David Minerva Clover

David Minerva Clover

Bio

David Minerva Clover is a queer and transgender writer, covering everything from parenting to why dinosaurs are awesome. His work has appeared in The Washington Post, New York Mag, The Establishment, and many other places. He lives in beautiful Detroit Michigan with his spouse, one child, and an embarrassment of animals. Check out his blog at Postnuclear Era or follow him on twitter at @dm_clover.

David Minerva Clover Articles

What I love, what I’m most interested in (at least in terms of written and spoken word), is the telling of stories.

Selling Yourself For Scraps: Why I Love Personal Essays

But what I did write, and write constantly, were diaries and journals. I kept notebooks and three-ring binders filled with observations about my life that I thought were interesting. Sometimes I worried that these personal stories were too naval-gazing, but I still held on to them, hoping that someday someone would want them.

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Is it possible to keep my trans family safe?

How Can I Keep My Trans Family Safe Under Trump's Administration?

The Trump administration plans to define trans people like me out of existence. How can I keep my trans family safe now?

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When you hold travel up on some kind of pedestal, you sound classist as hell. Image: Joshua Earle/Unsplash.

Your Obsession With Travel Sure Feels Classist To Me

I don’t get out much — and it’s not because I don’t have a sense of adventure or don’t care about learning about the larger world: It’s because I’m broke.

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There are definitely classist roots in here, but I still like Konmari. Image: Thinkstock.

This Sh*t Brings Me Joy: Konmari For Poor Folks

Getting rid of all of your stuff is all well and good if you are childfree, but if you have the fortune (or misfortune) to have children, they literally will not let you.

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Pretty much nobody wants to be called a housewife. Pretty much everyone agrees that it’s degrading to spend your time doing housework. Housework is the ultimate invisible labor.

I’m Not A Stay-At-Home-Mom, I’m A Queer Housewife, Thanks

One of the most insidious things that patriarchy does is the complete and utter devaluation of anything that is considered “women’s work.” Not only does patriarchy limit what women (and all trans and nonbinary folk) can do in the world, it also takes what we do manage to do and tells us it isn’t worth anything.

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Listen, a vagina is not an artificial waterway for babies to be born.

Let's Talk About Genitals: The Term Birth Canal Is The Actual Worst

The way we as a society discuss genitalia is already messed up and confusing. When the word “vagina” is used to mean everything from, well, “vagina” to “vulva” to “the entire female reproductive system — yes, even including the ovaries,” it’s no freaking wonder we don’t know how to talk about this stuff.

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The reality is that I did not become poor because I ate a meal in a restaurant one too many times.

Yes, Poor People Eat Out Sometimes, Deal With It

I’m a poor person. I live below the U.S. poverty line. And yeah, I deserve to make my own financial decisions. The reality is that I did not become poor because I ate a meal in a restaurant one too many times, and while it’s true that eating out less can affect one’s budget, refusing to ever eat out again won’t make me not poor.

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Photo By Dr. François S. Clemmons [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)], from Wikimedia Commons

Things I Learned Binge-Watching Mister Rogers With A Toddler

I learned binge-watching Mister Rogers that he wasn’t just being comforting, he was rephrasing many of the things I was hearing in therapy.

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When subtle homophobia meets the three of us out in public, it looks back and forth from face to face and eventually just asks, “So, whose kid?” Image: Thinkstock.

It's The Casual Homophobia That Hurts My Family Most

Despite our relative insulation from homophobia, my wife and I are not unaware of the situation. There are plenty of people in this country who don’t believe that we have the right to exist, to be married, or to raise a child together.

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It was like a part of myself woke up, but it was a part of myself that I was sure was dirty and wrong; a part of myself that I was sure I could squish down if I just tried hard enough.

I Just Have To Tell Someone About This Weird Thing I Do: On Discovering Masturbation

It was like how you might feel if you thought you were the only person who liked apples. Maybe everyone else just thought apples were for decoration, but you liked to eat them. And then one day you found someone else who also ate apples, and you got really excited about that! And then suddenly, it hit you… What if everybody secretly ate and enjoyed apples, only we were all too afraid to mention it?

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