When masculinity goes down the toilet.

It was the Philadelphia Eagles stadium--a shrine to masculinity. I was there to hang artwork for The Print Center. In addition to the on field pursuits, the owners of the Eagles also donate money to the arts and have local galleries and schools hang artwork in their club lounges. It was my first year on the job the first time the union workers had had a seemingly straight guy come in to hang art. Not only was I "straight," but I love football. I was excited to be there and the carpenters could tell. I got a tour of the field, got to walk through the visiting team's tunnel. I felt like one of the guys.

After a couple hours of "supervising" I had to pee. It was the off season so the stadium was pretty empty. One of the carpenters unlocked the men's room. I walked into a stall and sat down hoping no one else walks in. I still believe that men can hear that I am sitting down to pee. I quickly did my business and went to stand and pull my pants up when I hear a loud splash. I freeze, look down between my legs into the bowl and see my dick floating in the yellow water of the toilet.

My first thought was to sacrifice the dick. Just flush and run. Or just leave it? I spend what feels like forever just staring at the silicone soft pack bobbing just below the surface. I have to do something. I man up, fish my dripping penis out of the toilet and wrap it in cheap, single ply toilet paper. Then what? I knew I couldn't stuff a urine soaked soft pack in my pocket. I'd have to wash it off. I begin to panic. The stadium was empty except for the crew, but what would happen if someone walked in and saw me soaping up a soft pink penis, detached from my body, in the bathroom sink? I knew that if someone were to need the restroom, now would be the time.

I scurry to the sink. Rushing while trying to look like everything is normal. I run my dick under the painfully loud stream of water, picking off bits of toilet paper. Once I make it back to the stall I stuff it in my pants. After a few deep breaths I walk back out to the club lounge. So much for manhood.

A Line in the Sand Revisited

I had just been thinking of the Semenya story (the runner with ambiguous gender) today and wondered what ever came of it. Someone brought it up at dinner and I heard some of the rumors. Then a friend posted this link and asked what are they doing to this girl?

Turns out she may be gender variant. Read the story. I've already said most of my thoughts in my origional post (linked above) but I think the last line of the video is the most interesting--"if she didn't know, she wasn't cheating. it's not like she was taking drugs" (quoted very loosely). There are, again, so many bigger theoretical questions but now, in the very base level of competition, I am also wondering--if she is "mostly male" (whatever that means) and were to compete with the boys--how would she do? Even better--assert she is a woman and say fuck all you all and race the men. We could use another Billy Jean King!

I got a name...

My name and gender are finally legally changed. There are still hoops to jump through and forms to submit, but that's just busy work. I am no longer at the mercy of courts and judges and someone else's opinions.

I thought this day would come with me screaming and cheering from the rooftops. Initially just the feelings of relief were overwhelming. When I finally heard the news I didn't cheer--I quietly began shaking. The end of waiting. Anna and Laura knew because they were with me, but beyond that I didn't tell anyone. I didn't know how. Although it's an obvious milestone it also felt like a very strange thing to share. I told my parents that night, gradually told my friends, but for a very public transition this was a very private milestone. I've been met with some very unexpected mixed feelings--moments of questioning.

I don't regret my transition, but I do often miss my dyke self. This name I have given up feels like the last public part of that identity. Getting carded in public was often embarrassing and awkward, but getting carded at a gay bar made it look like I belonged. Even if I publicly walk through every minute of every day as a man, I still carried a little bit of my history in my wallet.

I haven't worked out all these feelings yet. Looking back I remember myself as a strong, outspoken, confident dyke. Now I often feel like an awkward, timid self-conscious man. I was watching Gran Torino recently and there is a scene where Clint Eastwood is teaching a teenage boy to be a man. The more time I spend as a man the more important those lessons I missed out on become. I assumed the life lessons learned as a woman and as a human would translate. I would be the same person needing the same skills in a slightly modified body. In many cases this is true. Dealings with friends and other women are comfortable and casual, but men treat men differently. This isn't bad, it's just different. It's something I have never learned. Men have thicker skin and mine is thin.

So this signed petition is met with relief and also a feeling of great responsibility. Relief that my presentation and documents are now consistent. The limitations I used to experience in travel, renting a car, in feelings of personal safety no longer have to be an issue. There is also a responsibility to myself to be honest and live with integrity. Responsibility to own my past though it could now easily be ignored. A responsibility to let go of my feelings of fear and danger--fear became a part of me and it's time to let it go.

A line in the sand

I don't know how many of you are aware of the Track and Field scandal surrounding Caster Semenya. This 18 year old from a South African village competed in the 800 meter run in Berlin and won by such a margin that her sex/gender (articles are mistakenly using the words interchangeably) is now being called into question. This investigation is raising so many questions that I don't even know where to start.

