Showing posts with label Halloween. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Halloween. Show all posts

Saturday, September 14, 2024

I Am I Said

 

Archive Image, JJ Hart

One of my favorite Neil Diamond's songs is "I Am I Said". I particularly was drawn to the line saying I was lost between two shores. Neil was referring to New York and Los Angeles and I adapted it for me to signify being lost somewhere between being male and female.

The song's lyrics go on to say "I am, I said to no one there " I again felt the same way because I had no one to discuss my gender issues with other than the occasional therapist who went quickly through my life with little or no benefits until I reached a point much later in my life. In addition, the pressure to conform to the successful male life I was leading was intense. One of the few positives of my job was I was named a managerial training manager so I was able to take medium ranged business trips from my home in Ohio (yes I am from the much maligned Springfield) and travel by car to Lexington, Kentucky. Usually, I was asked once every six months to make the trip which I quickly saw as an opportunity to pack a few of my feminine items and cross dress. 

I usually worked it out with my second wife I was taking a second night at the company headquarters so I would not have to drive back at night. When I did, I was able to either cross dress and head out to one of the Lexington gay bars. It turned out, there were several back in those days, since the University of Kentucky is there. When I went out, at the least I didn't have to tell the chair or mirror I was actually someone feminine. On one occasion, I hit the jackpot and my training seminar just happened to coincide with Halloween. I thought ahead and when I packed away from my wife's prying eyes, I added a few slutty outfits to put together a Halloween "costume." The difference this Halloween was I was going to try my luck at going to a big straight club and not a gay venue. After a few wrong turns, I found the place and gathered my courage to go inside. Here I was dressed in an all black mini-dress with black heels, hose and blond wig doing my best to ignore all the guys pinching my behind as I walked across the dance floor, Since I needed to be up and fresh early the following morning, I needed to be back early to go to bed.

All along, I was learning what I was and was finding out the hard way what could happen if I dressed the wrong way. One night, I decided to stop at the halfway point on the way home which was Cincinnati. I got a hotel room and proceeded to seek out one of the more infamous gay bars in town for hookups, I thought since my black outfit worked so well before, I would try it again. This time, a very drunk guy at the bar tried to pick me up...until his wife showed up. I was embarrassed and was trying my best to back pedal from the whole situation when he made things worse by telling her why did she not have legs like mine. By this time, I headed for the restroom to hide and when I came out they were gone. As was the black outfit.

Through it all, all the lying I was doing to my wife was wrecking my moral code and when I asked who I was, I did not know. Which made the Diamond song so important to me. 

Finally, I did climb out of the pit I was in and was able to learn who I was but sadly was never able to reconcile my transgender life with my wife before she passed away. All along she was urging me to find myself and by the time I did, it was too late. I was no longer stuck between two gender shores. I had found myself and she was feminine. 


Thursday, September 12, 2024

Options or Paradise

 

Liz on Left, out to eat! 

During our gender transitions, many times we have the choice of options or paradise. 

Often, options come about as not being a choice. Examples include all the days we had to rush around and hide our feminizations from our family and friends. We had no option but to hide our truths. For some if us also, our cross dressing options never became any better when we had to pursue stints in the military. Certainly, the military provided every roadblock in the world for pursuing any route to paradise for gender conflicted individuals. 

As a whole, back then, paradise was very difficult to achieve. In fact I can now refer rare paradise as gender euphoria. For many years and even decades my gender balance never changed. I was still sneaking around risking life as I knew it to momentarily express my true inner gender. Fortunately, I had the time to work on perfecting my femininized presentation. When I finally was able to pursue paradise by going out in public, I was closer than before to achieving success. In fact, once I learned to blend in with  other women in the world, I was more likely to find a fleeting sense of paradise. 

Usually, my paradise did not last long because I needed to quickly return to my male world which I was increasingly feeling uncomfortable in. I was desperately seeking other options to find more gender euphoria other than the annual Halloween parties I was going to as a woman. The parties and the transvestite/ transsexual mixers I started to go to helped me to understand the gap I was facing when I considered the ultimate outcome of where I wanted to go with my life. Instead of just embracing the usual male attributes in life, I needed to include the very real possibility I would have the option to live life out as a transgender woman. The reason I thought this way was I encountered paradise when I was experiencing the world as my true authentic self. I felt so natural and wondered why I had waited so long to do it.

What if I had experienced paradise a decade earlier than I did when I went to a TGIF restaurant and bar determined to mix with other single women. Maybe I was just waiting for the world to catch up to me but more than likely the opposite was happening. I had the options to catch up to the world and I took the chance. By the time I ventured out into the world, I had certainly paid my dues and was  ready to reap the benefits. 

Still I was frustrated when the benefits of my new life were just out of reach. Such as the times when I was so comfortable in my new feminine world I actually forgot where I was and caught myself slipping back into a male mode. I still did not have the full closure from my old male self I so desperately needed. I kept running into unexpected roadblocks and stop signs on my gender path such as a spouse's death which changed my ideas of where I was headed but not for long. Soon with fewer and fewer options to consider as well as a solid new life I was building, paradise was closer than ever before. 

As transgender women or trans men, we often experience periods of options or paradise as we follow our difficult, unique gender paths which separate us from other humans. The whole journey hopefully makes paradise worth it.  

Wednesday, September 11, 2024

Just Weary

 

Image from Harry Quan
on UnSplash


Following a lifetime of doing my best to maintain a male lifestyle, I grew weary of living a lie.

Similar to many transgender folks and/or cross dressers I grew impatient with the progress I was making with my gender transition. I had two main problems, the first of which I did not know where I was going and the second was I had no basic idea if I was ever going to learn the basics of what I was doing. Very quickly, I tired of just looking at myself in the mirror and wanted more. I wish now I would have seen my feelings as being transgender but all of this occurred well before the term transgender was invented and became popular.

At the time, my frustration level was rising to an all time high. I was doing my best to learn the basics of feminine presentation but rarely had the chance to try my efforts in a public setting. Those occasions just happened to be Halloween parties which I learned many new basics from. Such as what happened when I dressed slutty compared to when I dressed in feminine professional attire. As Halloween rapidly approaches, I will try to be more in-depth on what I learned which helped me along on my journey to be a transgender woman.

