be at this wedding. Well, I'd love to. Yeah, so we're engaged as well. And we're going to be looking at getting married next September. So if you play your cards right, there will be an invite for you as well. All right. As long as you don't do what Cam has done.

Cam and his fiance have given me instructions on what songs to play at which moments. I actually have... Do you remember in Seinfeld when Watley, the dentist, would have people over and give them tasks to do at the party? I have lots to do at this wedding next Friday. But I'll report back to everybody because cam doesn't come on toronto mic so uh anymore so i could just do the real talk

here okay so you're engaged to be married to christina who i met at sneaky d's during a rusty show please keep going because you you said closeted trans person so uh keep going with your story sure sure so um i have been uh for a long time doing a lot of work in the community uh really working hard at like my job and uh going to school i've been in school forever and i always kind of you know there was this thing that I wasn't talking about. There was this thing that I wasn't sharing. And it had a lot to do with my gender identity and my sexuality. And there was lots of things that were happening for me. And so, like, in my workspace, I work at Church and Wellesley.

I've always worked with, like, a lot of queer and trans folks. And I've had some, like, really close relationships with these people over the years. So I kind of had found a way to like show up as a ally because I was scared about coming out. And I didn't always have exactly all the language. I didn't always know exactly what it was, but I knew that, you know, part of me was different than the way that I was portraying myself and have always felt that way. Like even thinking back to a kid, like I would kiss boys or I would ask for like pink toys, things that were very like gender binaried. I was attracted to other things that would say like, that's for a girl. And I would say, well, I want that. And so like, there's a lot of,

And I would say, well, I want that. And so there's a lot of, in my childhood, these kinds of experiences. My partner has been a great support for me. They're the ones that I kind of came out to first. And they're also a queer person. And this is Christina. Yeah, Christina.

So Christina's pronouns are... She, they. Okay, she, they. Yeah, and. So Christina's pronouns are she, they, okay. And I, yeah. And I, and I'm, uh, uh, I use they, them. Um, and so, um, when, um, we kind of did this, um, uh, we talked about it and, uh, she was a huge support to me, uh, and really like, uh, helped us to kind of come together and has been there beside me through the whole thing. I only came out about three months ago, so it's been a really new thing. But we've been doing a lot since.

And so I've got this background in community development, working with groups. We used to run or've been part of taking youth to the Mattawaska River, doing rapids. I've always been that kind of person. And so now what I've done is kind of shifted this momentum and this skillset to kind of work with, in a sport that I love, which is disc golf, and to support queer and trans and LGBTQ folks and really anybody with barriers to the sport to come in. And it's something that we've taken a lot of time and a lot of pride putting together. And it's for me somebody who has always felt that I don't live up to my potential, to feel as though I can do that has given me a

new sense of confidence in who I am. And it's allowed me to kind of step into who, who I am. And it's been, it's been amazing for me really. Now, am I allowed to ask you anything? Like I have questions,

but I don't. Yeah. Okay. Cause my apologies if i mess up here but great so i had some ignorance too much of what you're speaking of until i watched this it sounds almost embarrassing to say but i watched the series transparent did you ever see transparent i haven't seen it but i know i know about which i loved i love transparent and it it kind of helped me realize that uh you know the gender with which you identify with is actually like mutually exclusive from your sexuality so totally totally so i identify as um as trans but also pansexual

and so what i mean by that is like i'm a trans person I don't, I kind of identify in gender wise, very fluid in lots of different, depending on spaces, depending on how I feel. And then in terms of like sexual attraction, I'm attracted to really anybody in terms of like, I don't look at like gender or gender presentation or sexuality and how I would love someone or share that. Right. You're attracted to somebody's spirit, their soul, so to speak. Totally. I think I put my, again, over the 1,283 episodes, I probably stuck my foot in my mouth multiple times. But I know there was a moment with Avery Haynes where Avery Haynes was married to a man for a long time. And then Avery Haynes got married to a woman. And I think I,

like an idiot, I think I asked Avery if she had come out as a lesbian and she was explaining fluidity much like you are now. So I'm always learning. Like I am always learning. I'm a boring, uh, heterosexual,

