It's Still New

Yesterday I had to go to my doctor's  office for "labs," which consist of a phlebotomist taking four test tubes of my blood.  While there, I asked whether I could see Dr. Jennifer, the gynecologist who is part of the practice.  She wasn't in but, the receptionist said, Susan,  a midwife/nurse practitioner, was on duty and I could see her.  


I described the twinges I felt around my clitoris and what seemed to be an unusual discharge.  She said it "wasn't serious."


"Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to..."


"Don't apologize," she said.  


"I really give myself away as a tranny at times like this, don't I?"


"You're learning."


"You're right.  It's a strange thing:  Having a vagina seems completely normal to me.  But I still don't understand it."


She assured me that is "normal," and that it will take time to learn about it.  "Yes, it feels normal to you.  But it's still new.  How long has it been since your surgery?"


I did a mental calculation.  "Sixteen, almost seventeen months."

"That's not long at all.  How long did you have a penis before that?"

I won't tell you that, dear reader.  After all, a lady isn't supposed to give away her age.  Right?


After giving my answer, I added, "But you know, it seems so long ago. Sometimes I forget that I had one. Does that make any sense."


"Of course.  You've changed."


I was reminded of just how much when she asked, "How long has it been since you had implants?"



"You're the best!  I've never had them."
nu
She was asking the question because, in asking about what examinations, vaccinations and such I've had, she wanted to figure out whether I needed to be screened any time soon for breast cancer.  That reminded her of breasts, generally, or mine anyway, and the fact that implants need to be replaced something like every seven years.  


Now, I think that my breasts are small, particularly for a woman of my size.  But I'm not troubled by that, and I was never tempted to get inplants or any other surgical procedure on my breasts.  The well-endowed women I've known have complained about their "gifts," and I can happily live without the back pain and other problems that seem to come with large breasts.  Also, when I've had relationships with women, I never cared about whether or not they had big boobs; a couple of women with whom I was involved had them, but they weren't  what drew me to them.  


Somehow I don't think I'm going to change my mind about them.  Then again, I have changed, and will probably change even more.  And, as Susan said. even though all of this feels natural to me, and that I carry myself with ease (Really?), I'm still learning about my body, as it's become.

Off The Bike, Under the Papers

I really must have been paying for some past misdeed or another.  It's been an utterly gorgeous spring day and I can't ride my bike. Worse yet, I've had to spend most of this day reading papers, and tomorrow it looks like I will do the same.  


Eventually, I won't have to grade any more papers.   Eventually, I'll get back on my bike--or so I hope.   Dr. Jennifer is on a leave of absence, so I saw another gynecologist, Dr. Ronica.  She says to stay off the bike for now, but won't tell me when I can get back on.  Hopefully, I'll do that when my infection heals and, hopefully, it will heal soon.


She is something of a cyclist herself:  She told me she has two bikes and rides every chance she gets.  So, I take her seriously when she says she has seen other cyclists who developed a tear and an infection, as I have.  And I'm listening to another of her recommendations, even though it goes against one of my cardinal beliefs (at least, as pertains to cycling):  that I get one of those saddles that has a hole in the middle--and a softer nose than the ones I've been riding.  So, it looks like that means bye-bye Brooks and hello...Specialized?  Terry?


Oh well.  I used to think that real men rode unpadded leather saddles.  Now I don't have to worry about being a real man--especially now that I know that nothing in this world takes more balls than being a woman.  And that's one of the reasons why I wouldn't trade it for anything--not even to ride a leather saddle with copper rivets again!


Then again, if I never much cared for leather with studs on it, why should I be so focused on a saddle with rivets?


Once those papers are all done, the students have their grades and I'm back on my bike, I can think about other things.  Well, I'm thinking about other things, anyway.  That's pretty much what I've tried to do for the past few months.  Actually, I haven't tried; it's what I have done.  I never knew that would be a consequence of my surgery, or my transition.


Given what a workload I've had this semester, I think my students have done pretty well.  Some would say it's because I've done pretty well.  Maybe that's true, at least to some extent.  I guess I can say I've been a pretty good instructor, at least given the circumstances under which I've worked.   It'll seem better once I start cycling to work again, I'm sure.  I just hope that day comes soon, and that I don't have to miss riding on another day like today.