As I went along, my femininization lessons just increased my weariness of being male. I grew extra tired of all the games guys play when they size each other up in the world and I wanted out. I could not wait until I could head home and escape into the safety of my woman's world, The whole problem was, my world was still so isolated and I needed to get out. To enter the world, I dreamed up ways to do it and began by going shopping where clerks had to accept me for my money, not my gender. I also started out by going to gay bars thinking I was safe there. In the long run, I discovered neither did me much good as I was not challenged to build a better feminine self. As I said, acceptance was a given in the clothing stores I went to and not a given in the gay or lesbian venues I went to. Through it all, with the ups and the downs, I learned I was on the right track to my gender discovery. Even though I needed to make sure the light up ahead was not another on-coming train.

My salvation turned out to be being myself, as I ended up going full circle and enjoying the sports venues I enjoyed going to as a guy. Sure I was scared at first, but I followed my instincts of being friendly to the staff, dressing to blend in with the other women and tipping well. Before I knew it, I became a regular at several venues as I enjoyed myself. During this point of my life, even though I was still intensely lonely, I still was increasingly weary of any idea I was still a man. 

To do away with any of my masculine traits became a primary goal of mine. I worked hard to lose weight and take care of my skin to do my best to improve my femininized appearance Plus the addition of the gender affirming hormones I began very much improved my confidence and outlook on life, I finally had arrived at my gender tipping point when all the male clothes had to go and it was time to consider coming out to the closest friends and family I had left. 

It was time to leave my weary life behind and open the doors to an exciting new life as a full-time transgender woman.  .  


Wednesday, September 4, 2024

Gender Freedom

Image from Irina Rudnick
on UnSplash


 I found freedom was fleeting many times during my life.

The first time I can remember is when I did not ever have the power to cross dress when I wanted to during my early life, I had to really be aware of what I was doing to avoid detection. Of course, if discovered, any life I was living would have been destroyed. I could only imagine falsely promising I would never cross dress again or find myself in a version of conversion therapy. 

The second time I vividly remember my freedom being compromised was when the Vietnam War draft began to loom in my future. It was an unreal situation which became all too real. After college I took my physical and was pronounced fit to serve in the military. I ended up enlisting for three years to be able to further my career as I served my country. 

All along, my youthful self was learning the basics of freedom. I found rare ways to express my true gender self by sneaking out the back door of the house and initially walking around our neighborhood. Plus there were the yearly Halloween parties I went to dressed as a woman to get me by. Both attempts to ease my gender pressure did work, for a short while and then I was back searching for more freedom and often still risking everything I had to achieve it. When I could, I was making the fifty mile trip to nearby Columbus, Ohio to meet and socialize with a very diverse group of transgender and LGB individuals.  From them, I was able to learn more about how far I would have to go to have a semblance of gender freedom.

It was not until I began to really explore the world as a transgender woman, did I finally begin to experience just a bit of freedom. As gay bars and other unforgiving venues began to fade into my rear view mirror (along with malls) did I begin to discover a glimmer of hope I could survive in the world as a transgender woman. With the hope, came a new push to do whatever I could to make myself into a better woman. It turned out, I was not making anything. She was already there waiting very impatiently for her turn at freedom and life.

I learned also, freedom is never free and you have to work for it. In many ways I had paid my dues and it was time to take the chance and collect my winnings. After following a very winding and bumpy gender journey for all those years, many of the traffic signals turned from red to green and destiny stepped in to insure my gender freedom.

My mental health improved and became stronger with everything else in life. Improbably a cis-woman found me and wanted to love and nourish me at one of my lowest spots, so freedom again became a breath of fresh air. Now our gender freedoms are at risk in the upcoming election. One of the candidates who is not female wants to take them all away. Don't let him!  

Friday, July 26, 2024

Ditching Good with Better as a Trans Girl

 

Archive Image
from Witches Ball
Tom on Left.

Ditching good with better has always been a difficult obstacle in my life. 

I always blame my parents for my feelings on doing the best I could on anything I tried. Nothing I did was good enough. If I got B's they should have been A's was a prime example. Even though I was an above average student, I don't remember ever being told I was doing a good job. I think now, their influence carried on with me in every facet of my life, including when I was a novice cross dresser and budding transgender woman. 

It all started with my appearance as a girl. When I was younger and before I went through any testosterone poisoning at puberty, it was much easier to look like a girl. But just looking like a girl was never good enough, I wanted to be a girl and enjoy their life. Or at least as I perceived it to be. I guess my parents attitude was rubbing off on me. At the time, all I could really do to further my looks was to over achieve with my meager allowance and take on a rural newspaper route. Between the two, I could sneak out to the store and buy the occasional wardrobe item or makeup I could experiment with. I was doing my best to ditch my good with better as a trans girl during my early age. If I had given the same effort to everything else I tried during that time, at the least I could have received better grades and my parents would have been pleased. 

On the other hand, my parents in no way would have been pleased if they had known I had issues with my gender. I shudder to think what would have happen to me if they had discovered me dressed in my feminine wardrobe and makeup. At the least, I know I would have been sent to a therapist during a time when even being a cross dresser was considered a mental illness. I never wanted to even consider what the worst could be. Perhaps since we were not particularly religious, Christian conversion therapy would not have been in my future. The only thing I know for sure is, I would not have had any understanding at all. All along I did the best I could and was able to hide my cross dressing with the world. How I don't really know.

The older I became, good certainly did not become enough. A prime example would be the Halloween parties I went to when I was first testing the world  I started with just trying to be a sexy sleaze of a woman thinking I would receive some sort of a validation. Several parties later, I grew more bold and wanted to see if I could be mistaken for a real woman, so I wore my business attire and then waited for reactions. Overall I was received well with strangers who did not know me mistaking me for a woman who did not have a chance to dress up for the party. I was discovering better was always best when it came to how I presented as a transgender woman in the world, under the cover of Halloween or not. 

All of my experiences led me to establishing myself in a new feminine world. I needed to try very hard to do away with all my old values to do it. My whole world became a concentration of new friends and life. In my own way, I needed to be better than the world to succeed in chasing my dream of living full time as a transgender woman. Sure I needed to look the part but suddenly I needed to be the part which meant moving and communicating as a woman. 

Ditching good for better in my transgender world was one of the best moves I ever made. By the time I was medically cleared to begin taking gender affirming hormones or HRT, I was more than ready for the results. Almost instantly I knew I made the right decision.  Since my parents have long since passed away, there is no possible way for me to communicate to them they were right. For all the wrong reasons. Their resistance  to giving me any positive feedback early in life made it easier for me to find my own path in the world as a trans woman. A place where good was never enough for me.  

