What a Fine Mess

Plenty of garlic!

This week I learned how to make garlic & cheese scones, then wrote to the Electoral College.  Both were a little itty bit messy.

When I was little, clearing up after dinner was the sole responsibility of my older sister & myself.  At the time, I didn’t wonder why my 4 brothers were exempt from this chore; I was concerned with how messy it was to scrape dishes.  My sister, eternally 9 years older & 9 years wiser, said, ‘Lora, you can always wash your hands.’

Oh, if only all life’s messes were so easily dealt with.  Now, onto the mess in my country, the mess in the kitchen, how I’m reacting to both.  Let’s start with the Electoral College. 

They call it a Hail Mary plan, but being 3000 miles from home means there’s limits to what I can do.  So, when a link came up on Facebook to all the Electoral College email accounts, I filled in the template & sent off my request, thinking I’d done a little bit of my bit.

My only reply came from Alex Kim, a Texan College member, lucky me.  Without any salutation, not even a rude one, this is partially what followed:  

The good citizens of Texas have voted for Donald Trump.  The voters of this great nation have rejected HRC, and I have no desire for her to become President . . . The fine people of Texas really have no interest in the opinions of someone from your state . . . We all have our own political process, not to be interfered with (sic) others.

You cogitate on that a while & I’ll tell you about Life With Scones.

If you look at the recipe, it seems to be made of normal cupboard stuff.  I whacked off the butter I needed, put it on the plate warmer to soften & went in search of my normal ingredients.  

I can hear you laughing.  

Hag Improvs 1 & 2 - mustard seed & baking powder.

The first Hag Improv, no mustard powder, but I did have mustard seed, so in it goes.  I trebled the garlic as usual, cut fresh chives from the garden, then dearie me, the flour isn’t self-raising.  What does that mean for my scones?  

Google told me that for every 150g of ordinary flour, add 2 tsp of baking powder.  The recipe already called for 2 tsp, so this would increase the amount to 8 tsp.  I have no idea now if all that were needed, but since I’m writing this, you know I didn’t blow up the kitchen.  At least not fatally so.

How do people live without parmesan?

Now for cheese.  Grater in hand, I fling open the crisper drawer only to discover we had no cheddar & that the little tub in there isn’t parmesan at all.  How do people live without parmesan?  I can’t stop now, so what cheese do I have?  Bleu & Babybel Light.  In they both go.

Can I help?
(I smell cheese.)

Beat the eggs, add the milk to them, pour that mess into the dry ingredients, & learn that a whisk is not my friend.  There I stood, holding my clogged whisk, looking at the unmixed dough.  Mary Berry had blended this scone gloop with her hands.  She touched that cold, wet, icky stuff.  Eggs & junk. 

When I cook, I clean as I go, kitchen roll & hand towels always nearby, sometimes so fastidious that the utensil I used 10 minutes ago & need again is already in the dishwasher, the dishwasher already turned on.  I like order because it makes the what-happens-next easier. 

And not just in cooking, but in social interactions as well.  I value the order of social etiquette in first social contacts, in all professional contacts, because etiquette is a prophylactic for both sides of the situation.

This whisk i not my friend.

But when public officials such as Alex Kim or, in my own state, Pam Ramsey Taylor of the ape-in-heels comment, when they ignore basic respect in their interactions with people different from themselves, it’s only a matter of time before words become actions.  I see Alex Kim & Pam Taylor as not just insulting, but as dangerous.  First, because they’re shits in responsible positions & second, because they get applauded by more powerful shits.

In my heatless kitchen, I meticulously unclogged the whisk, put it in the sink, then mixed the gloop by hand, Mary Berry style.  Except with gritted teeth.  After forming 22 irregular blobs, I added my last Hag Improv, a sprinkle of dill, then into the oven with them.  The scones turned out so well, Siobhán got me the proper ingredients, & more batches were made with less gritting of teeth.  You can get used to most things.  But not everything.

Cheese & garlic scone w/dill sprinkled on top.