Off The Bike, Again!

Yesterday marked ten months since my surgery.  Before I know it, I (as I am now) will be a year old.


I just hope I can take a really nice ride that day.  Yesterday I found out I'm going to be off my bike again for another week or two. Just when the weather was getting good!


Over the last few days, I thought I might be developing an infection.  There was some yellowish discharge and I felt twinges, but not a burning sensation.  (The latter would have been an almost sure sign.)  So I went to see Dr. Jennifer.


She found a small tear inside and said that I should stay off my bike at least until my next visit, which will be next Friday.  Oh, dear.  I don't think of myself as superstitious (I have slept in cemeteries twice and walk, even at night,  by the one that abuts the campus where I teach.) but now I think that maybe, just maybe, I shouldn't have said anything about starting a bike blog!  


I will visit Dr. Jennifer again the week after next as well.  I just hope I heal before then.  Oh, please, great goddess of the transwoman cyclists, let me heal so I can get on my bike again.  Yes, even though my motives are selfish:  I want to ride and I've gotten fat.  


Now, without sounding too much like Joseph Campbell or anyone like that, I guess it's really true that one creates one's own mythology.  It doesn't even have to involve deities or powers:  Any belief by which someone chooses to live is a myth.  That, of course, doesn't necessarily mean that said belief isn't true.  At least, that's what I tell myself when I think that I'm going to win Lotto and that Elvis is coming back. ;-)


Oh well. I'm going to be very busy during the next couple of weeks.  So, maybe I wouldn't have been able to do much riding.  At least it's good to think that way.  But some is better than none.  And riding to work again has definitely made my workdays go by more quickly.  


Whatever I tell myself, I want to ride.  

Old, New and Current Beginnings

Today I didn't go to work. I had a really bad headache all day yesterday and my nose was more congested than the Long Island Expressway during rush hours. And when I blew my nose, what came out was only slightly less toxic than some Superfund sites.

So I went to my doctor, at Callen Lorde. Actually, I didn't go to Richie Tran, my regular doctor; I saw one Victor Inaka,of the other doctors in the practice. On my way into the building, I saw Dr. Jennifer, my gynecologist. She's exactly what you want any health care professional to be: She not only has good knowledge and skills, she makes you feel better just by being within sight and hearing distance.


With Jennifer was someone I hadn't seen in a long time. (I seem to have run into a lot of people like that lately!) Kate is one of the butchest (Is that a legitimate adjective?) women I've ever known. She once told me that she thought she was transgedered but decided to live through her "masculine side."


She facilitated the very first transgender support group in which I participated. I can't believe that it was eight years ago! I can recall some of my "classmates" in that group. One, who called herself "Jennifer,' was sixty-five years old. She had just recently begun to live full-time as a woman, having waited until her children were grown and until she retired from her job to "come out." As she expected, it ended her marriage, but she didn't seem too sorry about that.


I'm also recalling Laura, who was a freelance photographer, among other things. She was attending Sarah Lawrence College, which--not surprisingly--she found to be a "tolerant and supportive atmosphere." We went to the Guggenheim and a couple of galleries together, and spent some time with me as Tammy and I were splitting up. I enjoyed the time I spent with Laura because she and I saw our gender transitions--and life itself--as spiritual journeys. She once told me that her goal was to "become the Buddha."


Then there was Marianne, who had just recently "come out." She had just taken a leave from Columbia University, where she had completed two years' worth of courses. I won't make any judgment as to whether she--or anyone else--is transgendered, or any other label you can think of. But I remember feeling that she had a whole bunch of other issued that she needed to work out before embarking on a transition. I know, because I had some of those very issues.


I wonder where they are now. I'm especially curious to know how (or whether) Jennifer continued to live as Jennifer. Tom at SAGE and I are still talking about creating a group for older trans people, so hearing about Jennifer's experiences would be especially interesting to me. I'm also wondering whether Laura continued her transition or whether her journey led her to someone else. As for Marianne, I'd like to know that she's still intact.