First there are the initial, somewhat surface questions. According to the New York Times (linked above) and the Yahoo article I have read, Semenya's sex/gender was initially called into question when she bettered her time in the 800 meters by more than seven seconds. What does it mean that someone performing well means that one can't possibly be a woman? Still, this alone is not enough to spark an investigation. There has to be further complaint. Complaints something like this, perhaps? (from the NY Times)

Some of Semenya’s competitors in the 800 meters considered the issue straightforward after Semenya romped to a commanding victory at the world championships Wednesday. “Just look at her,” said Mariya Savinova of Russia, who finished fifth. Elisa Cusma of Italy, who was sixth, told Italian journalists: “These kind of people should not run with us. For me, she’s not a woman. She’s a man.”

Her parents have no question about her gender and say she is simply a hard training and determined athlete. Her former head master thinks she is a boy because she only wears pants and plays soccer.

The process by which they are determining gender is complex and ultimately could end with just as much confusion and disagreement as they started with. This young runner will have to face a physical medical evaluation, and includes reports from a gynecologist, endocrinologist, psychologist, an internal medicine specialist and an expert on gender. They could find nothing abnormal, or they could find a host of genetic, hormonal or chromosomal variations. Either way, does that mean she is not a woman?

These inquiries are not new, but they aren't generally played out this publicly. I think this case will ultimately raise more questions than it answers, but these questions that will undoubtedly come up are things that I would really like to talk about.

At what point would Semenya be considered a man? Apparently the Bantu, a group of indigenous South African people, may be more predisposed to being hermaphrodites but they do not always have obvious male genitalia. They are genetically female yet have both testes and ovaries. Would her evolutionary heritage push her over the male line? Would high levels of testosterone make her a man? This could be caused by congenital adrenal hyperplasia. What is considered high? All women have some testosterone in their system and some have more than others. Would a Y chromosome determine her manhood? There are plenty of people who have chromosomal abnormalities most of whom never realize it. Is it looks? Is it actions? Is it a court (as I just experienced first hand)

And if it is deemed that she isn't "entirely female" does that mean she is not allowed to compete? Most athletes have some sort of genetic predisposition that makes them more talented than the average person. Lance Armstrong has enormous lungs, Michael Phelps has a perfectly designed swimmers body, but because their abnormalities aren't tied to gender their achievements aren't in question.

Whatever the ruling body decides will not really be the truth and it won't bother to answer the broader questions of what makes a man or a woman and what does that distinction mean?

“It turns out genes, hormones and genitals are pretty complicated,” Alice Dreger, a professor of medical humanities and bioethics at Northwestern University, said in a telephone interview. “There isn’t really one simple way to sort out males and females. Sports require that we do, but biology doesn’t care. Biology does not fit neatly into simple categories, so they do these tests. And part of the reason I’ve criticized the tests is that a lot of times, the officials don’t say specifically how they’re testing and why they’re using that test. It should be subject to scientific review.” “But at the end of the day, they are going to have to make a social decision on what counts as male and female, and they will wrap it up as if it is simply a scientific decision,” Dreger said. “And the science actually tells us sex is messy. Or as I like to say, ‘Humans like categories neat, but nature is a slob.’ ” From the New York Times, Aug. 20, 2009

I couldn't have said it better myself--except maybe I'd say nature is more imaginative than sloppy.

Whoa, Baby

The appearance of Thomas Beatie on the cover of the Philadelphia Weekly's "Queer Issue" a couple weeks ago sparked a whole new wave of feelings, many of which I've been struggling for the past couple weeks to explain. As far as pregnant trans men go, I don't feel so black and white about it as many people I know do. In general I say do what you want to do. Live and let Live. Unfortunately it's so much more complicated than that.

I would personally love to have a baby, but there are concerns beyond just simply wanting to have a child. For one thing, I'm concerned about what the effects of incubating a baby in eggs that have been pickling in testosterone would be. Medical issues aside, however, I don't think that wanting to have a child is an intrinsically female thing. I think more men would choose to have babies if it were genetically possible. In many cases it has been women that have had the strongest reaction to the Pregnant Man story. For some it is a mental misunderstanding of the difference between Gender Identity and Sex making some wonder why he would transition if he wanted to have a baby. I can explain this away with some clarity, but I can't explain away the feelings and resentments that seem to linger.