cis, you know, white male. So I'm, I'm always, always learning. So I understand the fluidity of sexual attraction but just back to you being a trans person so you're you don't identify with any gender your your

pronouns are them they and you uh you're you're non-binary yeah yeah so in the way what i how i kind of see it is is that like i don't look at my gender as something that's a binary or a binary construct, that I feel different types of ways throughout my whole life. And looking back on that through my life experience, it kind of all makes sense. I think it can be hard sometimes to explain this to somebody who isn't quite there, because it's kind of like asking somebody, like, how do you know you're a guy, right? Or asking someone, how do you know you're a woman? Or how do you know you're trans or trans non-binary? Sometimes you just kind of know. And so it's

the kind of thing where it's hard to always describe it to people because a lot of it is like kind of an internal experience. Well, that's why you're here because i get to grill you and if i sound ridiculous then it's on me here but okay so you lived most of your life with the uh gender assigned to you at birth correct which was male right right and you had a name which i which is now your dead name but you had a name that uh is typically used by uh people who identify as uh men him him uh his which would be the pronouns i typically use is he him right thank you we'll get there we'll get there together okay andy we're doing this together so you have a dead name and now you go by andy and i should point out andy's with an i right right and so that name um i uh there was a time in my life where i kind of met

an interesting group of folks, like kind of in the punk rock scene. And in my teenage years, where I had, I would say it in my life where I felt more of a belonging and their nickname for me during that time was Andy with a Y. And so when I was kind of picking something that I wanted to go by, it felt like a really natural transition for me. And then putting the eye on was just because, like, I don't know, eye is kind of fun. Well, so one of my questions is, like, so we just, although we had met at TMLX 8, that's been a while.

That day was a blur for me. A couple years ago almost. And it was a blur because those events, I meet like 100 people. And so sometimes it's tough to retain specific moments and stuff. But now we're one-on-one, right? So I'll never forget me eating Andy today. It's a whole different experience, one-on-one for however long we talk. But today I noticed, oh, your 42% of your body is covered in ink.

You've got lots of these tattoos. You've got a, like, I wish I could grow a beard like you grow. Like I'm jealous. It's a lot longer before I got it cut down today. You got it cut today? Yeah, yeah. How long was it? Like three or four times the length.

You should have kept it. No, I had to look good. So, you know, I got to do a comparison before and after. Okay. But that's this presentation, right? Black t-shirt, like I would call it, like ink and the beard. It would be a presentation.

Typically, is it fair to say typically associated with men? Sure. And I think like that sometimes confirms or reinforces gender binary binary that well talk to me about that because i'm sure you've been you're being misgendered uh left right and center yeah and i mean like the thing about me that you know you don't see is i wear different things in different spaces and so a lot of times like i'll wear like pink and i'll wear some of my um fiance's clothing uh i don't like i i'm very fluid in how i feel right and so there's like part of me that really likes like black t-shirts and black cutoffs because i also love

cross punk and that's like part of that's like a big part of me right and there's parts of me that love like a pink shirt that's cut off and you know you can you can you know come it kind of hangs down 12 feet and is oversized and looks like more like what would be considered a dress, right? And so I like to like play with that and do different sorts of clothing. So I don't like, you know, dependent on the spaces that I'm in, I can, I definitely look different in how I feel. I dress different. And so that's kind of been a big thing for me. And we're definitely going to get back to the disc golf okay so that i've taken a note there you you referred to yourself as a closeted trans person so i was previous right now you're out of

the closet so how how long ago did you come out of the closet just like three months ago okay it's fresh okay yeah it's fresh and tell me what does that entail is that as simple as i don't that's my this is that was my dead name this is my new name and these are my pronouns now is it as simple as that i mean it depends on the depends on the audience right and i so i think that there's like been some people who have been like just huge huge huge supporters of me and have loved me and you know people that have really shown up for me have continued to show up and have been there kind of since day one. Other folks, I think that there's been more hurdles to that. But for me, the reality is, is that where I'm at in my life is that I don't have time to worry about how everybody takes, understands me. And I don't

