From Yahoo News:

"Make Up For Ever is setting an important precedent in the beauty industry. The brand has tapped transgender model Andreja Pejic to be the face of their latest campaign, making the leggy beauty one of the first transgender models to land a major beauty deal (Pejic joins Brazilian model Lea T —who partnered with Redken in 2014—in leading to change in a largely cisgender-dominated industry). "I prefer doing shoots," the 23-year-old reveals in the interview. Time magazine last year for a feature titled "The Transgender Tipping Point," which explored how the acceptance of transgender individuals is the next social frontier in the U.S.)."


Don't you LOVE it? and her!!!!

Breaking Transgender Military NEWS!!!!

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Associated Press has learned that Pentagon leaders are finalizing plans aimed at lifting the ban on transgender individuals serving in the military.

Senior U.S. officials say an announcement is expected this week. They say the military would have six months to determine the impact and work out details, with the presumption that they would end one of the last gender- or sexuality-based barriers to military service.

The officials say that during the transition, transgender individuals would still not be able to join the military. Decisions to force out those already serving would have to be referred to a top Defense Department leader.

Several officials familiar with the planning spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the issue before the details have been worked out.

FINALLY!!!!!

Didn't Your Mom Raise You Better?

Sunday afternoon (yesterday) Liz and I went to her neighborhood large chain drug store to pick up a prescription for her and items for her Dad. I can make an excuse and say I wasn't having my best day with all the heat and humidy, a bum knee and various other "old person" ailments. But, it was going to get worse-for somebody else.

At any rate I followed Liz through the sliding doors and had enough time to look up and ahead of me at this 40 something woman almost peeing down her leg elbowing her husband in the side to notice me. I don't know if she ever got his attention after I started glaring her down.

I just kept staring at her until I had fully walked by and after the first "pee down her leg" moment, she only made the briefest of eye contact with me. The fortunate part was I didn't tell Liz until she had left the store and I asked her (Liz) "didn't she think it was sort of strange so many store employee's had "happened" to make their way to the front door to say goodbye? 

She said no-why? Then I told her the story of the rude woman who obviously had to share her "secret" to the crew. It did surprise me though, the crew did respond like that because we go in there quite a bit.  The crew though was not mean and since they were 20 somethings- for the most part- are fascinated to transgender women and men.

So, Liz wanted to go find the woman- NO! The rude woman was introduced to a "not so sweet" trans woman and the crew was treated to a more interesting afternoon! 

I felt better!

I Did Not Want to Wake Up!

As I read and see all these transgender women and trans girls talk and write about always wanting to be or feeling like a girl-I wonder where did I go wrong?

Was I really a transgender "pretender" or a glorified cross dresser as many were quick to suggest?

In my "spare time" these days I seemingly am turning up more and more gender "history" on myself. First of all, let me point out I could give a rat's ass less what 99% of the people think about me. These are merely a few of my "aha" moments.

1.- Yes, I did wake up some mornings desperately wanting to be a girl.
2.- On Christmas, YES I did want girly things and not boy gifts.
3.- No, I never wanted to hunt and fish with Dad and brother (although I did later embrace fishing later.
4.-Possibly the best story is the year we went on a vacation fishing in Canada and for no reason in particular happened along another car for a stretch of highway time. In the car was a teen girl with what I considered was a beautiful head of long dark hair. I again, desperately wanted to be here. I ended up burying my head in my pillow and tried to dream about being a girl.
5.-Speaking of dreaming, yes I did have many dreams which turned out to be nightmares. I dreamed I was a girl-and woke up a boy-again.

So, there you go. i am not sure there is some sort of a transgender rating system. But that was mine. 

Cyrsti's Condo "Sunday Edition"

KerPlunk! Another Sunday edition is hitting your virtual front porch! We are experiencing another very "normal" summer Sunday here in Southwestern Ohio-complete with loud "thunder-boomers" in the middle of the night. For no particular reason, we are drinking our "Joe" hot (coffee) this morning. Grab a cup and let's get started.

Page One.-The Week that Was or Wasn't.- Transgender kids came front and center again-a good thing!  The TLC network (for once) featured a show which didn't feature a child molester family such as the Duggars and/or Honey Boo's Mom and promoted their upcoming trans superstar teen "Jazz Jennings"  

Page Two.- Party Girl.- This weekend was my youngest grandson's birthday. The party proved a very uneventful coming out affair for me and a very fun time for the eight year old party boy. To put it easily, I was only mispronounced once and didn't feel much different one way or another around all of them. One thing that did help though was Liz calling me Cyrsti at every turn and both using the "she" pronoun with me. Plus, in what I call the transgender coming out "ripple effect", my daughter's Sister in Law is from Cincinnati and is ready willing and able to go out with Liz and I to eat and enjoy an adult beverage. Each person who knows and embraces a trans person is where real change beings.