I do have major issues that go much deeper and are much more complicated than simple medical concerns. Thomas Beatie was all over the news. GLBT groups, many at a loss for how to respond, issued statements criticising the sensationalization in the media, but it can't be ignored that Beatie was the one that put his story out there. Although seemingly mild mannered and "shy," this level of attention can be very addictive. He doesn't seem to have considered the needs of the greater community nor is he conscious of the effect his actions have with regards to social and legal matters. I struggle because I don't want to say that if you don't fit the mainstream queer you should shut up. The mainstream becomes a bigger and bigger stream everyday and a stream I didn't fit in not too long ago.

However, I think it is every queer persons responsibility to manage their visibility responsibly and be conscious of the greater community. I personally got really nervous when he showed up on the cover of the Philly Weekly as I'm waiting for my court date for my legal name and gender change. The Advocate--the first to break the Beatie story--also offered an article on it's potential aftermath for trans advocates. Here's an excerpt, but check out the rest of the article here.

"Some trans activists also note that this story has a high “ick” factor for the general population. The first reactions [author Jamison] Green read online were discouraging. “They wrote ‘disgusting’ or asked, ‘How can someone do that to themselves and think he is a man?’ and worse,” he recalls. “I worry that for the uneducated and less accepting, this brings back the whole ‘freak’ label to transgender people.” When she saw the teaser for the Oprah show, alarm bells went off for Cathy Renna, managing partner of Renna Communications, a New York City–based firm that develops communications strategies for LGBT organizations. “My sense is that this story has all the hallmarks of one that could be easily sensationalized—one that could easily set back some of the improvements that have been made by transgender people,” she says. “Beatie’s article opened the Pandora’s box.”

Think about what happened in 2003 after the Massachusetts supreme judicial court ruled that the state had to allow marriage as an option for gay couples. Other state governments panicked. Twenty-three states amended their constitutions to limit marriage to one man and one woman, joining three that had done so earlier. Some states, such as Michigan, even went further—using their amendment to justify denying health benefits to the gay partners of state employees.

“Generally, with the public and mainstream media we’re still doing Trans 101,” says Renna. “I worry this kind of story will create a whole new level of regulation. Anti-trans groups will use this as ammunition to influence politics to make laws that won’t let trans people make decisions about their own body. I so hope I’m wrong.”

That’s not just negative thinking. In Japan it’s illegal to transition if you’ve already given birth or fathered a child. So far no such law exists in this country, although three states—Idaho, Ohio, and Tennessee—will not allow their transgender citizens to legally change their gender on birth certificates."

It was his appearance on Oprah that partially got me jammed up in Michigan with the Department of Vital Records pointing to his story as a reason I could not change my birth certificate. Still, my court date is probably a couple months away and if Oprah couldn't keep him in the spotlight I doubt PW will. The story already seems to have waned.

But even in its waning, the existence of more and more pregnant men can't be ignored and I know it's an issue many transmen struggle with. I asked one friend about his issues. "I don't know. I guess because it's sooo not something I would want to do and I consider being pregnant very female, in fact. [Also,}] I guess because I've struggled so long to be "accepted" as a "real live boy" that [FTM's getting pregnant] just make it harder for me with the rest of society because automatically people then assume I'm the same as so and so....I don't know. It's not a feeling/thought process I'm particularly proud of but...there it is."

I think most everyone considers being pregnant to be a very female thing, but would we if it didn't have to be that way? I don't know?

I understand why he feels that way and I don't think it's something he needs to be ashamed of. Beatie and others are making it difficult for other trans guys if not simply giving us one more thing in an already long list of things that we, as FTMs, need to explain. For a while I was bombarded with questions about Beatie simply because I am FTM. In many ways, these pregnant men are putting the quotation marks back around the "man" in transman.

However, I can't help but recall butch dykes not being asked to participate in early gay rights marches because they would make the "just like you" approach that lady-like lesbians were going for less effective. It's true that butches upset the mainstream appeal of white collar gays, but the "just like you" approach also doesn't really work in the long run.

I also think there's a definite pendulum swing to transitioning. It's necessary to overswing to really masculine and then you kind of swing back a bit. I don't know if i would have felt differently about Beatie's story in year one of my transition than I do now. I know I am different. I'm a different kind of guy. Lately I have been thinking a lot about reconciling all that makes me a man with everything that makes me different. Trying to be OK with that difference is really hard. It's hard not being in the same queer community, it's hard feeling different, and sometimes jealous, than other guys, it's hard figuring out how to have sex with my parts and not loose that masculinity. I feel like I'm in a back swing right now and it's really disorienting.

