The "Enigma" Gender

One definition for enigma is: a person or thing that is mysterious, puzzling, or difficult to understand.

It's no secret the binary male and female genders don't understand much about each other, so it's no wonder neither know much about we "invisible T's".  Here in Cyrsti's Condo in the past, I have taken the title from the classic guide Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus: The Classic Guide to Understanding the Opposite Sex and added transgender people must be from Earth, right between the other two. If we liked it or not, we spent some time on both planets and many of us still commute back and forth.

We are enigma's with all the stigma which can be attached-good or bad.  This week for example, I ran into many new people.  Not just walking by them on the street, but interacting with them too in meetings and social events. Truthfully, I was willingly knocked out of my comfort zone all week long. I know what you are thinking "Whoa Cyrsti, thought you were living all this time as a girl.  I can explain it this way: Every so often someone will ask me if I'm living "full time" or "24/7" as a woman.  The question is always difficult for me to answer because I can only vouch for living 24/7 between my ears.  The remainder of the time I'm awake, my gender is how the world perceives it-not how I do. I already know. For all I know, on my androgynous days some may think I'm from the moon!

So, at this point I am an enigma to the folks from Venus and Mars.  For the most part, I can guarantee you most don't understand me but as long as they don't willfully hurt me, that's fine.  I can't understand ever perceiving myself as my birth gender completely so I don't understand them.

As I transition, I am learning the fun part is to stay an enigma to the other planets.  For the most part the Martians keep me at arms length and the Venusian's are as curious as cats. My latest responses (truthfully a very small minority of the world who has much more to worry about than me) are centered in the eyes.  I had two or three women this week who seemingly couldn't get out of mine. If you are a believer in the eyes are the windows to the soul, they were trying to look at mine!

If I was a better writer and more disciplined a "Classic Guide to Understanding Earthlings" would be a fabulous follow up to understanding both other planets-or-we could do the "Why's and How's of Being a Gender Enigma" too. In the meantime, it's interesting to step back and look at the wonder of it all. 

Porno and the Genetic Woman

Quite the title, right?  The reason for it is last night, by sheer osmosis, I found myself in the middle of a porno discussion between my partner and three other of her genetic women acquaintances.

Here lately, I'm becoming better at shutting up and have the conversation come to me.  It's very effective in that most people from without the TGLBQ community don't really know what to think of me and a little mystery doesn't hurt.

After the get together last night we were all sitting around chatting and I was surprised when one of the women mentioned her ex husband and her resultant introduction to porno.  The conversation went to sex acts and then moved on rather quickly.  I am the first to admit, my experience with women has shown me, they are less than the prudes they portray around men. But,  this topic with this group of seemingly middle aged conservative women really got my attention!

I found myself stuck in sort of a time warp in the conversation too. Here I was as a transgender woman still not talking about porno. The same as when I was a guy because mainly,  I never felt the charge my guy friends supposedly got from porno and/or strip clubs. Through work though , I ended up at quite a few clubs and of course I played the game when I was bored to death. I oohed and ahhed at the right time. I thought it best though not to bring any of that up!   So, I just shut up and once again-played the game knowing full well that sooner more than later a woman will ask me about my thoughts.

On this side of the gender fence though, saying less, indeed means more and I do so enjoy the mystery!

Cyrsti's Condo "Cover Girl" of the Day

Our feature cover today is Stella Bueno 

Cyrsti's Condo "Cover Woman" of the Day

Our feature cover today is Geena Rocero,  model, activist, and transgender woman.

Cyrsti's Condo "Oldies but Goodies"

Back in the day" when I was 15, I used to be able to go with an older friend who already had his drivers license.  He had an aunt who had a neighborhood variety store which sold magazines and paperbacks among other things like chips, pop and beer.  Her store was in a less than affluent part of town and on very rare occasions I would find paperbacks such as these.  The problem was having enough courage to buy them-which I didn't and at the same time act like I didn't care!