Sunday, July 21, 2024

Much More than a Phase

 

Civil War Cemetery image
from the Jessie Hart Archives. 

When I was first experimenting with wearing woman's clothing, I worked long and hard to hide all my feminine wardrobe and makeup. 

Due to transportation and financial constraints I always had a difficult time adding to my very limited collection. Plus, I always wondered if my Mom ever really discovered her clothes and others I managed to "borrow" for my cross dressing trips to my mirror. If she did, she never confronted me about it. Perhaps she thought it all was a phase and I would grow out of it. Similar to the fallacy, being transgender is ever a choice, I learned my gender issues were much more than a phase.

Very early on, I discovered a lesson I should have relied on but kept on ignoring. The lesson was, I wanted to be a girl, not just look like one. The very beginning of the realization I was transgender as I envied everything girls around me did.  Which went far past their pretty clothes while I was stuck in my drab male clothes. All along I was stuck in a family which valued male superiority and I wanted to rebel but couldn't. I often wonder if I had been born into a more diverse family (if that was possible back in those days) I could have made my feelings known and thrived. Instead, I did the only male thing I knew how to do and internalized all my inner feelings. I even thought, if I ignored my gender issues long enough, they would turn out to be a phase and go away.

Of course my gender dysphoria never did go away and just grew worse as I began to understand the full depth of what I was facing. As I look back, Halloween parties were my first indication I could do more than living a shallow life in front of the mirror as a cross dresser. I learned the hard way, heels weren't so much fun when I first wore them on long walks all the way to how much fun I had experimenting with the clothes and learning from the parties as a whole. Another step towards showing me my phase was not going away, I was just growing into it.

Halloween parties proved to be false feedback in many ways. Most people who saw me were friends who thought Haha I was the clown dressing as a woman for a laugh. Even though I was going as far as shaving my legs. In my mind, my legs alone would do the trick and everyone would know I was much more than a once a year man putting on a dress. At least I wanted it to as I grew confident I could present more and more as a real woman at the party. When I had achieved my goal, I felt I was ready to pursue a future as a successful transgender woman. 

When I did, the work really started. Life was so much more challenging as I left my male phase in my past. I wonder now if my Mom ever thought my simple love of girls clothes was a phase, what would she think now. Outside of the one time I tried to come out to her as a transvestite and she rejected me, we never discussed it again before her death. I can't help but look back and regret how much life I may have lost if she would have ever accepted me. I on the other hand took the high road and honored her by using her first name as my new legal middle name.  

Normally, phases come and go but certainly none of it applies to being a cross dresser or transgender person. Once the public at large learns to accept we are not a phase, trans kids especially could benefit from more understanding when they are young. Parents and siblings could have a more serious outlook of what being trans is all about, helping the whole situation. Or, leave the phase out and help the person. 

Friday, June 14, 2024

Trans Girls Dreams

Trans Ohio Archive Image from
the Jessie Hart Archives.




There were plenty of times when I thought living a transgender life was going to be impossible. 

All the days of staring into the mirror cross dressed in women's clothing come back to haunt me. As well as my poor attempts at the makeup arts when I turned out looking like a clown. Who knew being a woman was going to be as difficult as I was making it. But it was and took me years of work to come close to getting it right. 

Dreams of course can come during the night or day. As I was day dreaming my life away about being a girl/woman, I also tragically had the problem of dreaming of being a beautiful girl during my dreams. All my dreams, day or night, did was frustrate me even further. Most of the time, all my dreaming did was trigger my severe gender dysphoria. My cross dresser mirror visits were not doing any good and I couldn't see a way out of my gender issues. All the time shattering any hope I ever had of living life as a transgender woman. 

It turned out I was being a drama queen in many ways and was giving up a dream I really wanted way too early. What happened, all of a sudden I began to learn makeup and fashion skills so at the least I could survive in a world of women. It was a slow process to be sure but if I was ever going to achieve my trans girl dream, I just had to do it. Plus when I survived, I felt so natural and was elated at my progress. Perhaps my ultimate goal could be within reach after all. From then on, I still had a huge amount of work to do. As I delved deeper into the women's world I so admired, I then had to decide if I wanted to go all the way or not. Was the grass really greener on the feminine side? Again and again, I found it was as I tackled issues such as vocal training and just overall life surviving in the world as a trans woman. As I progressed, the light at the end of the tunnel turned out to be sunshine and not the train. 

Since I started my journey with no obvious feminine characteristics, I had a long way to go. I started my path by trying out Halloween parties initially dressed as a trashy woman, all the way to presenting as a professional woman at others. So I could see if I could indeed present as a realistic woman. Finding out I could led me to believe my trans girl dream could indeed be realized. At that point, my life became a blur as I attempted to live as both a man and a woman. All my attempts did was create a tremendous amount of pressure on me and essentially wrecked my mental health. With the help of a good therapist as well as several good friends, I was able to survive and once again re-direct myself towards my dream. Once I felt I was back on the right track, I started gender affirming hormones following an approval from my doctor and there was no looking back for me. 

I never considered I could make it as far as I have when I was the kid staring longingly into our full length hallway mirror at home so many years ago. Even though there were many rough patches along the way as I battled my gender dysphoria, along with waiting until I was in my early sixties to out myself to the world as a transgender woman, I still somehow made it. 

I guess the old saying is true, if you don't dream it, it will never happen. My dream of living a feminine life was the only goal I could think of when I was young and someone asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. Of course. I could not say a woman and ruin any life as I knew it, so I lied and said a lawyer or something more popular with my parents. I am sure many of you can relate to my story. 

Finally, after more failures than trials my trans girl dreams came through and somewhere within me there is an inner child who is rejoicing. 

Monday, June 10, 2024

Then I Went and Did It!

 

Trans Girl image from
Alexander Grey on 
UnSplash.

I played around for nearly a half a century being a very serious cross dresser. Sounds like a long time, doesn't it!

It was while I was doing it but now it seems like it was a blur. Most of it started with all the problems of sneaking around my home when I was growing up. I needed to use a ton of creativity to hide my cross dressing itself and not to mention the clothes I had accumulated. Somehow, I managed to do it all. Who knows, maybe it all made me a better person? I doubt it but at the least, the process helped me to be more creative with my life.

