Not Moving After All--Not Yet, Anyway

A couple of weeks ago I mentioned that I was thinking of moving in with a woman I know.  Well, at least I thought I knew her.  Or, more precisely, I actually knew her better than I was willing to believe.


She didn't steal my boyfriend (or girlfriend!).  In fact, she didn't steal anything, except for some time.  


Instead, she asked me out to dinner with her.  "My treat," she said.  But even if it weren't, I would've gone to dinner with her because she said she wanted to talk.  I assumed that she meant a conversation about the prospect of my moving in, or about other circumstances in her life.


But we didn't talk much.  Instead, she downed martinis--five, to be exact.  She chased them with shots of vodka.  And  I'm sure she'd been drinking before she saw me.


By the time she finished, she couldn't stand up straight,let alone walk.  So I had to get her back to her apartment.  She wanted me to stay, though she was barely conscious. let alone coherent.  I couldn't, because I had early classes and a presentation the following day,  She knew that, just as she knew that I don't drink.


I guess it was better to have had that experience a few nights ago han to have had it after I moved in with her.

What Do I Do Now?

Yesterday I was actually starting to like the idea of moving.  Well, I wasn't thinking so much of moving as I was of being in an apartment with more windows and light than what I have in mine.  And I do like the woman with whom I'd be sharing the place.


I just hate having to move.  I've done it a few times before, but it's never easy or fun.  And when I'm moved in, I'm so slow to unpack and arrange things.  I guess I still get overwhelmed by all of the tasks involved.  


Plus, I haven't lived with anyone since Tammy and I split up. That was eight and a half years ago.  And, if I recall correctly, the last time I lived with anyone before Tammy, I was with Eva, and about a decade before I met Tammy.


At least the woman with whom I'd be living is not someone with whom I am, or have ever been, in a romantic relationship. And I don't anticipate that we'll become one.  However, she has expressed interest in shopping and eating with  me.  So I also don't anticipate that we'll be merely two people who split the rent.


Oh, and Charlie and Max like her. 

Just Around the Corner

I am so exhausted. So what am I doing, writing on this blog?, you ask. Well, I'd rather whine to whoever may be reading this than to myself. Call it whatever you will.

I've spent all day unpacking and I still have so much left to do. Why is it that I never recall just how much work it is to move? One would expect that I'd be ready after all the moves I've done. I have an excuse this time: the short notice.

Now I'm thinking of something John, Millie's husband, said as we were returning the van. "If I could sell my house for about a million and a half, I'd just leave everything behind and start over." I can say that if I were made such an offer, I'd probably be tempted, too.

The bruise on my left side has grown. I guess that's to be expected, given all the bending and lifting I've had to do. Dang, it's ugly!

Millie called tonight, as she did last night. She reminded me that since she still has visitation rights to Max and Charlie, she'll be over this way sooner or later. And I'll be at her place again, probably for Christmas.

It's been weird, spending three days with no background music. I still haven't unpacked the speakers. They're in one of the hardest-to-reach boxes. I'll get to them sooner or later.

Now I'm living right around the corner from many of the stores in which I shop and restaurants and cafes in which I eat. I can't help but to think of my first visits to those places, some seven years ago. That's when I first moved onto the block from which I just moved. I'd just met Millie; I hadn't met any of her family members. I didn't know anyone else in the neighborhood. In some way, I felt even more like a stranger among strangers than I did when I first went to Europe.

When I first went to Europe, I'd just graduated college. But I toured on my bike, so I felt I was, in some way, a peer of many of the people I would meet, however briefly. Plus, I felt no special attachment to the college from which I graduated--or, really, to almost anyone. About the only people with whom I made any real effort to stay in contact were my mother, my maternal grandmother and Elizabeth. If I hadn't had them in my life back then, I probably would have stayed away even longer than I did.

When I first moved to the block I just left, Tammy and I had just broken up. We'd been living together for four years, and during the last year, I became a recluse. I was even distant from Tammy, even though we were sharing the same bed. When I moved out, there was really no reason for me to see her again, much less to return to the neighborhood in which we lived.

Now I am on another block where I know no one. But just around the corner, there's so much that's familiar to me.

Another Happy Thanksgiving

I'm writing, in part, to wish those of you who are reading this (and those who aren't!) a Happy Thanksgiving.

If you've been reading my blog, you know that I have many reasons to be thankful. The biggest one, is of course, that I've made it. I survived molestation, battering, decades of depression and self-loathing and all of the self destructive things I did--and I'm here now. I've managed to live long enough to live as a woman--and, of course, to have the surgery.

