It’s so heartening that transgender folk are finally finding their way into our collective souls.

Even as a relatively straight married lady, even when I was a little girl in combat boots, I have always understood that the duality of gender is just too simple for beings as amazing and creative as we are. I find the people who explore and claim their own genders in spite of what came with their birth bodies just incredibly brave and awesome. Especially the ones with a sense of humor.

You wouldn’t think the frum world would be so open to queer and gender-twisting tendencies, but the truly pious know God don’t make mistakes. If you didn’t catch the story in last week’s Forward, it’s a must read. I’ve been thinking about dear shtetl Beryl all weekend.

And then there’s Schemeckel, the wicked funny Jewish transgender punk polka band from Brooklyn, telling us all about the interesting dilemma of visiting the mohel once you’ve got a shlang to snip:

Awesome, nu?

While I’m on the subject, I may as well post my favorite song in the world from my favorite movie in the world, Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Hedwig is East German and definitely not Jewish, and The Origin of Love has its roots in Greek mythology and not Torah. But somehow, these lyrics—written by James Cameron Mitchell who performs them himself as the blond goddess of hilarity—reach their arms around the whole, wide, weird world:

May you be feeling loved today, wherever you’re dancing on the gender spectrum.