As I progressed slowly with my makeup art and improving my women's fashion choices by going to thrift stores, I found out I could do more. Then I went and did it by going out and testing the public's reaction to me as a novice transgender woman or at the least a skilled cross dresser. I found, the more I did it, the more successful I was and I felt so natural. To me, feeling natural was the best way I knew I was on the correct gender path and I wanted to keep going. Plus, feeling natural, gave me the confidence I needed to always push my gender envelope and try to do more and more. I even changed the way I viewed my Halloween costumes I was choosing. I started to go away from my trashy woman's look and then tried for a more realistic approach. I searched my brain for ideas which allowed me to try to present as a cis-woman at a Halloween party. Again, I went and did it when I succeeded at two parties where I was actually mistaken for a woman. Which in fact I was just learning I was.

By this time, it was too late to turn back and ignore my gender dreams. I was having so much success building a new life as a transgender woman, I just couldn't turn back. Even my sexuality was not a problem when I began to attract more attention from cis-women than I ever had as a man. I was validating myself as my own type of woman through my years of femininization and it felt so right. Then, I went and did it and jumped into the girl's sandbox and after a few bruises was successful. The claw marks I received on my back I felt were all learning experiences and I stayed and eventually held my own. 

All of this led me to my next transgender step of researching the possibility of beginning gender affirming hormones. Then I went and finally did by making my first appointment with a doctor who I heard would prescribe the hormones if a person was healthy. Thank the Goddess I was and the fun started. Like so many others, I needed to begin my hormonal journey on minimal dose of medication until my doctor and I could see how my body reacted. As it turned out, my body took to the new feminization hormones the way I hoped it would. It was like a big I told you so as my body changed. Inside and out. I needed all the help I could get in the appearance department and I was overjoyed when my facial angles softened and my hair quickly grew to a point where wigs became a part of my past. Luckily, my family history had no male pattern baldness for me to deal with. 

Since my overall appearance was becoming highly androgynous, I was loving it, I decided to give up on what was left of my old male life. I was to the point where none of my male shirts fit my breasts anymore, so rather than buy new bigger ones, I decided to go and do it. Give away what was left of my male clothes and live fulltime as a woman, transgender or not I was ready for the world. 

Since I had taken my time to make certain my gender decision was the correct one, I had no problems of never looking back. Many times now, I wish I had the courage to do it sooner and not have to worry about so many then I went and did its. 

Thursday, June 6, 2024

It's All a Big Transformation

Image from Ross Findom on UnSplash

Before we get started, I need to take a moment to remember the surviving military members of the D-Day invasion. It is important to remember how we arrived at the point of having to fight such a monumental war at all and hopefully learning our lesson to never do it again. My Dad fought in WWII but was not in Europe for D-Day. 

Now, on to the post: Anyway you look at it, life is nothing but a big transformation. We are born into a certain gender (right or wrong) and have our opportunities to grow into men or women. Not just males and females because it is a socialization process. Sadly for transgender women or trans men, we go through extra transformations in our life. Mainly because we need to escape from the initial gender declaration we were straddled with when we were born. Being forced into square gender holes when we were born as round pegs is cruel and unusual punishment. 

Over time, if we are lucky, we are able to climb out of our gender closets and thrive in the world but to get there, often it takes several separate transformations to arrive at our goals. For example, the first transformation I went through was when I was able to look at myself in my Mom's clothes in the hallway mirror. From there, I went even further by raiding her makeup and basically looking like a clown before I improved. At the time, I compared my expertise to painting a model car which were so popular at the time. It took awhile but I did get better with both at the same time. With no guidance from anyone, I needed to start from scratch.

Along the way, somehow I did manage to catch up partially with other girls of my age who I was watching closely. Another problem I had was having any income at all to purchase any feminine items of my own because I was rapidly out growing all my Mom's clothes so I took on a news-paper route to augment my meager allowance and buy a few items. In order to do so, I needed to visit my Grandma who lived very close to the downtown area which back in those days was a thriving business district. I snuck out, spent my money while being scared to death I would run into my Dad who worked nearby. Then sneak all my purchases back home and into my regular hiding places. By doing so, I was helping my transformation along.

The older I got, the larger my transformative steps became. Starting with going to Halloween parties dressed as a woman and then sneaking out of the house cross dressed, I knew each time I was successful, I could not go back to my unwanted, boring male life. Yet I needed to because I was still the round peg struggling to get out of her square hole and enjoy an authentic life as a novice transgender woman. Most importantly, it was looking as if I could defy all odds and do it. All because of the evenings I went out as a trans woman to be alone and ended up socializing with the world. Granted, it was a huge transformation to climb out of the male life I was in and make it into the dream world of women I always wanted to be part of but I made it.

Perhaps the biggest transformation came when I began gender affirming hormones. In addition to feminizing my body, I also feminized the world as I saw it. Finally I didn't have to play the old macho male game and was able to cry when I needed to. Surprisingly to me, my body even became more sensitive to changes in temperature and smell as my world softened.

I look at myself as being so fortunate in that I lived long enough to sense and go through several big transformations in my life. All the way from being able to father a child I love to living a fulltime life as a transgender woman with a woman I love, in many ways I feel I have received more than I deserved.  

Tuesday, March 19, 2024

My Gender Clock never Stopped

Image from the Jessie Hart 
Archives. Ohio River in back
ground.

 Although it is difficult to remember my thoughts when I first viewed my girlish image in the hallway mirror growing up, I am certain I had a mixture of emotions. 

Probably, my biggest emotion was elation and from that point forward, something within clicked and a new gender clock was set and running. From then on I had a new goal and possibly a new life to consider. One of the things I needed to figure out was how deep my gender leanings were running. My young mind needed to consider was I just trying to look feminine or was there something much deeper going on. At that point, my clock dramatically entered the picture. Within a relatively short period of time, everytime I cross dressed, the "buzz" would wear off and I needed to try to sneak around and dress as a girl again and again. Something just wasn't right and my young mind was feeling it. Looking back, my clock issues with cross dressing could be easily explained away. I was in the earliest stages of considering I was transgender, which I ran from for most of my life.

As I grew older, I grew braver in my gender outlook and I began to search for ways to open my closet door and see the world. Sometimes I was successful and other times I wasn't. The successful times when I was able to negotiate the world as a novice transgender woman essentially set my gender clock forward a few minutes. When I wasn't, my clock was set back when I needed to head home and attempt to figure out what I was doing wrong. For some reason, I wasn't able to complete what was going on with my gender puzzle. On occasion, when my feedback was quick and brutal, my clock had more than it's shares of setbacks.