There were others in that group, some of whom attended continuously and others who came and went. At least one or two may have decided they weren't transgendered after all, or simply decided they didn't want to make the transition. Sometimes I think the latter is Kate's story.


Speaking of whom...Seeing her again further changed my perception of time. She met me just as I was leaving my life with Tammy and now I am post-op. The one constant is that I have been a woman all along, which I think she understood.


Seeing her again--especially in the presence of Dr. Jennifer--made it difficult for me to believe that eight years have passed since I participated in that group Kate facilitated. Yet my days in that group seem like they happened aeons ago.


But Kate and Dr. Jennifer, like Marci, also represent beginnings in my life. By definition, beginnings define and demarcate the past. That is why the people who helped to make them happen are always present for you, even if you don't see them for years.

Healing And Wellness: How To Be A Spiritual Subversive

Another trip to the doctor--this time, Dr. Tran (who insists that I call him Richie), my primary-care doctor. I think I've spent more time with doctors during the past year than I did in my entire life before then.

Dr. Tran, like Dr. Jennifer Johnson, is part of the Callen Lorde Community Health Collective. I've been using their services ever since I "came out" to Dwayne more than seven years ago. Michael Callen was a composer and singer who, after learning that he had AIDS, started one of the first organizations for those stricken with the disease. That was at a time when all of the known victims--according to official reports, anyway--were gay men.

I never met Michael Lorde or, frankly, knew much about him before I started going to C-L. That probably says more about me than about him. On the other hand, I met Audre Lorde once. Ironically, it was during the early days of my sobriety: some time not long after my 90th day, if I recall correctly.

I had gone to one of her readings at Hunter College. The odd thing was that in my sobriety, when I was following the Twelve Steps, I was more taken with the militancy of her poetry--and her militancy, period--than I was when I was abusing alcohol and drugs. I say this newfound appreciation at that time in my life was odd, or at least ironic, because the Steps directed people like me to, in effect, surrender our selves to a power greater than ourselves. On the other hand, Lorde, in her poetry and her work as an activist, exhorted people--especially women, people of color and lesbians--to know as much about themselves as possible and to take charge of what they learned.

But what I was responding to about her poetry and rhetoric, and what I was responding to in The Twelve Steps were, in some way, not so incongruous. At that point in my life, I never would have become clean and sober on my own. Yet somehow I knew I needed to do that. And, in much the same way most of us need someone to teach us the fundamentals of the languages we speak and of computation as well as any number of life skills before we can construct our own lives, I needed help to start my process of recovery. When I told Kevin, who would become my first sponsor, that the "power greater than ourselves"--at least as I heard it decribed in the meetings I attended--sounded suspiciously like the Judeo-Christian God, he implored--in his old-school Bronx Irish-meets-Hell's Angels way, "Well, let them describe Higher Power that way. You know what it is for you; go with it." And so I did.

Anyway...after her reading, I had Ms. Lorde autograph my copy of "Our Dead Behind Us." I was the very last person for whom she signed a book that day, and we talked a bit. When I thought about that moment later, it seemed more surprising than it did at the time. After all, you can't find someone much whiter than I am, and I was living as a male--and doing everything I could to seem the part. On top of that, I was clinging desperately--although I could not know, at the time, just how desperately--to the idea that I was some sort of straight guy.

You might say that I had stepped up to a battle but didn't know that a war lay ahead of me.

But somehow she seemed to know that. And, from the expression in her face and, more important, in her eyes, I knew that she knew what I needed to do--and she expected me to do it.

Many years later, I would see exactly the same expression from another poet who, if she didn't know Audre Lorde, surely had read her works. During my second year of living as Justine, I attended a reading by Grace Paley. After she finished, she signed copies of two of her books for me.

Before I could say anything to her, Ms. Paley told me, "Write that book!" And Ms. Lorde told me, "Always tell your truths!"

What I learned from both of them--from meeting them and reading their work--is that a woman has a moral and political obligation to herself--and to other women, and to everyone else--to learn everything she can about her body, her mind, her spirit and the world she lives in, and to never, ever stop telling whatever truths she finds--even if they fly in the face of whatever notions were previously inculcated into her. Or, as Lorde said, "If I didn't define myself for myself, I would be crunched into other people's fantasies of me and eaten alive."

