And they lived happily ever after

So, a few weeks ago, I was reading Gwen Smith’s blog. She mentioned that this year’s V-Day performances of the Vagina Monologues would include the transgender option from last year’s transgender V-Day performance in LA. At first, I wondered if a transgender group in the San Francisco Bay Area could put something together in time to perform our own version, but I realized I didn’t have enough time for something to come together, nor enough time for myself to be involved with planning it.

I looked online to see if there were any local performances, and found that the University of California - Berkeley was having three performances. I contacted them via email to see if they were having the transgender option. Two people responded that they were. They also mentioned that they were in need of transgender performers and asked if I knew anyone who might be interested.

I passed along the names of Sherilyn Connelly, who I met at the Cotillion when she performed her own spoken word piece, and Gwen Smith, who was very much involved with last year’s performance piece.

Longer story short, Sherilyn and I auditioned for spots in their monologue and got them. I wasn’t sure I was even supposed to audition, but I said what the hell, looked over the script for a few minutes, then read the entire thing as an audition. They appeared to like my rendition well enough to ask me to perform Eve’s transgender monologue this year. Cool. Sherilyn and I will also hopefully be writing our own personal monologues since it appeared that most of the production crew weren’t that impressed with Eve’s T-monologue. They didn’t think it was as personal as others they have had. You see, UC-Berkeley has had transgender performers in the past - regardless if there were transgender monologues or not. So, I guess this will be keeping me busy. The last of their three shows falls just over a week before I have my own vagina.

That still seems to weird to say. Vagina. My vagina. When I look in the mirror and pull my penis to the side and hide it so I can’t see it - cupping it as though it weren’t there - and imagine that there is a vagina there, things seem right. What’s remarkable, though, is that there is this feeling of just being me. Me. And it feels nice, like a warm happy glow. I wonder if that glow - this happy high feeling - exists post-op? I also wonder how reality sets in afterward. Will I grow depressed due to loneliness? I’ve been alone most of my life, but the times I have been in some type of relationship, I have been a lot happier. I have so much I want to do in life, but now I feel hampered by my age and my debt. I can and will work off the debt, but dealing with growing old is something I will just have to deal with. I’d like to deal with it with someone I love - but that is a new bridge I will have to cross.

Phucking cold

I’m tired...and way too busy. I just spent the past few days on the East Coast. The frigid East Coast. It was phucking cold. I froze my phucking balls off. OK, for a while longer I can say that. Seriously, the guy on the radio yesterday morning said it was 7 degrees on the wrong side of zero - and that was after it had warmed up a bit. They had a blizzard last weekend, and, of course, since it hadn’t been that warm, most of the snow was still around. The roads, though, were quite clear.

While in the area, I was able to visit with Reise, a good friend I’ve now been able to hang out with twice since visiting her area. Although we are both quite unique, we still share similarities outside our vast differences. She’s one of my few close friends that isn’t hung up on being straight. Like me, she’s open to women, men, and T’s. I think I need more friends like her. :)

One Month To Go

People ask me if I am nervous or excited. I say yes. I’ve had a variety of people...a fling, a good friend from college, co-workers, other T friends, my grandmother....ask me how I am doing, if I am excited, or nervous. I am doing ok, and yes, I am excited, nervous, worried, anxious....for it to be over, for it to begin.

One month. I’m exactly 34 and a half years old today. Thirty-four years and six months, four hundred and fourteen months old. It’s flown by, but it’s gone so slowly. And now I have one more month to go. The past 11 months being full time have flown by, and the next one will too, but it will also go as slow as....well, as slow as I want it to go. I’ve stayed busy....busy keeping my mind busy. I probably need to take a day or two off and just think. Or not think. Ponder. Just sit and be one with nothing. To answer the question of who I am. Just to make sure? Why am I looking for a reason not to have it. Nothing says to keep it...well, except for the occasional sexual appetite for a woman. Is that it? Do I only worry about keeping it in case I meet a woman that is into having penetrative sex with a TS? I don’t know. I do like girls. I also like boys, and TS. And yet, I’m just a child dealing with her sexuality. I’m not even comparable to a college student testing out her passionate boundaries of intimacy.

Staying busy....today, I was in a wrap-up meeting for Day of Remembrance 2004. We just sat around discussing what went right, what could be improved, and just chatting in general. We had barbeque and pasta salad that I brought, and a little ice cream to wrap it all up. A few asked how I was doing. Nervous, excited. What else can I say? To go through all of my thoughts, I’d have to write about a zillion pages. Or well, I can say what I have summarized before...on my trip with Amber during her SRS last summer: SRS is the best available option at having a fulfilling life. Yes, it is the only option outside of an orchiectomy or keeping it, but I’m done worrying about having it. I wish I didn’t have to go thru the mess of obtaining it...of spending a lot of my lifetime savings, of going thru the pain, the swelling, of having to dilate, of having to worry about surgical complications....worrying how I will feel 20 years from now about a decision I’m making today.

Too much thinking. I’m off to party.