One Gender Size does Not fit All

Image from Grae Phillips 
on Geraldo television show.

 If the truth be known, all the way back when I was a kid struggling to understand what gender I was on any given day, I would have been known as gender fluid. 

Of course, gender fluid was a term which hadn't been invented yet. Anyone who was interested in cross dressing was branded as being a transvestite and even worse labeled as being mentally ill. In the middle of my gender vacuum, even I knew well enough I was not mentally ill just because I wanted to wear makeup and dresses. I hid my desires and hoped for the best, which mostly came when I was left alone to cross dress and admire myself in the full length hallway mirror at home. Most of all, I was trapped and could do nothing about it. Keep in mind, all of this was happening in the information "dark ages" before the internet and social media. The gender underground I was interested in came mainly from the pages of Transvestia Magazine and Virginia Prince. Even I knew the pages of the "National Enquirer" and other predecessors of Faux News who sensationalized cross dressers were not to be trusted.

Then came the barrage of so called reality television talk shows including, Donahue, Springer and Raphael. All of whom seemed to be pushing the theme of cross dressing husbands Except for the impossibly beautiful and talented "Grae Phillips" who put everyone else to shame. All of these shows probably did little or no good for my gender dysphoria except for publicizing the fact there were cross dressers of transvestites of all kinds at all. All I knew was I desperately tried to watch or tape every show I knew was coming up from my "TV Guide". My wife was trying to tape her soaps and I was trying to tape my talk shows and both kept us busy. Even though I still had to watch my shows in private attempting to learn anything I could about the outside world.

I did learn once again. my gender size was unique and did not fit all. In fact, I still felt out of place when I started to attend my first cross dresser - transvestite mixers here in my native Ohio. I discovered there were so many different levels of participation from transsexuals headed for gender surgeries down to the weekend cross dressing hobbyists.  For some reason, I was not part of either group and once again my gender size was not fitting in. The problem was, all of this happened before the transgender terminology was introduced. When it was and I started to have access to my first computer, I was able to research the term which was unknown to me. Suddenly I knew what had been missing my whole life, a gender size which fit me and I set out to discover more about being transgender. For me, it meant being part of a gender description which was somewhere in-between the spaces I had been in previously.

Even though my gender size did not fit all, finally I was able to locate my own niche to thrive in. Life became fulfilling, scary and exciting at the same time. I found out I was fine being who I was all along and it felt so natural. I was home. 

"Trans-Dar" Activated

 

Image from Nikki Smith

Yesterday I happened upon two television shows with  LGBTQ friendly hosts. 

During both shows, I was actually late in tuning in and missed the very beginning of the segments. During the first show, my "Trans-dar" didn't really go off at all until the questions started. Of course, once I realized the woman was transgender I began to pay closer attention to what was going on. It turned out the trans woman's sister invited her to be in her wedding. I immediately thought what was the problem? It turns out the trans woman was forced to walk down the aisle by herself because no one in the best man's party would commit to even holding her hand for the walk. Of course, I felt her situation deeply having experienced something similar to that myself.

Years ago, when I began to become close to a small group of people in a venue I became a regular in, I was invited to join in a bachelorette party. To make a long story short, my invitation was revoked for a reason I was never told. Life went on and I was disappointed but I got over it. Maybe one of more of the other invitees objected to me being invited at all. I moved on forever wondering what went wrong.  Joining in with a bachelorette women's party at the time would have done wonders for my overall confidence with my presentation as well as my confidence in my new life.

Since I rarely see any shows on television which cover transgender  women or men at all, I was surprised on the same day, to see yet another program featuring another trans person. This time my "Trans-dar" did go off and I was able to research who I was watching and came up with "Nikki Smith". During the interview, she was able to provide feedback (in a short period of time) on the issues we face as transgender women. Especially in Utah where she grew up and the problem of finding her way in a field such as rock climbing. Both her and the interviewer did an incredible job of providing an insight on our lives.

