Wisconsin Life

The Trans Handy Ma'am wants to help you repair your apartment

[bright piano music]

Mercury Stardust: It’s all about helping the person who’s the most marginalized, right? It’s all about helping the person who knows the least in the room.

[music continues]

Mercury Stardust: Nothing makes you feel more of a human than when you are helping people in need. Hey there, hi, my name is Mercury Stardust. I’m the intersectional feminist trans maintenance lady. I can help you.

[music continues]

Mercury Stardust: I was a professional maintenance technician at a property management company where I had to take care of 150 units, about 500 residents. It was a really tough job. On day one, I heard people talk about racial slurs. Day one, I heard people say transphobic things. That can be really difficult to be able to be a marginalized person in that space because you want there to be change, and you don’t wanna be a problem.

[music continues]

Mercury Stardust: I was scrolling TikTok, and then I saw someone who was very upset. It was as a mom of, like, two or three kids. She was, you know, crying in this video, saying, “Hey, I don’t know what to do.” And when you’re watching a video like that, as a person who was often told I was stupid for not knowing certain things, I related to her in that moment and I wanted to educate her in a way that I wish I was educated to. So I turned on the camera and I said, “Hey, I’m gonna make a video.” I had no idea what I was doing.

Mercury Stardust: Oh, that is a great question. Let me show you what this little thing does.

Mercury Stardust: I posted the video and I didn’t really think much of it. Woke up the next morning, I had, like, 100,000 followers. That video had now hit, like, 600,000 people. And my life changed so fast.

Mercury Stardust: A lot of you are new here, so let’s do an intro, shall we? My name is Mercury, and I am the Trans Handy Ma’am. Get a piece of cardboard, place it right underneath the nail. This is a flange plunger. It’s gonna make your life a whole lot easier.

Mercury Stardust: I would work my 10-hour shift and then I would clock out, and then I would go and do, like, a four-hour live. And I would sit there in a live stream and just answer questions.

Video Commenter: This video is for Mercury Stardust, the maintenance lady.

Mercury Stardust: When the management came to me and said, “Hey, we found your TikToks and those funny little videos online,” as they called them, were not rubbing them the right way. I left in 2021, about three months after I started my TikTok career. But yeah, I haven’t looked back since.

Mercury Stardust: But now, you just gotta go a little bit farther. But you’re in the right direction. And that’s gonna be the plunger and your Cobra skinny drain cleaner. That’s called acting.

[laughter]

Mercury Stardust: It’s kind of bringing an intersectional lens to the DIY space, where if you can help the person who’s the most marginalized, the person who’s most affected by the systems that are oppressing, then you’re able to kind of help every single person.

Mercury Stardust: But I am telling you right now, you can wear jeans, overalls, no bra, and do this work and get a little dirty, and have nail polish still, and get a job done. It doesn’t matter.

[saw buzzing]

Mercury Stardust: It’s been a wild thing. I mean, I wrote a book, to become a number-one New York Times bestselling book. I also do a podcast called The Handy Ma’am Hotline. I answer questions all the time.

Mercury Stardust: Naturally want to come and swing out. Do you know what I mean?

Mercury Stardust: I also raise money for Point of Pride. Point of Pride is a nonprofit organization that provides gender-affirming care for people who are not able to access it.

Crowd: And share the live!

Mercury Stardust: In the last three years, I’ve raised $4.5 million total. It’s a wild experience to be, like, you’re strapped to a rocket and you’re just shooting off into space. And now here you are, trying to figure this out.

[Mercury laughing]

Mercury Stardust: I think the overarching theme of all the work that I do is about just taking up space. It’s about just being myself and doing the things that I care about. Right now, trans people are the center of every gosh darn topic. We are 1% of the population, but we’re 95% of the conversation. We’re being talked about, but never talked to.

Mercury Stardust: Thank you for sharing that story.

Mercury Stardust: The world that I care about is about providing services to others. Be it from providing gender-affirming care to people who can’t access it.

[Mercury cheering]

Mercury Stardust: We just jumped up to a million and five!

Person off-camera: What?

Mercury Stardust: Being providing, you know, home repair knowledge. You already know how to solve this problem before you even start. Be it just connecting with people on a human level. I enjoy those things.

Mercury Stardust: I wanna let you know, you don’t have to shave your eyebrows off. You know?

[laughing]

Mercury Stardust: Am I gonna be here in five years? I don’t know. Am I gonna be here in 10 years? I don’t know. But I would love to be the Betty White of the maintenance world.

[laughing]

Mercury Stardust: Live until I’m 105, fixing drywall and making people smile. That’d be great. Have a good day, take care, and remember, you’re worth the time it takes to learn a new skill. Buh-bye!

[bright music]