On the bright side, as hard as I tried to wreck my male life as I knew it, I was never successful as I searched desperately for my truth...could I really or ever live a life as a happy fulltime transgender woman. Since happiness was always difficult to define in my family growing up, I often wondered if gender was the missing ingredient for me to survive. 

Then there were the times I needed to put my gender clock on hold due to many major life changes such as going away to college and serving my time in the military. Essentially, again to survive, I needed a safe spot in the back of my head to store my clock until I could put it into use again. Thanks to several well attended Halloween parties I went to and tested out my prowess at being a novice transgender woman, I was able to set my clock forward to some sort of version of gender savings time. Because, at the same time I was watching the time, I was saving my life for the future. 

As I set the time forward, my life as a cross dresser became so intricate, I needed to seriously consider making a change. Finally, I came to the conclusion I was a woman cross dressing as a man and I needed to perceive myself in a different way. The different way involved me seriously considering if my gender clock wouldn't stop until I started to live more and more on the feminine side of life. At that point, my gender clock went into overdrive. I quickly started to develop a new life as a woman where very few people knew the old male me and I made the major decision to begin gender affirming hormones. 

Luckily, all this activity made my mental health better and my gender clock stronger. To this day, it has never stopped. Plus, if the world didn't like me, it was their problem, not mine.

In another side note, I received comments from "Sunshine Jen " and others on my health situation. So far I just found the main Cincinnati Veterans Hospital wants to take a further look at the spots on my head. So we are still in a wait and see place. Thanks for asking!

Thursday, March 7, 2024

Gender Truth

 

Ripley, Ohio Image from
the Jessie Hart Archives

Following years of living a huge lie, I decided to live my gender truth. All along, I should have never been a male and felt so natural and alive when I was being feminine. 

As with any lie, you need to be more and more skillful to keep the ball rolling and not be discovered. The process all started when I was a kid and was carefully hiding away my small collection of girls clothes and makeup. Some of the items, I "borrowed" from my Mom when she discarded them and others I was able to purchase myself with funds I earned doing odd jobs around the house and from my newspaper route. I will never forget the first trips I had made to stores in nearby downtown Springfield, Ohio to buy makeup. I was scared to death since my Dad worked close by and I thought for some reason he might catch me there. Even though, it was my money and I was spending it the way I saw fit, I still felt guilty. The truth of my life still escaped me as I did my best to live in the male world. 

Somehow I was able to hide away all my clothes and makeup and even managed to shave away the hated hair which appeared on my legs when I became a little older. Probably, I was shaving my legs earlier than some of the girls I knew with strict Mom's who wouldn't even allow them to use lipstick. Looking back, I am sure I would have had the same problems with my Mom had I been born female. I just know she would have tried to restrain me the same way she did when I was her oldest son. All she really accomplished was enabling me to be more skillful in hiding my truth. I think. At the least, nothing was ever said to me by either of my parents.

As I cross dressed my way through college and my post military days, hiding my gender truth became increasingly more difficult. Primarily because I was slowly doing more and more in the public's eye as I left my closet to explore the world. The new truth I needed to face was how or if I was going to tell potential spouses who crept into my life. Even then, it seemed to be extremely unfair to both of us to not come clean from the very beginning. Except for my first fiancé, none of my future wives held my gender truth against me. Primarily because of a Halloween party, my first wife attended also, she was around when I confessed to a very small group of friends my costume was more than a casual fling to dress as a woman. As the years progressed and I became more assured of my gender truth, I decided I needed to tell my second wife also before we became married.

The problem became with my second wife was when I though I was telling her my gender truth about being a cross dresser, I wasn't. All along I was lying to myself and I was really transgender, not a cross dresser. Which was always a major problem for my second wife. She didn't care about the cross dressing but drew her line in the gender sand when it came to any idea or discussion of beginning any gender affirming hormones. Which, had she lived, would have probably ended our relationship.

Years later, at the age of sixty, I thought I was done with anymore serious relationships and wives is when several other friends came along, including my current wife Liz. With them, I basically had the opportunity to go full circle with my gender truth. Specifically, with Liz who told me at the time, why didn't I just leave the rest of my male life behind because she didn't see any man in me at all. 

Her push was all I needed to throw out what was left of my male clothes and concentrate on living my gender truth. The only problem I had with how it all worked out is why I waited so long to see it and live my gender truth. 

Sunday, January 28, 2024

Running as Hard as I Can

Image from UnSplash

Throughout my life, I frenetically ran from one thing to another.

In theory I was never much of a runner and only ran  when I was forced to during times I was in the Army and/or played football. So running never came naturally to me. for some reason though, when I was discharged from the military was when I free to face the world again would I settle down or run again. My answer started to emerge. It didn't take long as  I remembered when I was discharged and was heading home to Ohio from Ft. Dix in New Jersey. Before I arrived home, I had the entire Pennsylvania Turnpike to drive. Before I did so,  I paused for a second to ponder what I was going to do with my life. Surprisingly, at that time gender played just a small part of my future. Perhaps I was saving my gender issues for the future. 

Possibly also, at the time, I was still basking in the glow of coming out as a transvestite or cross dresser to three of my closest friends in the Army. Included in the group was a woman who was also in the Army. We had worked out she would meet me following her discharge and we would decide what would come next in our relationship. After we decided to visit her parents in California from Ohio, we decided to get married and as I said, she was fully versed in my gender issues. At least to the point which I considered them to be. At the time, I considered myself a serious cross dresser and I had a long way to go to being transgender.

As time went by, I switched professions from being a commercial radio disc jockey to the restaurant industry which at the time was expanding rapidly. To support my new family (daughter), I needed to be able to make more money. During the same time, I wedged in buying a small bar with a friend which eventually became a fairly successful pizza and beer restaurant. To make matters worse, I was beginning to feel the gender pressures I would need somehow to learn to live with. Even though I managed to dress in drag on various Halloween parties I went to, the rest of the time, I lived in my dark lonely gender closet knowing the next day I would be back in my male drag. 

To make up for my issues, I tried to offset my thoughts by moving our home as well as switching jobs. In addition, when I could, I tried to participate in civic groups which gave back to the community. Anything it seemed to take my mind off my desire to be feminine. Along the way my second wife and I moved from our native Ohio to the New York City metro area and then back to a new very rural area of Ohio which bordered on West Virginia. In the space of a couple years we went from living in very upscale Westchester County, New York to living in a farmhouse near the Muskingum River in Ohio where we heated with wood and needed water trucked in during times of the year which were drier than others. I was running from my problems as fast as I could.