In my country, compassionate, sensible people are saying, take the moral high ground, give things a chance, work with the system, it won’t be as bad as it looks, there are checks & balances.  They think the whisk can be unclogged by playing nice.  

I think they delude themselves.  I want to be wrong.

Soup, Flatbread & the Giant Tangerine

Let's get cooking.

This week, I continue my learning-to-cook adventure here, but first, I want to comment on the US election.  If you can’t hack more of that right now, then jump down the page to the heading: 

IT’S SAFE TO COME OUT NOW!

Last week I said, being alive means accepting reality in its ugly & miraculous.  This week, my country told the only professional presidential candidate to get back in the kitchen, then gave her job to a Giant Tangerine.  Our social equality clock just got turned back to the Good Old Days which, for people like myself & perhaps you, too, weren’t all that good.

I remember at the large family gatherings of my childhood, men visited, children played, women cooked.  The chillen were served first in a side room, the men were served next at the proper table, the women ate in the kitchen.  The last to be fed, they stood or sat on stools or counters, ready to tend crying kids & serve pie to the men.  No real surprise, then, that the little-girl-me found no enticement in cooking. 

The women's private little fuck-you to this unfair, hard-work segregation, was keeping the best tidbits of food in the kitchen for themselves.  But being a woman, both then & now, means more than being taken for granted.

Females are taught from the beginning that we’re smaller, weaker, less able.  As children, our families protect us from all the scary things that eat little girls or worse, in too many cases are the scary things themselves.  As women, we take charge of our lives & yet pretend it’s normal to automatically check for danger, even in daylight, taking precautions men never take when we walk to shops or to work or through the park.  If we don’t, we deserve what we get.  We accept that.  Men accept that.  Our court systems enforce that.

Women know fear.  It's a natural part of our every day, just like it is for ethnic & religious minorities, immigrants, the disabled, the elderly, the LGBT+.  It's been said by smarter, more talented people than myself that with Brexit, with Trump, it's not about ideological differences.  It's that those of us without power have been give notice that it's officially okay to harass, bully, insult, exclude, grope, attack, injure and kill us.  It's about being afraid to live in our own countries.

So eating the best bits in the kitchen, well that’s funny, at first, then it becomes a little sad – that small act of defiance, of dishonesty, is that all the women in my family had?  Actually, they had each other in those kitchens, where more went on than sneaking food.  I think about them, now that I’m desecrating Siobhán’s kitchen.  I’m glad other disenfranchised people may read this, too, because it’s always nice to have company in here. 

IT’S SAFE TO COME OUT NOW!

 

Are you sure?

So on to cooking.  Despite it being election time in the US, is there a better season than autumn?  My son, El Punko, iguana that he is, thinks Fall is the beginning of evil incarnate, but I love being outside in autumn, all the sensory things that go with it – colour, textures, smells, sounds – & then coming inside to all those wonderful autumn foods.  Great stuff.

Not surprising, then, that my first stab at this new cooking lark would be soup & bread a la Mary Berry. 

Hag Improvs

If you were with me here last week, then you know I should’ve learned not to be Hag Improv when it came to cooking, especially not with Maestra Berry’s recipes, but the little cogs in my wee brain, those little cogs, those little cogs. 

The soup recipe starts by browning some garlic.  I decided to use leftover seed garlic rather than store bought.  The Garlic Farm's rule on this is, you can eat growing garlic but you can’t grow eating garlic.  Although this particular type of garlic’s supposed to be hot (Red Duke), I used 3 cloves cuz I do love my garlic.

I also added a couple of chili peppers for that kick in the taste bud’s trouser seat.  Where sugar was added to cut the acid of the tomato, I substituted 4 beetroots.  And since we had no cream, double or otherwise, I used 0% Greek yoghurt, even though Mary Berry warned it’d curdle.  It didn’t.  In fact, the soup came off without a hitch.  

My take on the proving drawer.