And now I've just shared a Thanksgiving dinner with Millie, John, their daughters Stephanie and Lisa, their son-in-law Tony, grandkids Melanie and Stephen and Millie's friend Catherine. Today's dinner marked the fifth Thanksgiving I've shared with them.

Now I have to go and continue packing for tomorrow's move. Hopefully, that will be a reason to give thanks, too.

Pregnant With A Hammerhead Shark On One Side

Have you ever seen those ads that promise to tell you your "true age?" Well, I think I don't need one of those ads: My body is telling me, loudly and unambiguously.

Today I've been packing for my move, which is the day after tomorrow. Actually, I have until the first, but Friday was the only day for which I could rent a van. And, the month begins on Tuesday.

I'd forgotten how much work it is to pack for a move! Another problem is finding anyone to help me on such short notice, especially during this holiday week. Plus, Bruce has pneumonia.

When you've been as inactive as I've been for the past few months, you feel it after you've lifted things or bent a few times. And the injury I incurred today isn't helping anything, except my memory of why I don't normally use bike lanes.

I was on the nice old Raliegh three-speed I bought a couple of weeks ago. I was riding it about three blocks from my place when I experienced one of the worst nightmares of most urban cyclists. Yes, I got clocked by a car door and went down hard.

The thing about most falls is that you don't really see what injuries you have from them until later. It's as if you're in too much shock to notice. The scrapes on my arm weren't as bad as they felt when I first got up. But where I didn't feel any pain on my first--on my left side--there's a huge, particularly ugly bruise about half the size of my hand. And, the swelling is noticeable under a form- or close-fitting top. Someone who doesn't know me might think my liver is swollen from booze, even though I haven't drunk alcohol in more than twenty years.

Speaking of which: Having been around a lot of active and recovering addicts, I've seen people with what I've just described. Someone in that condition looks like he or she is pregnant with a hammerhead shark on one side of his or her body. I can recall one particularly extreme case: A woman I knew named Jackie, who worked with me at MacMillan Publishing at around the time I was getting sober. About the same age then as I am now, she was vivacious and very knowledgeable about so many things. I saw a photo of her when she was young: I would not mind looking the way she looked then! Well, except for one thing: Her eyes seemed incongruously dull, save for a twinge of sadness.

As I recall, she died not long after I left MacMillan. I hadn't thought about her in ages. What's happening? A college friend I hadn't heard about in at least twenty-five years has gotten in touch with me. Now I'm thinking about Jackie. Will I be revisited by more of my past?

Right now, I wouldn't mind some of the physical stamina I had in my past. But I certainly wouldn't want to be in the mental state I was in back then.

And I hope I'm not pregnant with a hammerhead shark on one side of me for too much longer.

Next Installments

So today I paid my first month's rent on my new place. I still have mixed feelings about it. On one hand, it's a new beginning and is therefore exciting. On the other, I wonder whether this is a detour from the things I'd anticipated.

At least I feel like some part of my future is unfolding. Today I also met with Tom Weber, the head of SAGE (Services and Advocacy for GLBT Elders), Randi, a social worker with SAGE and someone whose name I'm not recalling at the moment.

We talked about starting a focus group with transgender people 45 years and older to find out what they might want in a group for trans people of that age. I came up with the idea when I was in Colorado and noticed that Joyce, Lindy and Danny, who were there for the surgery, were all around my age. It made me think about some of the issues we face, and how so much of what's available doesn't address them. Like so many other things in our culture, support groups and other LGBT services tend to be very youth-oriented. Not that I have anything against the young people: It's just that our concerns are different.

I am excited about the idea of moving ahead with such a project--and, if you know me by now, you wouldn't be surprised to know that I'm a bit nervous. I know that I'll be working with mental health care professionals, who will help with screening and other things in which I have no experience. Still, when I'm doing something to help someone, I want to know I'm doing the best that anyone can do for that person.

At least the ideas I expressed look like they may bear fruit. I guess that's an accomplishment, for now.

Coming Down With, Coming Down To

I have a cold. At least that's what I hope. All I need now is the flu, or something worse.

The holidays are coming up and I've got stacks of papers to read. And I'm going move, though not by choice. I'll talk more about that later. So if my posts are shorter or less frequent during the next week or two, you know why.

I know, you didn't come to this blog to hear me whine. Whatever else is going on, my life is still better than it was. Or, at least, I'm feeling better about it all, even if I'm not feeling so good now.

Perhaps the irony of my situation is that something I forecast is coming true. I had a feeling that some things in my life would change after my surgery--some by design, others by circumstance. Well, I guess this is a case of the latter coming true. As with so many predictions, it's coming true, though sooner than, and not quite the way, I intended.

Now I have to attend to my needs and get whatever sleep I can. G'night, all.