Ultimately, masculine is different for everyone--trans and biological guys alike. It doesn't have to be macho. A masculine swing could be whatever your version of masculinity is. If being a man for you always meant not having to wear a shirt in the summer than maybe you never wear your shirt in the summer. Then you eventually realize that all guys have to wear a shirt sometimes in the summer. Topless on the subway is not very classy as I was totally disappointed to learn.

I'm sure the Beatie stuff will all shake out in the wash and ultimately be good for the movement. I'm also sure that some people will be hurt in the process. I'm more interested in the internal dialogue that this could spark for the trans community. When so much of transitioning is about feeling "normal" for the first time in our lives, any threat to that can be really unsettling. Still, it's the freaks and outsiders that have changed the world. Personally I really wish Thomas Beatie would just shut up and go away, but publicly I'll defend his right to exist no matter how much I cringe while doing so.

Memories, cornered in my mind...

I spent the evening last night remembering my transition. I told all the great stories that had become lodged in my psyche, moments of awkward humor or brilliant awakening. In some ways I had meticulously recorded my transition, but, like all records, it was a record of things I wanted to remember. As the evening wore on, however, I began to recall moments that has just slipped away. I began to wonder about those moments that I simply didn’t want to recall. Moments that were so defeating and heartbreaking at the time that I didn’t think I would ever want to go back to them. We all remember those times when we begin to pass, but what about all the times we don’t.

Here I am years later being asked questions by two people that, together, provide my perfect combination of feigned confidence and total anxiety. I see myself in both of them so clearly that anxieties and fears I totally forgotten come rushing back. Some stories I’m learning are somewhat universal, moments that many if not all transmen share. Others are stories I keep hearing, stories that seem to be universal to everyone but me. Seemingly more common are the feelings--feelings of guilt, shame, awkwardness, annoyance, anger, fear, pride and bravado.

So, in the interest of full disclosure, here are some memories that at the time I probably preferred to forget…

I had decided to transition, I had decided to make art about it and that seemed to be the end of it. Nothing was happening. I didn’t know what to make work on, I didn’t look any different, but I went from a confident dyke to a terrified and nervous nothing. Maybe I wasn’t trying hard enough. Maybe if I only put a little effort into it something would begin to happen. If you knew me then you knew I had D breasts. I didn’t bind. It wasn’t because it was uncomfortable or hot or suffocating, though it certainly was all those things, it was that it didn’t work. I would have gladly turned my breasts into deflated pancakes if I though it would make me look like a man. It turns out that I passed more often when I didn’t bind. The minute I put on a binder my stomach turned into knots and any eye contact I made with the world took on a dear in headlights terror. This fear took away any masculinity I may have gained by a flat chest. Still, I kept going back to it. I wasn’t trying hard enough. I woke up that morning and decided to bind. Anna and I were going into Manhattan and I was going to be a man. I got out of the shower and with Anna’s help, began wrapping more and more fabric around my chest. A sports bra, ace bandages, another sports bra, an undershirt and then a sweater. It was the tightest I’d ever gotten things and I thought I looked good. I couldn’t breath, sit normally, walk normally or really talk, but surely I must look like a man. The entire subway ride into the city I was feeling alright. My eyes darted from face to face looking for any acknowledgement of my masculinity. The next stop was lunch—my first interaction with another human. The first words out of his mouth—“can I help you, ma’am?” I wanted to cry. I didn’t say anything trying to decide in that split second if I should correct him, trying to force myself to say “actually, it’s sir.” Instead all I could choke out through my constricted chest was “one slice of plain.”


I hoped the old wives tale was actually true—that when you shaved a hair a darker one grew back in its place. Before I took a drop of testosterone I was going to try to coax a beard out of my fair skin with shaving cream and a disposable razor. I went to the dollar store by my house in Brooklyn. I picked out some shaving cream from the shelf, but the razors were behind the counter. I gathered all my courage and asked for a bag of razors. The Dominican man behind the counter looked closely at me and then said “for your face?” Yes, I told him, thinking I had finally passed. “You don’t look Puerto Rican,” he tells me as he turns and grabbed a pink bag from the wall. I wrinkled my brow, not following. As he tossed the razors on the counter he explained that these were the best for ladies faces. Easy on the skin. All his customers prefer them. He didn’t think I was a man but a Puerto Rican lady trying to get rid of my feminine mustache. “I’m not Puerto Rican,” I said, affecting the lowest voice I could muster. I left before he could recommend a woman’s shaving cream.