Having Coffee with the Peeps

If you recall, my sit down with the Dayton/Cincinnati Trans Ohio community meeting was this last Tuesday and I wrote a brief post about it here in Cyrsti's Condo.

Since that time of course, I have come up with a few more observations.  First, I was disappointed in the transgender turn out.  In an organization called Trans, in a group of 14-16 peeps, there were only three in the room who identified as trans. From that point on, the meeting became one of educating everyone else about us and our concerns. Absolutely no problem.

The tough part was explaining why we transgender women belonged there anyhow. Trans Ohio is largely a trans male based organization but I have no problem with that either.  The third trans person in the room was a trans guy and the host.  Bottom line was, once again, I found myself  aligning with the other trans women and speaking for a silent group.  Fortunately, neither of us was shy.

As I said before, we introduced transgender employment, health care and over all visibility into the conversation. The first two, are such huge issues, I can't come even close to solving them -except to talk.  As far as visibility went, the turn out proved we are still an invisible "T".  A gay guy in the room went out of his way to explain why using the Tranny word was as OK.  He had it all worked out.  Since gay guys can call themselves fags then they can call themselves trannies as well as black's can use the "N" word with each other.  What he still didn't understand was as long as Tranny can be mistaken for an abbreviation for transgender or transsexual, it's not right  and is a slur.

I was satisfied though, by the end of the meeting, I walked out with the feeling I had helped to educate the gays and lesbians in the room who we really were.  An example was the young lesbian representative from a prominent GL organization in Cincinnati  who had no idea of HRT was or the succession of transition. I make the mistake of assuming they know as much about us, as we know about them.

The best I could do from there- at the end of the meeting I passed out my business cards and volunteered to attend their meetings too.  Every educated person helps!

Finally, the building the meeting was held in a GBLT Center and the sign on the restroom door was "Anyone"!

Cyrsti's Condo "Cover Girl" of the Day

Our feature cover of the day today is a very "80's" looking Grae Phillips.  If you don't recall Grae's story, he was billed as the "original Tootsie." I still remember clearly when he made his first appearance on the Phil Donahue Show.  He couldn't land a job as a guy singer in NYC and just " happened" to throw on a dress and makeup with the help of a girlfriend and was much more successful performing as a woman.
There are tons of Grae's videos on YouTube plus you can follow the link above for a website.

All The Letters in the Same Room

As you may recall, I posted here in Cyrsti's Condo about attending a Trans Ohio community organizational meeting.  Several were set up around Ohio. The main idea was to explore the main issues we face as TGLBQ individuals.  Meetings such as this have a tendency to either be used as a platform for some to vent on specific grudges or become extremely boring as a few seem to love to hear themselves talk.

This two hour meeting was neither.  The mediators managed to keep an incredibly diverse group on track. Approximately 14 people attended, two of which (including me) identified as transgender. The remainder were either gay or lesbian and even a person who identified as gender fluid.

As issues were discussed, we transgender women were able to mention primarily the lack of understanding from the rest of the community.  Of course, another main concern was the total lack of cooperation under the entire community umbrella.  In fact, the meeting started with one individual launching a mini rant on another person who wasn't there.  Needless to say, an unfortunate example of the problem.

My personal goal for the meeting was raising the goal of visibility for the transgender community.  I pushed the need for a central "clearing house" within the TransOhio organization.  What I mean is, a spot where a gender studies program, church or any other organization could go to get information or even a speaker.  I know it happens now, in isolated spots but to expand it, I believe you need an easy accessible central place to go for info.  In Ohio at least, one of the more populous states in the union, none exists which is publicized.

Here's an example.  A local small liberal arts very upscale university where I live, does have some sort of gender studies program but the professor I'm acquainted with who is involved knew absolutely nothing about trans people. In fact, he only acknowledged the gays and lesbians in his speeches. Plus, I know larger schools probably have several trans students who have come out but are the major issues of suicide and health care being discussed in  insulated college settings?

As with any meeting, what happens with the discussions in the days and weeks ahead determine success or failure.  We will see.

Cyrsti's Condo "Quote of the Day"