Even still, both shows plus what I heard on one of the cable news networks I am a fan of, left me deeply troubled on the future of LGBTQ people in an overall sense and trans people in particular will have to face in the future. Texas (of course) was featured in a show I was watching when they pointed out how far right wing companies such as "Patriot Mobile" in Texas are funneling thousands of dollars into winning local school board races. Which in turn force schools into anti-gender and racial systems  of education and book banning. Closer to home, the school board where I live just painted out a diversity mural the middle school students had painted. Amid many protests the board ignored.

Hopefully the whole process back fires on the gender and racial bigots and the younger generation continues on their path to providing a more equitable future for all. 

The Gender Blender

Photo from Unsplash 

Recently I have been binging on PBS cooking shows. In other words, Martha Stewart and her minions for some reason interest me because even though I can cook, Liz does most all of it for us. So  the same as most of the things I do in life nothing makes total sense. 

As I watched the shows though one of the things I noticed was the reliance all the cooks have for food blenders and/or processors. Then of course I started to think how my gender during my life has been affected by a huge blender.

Early on I seemed to add in (or sneak in) as much feminine life I could. As the blender turned, my old male self prevailed and I still tried my hardest to pursue a false life as a male. The solution was I began to add more and more feminine ingredients into the mix.

First it was just going out shopping as a woman. Then it grew into a much more serious path as I met and began to meet and establish friendships with those people who only knew my feminine side. Even with all of this happening, or maybe because of it, I started to add a bigger share of feminine ingredients into my gender mix. The more I added the better the mixture tasted. Even though I was risking the life of friends, family and male privilege I had worked so hard to establish. 

Finally, since my mixture was tasting so good and the results felt so natural, I decided to take the major step and add the hormone replacement therapy ingredients into the mix. Of course when I did it, the outward balance of my gender perception really began to shift to the feminine side. Plus  internally my emotional make up was changing also. 

The more I blended away my old male self, the more I didn't miss him. Life made it to a point where I barely remember him at all. Plus, I am so happy I made the choice to keep adding more and more feminine ingredients to my gender blender.

I am waiting now for a well known transgender chef to come up with their own cooking show and feature their own gender blender!

In the meantime, I can't thank all of you enough who subscribe, comment or clap for all my posts on several different writing platforms, it means everything to me and I even am able to retain a portion of your hard earned money if you subscribe. Thanks again!

And the Winner is Transgender

 

Amy Schneider, a trans woman from Oakland, will make her fourth “Jeopardy!” appearance Monday after winning three games last week during Trans Awareness Week

.After her victory on Friday’s show, she told Newsweek that she had been trying to get on the show for over a decade. 

“I’m not sure quite how long [ago I first applied], but I remember trying out when I still lived in Ohio, and I’ve lived in Oakland since 2009, so it has to have been at least that amount of time,” she said. 

Schneider also explained how her transition in 2017 might have helped her finally get a spot on the show. 

“The reality is that for the first few years of that, when I was trying out, I was, as far as any of us knew, a standard white guy,” she told the magazine. “And there’s just more competition for those slots on Jeopardy! They’re making a TV show, they don’t want everybody to look the same, and I looked a lot like many of the other contestants, and I think that definitely made it a little tougher for me at that time. I would have got on eventually — I was never gonna stop trying!”

No Power no Post

Source: Cyrsti
Hart

 Yesterday turned to be a complete bust as promptly at 7:45 AM, our electric power went out. After the usual paranoia about paying the bill, I realized it was too early for even the electric powers to be to be shutting it off. 

Since my partner Liz is still very much a working woman, she gets up before me to have her morning coffee, take care of the animals (except me) and get her morning meditations done before clocking into work as she works from home. 

As I turned over and noticed all the power was off, Liz met me at the steps to the bedroom to tell me the energy company had robo called her and said the power would be restored in approximately two hours. Approximately was the key term as it was nearly twelve hours before our electric was restored. 

We live in an all electric home, so everything ground to a halt. Including our heat. 