And finally (for today)…
You know how annoying 13 year old boys can be? I Was That Annoying. The great thing for these kids is that they have no idea just how obnoxious they are, but when you have the mind of an adult and the hormone levels of a child you unfortunately know better. Even worse, there is nothing you can do to stop it. I was passing most of the time so I no longer had this look of terror frozen on my face. I was no longer spending all my energy trying to be a man, but belong. It was non-stop over compensation. This need to be a man, need for the approval of my peers, approval of girls, approval of adult men and although I saw myself as a train wreck in slow motion, there was nothing I could do to stop my hormonal wrangling not for king of the hill, but for a spot somewhere along the side of it. I would push a bit too hard, talk a bit too loud, and my jokes were a bit too inappropriate. I totally wanted to pee on things. I got drunk and spray-painted something (I have no idea what) on the side of a bodega. If I thought I could get away with body checking everyone on the subway I would have. I wanted to be a man, but as annoying as I was, I had to be a boy first.

Politics and the Popularity Contest

From "The Onion"

Grandmother Proud To Have Lived Long Enough To See First Viable Female Candidate Torn Apart
June 16, 2008 Issue 44•25

PEORIA, IL—Seventy-six-year-old grandmother Anita Graney told reporters Monday that she was "overwhelmed with pride" for having lived to see the first viable female presidential candidate in the nation's history so successfully run into the ground by vicious media attacks and hubristic, arrogant miscalculations. "Hillary [Clinton] showed America that a woman can be politically destroyed just as completely and heartbreakingly as any man," said Graney, a lifelong feminist. "What an amazing example for today's young women who aspire to fail spectacularly at the highest levels." Graney expressed hope that one of her granddaughters might someday be the first woman to get utterly eviscerated in a nationwide general election.

The Primaries are finally over. They have been over in Pennsylvania for some months. Certainly, most are thrilled that it’s over, but I can’t help but feel disappointed at the outcome. This has nothing to do with the potential abilities of Senator Obama. In fact, during the Pennsylvania Primary I’ll be the first to admit that I found his advertisements a bit intoxicating. I found his speeches inspiring when often times I found Clinton’s speeches would somehow make me cringe. Cringe because she sounds annoying, cringe because she sounds petty, cringe because I know she didn’t really mean it that way. She’s like a really old, dear friend that you try to introduce to your new “cool” group of friends and you keep feeling the need to apologize for her.

Still, in spite of all this cringing I still believe that she is the better candidate. I’ve long believed that the best presidents are also probably the worst campaigners. By this same token, some of the best campaigners make really awful presidents. George W. is a prime example of this.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I am completely confident that Obama will perform better than W., but I’m also confident that most anyone could perform better than W. I’ve discussed this campaign a lot with my mom, a strong, smart second wave feminist, and found that we both share this somewhat surprising intense feeling of sadness. What I fail to understand is how she got pegged as “the Washington machine” and he became this voice of inspiration. I remember listening to the Slate Political Gabfest and hearing them talk about the Super Delegates. This was just before the PA primaries and everyone was talking about how maybe, just maybe, if Hillary won by a big enough margin then maybe, just maybe the Super Delegates would decide she was the better candidate and give her the push she needed to get the nomination. As this conversation wore on Emily Bazelon (who always sounded to me like she really liked Hillary, but was embarrassed to say so) said that she just thought it would be a very bad political move for these Super Delegates to essentially take the nomination away from “the first viable African American candidate” and give it to Clinton.

Maybe I was sleeping for a few years, but when have we ever had a viable female candidate? When did the first woman president become less important than the first black male president? Clinton may have been involved in politics for a very long time, but I happen to think that can be a good thing. She spent her entire campaign on the defensive and the press counted her a looser before she even had a chance to play. All her supporters seemed to melt away as she no longer looked like the “cool” candidate, with only Tom Brokaw coming to her defense. Even just the fact that she is referred to by her first name and Obama by his last seems to imply some subtle underlying sexism.

Hillary Clinton came to Pennsylvania. She sent her daughter to Woody’s (a local gay bar) while Obama called the most famous lesbian he knew (Melissa Etheridge) and had her call in. Clinton may not always connect with the people, but at least she tried to do it in person. Obama settles for flashy TV adds and had Shepard Fairy make inspiring posters, allowing the "cool kids" to make his case with him. I know I sound angry, and I am.

I don’t mean to digress. I get it. She lost. Obama won. I know I’ll vote for him come November considering the alternative, but I just can’t wrap my heart around being an Obama supporter just yet. As a final thought I just want you to ask yourself why being against Barak Obama or even simply for Hillary Clinton made you a secret racist or working class stoop while everyone could freely rail on Hillary Clinton’s every move and no one was accused of being a raging sexist.