really want to, to have to reeducate people to the point of where I'm trying to justify my who I am right and so what I say is like what I think kind of happened was in the process of coming out it kind of strengthened certain relationships and then also kind of made other relationships that I thought were a bit stronger, maybe a little, just a little less close. And I kind of, you know, would use my time and, and, uh, resources to spend it with the people that I knew just really supported me. Um, not because, you know, I was necessarily mad at people, but it was just because that's kind of what i needed well i was going to ask you if there's any uh any flack from anyone because i mean i have four kids and if any of my children were to uh come out as a a trans person or even just change their pronouns i would 100 be supportive

and adapt very quickly and i just love my children's souls like i'm not you know i did assign them a gender at birth. And even the other day I was telling my wife, I was like, why are we assigning gender at birth again? Like if even that feels antiquated now, like the whole assigning gender at birth. So I don't know like about all those kinds of issues. I don't know what, you know, where I kind of,

but I kind of know where I am and where I am right now. And to be honest, I don't think kids are really in our cards. So it's not something I've had to really think about. But I think that they're like the idea that love and support are kind of central in understanding and supporting trans people. and supporting trans people, that when we look at the research and when we look at the statistics, family support, whether that's biological family or chosen family, and having like support systems in place that love and affirm people tend to be really protective when we think about some of the challenges that people might experience from transphobia. And I've worked a lot in mental health and worked a lot at church and Wellesley.

And so I do understand a lot of these issues also before coming out because of just the line of work and where I work. Right. So it's part of kind of my, my, my lived experience from personal and professional. Recent Toronto Mic'd episodes, I'm referring specifically to the episode of Colin Mochrie and Debra McGrath

and Sandra Plagakis. They have children who are trans. And we talked about what I would deem to you, and I'm curious about your experiences, but there's a lot of anti-trans out there. Like it's almost like this last bastion of hate that seems like i'm not going to call it socially acceptable because i if i sniff it somewhere i i stomp on it like that's

on no no hate here but be it dave chappelle or jk rowlings and you name it these mainstream people uh seem to float these anti-trans sentiments and i'm wondering if any of that has hit you as you come out i am so i think it's a pretty tricky topic because i think that there are things that are more overt when people are kind of in positions of power specifically if they have like large media platforms that those things are very visible right right? That I think most reasonable people could see as transphobic if they're blatantly saying it, right? And then I think there's also like things that are a little bit more kind of under the radar that are more kind of those individual experiences that show up in someone's day to day that may be harder to miss. Um, and so like those sorts of things,

I think is what is harder to describe or bring attention to sometimes because, um, ultimately like when a larger sort of figure takes on these opinions, uh, and shares those opinions widely, um, and nonetheless influences how other people think, right? And that those experiences then kind of come down in other ways, right? And so if people are listening to what someone is saying about trans people being, you know, X and Y and Z, right? Zed. Yeah, that they begin to kind of think about those things as well, right? And that kind of influences public opinion, which leads to kind of a bias or stigma and kind of impacts things at lots of different levels. Well, one way to, you know, be, I guess,

a little more passive-aggressive with your anti-trans sentiments and thoughts is to intentionally misgender you, right? Like, so, you know, using your dead name or call, I don't know,

calling you dude or using the pronouns, uh, him, he, uh, just intentionally like trying to reinforce like that your gender needs to match your genitalia. Right. And I think that like in some,

in some respects, like, um, Right. And I think that like in some in some respects, like we're seeing a lot of people that are being challenged by things that don't fit within a binary. Right. And so I think that when people sometimes feel that their ideas of the world are challenged, that they kind of hold on harder. right? They kind of get louder. And so I see it as like in some ways that kind of like, in some ways I see this kind of outwardly like hate that's happening. You know, we're seeing what's happening in the States with laws. Sometimes you wonder if it's like also them losing some ground, right? And kind of like now these things are really like in the public conscience.