Heat wasn't so much of a problem to me because it isn't that  cold and I could but on an extra sweater. What really bugged me was not having a television. I was forced to spend extra time faced with only me. I am my own worst best friend always overthinking every situation which causes me extreme anxiety at times.  To counteract part of my destructive thought processes, I even sleep with the television on. The harmless shows on the "Hallmark Channel" always seem to do the trick and I can quickly fall asleep. I truly get panicky inside if I have to think of sleeping without noise. Fortunately, Liz has learned to live with my quirky behavior. 

The whole day of facing myself stressed me so bad I still couldn't sleep when I went to bed, television or not. I finally fell asleep approximately four thirty in the morning. It's barely 10:30 AM now, so that is my excuse for this rambling post. 

 As with any negative situation, there is usually something positive which comes from it. The good thing that happened was I  found I was going to get an extra night out because we had no way to cook dinner. The trick was to put what ever small amount I wear anymore on by flashlight. The whole process turned out to be surprisingly easy. In fact, I thought of many cheap shots to use when describing my makeup which I won't use. The good part was I was riding a wave of confidence because when we went out to vote on Tuesday, the lady who checked me in called me mam. That's always reassuring even though I have never experienced any problems when I have gone to vote. 

The only problem we possibly experienced at dinner was one older woman who couldn't seem to not wanting to stop and stare at Liz and I as she was leaving. It was so bad even Liz noticed which is rare. Normally I always do before she does. It's possible also, since Liz and I were sitting together across from her son, the woman thought we were lesbians which is a whole other story. 

All in all the power was on when we returned home and life returned to what passes for normal around here. With or without sleep.

Transgender Emmy

 

The ABC’s kids drama series First Day, starring transgender actress Evie Macdonald, has won an International Kids Emmy Award.

In the show, Evie (pictured  left) plays Hannah Bradford, a 12-year-old transgender girl, who is navigating starting at a new high school as her authentic self

First Day premiered on ABC ME in March 2020, and subsequently was a huge success overseas.

It screened around the world including in the US, UK, Canada, Japan, France, Finland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Israel, New Zealand, Taiwan, Ireland, South Africa, and Brazil.

Now the show has won best live-action series at the 2021 International Kids Emmy Awards, announced online this week.

After the win, the show’s producer Kristy Stark thanked everyone involved with the show.

Another Top Transgender Star

 

Indya Moore started as a model, but they really made a name for themselves when they were cast as Angel on FX's "Pose." 

As a trans and non-binary person, they became a mainstream success, booking even more modeling gigs and eventually becoming Elle's first trans cover model. 

Transgender Reintroduction

 Tommy Dorfman is reintroducing herself.

The "13 Reasons Why" star, who played Ryan Shaver in the Netflix series, revealed that she has been "privately identifying and living as a woman" in a Time interview published Thursday. 

"Today is about clarity: I am a trans woman. My pronouns are she/her. My name is Tommy," Dorfman said, adding that she has officially undergone a  medical transition as well.

Congratulations

That's all Good...But...

 Perhaps, by now you have heard the good news "Mj. Rodriquez" (left) transgender lead in the Pose television series was nominated for an Emmy. This of course is a first for a transgender actor or actress. 

However, the trans entertainment news is not all good. 

This is from EW.com:

"The LGBTQ media organization acknowledges the past year resulted in a unique situation for theatrical movies, but it still went ahead with its 2020 Studio Responsibility Index, their report card for sorts on how well Hollywood's major studios brought LGBTQ representation to the screen. GLAAD found that, out of the 44 films released by those entities, none of them included trans or non-binary characters.

In fact, this is the fourth year in a row where this has happened. By GLAAD's own estimates, that's zero trans characters out of almost 400 films since January 2017. The last time a transgender character was included in a major studio film — Disney, Warner Bros., Universal, Paramount, etc. — it was an "offensive caricature," as GLAAD dubbed it: Benedict Cumberbatch's All in 2016's Zoolander 2."

Thanks Bobbie for sending this along!

Coming Out on Tic Toc?

 One of the programs on television I can't say I have ever watched is "Dance Mom's". 

However, one of the program's performers shed her non authentic male persona and came out as transgender. 