Page Three.- Health is everything! The best news this week for me personally was being pretty much given a clean bill of health on some of my "innards" the docs were looking at. Now, I know at 66, anything can happen but I will take any good news I can get! (Yay!)

Page Four.- The Back Page.- It's been fun kids, but today after we get moving, excitement will include, buying some more very addictive chocolate covered coffee beans, maybe try some salt and vinegar dried crickets and finally color my hair (again). As always, thanks for being my guest here in the Condo!!!! You all are the best!!! 

The Right Answer is There Isn't One

Over the years of my Mtf gender transition, I have come across many with a "it's my way-or the highway" approach to living a transgender life. Truthfully, I know along the way-I have been there too. Guilty as charged.

Recently, I have happened across a couple other bloggers who seem to facing the same problem from others.

Stana at Femulate is one and Francine at In Transition is the other. As is usually the case, Stana wrote a thought provoking personal post essentially about her life. I really don't want to describe it anymore than to say Stana talked in depth abut her life as a "feminine man" and her extensive fashion sense. I will say though, it seemed she was trying to "rationalize" all of it.  No need to!!! The world is full of feminine men and masculine women. Plus, as far as style goes, Stana and I very much fabulous examples of the opposite ends of the trans style spectrum and that's OK too!!! 

If nothing else, all the recent publicity with Caitlin Jenner, Laverne Cox and others should show the world as a transgender community we are different. And, appearance alone far from defines us.

In a similar vein was the post from Francine in which a reader asked her about the best way to come out to her family. Again, her answer was a good one. There is no right answer. Each person is different. 

The only right answer is to take care of yourself. Do your best to follow a path you can understand. Just be aware there will be many blind curves. It sounds like a clique but if you are heading the right way, your inner girl will tell you. She has all he right answers!

Happy Birthday?

Tomorrow night is a family birthday party of my youngest Grand Son. It is yet another in a line of coming out parties for me too. The problem is, I don't want to be the center of attention to fully half of the attendee's who have never met me out of boy-drag.

But after fully catching hell for not coming as me to the last couple birthday parties and coming out to all three kids-I will be there.

Truly, I don't have much apprehension except (of course) what am I going to wear. Blah, blah, blah!) Also, of major importance is the condition (or lack or it) of my hair. Very quickly, my main color of gray is winning it's inevitable battle. With a little luck, I should be able to sweet talk Liz with providing her bathroom-if I don't turn it into a copy (again) of the shower murder scene in "Psycho." If you have never colored your hair the color will stick to you, walls and everything else it comes in contact with. (I learned the hard way-of course!)

My paranoia is, I just don't want my presence to take away from an eight year old boys birthday party! Being transgender in a room full of people means finding a corner to hide in is tough!

Transgender Learning on TLC?

I recoil for the most part anytime I think of "TLC" (The Learning Channel) being a source of any positive television programming at all. After all, one of their greatest programming debacles was"Nineteen and Counting"  -recently exposed for covering allegations of inner family child abuse. If you remember, TLC also featured "Honey Boo Boo."

However last night, I caught an episode?documentary called simply Transgender Kids on TLC and next Wednesday TLC will begin a series featuring transgender girl Jazz Jennings.

Here is a link to the promo-just ignore the rest of the side show. 

"Paranoia and the Duck"

I have written extensively here in Cyrsti's Condo of my complete and total paranoia about spending my last days in this life tossed back in the closet of a bleak nursing home.  OK, I could be too much of a drama queen I know but then again it's my paranoia which lives in it's special little closet in my noggin.

Now, enter the Aflac Insurance Duck character. Wasn't it the Duck who said "without your health-you have nothing?" Well probably not, but-

My point is, I wrote a post about a scheduled "cat-scan" I had last Thursday at my Veterans Administration Hospital. Having no idea of what to expect physically, I did the best I could to shave my legs,pits etc. Of course after I did all of that my "Rolls" car broke down on the way and the only person who could conceivably appreciate all my "grooming" would be the tow truck driver on the way home. (I was wearing a long skirt anyhow.)

Tomorrow morning, I an rescheduled to do it all again.

Again, call me a "drama queen" but I do see all of this as the first stages of my future health care. I really do have a healthy "fear" of being the androgynous "senior critter" who has shown up for tests. Plus, I have led a remarkably healthy life, so I have no experience to fall back on. As we all know, the fear of the unknown is the worst fear of all.

Being a transgender woman though ( I feel ) has made me uniquely qualified to "face down" the unknown.

Tomorrow, I just want to make it to the appointment and let the "Duck" take care of the rest.