I observe mine, but I dont really like celebrating it. I'm uncomfortable with the concept of having a party for/about myself, so I typically keep mostly to myself that day. last year I was out of the city on my birthday, and only saw my bf, and we made pasta at home. not sure what I'm doing this year but probably something equally low-key. recieving a present makes me really uncomfortable if I don't have something to give in return, so that's another ding against birthdays for me

I do enjoy getting older, and having a time to reflect on personal growth+development, but I do more of that at new year's than around my birthday

(btw I've been mostly out of it, so happy birthday to whoever's birthday it is!)

my answer is fairly intangible, so I'll give two answers. my first and honest one is a better version of myself. that's basically how my life feels anyway, with self-improvement never quite getting me where I want to be

the more tangible/feasible/fun answer is harder to come up with, but I think maybe it would be my cell phone. taking that away from me would be a Very Serious Punishment + a particularly intense thing to tease with. it feels like it's a part of my own body, and like the part of my body which most connects me to the rest of the world (as well as the place where I make notes for myself). it's like a part of my brain that you can touch (and by and large, I dont let people touch it)

I think it would be very in-character for me to have a mutation that is impossible to cover up, like wings, or whatever Beast has. basically like something which causes me to be alienated by society.

at the same time, the power I would want more than anything is the ability to stop time while retaining the capacity to affect matter + move freely (I know this power makes no scientific sense, but it's what I want). I would loooove to be able to effectively have infinite time to read, write, sleep, have breakdowns, etc. also the heist potentials are ripe. I'm not sure how that power could manifest in a way which makes me look visibly different, maybe my eyes have an unnatural look to them or something

I would not stay on X's side for very long. I think I would be a star pupil for a while and then, after one too many fights with folks there, run off and join the gay punk mutant subculture that must exist.

I think this depends. I know a few straight men who regularly get mistaken for gay, and are sometimes thusly harassed, just because they don't take up a lot of space or stuff like that. but I dont think that's what you're asking? bc of course there are ways to "seem gay" which have nothing to do with appearing to have same-gender attraction

I think any kind of gay sensibility probably revolves around either 1. things that the larger culture deems gender non-conforming; or 2. things that rise to popularity within gay communities. for example, poetry and zines tend to proliferate in queer spaces, while they remain genres that the larger culture doesnt care for.

but most aesthetics and genres and values that gain traction in the gay community can probably be linked in some way to same-gender attraction (eg. cruising culture coming out of gay men not being able to openly pursue their sexual interests) or to gender non-conformity (men liking female pop stars is considered faggy, and so only fags allow themselves to like female pop stars). this includes poetry and zines, because they are cheap to produce and assume a small audience, which suits artists that fail to gain a cishetero following. I dont think I believe in a gay soul though, or whatever, I'm much more likely to chalk things up to the material realities of the culture

yeah so not a lot of cool clothes get made in my size, and also I get harassed even when I wear stereotypically masculine shit, so dressing in fun ways can be difficult. that said, I still do it to some extent, and find ways to express myself even if it makes the world uncomfortable (like I do absolutely wear shirts with homoerotic imagery, tiny tight shorts, leather/pvc collars...). sometimes I make compromises, like wearing Hawaiian shirts because it's the only acceptable way to get colour into my wardrobe, and also the buttons let me show off my chest hair lol

but if I could dress however I wanted... basically like, I'd wear long slouchy coats, more patterns, more straps + harnesses, faux/fur, do fun stuff with eyeshadow, mesh shirts... I'd probably be a lot more goth. here are a couple of pics, just as examples

https://goo.gl/images/Mf5KL7
https://66.media.tumblr.com/6c6e2f7909fb532db10c79ea7615a421/tumblr_orkcxnH8k31tr28bbo1_1280.jpg

also a lot of rick owens stuff. rick owens but sluttier

I wrote up a long answer because, at first, I didnt think I could think of one. most lgbtq artists that I like are people who I knew were queer and got into partly as a way of unlearning my internalized homophobia. but I just remembered a couple

when I was young I was a fairly stereotypically masculine person, to the point of over-compensation, and also someone who like was confused/doubtful about the concept of a broader queer community. basically I was kind of a shit. but I did really like the band Judas Priest, and the band Against Me!, which both fell comfortably within the acceptable limits for """masculine""" musical tastes. since then, rob halford has come out as gay, and laura jane grace as trans.

in my later teen years I started intentionally seeking out queer artists. it went slowly at first, and now it's a big deciding factor into who I'm willing to give a chance, but it used to be that the first whiff of gender non-conformity would repel me (unless it was couched in some real toxic masculinity like Korn or MSI or Brett Easton Ellis or whatever)

hooo boy... it's really hard for me to think of anything from those years in a happy light. a lot of it was objectively unpleasant or painful, and even more of it has been retroactively ruined by embarrassment/shame or my relationship to certain people changing for the worse after the fact. another complicating factor is that, due to ptsd brain, I have very few complete memories from that time in my life

I think my favourite memory is probably from when I was in like grade 9, and I went to a friend's house for a shindig with a few pals. it was really pleasant, we sang songs together and watched movies, and we laid on our backs in the street near her house (she lived at the end of a cul-de-sac, so there was very little traffic), and stuff like that. we had a few get-togethers like that over the years and they were a lot of fun. I liked that friend group a lot, and she had a basement that we could have all to ourselves. so I'm kinda blending together the memories of all the different times we hung out there