Now for the flat bread, which uses yeast.  Our kitchen has dubious origins, possibly as part of the garage, but wherever it came from, it has no heat and we have no proving drawer.  My solution to this was a plate warmer, a metal bowl and the inside of the nuker (not turned on, of course) to keep off any wandering cold drafts.  This worked quite well, actually, but I’ll note that this particular bowl has a rubber-esque bottom.  A plain metal bowl might be too thin for this sort of carry on.

The herbs in this flat bread recipe sounded a bit dull for me.  Basil and parsley.  I’m a great basil lover, but parsley?  At least that’s what I thought until I cut some of the stuff I’d grown for Siobhán.  My God, what a wonderful peppery smell.  Still, I wasn’t convinced this would add enough BAM factor, so Hag Improv once more.    

In addition to the herbs, I kneaded in sundried tomato, parma ham, salami and Leerdammer, the latter being the only cheese besides bleu in our fridge.  To do this, I shaped the dough into a type of hill fort, 

Hill fort dough with toppings.

put some 

of the stuff 

on top, 

Folded over.

folded it over several times, repeated the process until all my goodies were inside.  

Cut into sections.

After that, I made the dough into a little mound, divided it evenly into eight sections with a knife, & proceeded to flatten them into individual breads.

About this flattening craic.  When we moved into our current house, the dryer didn’t work.  We dragged it out to hook up our new dryer, & found a large marble pastry board shoved in behind it, reason unknown.  Cleaned up, it’s a thing of beauty.  Problem is, I’ve been a lifelong knitter and my hands are now 60 year old knitter’s hands, so pressing dough against a marble surface hurts.  Instead, I flattened the bread with a rolling pin.  This probably is akin to sacrilege in cooking theocracies the world over, but in my book, pain is not a worthy price to pay for food.

The sacrilege of rolling pins.

Dough sufficiently flat, I sprayed them with oil and slapped them onto the griddle, where cooking took a helluva lot longer than Maestra Berry claimed it would.  At one juncture, I tried cooking them in a small skillet (frying pan, to non-Appalachians), which took a lot less time than the griddle – only 2 and a half minutes each side.  However, I did like the dark lines made by the griddle, so in this case, aesthetics won out over speed.  And breathing.  There was a lot of smoke involved.  Eventually Siobhán wandered through (perhaps concerned about the smoke) & talked to me about heat conduction through iron griddles.  End result, a small regulation of hob temperature sped the process up considerably.

And so we ate.  The soup turned out perfect & as a leftover, the chili flavour was even stronger, enough to smack my taste buds around just the way I like it.  The flat bread still didn’t have enough punch for me to eat on its own, although it tasted great in the soup.  Next time, I’ll add meat & cheese with stronger flavours – I’m thinking chorizo, definitely.  Undoubtedly the little cogs in my brain will flooster with the herbs as well.  This recipe had endless variations ahead of it, I suspect. 

When you make your soup & bread in your version of the pantsuit kitchen, be sure to share your efforts evenly with the people you love, around a table where you all get to sit.  As nasty women & bad hombres, know more will be asked of you, & probably less will be valued.  You’ll face fear & undoubtedly be grabbed by the very body parts they hate you for having.  Remember to go high.  That love trumps hate.  Help the person next to you who helps the person next to them & we all survive this. 

Mary Berry's tomato soup & flat bread.

You & I, we’re in this together, & that’s not a platitude.  Let's eat. 

  

Learning To Cook At 60

My mother, who’ll be 93 this month, said life began for her at 60, possibly because her youngest turned 18 that year.  Her mother passed her first driving test at 63, left the home she’d been born in and became a university dorm mother, forming relationships that lasted the rest of her life. 

The world outside my bedroom window.

Me?  On my 60^th birthday, I’d been incapacitated for 5 months by an illness I secretly didn’t believe in.  My days had been reduced to watching magpies outside my window chase copulating pigeons away from the view of their own impressionable fledglings.

I used to have plans that didn’t include getting tired every time I took a shower.  At first glance, it seemed everything had been stolen from me.  Gradually, though, it became evident that I was on the same journey I’d always been – i.e. my life – the only difference being that rather than going 70 mph down the freeway, I was now on foot. 