The end result was I finally had enough and I needed to face my problems head on. One lonely night, I realized I had experienced enough of living a transgender life, I wanted to live it full time. My old male self had lost the battle and my new life felt so natural. 

It turned out I was never very good at running to start with. 


   

Sunday, October 29, 2023

Ode to Halloween

 

Halloween image from
the Jessie Hart Archive (Tom on
Left)

I have lived long enough to experience Halloween coming full circle.

Early in life I experienced the urge to wear a feminine costume but never had the courage to break out of my gender closet and do it. Plus I lived in such a small rural area, there weren't too many kids to go around and once you were pigeon holed into a certain category with your peer group you couldn't get out.  Examples included friends who were good or bad students as well as those who were always the outstanding athletes in the class. There was never any space for a stray boy who wanted to be a girl.

So I had a deeper reason never, ever express my feminine longings at all on Halloween. On top of all of that, I never saw any other boys who were dressed as girls. No cheerleaders, princesses or any of the stereotypes from the female world. The only time I can remember ever seeing a fellow male in drag or cross dressed was for selected festivals in high school. I was amazed at their male to female transformation. Plus I did hear the gossip concerning another guy in school I didn't really know who was dressed in his sister's clothes for his "costume" as the rumor went. I was so envious!

Once the years progressed and I naturally achieved more freedom to be my own person, I was able to pursue more courageous goals as far as Halloween went. I tentatively used the holiday to sneak out of my closet and explore. Could I dare make it in public as my feminine self. Very early I learned lessons I could take with me for years as I transitioned. I found if I dressed more conservatively at Halloween I indeed could have a chance to present well in the public's eye as a woman. As it turned out, all of this would be just the beginning of what I could learn on my ever rocky gender journey. 

Halloween made it possible for me to understand I could indeed live a life as my authentic feminine self. The only real problem came when I could only experience my terrifying yet exciting new life once a year. I was increasingly forced into the real world to learn my new gender lessons. All of which were made possible by Halloween.

Ironically, the more I learned from my initial experiences, the more I found the lessons would serve me well when I transitioned into a world ran primarily by women. If I could get other women to accept me, the better and easier I would have it. I also learned the hard way the process I would need to go through with men to attempt acceptance. Along the way, when I learned the better I presented at Halloween parties as a woman, the more of my male privileges were lost. Almost instantly, my old male friends began to leave me alone with the rest of the women. 

These days I have gone full circle with Halloween. It has served it's purpose of launching my journey down a path to be a full time transgender woman. So I don't have any need to go to any parties with elaborate costumes. I have done all of that and it is time to sit back and recognize Halloween for all the amazing experiences I was provided.

Thursday, October 5, 2023

Impactful Month

 

Image from Stories
on UnSplash

The rest of October will be very busy for my wife Liz and I.

Towards the end of the month she has two surgeries coming up which could entail spending a couple of days in the hospital. The operations are so intense we have to go today to go over all the details of the surgeries. Plus, the pre-opt work on Liz's side starts next week. 

As far as I am concerned, I am deeply involved in the process and will accompany her to all the pre-surgical consultations. It means facing a whole new set of people I have never seen before, which sets off my interior shyness. However, I have resolved myself to stay strong primarily because I am so worried about anything going wrong. 

As you regulars know I write often about losing my spouse of twenty five years and I do not want to go through the trauma and pain of doing that again. 

Of course what I am wearing to the pre-surgical visits is a no brainer. I am wearing my good jeans and light green sweater along with a light application of makeup and my hair tied back off of one shoulder. 

Plus, before all of Liz's work happens in the latter part of October, next week I have my twice a year in person appointment with my primary provider at the Veteran's Administration. A primary provider is similar to having a family doctor. Since I was trying to save a trip, I requested my provider approve my pending blood labs for another VA provider and (if they can) set me up for my flu and Covid shots the the same time. Since I put my requests in on the VA online system, I haven't heard back yet if they have been approved. 

All things considered, recently during my last several visits to my local VA clinic, I have been treated with respect, which wasn't always the case so I am pleased. Sadly, the personnel changes so rapidly at the clinic, you never know who you will or won't see again.

One way or another, October will be an impactful month because it also contains our first wedding anniversary after being together for over ten years. Just a lot to keep track of! And I can't forget all the impactful Halloween memories I would love to re-share. Plenty of posts to come. 

Monday, September 25, 2023

From Dreams to Reality

 

Image from the Jessie Hart
Collection


Very early in life, when I was asked what I wanted to be when I grew up, I never told the truth. I would fall back on the politically gender correct answer and say the usual such as a lawyer, doctor etc. The reason I say politically correct is because how I really wanted to answer was with the truth. All along I wanted just to be a woman when I grew up.

I do think, at the time, I did know what a difficult proposition being feminine was all about. Primarily against my will, all along I was becoming more entrenched in a male lifestyle I never wanted. When I was being the square peg being pounded or forced into societies' square hole, I hated it. Even then I put up a brave front and liked the popular male things such as sports and cars, in reality I wanted to be the kid with the new doll baby at Christmas rather than the BB Gun I was gifted. But, life went on along with a pending meeting with the military along with the Vietnam War. I outran the war as long as I could. Finally it caught up with me and I enlisted for three years in the Army, rather than being drafted and insuring me a sure date with Vietnam. 

I dreamed of pursuing a goal of pursuing my early career in the radio broadcasting business while I served my military service for my country. Sure it was all a long shot but the long shot suddenly became a reality with the help of a local congressman whose radio station I worked for. With his backing, I was able to work a year in Thailand for the AFTN Radio and Television Network and then against all odds, managed to end up in Germany working a year and a half for AFN or the American Forces Network Europe. In doing so I was able to experience new cultures on different continents while I tried to keep my eye on the goal I couldn't seem to lose, the desire to be a woman.   

As we approach Halloween season, it is important to note how important Halloween was to me. Primarily because the parties I attended in "costume" as a woman allowed me to experiment on how far I was advancing  my feminine presentation and more importantly could I exist in the public's eye as my dream  woman. I have plenty of posts I will be sharing as we come closer to the actual day of Halloween. 

Spoiler alert, of course I finally did overcome all my doubts of ever being able to live out my dream but found I still had a long distance to go on my gender journey. Every time I think I was making progress, I found I still had so much farther to go.  As destiny directed me, I painted myself into a gender corner I couldn't delude myself to continue. I was ready to take the final step and live my dream of being a full time transgender woman. No more of just thinking I was just a weekend cross dresser, I needed more.

