Jul
30
Enough already! Now we’re harassing teenage girls courtside?
Sophie Cunningham is against trans girls/women competing with cis girls/women. She has her reasons, and from what I have heard, none of them include hatred or bigotry towards transgender people.
She is entitled to her opinion.
The fact that she is being attacked for expressing it looks bad on all of us.
Leave her be.
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Jul
27
I think we got a new mailman. For the past few weeks, I have found letters only halfway put through the mail slot, which I find upsetting for two main reasons. First, they get rained on, and I get a wet rag instead of a letter. And second, they are vulnerable to anyone coming by and pulling them out, and getting access to my private information in that way.
I always thought that mail was a minor miracle – how you write an address on an envelope, add a few cents postage, and it gets delivered with surprising accuracy and speed to places near and far. But I am doing what I can to reduce my mail deliveries because I can see so many vulnerabilities in the system – one of which is mail left sticking out of mailboxes. It is a surprisingly difficult task to accomplish because certain important places, like government, ignore your preferences and send sensitive mail regardless.
Being peeved at my mailman meant I was always on the lookout for the guy, so I could grab him and shake him and ask him what was the matter with him that he couldn’t put the mail INSIDE the mailbox. And my chance came last week, just at the end of a pretty tough outdoor workout.
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Jul
08
I let my Instagram followers in on a little secret of mine. But you already knew. Click “Read More” to see what it is.
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Jul
03
I attended a wedding recently, and sat at a table with some very old friends, male friends, from my previous life.
It was a nice time to catch up with everyone and to enjoy dancing to a surprisingly appealing choice of music from decades ago, with a few more modern but nevertheless upbeat tunes mixed in.
As happens in large gatherings, conversations flowed among the group, involving changing sub-groups as the night wore on. When I wasn’t included, I was only too happy to scoot onto the dance floor and dance by myself, letting my heart soar with the energizing beat. I even asked one of my lonelier-looking guy friends to dance at one point.
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Jun
30
This seems to be my summer for reading. I just finished Penny Aimes’ For the Love of April French and I have to say it’s a winner.
The book follows a couple that meets in a bar catering to BDSM. April is a transgender submissive and Dennis is a meticulous dom. Not being in that lifestyle, I found the BDSM aspect a bit distracting. But I did learn a lot about why it is appealing, even if I cared a lot more about their relationship as simply man and trans woman. To be fair, there is an interesting interplay between the two.
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Jun
27
Last night was the Trans March. It is the first of three marches put on by the local LGBTQ+ community to celebrate transgender people, gay women and then the big one for the entire spectrum. It is meant to show we exist, and to express certain political opinions.
But, as with many years before, when it comes to the Trans March, there is no press coverage at all, nothing you can even find about it on Google, except a video of the event. No opinion pieces, commentary. Nothing.
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Apr
03
Today I found myself in a boutique shop that sells all manner of cocktail supplies. The only service person in the store was a young man – early twenties, I’d guess – very feminine, and actually quite beautiful.
My gender sensors identified him as a man, and that’s how I’ll refer to him, but I have no idea how he identifies or how he was born.
A few things struck me from our interactions. First is that, in writing this post, the inadequacy of language in this regard is quite obvious. Do I refer to this person as “him” or, if not, then what? Anything I choose is as likely to be as wrong as it is right, and I don’t see a way to write this post without gender-specific pronouns.
Second, not knowing his gender didn’t matter – at least not to me. I found him attractive and helpful and personable – and none of that need have a gender.
Third, I thought about the wonderful freedom he had – to be male or female or both or neither or something else entirely. Lucky him! He could change from day to day, or not, or he could change by the minute if he pleased. What a kaleidoscopic way to experience life and learn about yourself!
Once upon a time, I had a gift of sorts to be able to present and behave alternately as a masculine male or a feminine female, but my mindset had these compartmentalized and it was a determined effort. Also, it turned out that one side was real and the other a relic. Here, it is much more organic, and the change I saw in him from being very feminine one moment, to affecting a male presence the next is what prompted me to these thoughts.
Last, this privilege he has, well, it is a gift of youth. It won’t last long. Sure, he gets to experiment and try every possibility out if he wants to, but eventually he will grow into something less flexible – at least physically. Will he pine for the days he was a chameleon of sorts, or will he grow comfortably into whatever identity most suits him?
Like everything else, it seems, that will be up to him.
Mar
26
Not everything can be about angst and self-doubt. Sometimes, a girl’s just living life, having cocktails and a nice dinner.
It feels nice just to be. Y’know?
Mar
20
Will It Always Be Hard?
Health and Beauty / Introspection / Out in the World / Transgender Life Posted by Janie
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5 comments
I am Janie. That other part of me has receded into, well, I don’t know where. I live my life pretty much like any other woman.
And yet…
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Mar
15
I have done a lot more writing than reading when it comes to trans experiences. But now that I’m on a reading kick, I am discovering how powerful it feels to me when transgender authors express experiences I have had through their lenses.
The whole thing is making me a bit emotional. First, there’s that sense of community, of shared feelings and responses that I never got even from all those trans events I attended over the years, where I got to know so many terrific people. I now get to sit in the quiet of my home and let these messages wash over me rather than having to have a ready answer for a conversation-mate, or a quick reply before the music or other revelers intruded.
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