People are talking about it in different kinds of ways. And that it's like feels like it's even though it is disgusting, there is some sense of like, well, they're hearing us. And now they're like, it's kind of like mounting that battle, right? Interesting. Yeah. Interesting. Question about your fiancee yeah so firstly even if you realize oh i don't have the toronto mic shout out in the empty cell video christina could send an email to me to say uh hey i'm the person

you asked for the video and i'm just letting you know i actually don't have the shadow like just a little courtesy note you know what i mean because i was shout out, like just a little courtesy note. You know what I mean? Because I was like waiting and it's like, oh, it's not coming. I don't have it. And it was a long time before I finally found somebody who did have it because, you know, it wasn't like there was 20,000 people at that concert. But there you go. So there you go.

And I feel better for expressing that Christina could have sent me an email and say I don't actually have the video. I'm sorry. But I guess like at the same time too, you know, when you walk up to someone randomly at the bar and provide you this little context that they may or may not get back to you right like it is like i know but now that i know that christina knew who i was i now i'm taking it very personally okay but one more question about christina's pronouns uh there's a almost like a mix and a match there right because it's mix and a match mix match what is this the the mattress sale from christine because she they i have a question a

legit question about she there what is the spirit behind she they as opposed to uh them they well i think that you know just to be completely uh like respectful and stuff that um that is their kind of story and their experience. And Christina's not here. Christina's not here. And so for me to speak to that is not really on me, right? Because I can't explain like what something comes from my perspective or worldview, but from hers, it might be something different. And so I'm just a curious cat.

Yeah. Yeah. So if you want to bring my curse and my blessing, bring us back together, then I can, you know, i'm sure she would share um but i i just feel like uh speaking on on her behalf is not um wait okay because there you go did you hear yourself you said her behalf sure she's it's their behalf no she uses she and they so that's a flexible oh i now i i thought it was that it was she and that and okay okay so either or So either, or. Either, or. Gotcha.

I miss, I completely misunderstood. I thought it was. Yes. Okay. So see this. You called me out for, for, you tried to call me out for misgendering someone when I didn't misgender them. Right.

Well, this is part of the, this is it. Part of the learning, right? You told me I could ask you anything and I'm fully comfortable to ask you anything. And that was something I was confused by. She, they, but it's actually just either, or that was something I was confused by. She, they. But it's actually just either or. It's not a she, they versus she, her. Right, right.

Which is how I interpreted it. Instead of she, her, it's she, they. Okay, now. Yeah, now we're there. I get it. Either or. Before I came out with they, them pronouns, I started with, for me personally,

I started with he, they. And so I used that pronoun. I get it now. Because for me me it felt a little bit safer see but if i'm confused i bet you that someone else is confused so i get it i get it yeah completely understand it now okay so now you're uh them they strictly as your as your preferred pronouns yeah so i use they them as my pronouns now um and i mean that could that could change i don't know you know i just know kind of where i'm at right now do you find it annoying when uh somebody like

me asks you a bunch of questions about uh something as personal as your you know gender identity and sexuality here's the thing is is that like i'm also consenting to being on this show that's true you didn't consent i uh i know who you are. We're not on the subway right now. Right, right. And so like I know what you've used your platform in the past for. And like I'm not sure what name she's using, but AJ Andrews.

She. Yeah, so I'm not sure what her, is she still using the name AJ? Ariana. Ariana. So when Ariana came on, I, is she still using the name AJ or. Ariana. Ariana. So when Ariana came on, I listened to all of her stuff. Fascinating. And so I, so that's kind of like, to be completely frank, I, you know, if I hadn't have listened

to those episodes, I'm not sure that I would have necessarily reached out to come on the show. But because I, because I, and just, you never know, right. And, but in hearing and how you like, how you connected with and provided a platform for, for some marginalized voices in sports media in particular, made me feel that, you know, I'll go on that show because even if there's maybe pieces that you do or don't understand, you know, we can't understand everybody's perspectives and everyone's worldviews, right?