When I did, the final step was till more scary and ambitious than I ever imagined. I still remember the day I gave what was left of my male clothes to the thrift store and resolved to never look back on my old male life. No more just hiding behind my cross dressing until I could escape back to my comfortable world of male privileges. Through it all, my HRT or hormone replacement therapy helped to alter my male body enough to help my difficult attempt to present convincingly as a woman. 

From dreams to reality, the long twisting gender experience was worth it. My lifelong dream was a true one and I learned I was not making anything up. I was living how I wanted. 

Sunday, August 20, 2023

Transgender Recipe

Image from Callum Hill
on UnSplash
Every now and then I am asked how I negotiated a difficult and often impossible gender journey. 

As I have been able to sit back and look at my path, I know my recipe for success is in some cases very different from other transgender women  but at the same time eerily similar. An example would be those of you of an age close to mine (73) needed to endure years in a very dark and isolated closet in the pre-internet and social media era. For years, I was convinced no one else shared my own gender issues. My own recipe for success as a novice cross dresser or transvestite (or whatever you happened to call it) turned into a recipe for survival.


Through all the down days of questioning what gender I was, life went on as I built into my recipe different ways to survive in a male world I wanted no part of. I mainly resorted to existing in a very lonely life as the girl in the mirror. The major problem was the girl in the mirror always provided positive feedback no matter how poor I really looked. The learning curve proved to be a challenge since I had no real peer influence to help me. 

My recipe didn't really change for years as I basically just bided my time until I graduated high school and college. Then waited for the military to draft me into their world which shattered any of my possible future cross dressing ventures. They would have to be on hold for my three year enlistment. Surprisingly my recipe did not include my first adventure in letting others in (or coming out) to a select few others. I write often about the Halloween party I went to in Germany when I had approximately a year left to serve, as a prostitute. Weeks later, when my "costume" came up among friends. over many quality German beers I admitted I was not wearing a "costume", I was a transvestite. Even though I felt as if the weight of the world had been lifted from my shoulders, I then had to begin to worry about being outed to my superiors and being ushered out of the military with a dis-honorable discharge. Fortunately, I wasn't. I served out my final year and was honorably discharged. With my gender issues safely hidden away.

Following my return to the civilian world, my interaction with others as a transvestite revolved basically around the various Halloween parties I went to as a woman. During the parties I was able to mix in interacting with the world as a novice transgender woman into my recipe. The lessons learned are basically too many to share in this blog post but the most important ingredient I added to my gender recipe was the fact I just may be able to exist in the feminine world as a full time transgender woman and most importantly how much I enjoyed it. 

From there my life became much more complex as I enforced my ever-evolving gender recipe. I was at once elated but  at the same time terrified to be giving up what was left of my male life. I suspect those of you followed a somewhat similar path as you wrote and followed your own recipe for gender success. It remains amazing to me how far I have come since the deep dark days in the closet I survived years ago. 

Friday, August 4, 2023

Stages

Image from the
Jessie Hart Collection.

 Our topic today in my Veterans Administration group concerns the trials and tribulations of coming out, or letting others in to our authentic selves.

When I think back to my process of letting others in to me, I have a tendency to just zero in on two people, my daughter (only child) and my only sibling, a brother. To make a long story short, my daughter was very accepting and my brother was the opposite. In fact, I have not talked to him to this day. Sad but true. Overall, the real staging process came way before I came out or let some one in. 

In truth, I came out in stages when I experimented with testing the public as my novice feminine self. Thinking back, my first attempts at "showing off" came during Halloween parties. I started, predictably enough, with trying to dress as sexy as I could and telling everyone my "costume" was a prostitute. Over the years of trying, I slowly evolved into just trying to present well enough at the parties for others to think I was a cis-woman. As even that worked for me, it was time to consider my next move or stage I was going to.

What I decided on was I couldn't stand to wait another year to be in the public's eye as whatever label you wanted to attach to me. Cross dresser, transvestite, or even novice transgender woman were all possibilities What really mattered was I was finally beginning to adjust to living in a new gender world I had only dreamed of. Once I made it to one stage, I always thought I could make it to another. I was successful in doing the grocery shopping all the way for shopping for the Christmas gifts I was going to give away. As my new self. It was as scary as it was exciting.

It turned out the more stages I was successful on, the more I needed to be. Which led me on a collision course with my old worn out male life. Even though I was fairly successful living as a man, he could tell his time on my stage was coming to an end and did not appreciate it. It was around this time also when I hit the darkest time of my life. In the several years when my second wife passed away, I also lost nearly all of my very few male friends I had to death also. I was extremely lonely and turned to my feminine self to fill the void. I would cross dress to blend and go out to treat myself to a drink in one of the venues I had become a regular in. Since I really wasn't seeking companionship, I guess you could say I was going out to be alone.

Through it all, this stage of my life proved to me I could live as a transgender woman. All the other stages of my life all of a sudden became clear and I knew all the years of living on a male stage had been mostly a waste of time. The main thing that wasn't was the birth of my very supportive daughter. Which I would never have achieved if I wasn't on the male stage. 

Today, I won't have a very long time to explain the slow route I took to letting others into my true self.  Hopefully, writing about the process ahead of time makes it clearer to others.

Sunday, July 30, 2023

Come On In!

Image from A Zuhri

 I mentioned this comment briefly in yesterday's post. Recently, in my newest Veteran's Administration LGBTQA+ group session. The moderator brought up a new concept, instead of coming out, in reality we transgender folk are inviting others in.

This is a fairly radical idea when you take into consideration all the anti-transgender legislation which has been unleashed upon us by a certain political party not called the Democrats. Even still. the entire idea has a positive ring to it. Imagine having the comfort level (and/or confidence) to invite friends and family in to share your deepest darkest secret. The inner secret you have carried around your entire life. I know when I came out to others for the first time, I was in some sort of a gender free fall. In essence I had been stripped of all my old male reactions to any adversity. I needed to learned quickly the different gender path I would need to take to survive.