From The Chicago Tribune’s June 25 article Devil in a pantsuit or the demonization of Hillary Clinton

When the doctor checks to see if the patient is still breathing, it's disgust, not compassion, that leaks out between his syllables: "You couldn't kill her with an ax," he sneers.That patient—the wide-hipped, unwieldy woman at the heart of Dorothy Parker's 1929 short story "Big Blonde"—is a familiar image in books, films, songs, comic books, TV series, video games and, now, politics: The woman as monster. The over-large, over-ambitious, overbearing creature who irritates everybody, the death-defying witch who just won't go away—and who therefore must be destroyed.She's a vampire, a zombie, an alien, a werewolf, a psychopath, a serial killer. She's Alex, the Glenn Close character in "Fatal Attraction" (1987), who ... keeps ... on ... coming. She's the looming, clutching, stifling mother or wife or girlfriend in a Philip Roth novel. (Which novel? Take your pick.) She's the eerie, outlandish creature in the Sylvia Plath poem "Lady Lazarus" (1965), who proclaims, "Out of the ash / I rise with my red hair / And I eat men like air." She's the vengeful giantess in the 1958 film "Attack of the 50 Foot Woman."

It’s the acceptability of this rage that makes me the saddest. The complacence when Chris Matthews refers to Clinton as a she devil makes me furious. Perhaps the underlying rage has the same source for us both. You see, Clinton, to me, does not seem like a she-devil. She seems like a smart, compassionate, caring, assertive woman. She reminds me of my Mom.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, NOW BLOW ME

My birthday had ended a few hours ago, but in my drunken stupor that was nothing more than a technicality. I had settled comfortably into the beer stained sofa at The Boiler Room on the Lower East Side, sipping my drink and watching the interactions between the remaining men around the bar. As the night came to a close, it was clear everyone knew this was their final chance to find company for the night. A pudgy, balding thirty-something leaned in towards a lanky black man and lingered just a second too long. I sat back and smiled.

At the end of the bar one man sat alone, ready to make his move. He looked over, moved his glassy, drunken eyes up and down and squinted, either in an attempt to look sexy or focus. I wasn’t sure which. I am certainly no stranger to gay bars, but the directness of gay men’s dating rituals compared to the shy lesbian flirting I was used to never ceases to amaze me. After about five minutes, the man slid down from his bar stool. With a gaze that never left the direction of his prey, he walked slowly and deliberately past me into the bathroom. I turned to look behind me. No one followed him in. After a few minutes he emerged from the bathroom seeming angry and defeated. He stormed over to his stool, grabbed his coat and walked towards the door, first stopping directly in front of me. I looked up to see his rejected eyes glaring directly into mine.

At that moment I realized I was the one he was after. It was me he wanted to “do” in the bathroom. As the door swung closed behind him, a wave of excitement passed over me--not sexual excitement, but a misguided sort of pride. For the first time in my life I felt like a cheap piece of meat and I enjoyed it. I was the one being looked at. I was the man someone wanted for the night. Not only did this drunken stranger see me as a man, he saw me as a man he wanted to fuck. This was unlike my private sexual experiences where every fear and insecurity I’ve ever had can come to the surface. In this very public place I was a male sexual object. What had just occurred wasn’t a sexual day dream with 25 years of body disconnection behind it. This was a real life moment, lustful and sexual. The memory was permanent. Never would he know that my body was any different than his. Being desired like this did more for my confidence as a man than years of therapy ever could.

The haves and have-nots...

I’ve begun going to a gym. There little chance of me wasting away to nothing, but the physical activity does offset my love of cheese. This experience has become a rather intense lesson in the fragility and limitations of passing. I’ve joined with two friends. Both male, both gay. Having a set of queer backups added a certain amount of safety, but they aren’t always with me and even if they are, they don’t change the fact that I have no dick. It’s a tenuous and vulnerable space to begin with. Men with all their parts are cruising, or not cruising; looking and not looking and trying to not be looked at while they show off. It makes me very conscious of what I do and do not have. I do have scars. I don’t have a dick.

Do people notice when I am changing and wearing boxers? What about briefs? Are people looking, and if so, how closely? Underwear has always been a distinct marker of manhood for me, but never to this degree. I quickly realized that using the elliptical in boxers inevitably makes one short or the other ride so far up my ass that I can taste the fabric. I switch to briefs.

I’ve got a soft pack. I’ll wear that. And I did. It was all fine until I was finished changing and actually using the elliptical machine. The feeling of soft rubber chafing against my crotch and slowly ripping out every single pubic was not the burn I was hoping to feel. There would need to be a barrier.

