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.

Jin Xing

From the Thomson Rueters Foundation News:

"China's best known transgender celebrity says she never aspired to be an LGBT+ activist but now Jin Xing has an eye on politics, saying she has the power and presence to help society.

Jin admits her journey from teenaged soldier to ballerina to one of China's top TV hosts has been extraordinary, as has her widespread acceptance as a trans woman in conservative China.

Next stop: the political stage in one-party communist China.

"If you have the power and the guts and will and thinking to do something for society, why not? My talk show already had a political impact," she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in an interview on Wednesday at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, a ski resort hosting some 3,000 of the global elite."

Follow the link above for more.

Transgender Lesson Learned

As I go back through the ideas I have compiled for another book, I find myself living too far in the past.

My noggin tends to remember the good times and forget the bad ones. For instance, there was the rime I went to an urban downtown festival in Dayton, Ohio. I searched and found a post about it years ago here in the Cyrsti's Condo blog. It has always been interesting to me how in depth I went into what I wore. I mentioned the silky tank top I tried along with my favorite pair of distressed jeans. I even wrote about showing off "the girls" which back in those days were silicone breast forms. Not that there is anything wrong with that!

What I didn't get into was how lonely I felt. Even though I made sure I went out to my favorite venues afterwards, I remember the distinct feeling of being envious concerning all the couples I saw. During this time period I was still a year or so away from finding others I could socialize with. The lesson I learned was to keep trying and try to stay public hoping someone would find me...as they eventually did.

It was tough to keep looking forward and not back at my numerous failures. Especially the guys I met on line who "couldn't wait" to meet me. Then stood me up.

Ironically, I learned the looking forward lesson when I was in the Army. In the final weeks of basic training we were on a very long forced march in the winter hills of Ft. Knox, Kentucky. I remember distinctly having a brief moment of feeling sorry for myself as I looked up the rather intimidating hill we were on. It lasted until I happened to look back and see how far we had come. From that point forward in the life, I tried to remember that lesson.

I can't tell you how many times I applied the lesson to my Mtf gender transition. Little did the Army know they were helping me learn a valuable transgender lesson. Never despair where you are. Just look at how far you have come!