In other words, choosing her own survival is the most spiritually wholesome, and the most subversive thing, she could have done. I'm sure Paley could have identified with that. I know that I can.

You Can't Get An Education From Anyone You Don't Trust Or Who Doesn't Trust You

I am thinking again about yesterday. Perhaps that's not a productive thing to do, but I'm prone to that sometimes.

Anyway...I find myself reflecting on what I've been learning during these past few months. So much of it comes down to trust. And now I realize that the trust I'm learning is not only toward those who can actually give me the care and education I need. It's also a trust in myself.

When you don't feel whole, complete or simply right-- whatever that means to you-- how can you trust yourself? What can you trust if your body is lying to you and in order to survive, you have to tell-- or worse, perpetuate-- lies of one sort and another? And how can you hope to get an education of any sort if even your name is not your own?

James Baldwin once wrote that a child cannot learn from a teacher who despises him. That's more or less right. But I think that it would be more accurate to say that no one can get an education from anyone he or she does not trust, and who does not trust him or her. All you learn is a sort of defensive deception: You lie, dodge or commit whatever other subterfuge is necessary in order not to be harmed. And, of course, if someone is telling you the complete truth about something, it cannot be anything but a falsehood in such circumstances.

You go to a doctor because you think you've cracked your ankle in a fall. If the doctor, or his or her screener, asks if you've felt depressed, you say "no" because you want your ankle fixed, not to raise suspicions that you harmed yourself on purpose.

Something like that happened to me. And to practitioners I've previously used, I've said that I had sexual fantasies about women, and even talked about wanting to marry one or another, just so that I wouldn't get locked up somewhere that couldn't offer me what I needed, much less wanted.

How many times do we get through a situation, a day or a period of our lives by saying what someone else wants, or seems to want, to hear? Or worse yet, what we wish were true?

When I saw Mom back in August, I said that my years at Rutgers, where I was an undergraduate, were the worst of my life. She asked what I would have done differently: Would I have gone to another school? Studied different things? Or delayed going to school?

I might have done all of those things, I said, but I probably still would have been miserable. She cringed when I said that last word. "Oh, you were!," she said. "I haven't seen very many people who were more unhappy than you were in those days."

I explained that I was, by any definition of the term, deeply depressed. I felt as if I had nothing in common with anybody at the college. In part, it had to do with the fact that when I was young, I tended not to make friends among my peers. What friends I had were, for the most part, women older than I was.

Also, I felt more hostility toward who and what I am than I ever felt in high school, or before that. For many years afterward, I accepted the standard explanation: that I was noticing it more. And, being the sort of person I am--one who just wants to live her life--I trusted other people's opinions before I trusted my own experience.

The thing is, the higher you go in education, the more you encounter that mentality. If you experience something, it doesn't count for as much as what some "expert" says about it. I have come to realize that such an "expert" is more than likely to be self-appointed and gains his or her authority because so many people are, for whatever reasons, too cowed or indifferent to challenge it.

But there was another dimension to the conditions that made me so unhappy: I was in a residential college. So I was living with other students, whom I saw every day. They included various jocks or jock-groupies and frat guys. Living among them meant that I had to keep my acts and my defenses up at all times. I played the drinking games with the guys and feigned more interest in "banging" women than I actually had. Worse, I not only went along with the "fag" jokes, I made a few myself.

And, because I engaged in such mendacity, I came to despise everything about the college, college generally, the people in it and what I had to do to keep myself there. Today, of course, none of that surprises me--or, for that matter, the people who've heard this from me--because I had, by that time, learned to so thoroughly despise myself.

I fell into such an awful state because I could not articulate what was happening to me. I tried to fit into the labels: I was "straight;" I was "gay;" I was "bi" (whatever those terms mean! ); I was a guy with a "feminine side." And, of course, I kept that side as far from view as I could.