I went home that night and modified all my briefs, sewing pockets or pouches into each of them. The next day I tried again. All was fine until the inevitable bouncing began. Suddenly it started moving against my leg. This is probably the exact same thing an actual dick would do, but with an actual dick is attached to your actual body. You do not need to worry about it slipping out of your underwear, through the leg of your shorts and to the gym floor. Packing was not going to work. I needed something more secure.

Sometimes I pack and sometimes I don’t. It doesn’t seem to make that much of a difference. I am always aware of my body. Wear the wrong shorts—the ones that are a little too tight and ride up a little too high—and I’m sure my hips will give me away, or I’ll be stricken with camel toe so blatant that it will serve as a giant vaginal highlighter. Wear big and baggy shorts and they sink into nothing when I sit against the weight machine.

I’m sure that everyone feels this self-awareness at the gym. Gyms are a haven of embarrassments. Still, somehow farting on the treadmill seems slightly less concerning than exposing your vagina in the locker room.

I’ve begun swimming. Feeling the water flow over my bare back and chest is like nothing I’ve ever experienced. This liberation is tempered by the vulnerability I feel when I take off my bathing suit. I am naked in a bathroom stall. Men all around me and my body exposed. Will they see me through the crack in the door? With the door suddenly open? What will this mean? What would happen? Though I do sometimes wonder how people would respond if I joined the group shower in all my transsexual glory, self preservation keeps me from finding the answer. Some things are better left unknown.

EXECUTIVE CUT

The story below was written as a part of my graduate thesis. The thesis was completed in May of 2005. These actual events occured in February of 2005.

This wasn’t the first time I would be trying on suits. Rather, it would be the first time I felt like I was legitimately trying on suits. With a weddings and job interviews coming up and now that my breasts were gone it was time to own a suit that fit. Instead of running off to the thrift store and making do with the cast offs of others, I was going to be buying a suit that had never been worn by anyone else before. The fabric wouldn’t give me a rash, the pockets wouldn’t pucker at the hips, and the jacket wouldn’t pull over breasts that were no longer there. As Anna and I walked up Chestnut street I looked forward to finally being a man buying a suit and not a boy playing dress-up. I opened the door to Men’s Warehouse and with a deliberate gait walked directly towards the nearest rack of clothing. Navy blue and gray wool enveloped me to near claustrophobia. It was then that I realized I had no idea where to start, or even what size to look for. My sense of purpose waned considerably. I flagged down the first salesman I noticed and looking down at my shoes said, “I need a suit.” I then raised my head to see a very tall, lean redhead with a barely detectable smirk. I fought back the urge to point out every part of my body that was less than perfectly masculine. I wanted to tell him about my wide hips and big ass. I wanted to mention that I had short arms and really short legs. I wanted to let him know that I was really “curvy” for a man and when I saw him pull out a tape measure and kneel before me to measure my inseam I cursed myself for not packing that day and wanted to tell him why I didn’t have a penis. Instead I merely said, “I don’t know what size I am other than short.”


“Alrighty,” he said, looking me up and down. He measured me and said, “Well, you’re definitely short, and probably a 46.” He led me over to the seven suits that constituted the 46” Short section of the store. “You’ll probably want more of an executive cut.” I looked over at Anna, and we uncomfortably chuckled at the euphemism. “It’s a nice way of saying portly,” he went on to explain. The clarification was neither necessary or desired. He pulled a few suits off the rack and held the first jacket out for me to try on. I slipped into it and looked in the mirror. Unlike the thrilling experience I thought this first look would be, it amounted to nothing more than a hurried glance. I was terrified to look any longer. I don’t know if I felt like I wouldn’t look at myself “correctly,“ or if I simply wouldn’t like the reflection I saw in the mirror. I knew I should have taken a good look, but with both Anna and my tall, non-executive fitter expectantly staring, all I could think of was escape. I didn’t even know what to look for. Anna felt the fabric, and the fitter tugged and smoothed and tugged some more before ultimately informing me that this fit was no good. He then pulled out another jacket with the flourish of a man working on commission and had me slip it on. After repeating this same routine four more times he stated that this was the best fit I was going to find. It had “A generous cut in the front and a vent in the back for extra comfort,” which in laymen’s terms meant, “generous room for your hips, stomach, and ass.” Anna did her customary touch of the fabric while I looked around the thousands of suits and digested the fact that this was my best chance, this boring gray suit. I looked at Anna, ready to pull out my credit card and have the whole ordeal over with, but saw the hesitance in her face. I asked him if he could hold the suit so we could look around a little bit more.


