Journal three- Kenzie

Part one: I am really enjoying the reading of “Holding On”, so far. I like that it opens your eyes to different kinds of people and different kinds of lifestyles. I like the style,  how when you read the stories it starts off with the author giving a back ground to the interview and then when you  read the actual interview it is the words of the actual person who was interviewed. It is from their perspective. There is really not anything I dislike about the book. The only thing that I found odd was that the story about Roberta Blackgoat was a little different. When I read it I didn’t feel like it was her telling the story. There were some quotes from her, but it wasn’t like the other stories. It just seems, to me, like it is the one story that hasn’t really “fit in” with the rest of the book. I did like the story and thought it was very interesting; it just sticks out to me.

 Part two: From our most recent readings two stories really stuck out to me. I really enjoyed the story about Tommie Bass and his herbal healings. I think the story about Sylvia Rivera stuck with me more, though. I really loved that in the story about Sylvia they included Sylvia’s side of the story and they also included Seymour Pine’s side.  I just felt like this story was very real. It was blunt and emotional.  Sylvia told her hard life story and didn’t leave out any of the coarse details. It was hard for the LGBT community at that time (it still is, but much more then than now). She included about how she tried to kill herself at a very young age, and it was so normal to get beat up by strangers that she just got used to it. She ran away when she was ten years old and was hanging out in area that was definitely not a safe place for a young child. I found it intriguing that while reading her story I didn’t feel like she was radiating anger. It was a more “matter-of-fact” feeling. She seemed like she didn’t hold grudges against anyone- including Seymour. Sylvia lived the kind of life that if she was angry at the world it would make sense because so many unfair things happened to her. I find that very powerful, and, to me, that is how a person with dignity acts. My research question is: Were there other big riots that took place after the one on Forty-second Street, what kind of impact did Sylvia have on the LGBT community?