The result was that I never did anything more than half-heartedly. I was present only physically in my classes and in other college functions; when I reached out to others (Yes, I got very lonely sometimes!) I could only do so from behind a wall. And even in that relative safety, I was still in a mask and costume, whether or not it was Halloween.

So I could never ask the sort of questions I wanted to ask, or do anything that would allow me to get the sort of education that stays with a person: that which teaches a person by expanding his or her self-definition. This means helping that person to learn how to do what he or she is capable of doing, and to expand that person's range of what is capable.

Maybe this is the reason why, in spite of all the time I've spent in a classroom as a student and teacher, I have never quite trusted Education (with a capital "E"). Even when I enjoy teaching (which, these days, is most of the time) and otherwise helping students, and when I enjoy an exchange with a colleague (a more frequent occurrence these days), I still sometimes feel as if I cannot trust it. Perhaps I am still carrying a lot of residual damage.

I am interested in helping people gain an education, whatever that means for them. And most people go to school for that, and we are--at least in theory--charged with that role. But I often feel that my own education bears only an incidental relationship to the time I've spent in school.

In brief, I felt a little sad after leaving Dr. Jennifer's office yesterday for the same reason that I shed tears upon leaving Marci, Nurse Phyllis, Robin and all of those other people I met in Trinidad: From them, I was finally getting an education--a real education.

Now I'm wondering whether it's the only education I've ever had.

Another Graduation

Today I had what will be my last appointment with Dr. Jennifer, at least for a while.

She confirmed what I've suspected: Psedomona is gone! Okay, say it again: Pseudomona is gone! Just rolls right off the tongue, doesn't it?

Yes, that minor-but-pesky infection I had is history. And, she said, all of my major healing is complete. But she did advise me to finish my current round of antibiotics and to wait another week before getting back on my bike or getting that other kind of exercise. You know which kind I mean.

Of course this is great news for me. But I shed a few tears, too. For one thing, I was actually enjoying those visits with Dr. Jennifer. All health-care professionals should have her warmth and empathy as well as her skills. That, of course, is what I also say about Marci Bowers.

My tears today were, I feel, like the ones people shed at graduations. They are tears of joy, yes. But they also express a feeling of relief, of having arrived safely and well at some destination.

In some way, this really feels like a graduation, in much the same way having finished my session with Nurse Phyllis or seeing Marci the day after my surgery: I had "made it" through something through which each of them had guided and nurtured me.

That I learned about my body from each of them almost goes without saying. However, I now realize that my new-found education has come about because I had to trust each of them with my body as well as my spirit in ways that, earlier in my life, I simply couldn't have with anyone --partially because I never had to.

With each of them, I had to allow myself and them a level of intimacy that, for most of my life, I didn't know how to permit anyone else, much less myself.

You might say that I was experiencing, viscerally, what I had experienced vicariously when I saw The Vagina Monologues: a shared experience of having one.

As I understand it, that is supposed to be a reason for graduations: The new graduates reflect upon the common experiences of those who are graduating with, and who have graduated before, them.

So what does this "graduation" mean? For now, at least, I can, in some way, function independently as a woman. Maybe it was the logical "next step" for me. I've gotten to the point where, when people address me as "Ma'am," "Miss," or "Lady," I do not append it, even in my own mind. Although having lived as a male will always be a part of me, I no longer see it as a qualifying condition.

I have graduated again; I came home on a spectacularly beautiful fall day.

Pseudomona and the Old Gang

Today I went to see Dr. Jennifer. It looks like I'm going to be off my bike for another couple of weeks.

The ray of sunshine--if you'll indulge me in a completely inappropriate metaphor--is that we're supposed to have a Nor'easter this weekend. Charlie and Max will be happy about that: I'll be indoors and they can climb all over me to their hearts' content.

I don't see how anybody could have one of those guys cuddled up against them and still hate cats. In fact, I don't understand how people hate cats. After all, every one I've ever had has been friendly, sweet, polite and cute. Maybe I just have good cat karma or something.

Anyway, Charlie and Max have pseudomona to thank for keeping me home. Pseudomona: It sounds like a Greek play about someone pretending to be Othello's wife. Of course, such a play wouldn't be possible, as the ancient Greeks were writing plays about a milennia and a half before Othello was born.