"Zachery Torres"  recently shared on Tic Toc that her pronouns are "she/hers and they/them".

During an interview for Pink News she said she didn't feel a pressure to dance a certain way until she landed a spot on "Dance Mom's". Now she wants to use her platform so young transgender and queer kids don't have to face a line of fire. 

For more, go here. 

Remembering a Trans Icon

 From "Today":

"Now, viewers can binge “Pose,” “Supergirl,” “Euphoria” or even “Star Trek: Discovery,” but when Candis Cayne sashayed onto the screen on ABC’s nighttime drama “Dirty Sexy Money” in 2007, she became the first openly transgender actor with a recurring role on a network television series.

On the show, she played the vixenous Carmelita Rainer, who was having an affair with handsome New York state attorney general Patrick Darling (Billy Baldwin), who was itching to get out from under the thumb of his billionaire father (Donald Sutherland).

“Dirty Sexy Money” only lasted one season but it broke ground in a number of ways: Cayne was a transgender woman playing a transgender character. And Carmelita wasn’t the butt of the joke — she was beautiful, and as deliciously devious as her co-stars."

For more, go here: 

Charmed is Trans

 On the CW television network, the "Charmed" show has added another transgender character.

From the "Deadline" site:

"Actress Mareya Salazar is about to bring some of her magic to Charmed. The trans actress is set to join The CW series in a recurring role for the reboot of the spellbinding series. The timing of the news couldn’t be any more perfect considering its Transgender Day of Visibility — and we love to see Salazar join the cast.

The casting marks the second transgender actor to join this season. In November, Deadline exclusively broke the news that JJ Hawkins joined the cast in the recurring role of Kevin, a transgender male college student who inspires one of the Charmed Ones to take on a very formidable opponent. With Salazar and Hawkins, Charmed continues to move the needle when it comes to bolstering authentic representation of the trans community."

Perhaps the day is coming we won't  have to mention an actress is transgender at all. They will  just become actors or actresses.

And the Answer Is...

 Transgender woman Kate Freeman sported a trans pride pin as she became the first out transgender woman to win on the "Jeopardy" television quiz show.

She is a financial analyst from Lake Orion, Michigan. Jeopardy has been on the air since 1964 with more than 8,000 episodes.  At least one other contestant has transitioned in the past after winning the game but Kate is the first out transgender person to do it.

Her Story

 Richards not only starred in Her Story, she also co-produced it. The show went on to receive an Emmy nomination back in 2016. But more importantly, Richards, who has since appeared on TV series like Nashville, Better Things, and Tales of the City, has been working hard to promote trans visibility.

She founded an organization called Trans 100, which works to honor and recognize trans people and businesses that are doing positive things for the community. She has also been an advocate for pushing producers to cast actual trans people in trans roles. Her picture is below.

Jamie Clayton

 Honored by Out magazine back in 2011 for being one of the top transgender personalities, Jamie Clayton (below)has been portraying transgender characters for the last decade, starting off with HBO series Hung in 2011.

She has also done work to help young kids going through the confusing stages of their lives and gender identities by narrating the young adult novel George about a transgender girl. Sense8, the Netflix series that garnered Clayton an even bigger following than she already had is one of many that fans believe was cancelled far too soon. It has since developed a cult following.

A Transgender Powerhouse

If you hadn't noticed, transgender powerhouse Laverne Cox is and has been a spokesperson for Smirnoff Vodka. Here is one of her latest commercials:

Transgender in the Comics

I found an interview with Nicole Maines you may be interested in. You may recall, Nicole is the transgender actress who portrays a character on television's Supergirl.

