The Woman Within

A couple of random incidents yesterday combined to really light up my day and reaffirm my faith in hope for the human race.  I will admit that it is often simply the very few individuals who conspire to make life an obstacle course of hurdles and whose actions shadow the majority of the good and the love which truly permeates the world at its core. I was in BJ's yesterday stocking my shopping cart with the necessities of life and, for the life of me, could not find the one last item I was looking for.... a case of Annie's Macaroni and Cheese.  I spied a woman busily stocking a shelf and assumed she was a store employee.  I approached and asked her if she knew where the Mac and Cheese was and she replied that she was simply a contract vendor and not a regular store employee.  I apologized for my assumption and we engaged in small talk for a few moments in the crowded store. I consigned myself to the fact that I would be one item short of my list when I headed to t...

I haven't really blogged much lately and what I have written about, I've tried to keep topical and with an air of positivity. The reality is that there is so much more going on and it is hitting me from so many different angles and so many different areas in life that it is beginning to become too much for me to handle. This is isn't anything anyone else can resolve and it's not anything that therapy is going to help. This isn't anything that is going to be easier in making a choice and no easier if I do not. I don't even know where to start with any of this. So much of this started long before and so much has just been added to the pile of minutia which in totality has become a burden left for me alone and for some and other aspects for both of us to bear. The other day, I was out to do some Christmas shopping. Driving through the mountains along the nearly empty interstate highway that evening, some thoughts came to mind. I felt very comfortable and ...

Each of us has to come to the point upon which we stand in our lives in a unique way... following a unique path which is ours alone. Decisions we have made, paths we have chosen, decisions made for us by others, situations not of our control which have guided us.... guided or confined us... to walk the paths which have brought us to this exact place where no other stands. As humans we are similar in many ways, and many share similar paths, but no two are the same. In the parting mists, a self-awareness of my own place in the universe has come to unfold. It is as if, with clarity, I can see the cruise control I have been on for much of my life in chasing an ideal which was solely my own, but one contrived and built by others... parents, societal, and peer expectations. As a young child, I so wanted to fit in, that I created a goal at a young age... plans... to achieve specific positions and tangibles in life to that end. In so doing, I created a sense of uniformity and normalcy t...

Be it far from me to ever wish to stratify, segregate, elevate or separate myself within the transgender realm, yet interestingly, I have begun to notice and piece together just this sort of rift which has begun to developed.  In the transgender continuum, there is a huge difference between "doing" and "being".  There are many I know who find that simply emulating a woman in form and fashion is but enough to suffice their being.  They are those who "do".  Dressing and emulating the feminine form are the key and primary factors.  Photos and pictures arise in high numbers which validate presence and to entice with a show of form. Then there are those of us who are out as transgender women, as women.... who dress because that is who they are and feel they are... deep inside.   The dressing is simply a state which provides for the congruency which exists deep within and allows for integration and association within the female group which one feels most comfo...

How can so many smiling pictures I post not even come close to portraying what hurt and sadness and betrayal I feel inside?  It truly amazes me how well I have learned over the years and decades to bury these feelings so well.  Yet still, I am unable to forever hide this pain and these thoughts from my self.  This post is one which will be different from the many you may have read.  I truly do not like to vent my sadness or my hurt and would rather choose to post only the bright and positive and of the good of things to come.  But the weight that has been hiding and lurking within is becoming more and more omnipresent in my conscious thoughts by day and my agitated lucid dreams by night. My mom passed away a horrible death from dementia in January... something I blogged about in this link here . It was the end to many of the dark secrets and  more dark secrets I had written about and hoped were put firmly behind me.  Yet the box of Pandora is rarel...

I know many who say or who have said that "Halloween is the 'free night out' for crossdressers and transgender individuals alike. I suppose that, in one sense, it is... but in many ways it is not as well. For those who have spent countless anxiety ridden years hiding their feminine sides from the world in fear, it is a night that can bring a sense of acceptance or, at the very least, a perceived tolerance when they step out the door into the world for that one night. I beg to differ however in the entire premise of that perception.  The realizations are subtle but poignantly made in my last stop of my story of that evening... Joanne and I went out for a night on the town on Halloween Night. Neither of us were dressed for Halloween as we were not heading for a party, but rather, were heading out for an evening of shopping and dining. At the local Kohl's, no one perceived or was cognizant of any variance from the gender I was presenting as... save for one young, 1...

So I popped into Lowes last night for more wainscotting and liquid nails (sigh... not the gel ones that look pretty). I walked into the store thinking I looked pretty much like a guy... and even J agreed. Apparently I don't.... Approaching the register, a youngish girl cashier announces that her register was closed... but then takes a look at me after saying this and lights up with a smile from ear to ear and decides hurriedly that she would reopen the register. It wasn't a snirky smile or one of silent laughter from her. It was that look of "I know your secret and it's way cool". So I dropped my "hey,how you doin?" sort of pretense and and wafted into girl talk with her for the next several minutes. She wasn't interested in that sort of "I'd like to go out on a date" way... She was interested in me as a unique feminine person that drew her in a positive way toward me. So recapping this with J in the car, it amazes me how much more ap...