Of course by now we have all made it into the year of the force 2013.
The "force was with me" last night most certainly! As my GF said "It was magical"...Thus the title.
Where to start! To begin with, she planned all of this. I'm not talented enough to be the "social director".
The evening actually started early in the afternoon as we made our way into downtown Cincinnati. By the way, she is one of the persons I credit with pushing me over the cliff and enabling me to move forward faster than I imagined in my transgender journey. So surprisingly, many of my ancient fears of being accepted by the public weren't really a factor this time. Her complete acceptance of who I truly am as a transgender woman does instill confidence.
Before we checked in at our hotel, we stopped at an
excellent Jewish deli near the hotel for a fabulous
Rueben sandwich and some sort of a potato cake. I knew the evening was getting off to a good start when I was referred to as Mam about three times. We ordered our food to go and headed over to the hotel and began a rather lengthy check in process. I'm an impatient person to start with so minutes turned into hours before we jumped into an elevator and headed up to our room on the 28th floor.
We relaxed for an hour, ate our food and started to get ready to head to a performance of the Cincinnati Pops Orchestra. I did my best to do some understated elegance mixed in with a touch of casual comfort. (Do I sound like a fashionista? Ha!) I wore a see through black beaded lose top over a black sleeveless tank top of sorts and black flowing pants-finished with a pair of fancy black flats for comfort and safety on a snowy New Years Eve. I added one of my thrift store purse finds (a very dressy black bag with hanging silver baubles all over it with a long silver chain I added) and a black silver buckled belt I know some of you are thinking "where the hell are the pictures?" If the truth be known neither of us are picture peeps so there aren't any.
The newest "first" of the evening was taking cabs where we were going. Never had tried it as a girl but let's say we seemingly got quick service.
The
"Music Hall" in Cincinnati is a flat out beautiful structure with many flat out many beautiful women. My goal of course was just to blend and enjoy and all went very well. No secret glances or little smiles...nothing.
After the performance we headed down to the Ohio River "Banks" area and arrived almost exactly on time to claim our reservation at a big fun brew pub upscale restaurant. On the river. We stopped at the hostess stand and were greeted with "Good Evening Ladies" and were led to our table overlooking the river and the
Roebling suspension bridge. Roebling actually designed it and went on to design the Brooklyn Bridge in NYC. The "L" word became the norm (Ladies) and it truly was music to my ears as was the entertaining live band as we counted the final minutes of 2012.
As luck would have it, big large soft snowflakes were falling along with the Ball in Times Square on the big screens. The snow was reflected by the lit up bridge and one of the big double decker paddle boats as it passed slowly by.
2013 was ushered in of course by champagne and sweet kisses at the table. (I briefly wondered what all the other celebrants thought) All too soon the evening began to end as all wonderful things do and we hailed another cab and headed back to the hotel. Seizing an attempt to extend the evening, we were able to squeeze into the hotel lounge for the final drink of the evening.
It was there I
really felt the gender differences as two or three guys got into a drunken shoving match. It was close to closing time for them and the hotel security guard and a manager began to just clear the place anyhow.
But he came by where we were sitting at the bar and smiled and said you ladies can go ahead and finish your drinks. In one five minute period I was able to separate myself from male behavior and get a bit of preferential treatment for being a girl.
Then, the night was over and we headed up to our room and I was on a positive "
Cloud Nine" buzz. Somewhere above even the 28th floor.
Such a night! As I step back into reality off my cloud, I'm going to attempt to figure out all the nuances of the evening and pass it along in another post.
Until then...I
love my little cloud!
