For my birthday in 2022, I traveled solo to Mexico City. I think about that trip often, and I consider it to be a nexus event in my life when I reflect on the ways I have changed over the last few years. The above photo comes from the second day of that trip, where I spent the day at Teotihuacán. It is my favorite photo of myself from that trip (although a photo of me using a metate to make mole comes close), and when I look at it, I think of how, in that moment, I had no idea how impactful those nine days in Mexico would be. It is like looking at the final photo of the old Timothy.

During the week and a half that I was there, I crashed on the couch of Alex, one of my closest friends who was living in the city at the time. They had a nice apartment in the Roma neighborhood and were in close proximity to the metro, lots of restaurants, shops, and markets. Before arriving, I had done some homework and had a handful of things booked and planned for me to do. One of those things: visit the Frida Kahlo museum.

As someone with a little bit of visual art training, I knew enough about Frida to be excited to check out the museum, but not enough to purchase a ticket in advance. I had gotten pretty comfortable with taking the metro and had already taken it down to Coyoacán for that mole-making class, so I figured I’d find something to do or explore if I couldn’t get in.

“If the tickets are sold out, you could walk over to the Leon Trotsky Museum if socialist and communist history is your thing,” Alex said to me as we were finishing coffee and getting ready to start our days. Leon Trotsky? That name only rang a bell because I had seen it while researching things to do in CDMX a month or so before. I really did not have any knowledge of leftist history, but there were a few other things I was currently researching where socialism kept coming up — Black American Secular/Freethinker History and the Black Radical tradition. That was enough to make it a viable plan B if I couldn’t get into Casa Azul.

I made it to the Frida Kahlo Museum and saw both a line wrapping around the block and people being turned away. I walked up to confirm that they were sold out for the day, and after realizing just how close the Trotsky museum was, I headed over there. I don’t remember the entry fee, but it wasn’t much. Their website currently lists it at 40 pesos (about 2 US dollars). When I arrived, there was no line, and it was quite empty. Everything was in Spanish, and so it took me longer to read everything, but I read everything. Whatever I didn’t understand, I did my best to translate, but I realized I had too many questions and couldn’t keep up!

This was one of the sparks that led me down a road of what I call my “political awakening,” or what you could call the revolution that will not be televised.

I’ve been going through a revolution in my head for a long time, and since that trip in 2022, it has been in high gear, full speed. I’ve changed so much over these last two years, and I love who I am. At the same time, I feel disconnected from friends, family, and loved ones. Spiritual growth tends to do that.

As I continue to learn, I want to begin to share. I’ve been in a state of overflowing creativity and have been writing music, poems, and even stories. How I’d love to spend most of my waking hours working on art, but life ain’t cheap, and these bills won’t pay themselves. I don’t really consider myself a writer, but I do love it. If you’ve made it this far, then thank you. Hopefully, my rambling makes sense, and perhaps you can relate to it. This journal on my website is a look inside my head, a voice into the void, a way to practice writing, part of my process of learning, and a call for connection.