Geraldine

A recent conversation I had with Connie jogged my slow memory about Flip Wilson and his character "Geraldine" .

I do distinctly remember liking to watch the show just to  sneak a peak at what "Geraldine" was up to. This was way back before even the term transvestite had entered my vocabulary, let alone transgender, His show aired from 1970 through 1974. My closet in those days was built with heavy concrete blocks!

If you remember Geraldine, she was fond of saying "The devil made me do it."

I wondered to myself if the devil was making me wear girls clothes and thought well, the devil was showing me a good time!

Brutal

I need to make the drive to Dayton for one of my support group meetings. The trip up to Dayton takes about an hour and a half, one way...in easy traffic. When I go to my monthly veterans LGBTQ support group meeting, it doesn't let out until four o'clock which means in rush hour traffic, I won't get home for two hours minimum. I'm going to have to tell my therapist I can't make it anymore unless something changes.

In the meantime, the group was very small yesterday. Only another transgender woman and a gay man  The gay guy told a very sad story of being HIV positive in the gay community. And the total rejection he felt.

So, not much else to report from the meeting as none of the fun people attended! My problem is, I can't enjoy the meeting because I am worried about the drive back.

A Tweet in the Night

My phone is set to loudly announce a text message or tweet whenever I happen to receive one. Every now and then, I set my phone on the end stand beside the bed when I sleep. Rarely, does anything happen until last night.

About three or so in the wee hours of the morning, I got a tweet. Mind you now, I don't do much on Twitter, so I rolled back over and went back to sleep. I did check it when I got rolling in the morning and it simply said "I want to be a woman." First I thought well duh, who doesn't?

Then, I got to think how hard it is for a transgender person to come to grips concerning their inner gender. And, after that, how difficult the journey is to sync up your inner and outer persons.

I wondered if the person who sent me the text was serious enough to face all the challenges of crossing the gender frontier.

Or was the message just a lost soul in the night, who I will never know.

I don't sugar coat much of anything, so it's hard for me to paint a rosy picture for any questioning transgender person. The easy answer of hitch up those big girl panties and proceed to go at it alone, because many times there simply is no one to help you.

However, I do have a big shoulder to cry on.