Truth be known, cis-women have known the alternate path for years. Often, in their own way, the women said to others come on in and then they needed to sort out the fall out from there. It doesn't really matter because in everyone's life, we have to sadly face it's ups and downs. Relationships of course are included. My coming out example was very unpleasant in it's own way. It happened way back when I talked my first fiancé into dressing me head to toe as a woman. Then proceeded to still do it weeks and months later. She eventually held it against me when Uncle Sam and the military draft came a knocking when I graduated from college. She fully expected me to try to escape serving by telling the world I was gay. Which was wrong. I knew I was learning how much I didn't want to be a man but I wasn't sure I wanted to change my sexuality.

The entire series of events turned out to be an extremely beneficial  part of my life. My fiancé and I broke up and I moved on to serving three years in the Army. Ironically, the first people who I ever invited into my gender world occurred after a Halloween party I went to when I was serving in Germany. The woman who eventually ended up being my first wife and mother of my daughter essentially met me there at the party. So she was one of the few I let in. Ultimately, one of the biggest success stories of my life.

Even though I thought I was fighting the best I could letting anybody in, in truth I was pressuring myself to come out. All the Halloween parties I went too in my feminine "costume" just served notice how badly I wanted to let others in. During the parties, I  secretly rejoiced when anyone else told me how convincing I was. Later on, I pushed the gender envelope even farther by leaving the house during the day fully cross dressed as a woman. Putting everything I knew in life into jeopardy. Deep down I wanted to be caught.

Finally the whole intricate process came tumbling down. Call it what you want coming out, or letting in. It had to happen before the gender ripping and tearing nearly killed me. 

  

Monday, July 17, 2023

Her World

Image from Daniel 
Gonzalez on UnSplash

I live in her world and I am grateful to do so.

More exactly, I am a retired transgender veteran senior citizen who waited most of her life to finally fully come out to the world. Why I waited so long to live in her world, is a complicated matter which involved a semi successful male life which was difficult to give up. Not to mention the potential to lose what remained of my family and friends. By living an extended period as a man, I learned the hard way what I didn't like about the male gender. Even still, I wasn't sure I could ever achieve my goal of living as a fulltime transgender woman. Early on I was naïve and thought success as a woman only came when I did my best to appear as one. 

As I started my early emergence into her world, I found the process was going to be so much more complicated. How was I going to survive financially as well as get used to communicating with the public from the viewpoint of an all new gender perspective. I discovered quite quickly which gender stereotypes were true and which ones were false. I always play the intelligence card when I learned I lost a major amount of my intelligence with men when I completed my MtF gender transition. I found I needed to get used to the changes quickly. 

The more I changed, the more prominent her world became to me. Before I totally gave in to her, I made the ill-fated attempt to hang on to what was left of my old male life while I tried to live part time as a transgender woman. It was becoming increasingly evident to me I was so much more than a transvestite or part-time crossdresser. The relatively new transgender term I found, described me more completely. As I decided, I was able to leave more and more of the old male pressure behind me but not before an ill fated suicide attempt. When the pressure became too much to bear. The moral to the story, my inner woman had gone too far to ever return and I needed to realize it. 

These days, through the miracle of modern medical science, thanks to HRT (hormone replacement therapy) I am able to wake up every morning with all my hair, soft skin, breasts and expanding hips. All the physical signs I need to reinforce I am living in her world. Long ago I decided I did not need or could not afford any major gender surgeries to help me along at my age. My gender was securely entrenched between my ears, not between my legs. I could face the world with what I had.

The only drawback is when my gender dysphoria gets the best of me when I take a look at myself in the morning mirror. It's the time when certain days I dream of completing facial femininization to look even more feminine. Then I have to put my vanity behind me and move on. Also, I would be remiss if I didn't mention how internal her world is. The more I transitioned into her world, the more emotional I became as the world around me softened noticeably. Of all my favorite aspects of moving into her world, this was my favorite aspect.

I always say the only regret I have is not transitioning more completely earlier in my life. Perhaps destiny was telling me I had to live through certain learning times in my life. Such as serving in the military, graduating college and having my daughter. Without all of those, I would have missed out on so much of my life. Perhaps I shouldn't  have worried, all along I was living her life anyhow. I was just too stubborn to realize it. One time I had a close cis-woman friend tell me after a Halloween party suddenly tell me if "I ever decided to go the other way" (as a woman) I wouldn't have to worry. I finally listened and made the move into her world.

Saturday, June 3, 2023

Transgender Discovery

Pride Photo from past with Ohio
River. From the Jessie Hart
Collection

Recently on the day that Pride began, I guess it was fitting one of my long ago male friends found out the changes I have gone through. 

I wasn't there to witness how he learned my name had changed and I was living as a woman a distance away in Cincinnati, Ohio. What happened was my daughter and first wife were attending a funeral for my friend's nephew. After the ceremony my friend from way back in my high school and Army days asked innocently enough how (my dead name) was doing.  Keep in mind I haven't seen or heard from him in nearly forty plus years. He served some very difficult duty in Vietnam and for all intents and purposes became a hermit. 

Amazingly, after he asked my ex wife about me by my old dead name, she said "Who?" By this time my very supportive daughter was listening intently. The next thing that happened was my ex wife told him the whole truth concerning my gender transition to which he seemed to be very confused according to my daughter.  I'm a little surprised he was confused with the transgender concept because he has another nephew who is a transgender man. Perhaps it was because when he knew me I was in a macho overdrive attempting to cover up any feminine tendencies I may have had. Except when I went to one Halloween party with him and his soon to be wife dressed as my attempt as a sexy woman. I guess I was too good at hiding I was macho through my feminine outfit I was enjoying so much.

The biggest surprise I had from the entire episode of coming out with someone I hadn't seen for decades came from my wife Liz. Once I told her what happened, she asked if I was mad at or disappointed with how my ex wife handled the whole thing. I immediately said no. Most certainly I don't care if any of the very rare individuals from my past know I am now living as a transgender woman. In fact, I can't remember anyone I haven't told if I had any contact with them at all. As I always have said, I had such a small circle of male friends it is easy to remember any I never told my deep dark secret. In fact I never had to because nearly all of my old male friends passed away before I transitioned to a fulltime transgender woman. It seemed though, one previous friend I hadn't even considered slipped through the cracks. 

I also think if he had been paying attention, I was/am not the only transgender person in his immediate family or previous acquaintances. As I previously written, he has a nephew who is trans as well as my daughter's child who is trans also. Since it has been decades since I have seen him I have no idea of how he is reacting. 

Positively I hope.   

A Cajun Night Out

Ohio River Pride Image of Author JJ Hart Recently I passed my seventy fifth birthday. To have a mini celebration, my wife Liz took me to one...