That there's a sense of like, of trust or, or a sense of familiarity in, in what your motivations are and who you've helped and supported in the past. And it's interesting how it all kind of ties together that Arianna Andrews, part of her coming out as a trans woman

was hearing Scott MacArthur come out as a gay man. Scott did just return to Toronto Mic earlier this month, and people should check that out because Scott is up in Quit Radio and is moving out east, and it's a fascinating episode of Toronto Mic with Scott MacArthur. But Arianna Andrews, we are actually due for a follow-up because uh last we spoke Arianna was getting a gender reassignment surgery and I need to find out how that went so Arianna she's a good FOTM and I'm glad you listened to those episodes yeah I've listened to I think she's been on twice right yeah I've listened to

both those episodes and I think uh she's done a really amazing job just you know listening to her it was really inspiring for me and was a part of you know part a big part of why I reached out glad you reached out and I'm glad we're having this conversation and now I want to pick up something you dropped which was disc golf right and and how that ties to all of this. Yeah. So when I, when I came out as trans, I, I mean, my partner started to think about disc golf. And so disc golf was something that I started playing about a year ago.

It was, you know, for the person that was walking eight or nine kilometers a day, right. Or sorry, eight or nine hours. Right. Which is much more,

much more 20 kilometers. There was a sense of like purpose and there was an athletic movement and there was like uh serenity or or calm being in the woods or being in nature and all these sorts of places and i really fell fell fell in love with the game and when i started to play disc golf i was coming from playing golf with some friends and uh it was expensive. I couldn't afford it. And it was like, she's like, you know, I'm going to have to spend $5,000 a year to maybe get okay at this. Right. And it didn't really seem like there was a lot of like the juice wasn't worth the squeeze. You know what I mean? I hear you from my perspective, right? You know, other people may think different, but from my perspective, you know, golf ruins good walk yeah and disc golf actually enhances it and that's my that's the way where do you play

so i play all over i'm part of a few different leagues um i run a i run toronto queer disc golf which you can find us on instagram at toronto queer disc golf uh and we run a tuesday league at maryland bell park uh lakeshore i also play at the Centennial League on Mondays, which is up at San Antonio Park. I sometimes do glow night at the beach or at glow night at Maryland Bell. We play ladies leagues on Thursdays sometimes. So we're really like kind of out there in lots of different spaces. And disc golf is a really fast growing sport.

And it's been a really fruitful way to spend our time. And then the natural connection to a disc golf initiative to support LGBTQ players to access a sport has really helped me in my own journey and my understanding of myself by connecting with other queer players and playing with them as well. And so I brought in, we started doing this thing and, you know, it's really been a labor of love, but we recently, you know, with the help of some other queer sports leagues, like Queer Jocks TO, there's a Queer Forest Club. There's all these different communities, right, that do, there's a Queer Pickleball Club. And we all kind of support each other in some of those pieces. And so I was able to connect with those folks for some input. And then we started, you know, doing the league. So I kind of had a bunch of support from the queer queer community

and then a ton of love and support from the disc golf community and so there was like you know folks from women's disc golf toronto women's disc golf were helping us out um folks from chain link disc golf were helping us out um folks from all the different leagues were coming and like supporting us we did a launch at a tournament called Slamboree in Brampton, which was run by She Dizer Discs and Hops and Dizers. So like a bunch of community members kind of put us up. And so I kind of had the momentum to run with it. And, but, you know, really it was this propping of different, different folks that really saw the message that we were doing. And it's exciting for me because we just agreed to a partnership with Neptune Discs out of Virginia who sponsored Natalie Ryan.

Natalie Ryan is the number one female athlete in disc golf and also a trans woman who has been fighting for the right to play in women's leagues. And so now we're part of that group and we're kind of together doing this. And so it's a really exciting time for us around making changes and making a sport inclusive. It's a lot of work. changes and making a sport inclusive it's a lot of work um does it open us up to negative opinions and people criticizing what we're trying to do possibly but at the end of the day um well fuck those people fuck those people at the end of the day i take all that stuff send them over here wow okay we'll hit him with this is this frozen we'll hit him with this

it's in my freezer actually but that's an empty box i don't hit him with that 24-hour thought cycle so we got 24 hours to knock him dead um but um the idea is that like you know together um there's so much love right and there's so much support that a a disc manufacturer that's you know sponsoring a you know a major um uh disc golf athlete uh is kind of seeing what we're doing on a small scale and supporting it, right? And it's really nice because it's really beautiful because the first day when we started the Instagram account, it was really small. And I reached out to this company

to explain what we were doing and they got back to us right away. And so to me, that's like a very genuine. So I love hearing this, particularly because of what's been all over the news lately with some asshat named kid rock shooting up a case of beer right so like that's essentially the the heart of that whole nonsense is that uh you know bud bud light was you know and we drink great lakes beer on this program but but Bud Light. We're a Great Lakes household as well.