He agreed but now with his less than positive pitch, a last ditch effort to make the sale. “Well, you’re always going to have trouble.” I nodded, knowing I probably was a difficult size. “You’re never going to find something right off the rack,” he continued. “Maybe you could try a children’s store and see if they have a ‘husky boy’s department.” I kept nodding, hoping he’d realize that what I was really saying was your help is gradually becoming the biggest slap to my self-esteem that I’ve experienced since elementary school. He didn’t stop. “I mean you could try a big and tall shop, but you’re not tall, just big.” My face began turning a deep shade of red when it finally hit me. I was no longer experiencing the soft pat on the shoulder that a woman gets while shopping. He saw a man before him and he was giving me the honest truth. Instead of trying to ignore every salesperson in the room thinking they’d direct me to the women’s department, I was asking advice and getting it. I was short, I was big, and I was going to have trouble finding a suit that fit. Although you’d never hear a salesperson telling a woman, “I’m sorry but you’re just too short and fat for all the clothing in this store,” to tell a man essentially the same thing was perfectly acceptable. Before transitioning, while not identifying as a woman I was still aware of what expected of me as one. The size and shape of my body was supposed to directly relate to my self worth. Today, while preparing to buy a $300 article of clothing that I was trying to believe I was enough of a man to wear, I was told that being fat was just a fact. It didn’t mean I was any less respected or any less of a man. It took changing my gender to hear the truth about my body that I had longed to hear my entire life. My body, whether it be fat or thin or something in between, was a vessel that housed who I was. It wasn’t what I was. I looked up at him as he handed me his card and thanked him for his time and honesty, man to man.

million lil' what?

turns out that the Oprah book club memoir "a million little pieces" is closer to a work of fiction than a memoir.

According to The Smoking Gun website:
Of course, if "A Million Little Pieces" was fictional, just some overheated stories of woe, heartache, and debauchery cooked up by a wannabe author, it probably would not get published. As it was, Frey's original manuscript was rejected by 17 publishers before being accepted by industry titan Nan Talese, who runs a respected boutique imprint at Doubleday (Talese reportedly paid Frey a $50,000 advance). According to a February 2003 New York Observer story by Joe Hagan, Frey originally tried to sell the book as a fictional work, but the Talese imprint "declined to publish it as such." A retooled manuscript, presumably with all the fake stuff excised, was published in April 2003 amid a major publicity campaign.  turns out that his alleged crime sprees were grossly exaggerated if not completely made up.



James Frey is in fact not such a bad guy as much as he'd like us to believe otherwise. so was this simply to sell books? perhaps. Memoirs are the genre of the day. Seems more likely to me that he was doing what boys and men do everyday, he was looking tough. To look at a photo of this man you'd think him to be a kind of nutty professor type, with a tweed sport coat and a pipe the more likely outfit than prison stripes. his look doesn't give much of a "bad ass" impression. perhaps this man wanted to say what all men want to say: "I'm tough, i can protect myself, and I'm so much more interesting than I look. Respect me." Last night i watched a show called "Raising Cain" about the disservice that our country had done to it's young boys. With the advent of school shootings and youth violence, we have gone from coddling our boys to fearing them. It seems to me that Frey has taken a normal teenage bravado of talking shit (although slightly misplaced on an adult his age) and made a fortune off of it calling it a memoir. I've never read the book, but i hear it's a good story. Sounds a little sensationalistic, but a page turner nonetheless. And although his posturing doesn't really bother me, his constant and consistent denial that anything in his book is less than true seems more intriguing to me. I'm sure he was a boozer, a user and a looser, but admitting he spent a few hours in jail instead of three months doesn't make his book any less interesting. Instead, it makes him less interesting. that's what this is really all about. I know I'm relatively new to this manhood thing, but i want to say that i think honesty is more important than how often you can swear and how many months you spent in jail. i wouldn't mind making "a million little dollars" i just wonder at what cost. my integrity is worth more than that. i think that's being a man.

One of the boys

I've begun working at a fine art screen printing shop doing screen prep. They print for the likes of Chuck Close and Leroy Neiman. It's an interesting environment, watching the business of art. It's also interesting in that I'm the only non-guy working in the back room. My boss rarely refers to me by my name but rather "buster," "buddy," and "brother er...sister." I feel as though I've proven myself to be a hard worker in a rather physical job. It's just hard for me to ask for help lifting screens or anything like that because I don't know if people see me as more of a girl when I do or not. It's not surprising that anyone would need help maneuvering a screen that's 5 feet by 7 feet, but still.

It's a very active environment and I enjoy the solitude of blowing out screens and going about my business. It's also been nice being surrounded by men. I feel like I'm learning to be more assertive and not back down if I feel like someone is making fun of me. Chances are they are just joking around and I'm learning that in order to feel like "one of the boys" I need to give it back and not back down.