Cyrsti's Condo "Sunday Edition"

Ker Plunk! Welcome! Another issue of our "Sunday Edition" has hit your virtual front porch! Here in O-H-I-O Momma Nature has blessed us with a beautiful day, so let's get started!

Page One.- The Week that Was-or Wasn't:  As the residue (pro or con) of Bruce Jenner's interview continued, the reality of Leelah Alcorn's Christmas time tragic suicide surfaced again. The Ohio Highway Patrol released it's findings. No surprises. The parents put her through "Christian Conversion Therapy" and a suicide note left on her bed at home said it all. I paraphrase (Leelah wrote) "I can't take it anymore." and she went out to a lonely stretch I-71 just north of Cincinnati and summoned a poor semi truck driver to finish the job. The whole week just seemed to highlight the polar differences in the white transgender community. Yes-white. Jenner obviously is a senior entitled person who says he is trans but stays tantalizing on the edge of the process. After all, there is the "reality show" to come. Leelah on the other hand, went to school in a very upscale in the suburbs of Cincinnati. Her misfortune just happened to be who she was born to. Leelah was not an urban inter city trans kid of color who had all of that baggage to deal with. With parental support her story could have been one of success. Speaking of "parental support" (or lack of) check out Maria's recent post on her blog: "A Cross Dresser's Wife."

Page Two.- Holiday Season? Well not "holiday" in the strictest sense but in the upcoming weeks, it is Prom time, Mother's day and even summer class reunions. An interesting time. Last week we wrote a post called Prom Daze and of course Mother's Day is till to come. Mother's Day holds interest in a number of area's; on a shallower level what title we take on as Mtf transgender women with our kids. On a deeper level, what our mothers meant to us. Were they role models, inhibited us or worse. Finally there are class reunions.  None of us need a degree in math to figure out we "more mature" trans women are perilously close to a "50th Class Reunion." As Connie said:  Well, in a couple of years you can see what happens at your 50th class reunion. You just might win the award for "Most Changed".

Page Three.- Reuniting with Whom? As i stands now, if I live a couple more years, I won't go to my first class reunion ever. There are several whys and most have nothing to do with me being trans. First of all, I transferred into the high school and my Mom taught there, so more than likely more would remember having her as a teacher, than me at all. That's all good-I have no problem. What I do have a problem with was a class "committee" listing me as one of the peeps they couldn't find years ago when I was running the most popular restaurant in town. Plus, I was also finishing up a term as president of a very active civic organization. So, if going would make some sort of positive transgender statement-I would go. But, just to be some sort of entertainment...count someone else in. 

Page Four.-The Back Page: It's time to pack up my old dog and get out and enjoy the sun on this incredible day! I hope the sun shines on all of you and life is good!!! Thanks for visiting Cyrsti's Condo and please take a moment to send a positive vibration or two to the earthquake ravaged people in Nepal. 

So Close and Yet So Far

I know you have read me write here in Cyrsti's Condo about how amazed I continue to be about those of us in the trans or cross dressing community share a commonality about life.  From Pat's examples of "spreading" the word in gay venues about her to Connie and I playing football in our youth (different teams) to cover our "girl-ness" -literally tons of stories are the same.  Now, I have another which goes back to Marcia and Angel (left) of the blog "A Cross Dressers Wife." 

It turns out Angel is a trans vet and Marcia is a vet (USN) too.  Of course most of you probably know by now and I am trans vet but maybe what you don't know is my first wife is a vet too.  We still get along and was actually one of the first people I came out to as a "transvestite" in Germany where we serving in 1974.  It's a small world.  Marcia finished her post with these words:

"My hope is with this new-found openness in our country, we are becoming more united as a country that embraces our differences, inspires our characters and promotes our people to new levels of understanding and tolerance where we truly know the extent of what it means to be free.   And Freedom isn't free.

Hey Cyrsti, Let's start a role call of our military trans* that will be counted."

Angel Harding - USCG
Maria Harding - USN (Wife)"

No freedom is not free, and it's tragic the transgender military members fighting on the front lines for freedom- are the first in line to be denied it!!!!

Beauty and the Generic Spouse Part Two

Several excellent comments on our Cyrsti's Condo post which among other things discussed how your generic spouse reacts to your feminine appearance   I am fairly unflappable, but getting a comment from a "generic" (other than Liz) is rare around here:

Maria HardingJanuary 27, 2015 at 7:29 PM

Thank you, Cyrsti but, are women really competitive? Yes on one hand, no on the other. Until I found my spouse, I would compete however, at least for me, I did not see him as competition. He is, after all, my husband. The head of my household. I see the flip side, men are the competitive ones. For us, no matter how good (or bad) he looks, I let him know! lol. And she has always been my friend, whether she knew it or not. I always have her back.

 

The reason I wrote that Maria, as in all in the other gender differences, I see women as competitive as men -although in more complex ways. A man competes in a simple world, of physical or monetary power. The alpha females I worked with for years, brought it all to the table.  They listened better, were better in tune with their environment and could "bring the pain" in so many ways it may take you days weeks or months to discover.  Even today, when I'm walking into situations I'm not familiar with, I look for the women in the room first for potential problems.

 

FYI- Maria has a blog many of you may be very interested in!  It's called "A Crossdresser's Wife" See! All of you who think I discriminate against cross dressers-here you go!