Ultimately, my goal with everything I'm doing in kayaking is to keep growing the sport, because I think it's an amazing space and amazing way to interact with the environment.

But it's traditionally been for white men. So women, people of color, have avoided it.

There's a lot of issues both with machismo type things that turn off a lot of women and also with cost and expectations like camping in the woods, buying outdoor gear, knowing what to buy, having a resource to help you get there -- that affects people who didn't grow up already going out camping, or boating, or have friends who are in this space.

One of the reasons that I'm so out and telling my story, is to help create that space.

There are other trans whitewater kayakers, even in my friend group. One of my friends paved the way up here. They’re nonbinary and had some run ins, initially but at this point, everybody loves them.

I have this friend, Maddie, who lives in Vermont. She came out to New York, and we got her on the river and kind of pushed her to get better, and she herself has found kayaking was one of the ways that she dealt with being trans.

It gave her the freedom to be both active but alo be in her head and do her thing.

I also made a new friend this fall at a river festival that I hosted with my crew, for 450 people -- we had people from all over the US and Canada come to this festival.

For three days, I was standing at the gate, taking people's money and giving them directions, telling them what rivers are running, where to go, while being 100% out.

It's not something I imagined even a year ago, that I could comfortably stand in front of hundreds of people, and just be me. And to the community's credit, nobody even batted an eye, it's really wild.

[As told to @Ragi Gupta — continued tomorrow]