Okay, good. Big time. Shout out to Great Lakes. I was actually there yesterday chatting with Troy and had a great conversation there. But I won't rehash it, but what are your thoughts as a trans person when you hear that there's like literally a boycott of a beer company because they actually supported a transgender person so for me it's like the kind of thing again um if i sit in the comments if i sit and read uh all of the negativity um that comes out of it um it at the end of the day it doesn't help me right like i don't it's almost like sometimes i don't not that I don't want to know,

but I don't want to see the things that people write, right? It doesn't help me. It doesn't make me feel like, like it makes me feel angry. It makes me feel sad. Right. And so for me, you know, yes, I want to be safe around whom around. I want to know the people that are in my inner circles, of course. But outside of that, I just want to know the people that are in my inner circles, of course. But outside of that, I just want to take the time, take the energy that I do have. I'm grateful to be here. I'm grateful to be alive. Disc golf is something that completely saved my life and helped me come out and help me be who I am. And so for me to take this thing that I love so much and put it, put all my energy and effort into it feels like the best way and best use of

what I have. Shout out to Neptune. Neptune makes, they make the discs. Yeah. They're a discipline. I know that I know Frisbee is a brand name, so that's why it's disc golf.

It's not a Frisbee golf. Yeah. There's a whole thing. And it's like ping pong, right? Like ping pong is not the proper term for that sport because I think ping pong is a brand name. I believe it's called table tennis because it's the same way that disc golf would be called disc golf and not frisbee golf because frisbee is a brand name. Yeah.

You would know. I've done my homework on that. Unfortunately, I don't throw frisbees. I throw discs. But they're not frisbees. So that's okay. I'm my ignorance. Okay, so I bike the waterfront trail all the time and I see

the course and I see people playing it. I always thought they were throwing a frisbee, but it's not a frisbee. I mean, a flying disc, I should say, to be the proper term. I guess the major difference about... Is it heavier? Well, it's way more... There's a lot of different nuances to it. Okay. So discs come

in a variety of speeds weights fades turns glides wow uh and i think i'd like it yeah and what you what you do is is like the idea is that like you don't actually what you teach people to do with disc golf is is that you know the idea or the hurdle around learning is that you, you need to learn. Most people will learn that it's not really about throwing the disc because your arms can only do so much. The idea is more around kind of creating, um, a momentum in a swing in which the, the, um, your arm acts as kind of like a catapult. So if you think about like golf, there's like a backwards forwards motion that drives a ball and so if you think about like your arm being kind of the the vehicle right the disc sits in your arm and it's that same kind of movement that then launches the disc so this is how people throw

like 300 400 500 feet is because they're using more of their body and and then putting that energy from their body into discs. And so what we do is, is we teach a lot of new players how to play. We run everything. You know, nobody has to pay to come play with us. We have equipment for people.

If there's newer players, we always make sure that they have discs. And so we just like let people come and it's like, if you want to play and you want to play disc golf in a queer space come play with us and then like also come play with me at leagues on Mondays and come play with us at ladies leagues on Thursdays like it's beautiful I want to bring people kind of together right and so I've been helped by all these people and so for me to create something that I would say you know don't go to those leagues or don't play with those people would be wrong because those people have all kind of accepted

and supported me right so you never know who's listening to toronto mike like what a valued member of the fotm community you are andy if someone listening right now says i want to be a part of this toronto queer disc golf do they just yeah go Insta? Where do you want to send them? Yeah, so Instagram is Toronto Queer Disc Golf. You can send me a DM or add a follow or whatnot. We run meeting groups. We run these groups every Tuesday. And so the Tuesdays are at 6.30.

