Sephrena Lynn Miller asks us this morning to try to be positive about life. It's been very difficult in a deluge of bad things happening. But there are some good things to be joyful about. So in that spirit, I'd like to share three of them from this week.

1. I've been very lucky that Albuquerque has an excellent center to support the transgender community. The minister of my church has been wanting to find ways to help them. So Wednesday afternoon we both received a full tour of the new facility that the center just moved into over the holidays. It's a massive improvement over the previous location which was a bit cramped and run down. They moved into a 3 storefront retail(?) space that may have been a little strip for businesses. It got a massive remodel before they opened it in January. I had been there a couple times, but didn't appreciate all that had been done.
For starters, the center owns the property outright! No lease or mortgage to pay, no landlord to negotiate improvements with. That allowed them to make big changes to better help their main service group which is the local unhoused transgender community. The building has lots of restrooms and two walk in showers! There is a therapist working onsite full time! There is a large meeting space and a dedicated space for children and teenagers.
There is a special unit that supports the wider (not just TG) community who are surviving on the edge with STD testing and many other services.
And they are largely funding by state and local programs so there is no risk of falling on hard times due to the current Federal government's intolerance!!!

2. I had an orchiectomy in early January, which went well. But I had a complication that I've been dealing with ever since until Thursday. It is now resolved and I can get back to my normal activities like a 2 mile walk I put in this morning. (I actually want to work up to the routine of 3 mile jogs I've been doing for the last couple years.)

3. Tomorrow morning I'm going to pick up a trans friend and drive up to Farmington, located in a very Red county in the northwest corner of the state. We'll be visiting another trans friend I helped move up there last fall and a third friend who has been visiting her for a few weeks. So the four of us are going to hangout together, play some board games, cook up some food and generally just relax and have fun together. I had wanted to do this for quite a while, but it's finally going to happen!!!

So here's wishing all the best to each and every one of you!