If you ever read Othello and need something pithy to say in a class discussion, use this: Quoth Iago/ Lusty Moor. It'll bring a smile to even the most jaded teacher or professor.

Now, pseudomona isn't causing me any discomfort. But Dr. Jennifer says it could keep the last part of my healing from happening the way it should. And, when you've waited as long as I have for the operation, you don't want to mess it up.

Plus, given that I've done about 30 years of serious riding, missing another couple of weeks isn't so great in the scheme of things. But it's still a pain in the rear. At least it's not a pain in...all right, you get the picture!

After my appointment with Dr. Jennifer, I walked through Chelsea and the Village to Soho, where I met Bruce for lunch. He looked as un-well as he sounded over the phone. That, of course, made me want to make chicken soup for him. Since we had neither the time nor facilities for that, and Bruce, understandably, didn't want to trek very far, we had what might've been the third- or fourth-best option: miso soup at a Japanese eatery a couple of blocks from his office. (Chinese hot and sour soup is usually my next-favorite option for medicinal purposes.)

My chicken soup-making impulse was piqued by seeing Bruce in a rather "down" mood. Of course, having what might be a low-grade flu doesn't help his mood, which doesn't help him to feel physically better. He must have some Puritan background somewhere along the way: When he's unproductive, as he says he's been, he's unhappy. But what else could he or anyone be when unwell? Besides, he can make me seem like a slouch sometimes, so he needs to let up on himself, at least for a while. As if I haven't told him things like that before...

I know I'm talking about a friend: In typing the last sentence of the previous paragraph, I smiled a bit. We've known each other for 30 years, or close to it, and he's always been a bit of a workaholic and his own worst critic. I doubt he'll change in those ways. The only reason I'd want him to change is for his own mental (and possibly physical) health. But, otherwise, there isn't a thing I'd change about him.

After our lunch, I stopped in Bicycle Habitat, a couple of blocks from Bruce's office. Just what I needed to do, right? I made my first post-op visit there last week, when I saw Hal, the dreadlocked mechanic/musician who just bought a house in the Brooklyn neighborhood where he grew up. But nobody he grew up with is there now. Anyway, I couldn't help but to notice that he seemed to have aged a bit in the three or four months since I'd previously seen him. We didn't get to talk for very long, but I had the sense that something else is going on in his life.

And I saw Sheldon, whom I bumped into back in May, I think, for the first time in a decade or close to it. He's an old riding buddy and was a mechanic in a shop I used to frequent in the neighborhood in which he lived. It's funny: He was dating Danielle, and all of the other guys in our posse were in committed relationships with women. And I was with Tammy. He married Danielle; those other guys married the women they were with in those days. Or, at least, they're still with those women. I am the only one from that "gang" who's not with his or her flame from that time. What can I say?: Each of them got the girl, and I became the girl. Or, more accurately, I was the girl all along.

He told me that Ray, one of our group, was still with Kyra. She and I rode together and had coffee (and nothing more than that!) a few times before she met Ray, which was around the same time I met Tammy.

The last time I talked to Ray was a couple of weeks after 9/11. He'd called in the middle of the night, practically in tears. He'd worked on the site, voluntarily: His skills as a plumber and metalworker were very useful in sorting through the debris of that place. However, his physical courage--which, at times, bordered on machismo--was chipped away by some of the things he found, which included body parts.

I told him to get away from that site right away. He'd been there night and day for two weeks straight; nobody had any right to ask any more of him, I said. He insisted that he couldn't "abandon" the people, whether or not they were living. If I'd had more presence of mind, I'd've told him not to abandon himself, or his own health, at any rate. Instead, I told him to get out of there and "come to my place, if you want to." Tammy, much to her credit, favored that.

But I never heard from him again. And the old gang went our separate ways. A while back, I found myself thinking about him and wondering whether he was OK--or even alive. After all, who knows what he inhaled during those days and nights among the still-smoldering wreckage.

At least I know he's OK, at least after some fashion: Sheldon offered to give him and Kyra my phone number and e-mail address. If they call, it could be very interesting, to say the least!