And folks are able just to kind of show up to that. If folks are more comfortable in a smaller format or group format we will take the time to take players out one-on-one or in small groups and we just it's just what we love to do and so it you know folks off often ask like well why do you you know why do you spend so much time on something like this and it's because we love it and it's like it's what we love to do. Okay, I have one more question about that. But first, I just want to really quickly shout out recyclemyelectronics.ca

because if anyone listening has old electronics, old technology devices that they want to get rid of, don't throw it in the garbage. The chemicals end up in the landfill and it's bad for everybody. Go to recyclemyelectronics.ca. Find out the nearest, the closest depot that has been accredited where you can drop off your tech and have it safely recycled. So thank you, recyclemyelectronics.ca. And thank you to the Moment Lab for your tremendous support. They specialize in public

relations and they have a team of experienced professionals who know how to craft stories that resonate with your audience and generate positive media coverage. So whether you're looking to launch a new product or build your reputation or manage a crisis, they have you covered. I'm happy to introduce anyone listening to Matt and Jared at The Moment Lab. Do you have to be queer to participate in your disc golf so the way i kind of look at disc golf is that i look at um as a so for me for example as somebody who showed up long a long time as an ally right which sometimes was hard for me to access queer spaces or explore queer spaces and so i think the way i kind of look at it is like if somebody wants to come play with us and is aware that the space is a queer space they're welcome right like come play with us and I've had

you know a parent of a queer or trans person come and play with us I've had different things like that and so for me it's not about like closing it off i obviously want to talk with the people of the group to make sure that they're okay with this kind of these kinds of like um uh concessions just because queer people in sports have been underrepresented that they've had lack of access to spaces so it is important to kind of like be aware that these spaces haven't been offered to a lot of people um and so we do welcome folks in. You know, if somebody would like to come, you know, maybe would ask to send us a DM

or check in with us. I don't ask for ID. I don't ask for how people identify. You don't have to come and say that you are something of, you know, you're not, you're not, you don't have to say that you're part of the LGBTQ plus community to join.

But we just like people to kind of think about the fact that this is a queer space. And if that resonates with people and if they feel wanting to connect with that space, they're welcome to come play. Andy, you know this song. Very well.

There's actually an episode coming up. I believe it's scheduled for july 10th with the director of the new lowest of the low documentary and fotm andrew stokely is going to drop by and kick out his 10 favorite lowest of the low songs of all time so there's a whole like lowest of the low loving coming uh july 10th but before i say those magic words to stone love so much was there anything else and Andy, you wanted to share during your Toronto Mic debut here? I don't want you to be on your way home and be like,

I forgot to mention X. No, I think I appreciate you having me on, and I appreciate you taking the time to use your platform to help initiatives like ours and hearing our stories. So thank you very much. Well, I appreciate you dropping by and sharing your story. And I hope I didn't say anything stupid. I'm just a curious cat who wants to learn and do the best I can.

And I'm always learning. And this was a great experience for me. Thank you so much. And that brings us to the end of our 1,283rd show. You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at Toronto Mike. Andy, you are on Instagram. Is it Toronto Queer Disc Golf?

You got it. On Instagram, follow Andy there. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery, they're at Great Lakes Beer. Palma Pasta is at Palma Pasta. Moneris is at Moneris. Recycle My Electronics are at EPRA Canada. The Moment Lab

are at The Moment Lab. And Ridley Funeral Home are at Ridley FH. I recorded with Brad Jones at Lakeshore Arts yesterday with a wonderful artist named Dessa. And I urge you to check that out as the most recent episode of Life's

Undertaking, our first roadshow. And it went really well. So shout out to Ridley Funeral Home. I'll see you all Sunday at 11 a.m. We'll be live at live.torontomic.com because Rob Pruce and Bob Willett are joining me to kick out quintessential Canadian jams. Enjoy your Canada Day long weekend. See you all then.

The wind is cold with the smell of snow It won't stay today And your smile is fine And it's just like mine And it won't go away Cause everything is rosy and gray well I've been told that there's a sucker born

every day but I wonder who yeah I wonder who maybe the one who doesn't realize there's a thousand shades of grey Cause I know that's true

Yes I do I know it's true Yeah I know it's true How about you? Are they picking up trash And they're putting down ropes And they're brokering stocks

The class struggle explodes We'll see you next time.