On March 15, 2020, an episode of Supergirl titled “Reality Bytes” aired on The CW, focused on the harrowing topic of violence against trans women. Actress Nicole Maines, a trans woman who portrays Nia Nal (aka Dreamer) on the series, led the way in the episode with an emotional and raw performance and with contributions in the writer’s room. On March 31st’s Trans Day of Visibility, 

The interview comes from Beat Magazine: 

First Nicole was asked what the Transgender Day of Visibility meant to her: 

"Well it kinda feels like a double-edged sword for me. I feel like, on the one hand, it’s a victory lap for all of us because we’ve made so much progress. You know, we have reached all these milestones but then at the same time you know we have to take a moment and recognize, why our visibility is so radical and you have to remember everyone else who we’ve lost along the way and you have to keep in mind all the new legislation that’s being introduced amidst all this so there’s a lot of emotions, but I think it should first and foremost, be a happy day for us to celebrate that we can even be visible."

There is so much more to this interview. Here is your link to read it.

New Trans Kid Show

From the "Star Observer":

"Premiering March 30 on ABC Me, First Day, is a new children’s drama series about a transgender girl navigating her first year of high school.

Starring transgender activist and actor, Evie McDonald as Hannah Bradford, First Day will air as a four part, half hour episode series and will explore some of the difficulties transgender kids face at school.

First Day is McDonald’s first acting role, however, she has been involved in a number of transgender awareness projects including the 2017 campaign to remove the family court from the gender affirmation process for transgender children.

In an interview with Star Observer, McDonald discussed just how important visibility projects such as First Day are in changing social perceptions about what it’s like to be transgender.

“I want to help make it easier for other people to come out as trans in the future. Being transgender is not a choice – and we’ve been around forever,” McDonald told Star Observer."

For more, go here.

Home Alone

This is quite the comment from Connie. It has to do with my comment concerning paranoia spending any real time alone due to the effects of the Corona 19 virus:

"I have a difficult time falling asleep without the TV on, myself. In fact, I have a difficult time staying awake while watching TV any time after 9:00 PM. Many times I've awoken to some infomercial being shown at 3:00 AM while I'm still laid back in the recliner. At that point, there is no sense going to bed, if it's a work day, since my normal wake-up time is 4:00 AM. If I were to retire to the bedroom to go back to sleep, though, I'd have to turn on the TV there in order to do it. Without the TV on, I can't turn my brain off. The trouble is that, when I should be sleeping, my brain will turn all-OC on me - rehashing everything that really only required a passing thought. The TV is just enough of a distraction to keep this from happening.

There are very few TV shows that are so good that I really regret missing the second half of them. I've often wondered if I might be finishing the plot lines in my own dreams, but I don't remember many of my dreams, anyway. Most of them are probably no more interesting than the show that had put me to sleep in the first place!

I'm trying very hard to resist the temptation of reflection these days. I have so many things that need my attention in the here-and-now, and the uncertainty of the world around me is out of my control. I've lost some work, my wife has been asked to stay at home without pay indefinitely, and our governor has announced that he is seriously considering mandating that anyone over the age of 65 not to work at all. I don't know how they would police that, and I already joked to my boss that I might have to start a half-hour later to give me more time on my makeup in the morning - I only need to look 64. :-) Geesh, I've been a trans woman so long that there was time I could have been arrested for presenting as a woman on the street. Now, that's OK, but I could still be arrested for being an old woman on the street. Without enough income, though, I may have to resort to living on the street (in which case, the police wouldn't even give me a second look in this city).

I am trying to live as close to what was familiar to me before this Covid-19 thing started. There's no way to keep up with the changes coming, sometimes by the hour. Having a job to get up for every morning helps, but I still will get up and ready for the day if the work goes away - maybe at 6:00 AM instead of 4:00, though. And I'll end the day falling asleep to the TV, too!"

 Indeed we have entered scary times. Our three income family just lost one income and our main source of money (Liz) maybe forced into part-time hours...or worse. My income comes from Social Security which these days has been under attack from the current administration. Fortunately I have not let it bother me to the point of being up all night watching the television.

Candis Cayne

Candis Cayne was born August 29, 1971 and is an American actress and performance artist.

Cayne performed in New York City nightclubs in drag since the 1990s, and came out as transgender in 1996; Cayne came to national attention in 2007 for portraying transgender mistress Carmelita on ABC's prime time drama Dirty Sexy Money. The role makes Cayne the first transgender actress to play a recurring transgender character in primetime.