In practical terms, that meant that a few minutes weeding the rose garden followed by a few minutes of lying on my back watching the buzzards and kites scream at each other over sky space, well, eventually that does get the job done. 

Or as a Valentine's Day craft.

One day, lying on my back took the form of plopping down on the couch beside Siobhán who was watching Mary Berry make a chicken pie on TV.  The part where they wove the pie crust reminded me of the woven heart Christmas decorations we made in Appalachia.  I can do that, I decided. 

Later, when Siobhán made her own chicken pie, she couldn’t remember how to weave the crust.  Without consulting anything or anybody who might know better than myself (which would be just about anything or anybody), I took on the job.

When the scientific mind cooks, wine is essential.

Let’s stop here for a life observation.  The scientific mind (that would be Siobhán) interests itself in rules – learning them, repeating them, sticking to them in order to repeat desired results.

The creative mind has an element of oppositional defiance in it that constantly asks, Why?  How can this be better?  Can that be more suited to my liking?  When does the fun come into this?

So when Siobhán tells me that Mary Berry says we need 2 packages of pastry for the crust & we only have one, I decide to go for it, even though I know feckall about cooking and, well, she’s Mary Berry. 

But the creative mind is more than oppositional.  It’s curious.  I wanted to know why

this 

Lora's pre-bake weave.

turned into this.  

A lake has formed.

Re-watching the episode proved the instructions were a little more complicated than my memory of them. 

I watched another episode in the series and thought, oh my . . . what I’ve missed, being surrounded by good cooks all my life.  

Making smoke.

Into the kitchen I go.  And no, I didn’t become scientific.  My mind had its questions.  I substituted what I didn’t have.  I added what I thought I’d like better.  I made a lot of smoke.  And I got to eat as well.  Several times.

The lesson my mother and grandmother passed along from their sixties wasn’t about achieving.  It was about taking a life’s worth of kickass learning and moving forward with as much bravery and foolishness as I did in my twenties, despite whatever shit life has hurled at me.  It’s about recognising that the ability to experience something, to experience anything really, well that’s just about two shades past precious.  It’s not a Pollyanna, look on the bright side, never get what you want but be grateful approach.  It’s accepting reality in its ugly and miraculous because that's what being alive is, then seeing what the fuck this next thing’s all about.  In other words, while it’s not 70 mph, keep moving and you’ll meet things.

Going it on foot.

If I hadn’t gotten sick, I’d probably find as much depth in my life as I do now because that's what creative minds do.  Most likely, though, I’d not stop weeding the roses to watch the buzzards and kites.  And I certainly wouldn’t take the time to learn to cook.  But I did, so I am.  It ain’t heroic.  Cooking’s not life changing (unless it’s fatal, which in my case, is possible.)  But I am.  I’m going to learn how to cook at 60. 

Woodpecker Asks

The tag line under this site’s title reads, The first year of my partner’s gender transition.  This month, that year is up.  So a little reflection.

About a decade ago, my spouse (who’s now known as Siobhán) first admitted to me her gender dysphoria – being transsexual.  I turned to the folk who’d helped me with my son El Punko’s transition – Transfamily –  a web support group with chatrooms for different family member groups.

Their trans-parents chatroom had been full of concern and worry and the grief that comes when you realise your child’s future will always have this gargantuan   

It's behind you!

THiNG in it. 

The spouse chatroom had ANGER.  Understandably so.  Most, like myself, hadn’t been told what they were getting into before they married.  Few, if any, had been through a transition before.  And let’s face it, our culture is SO focused on sex, sexual orientation, sex, sexual identity and did I say SEX, that while the supportive trans-parent becomes an archetype of parental love, the supportive trans-spouse gets tarred with the weirdo-pervert-just-plain-crazy brush.

As one of Siobhán’s friends said, Lora didn’t sign up to be a lesbian.  As if that’s all marriage is about.

I didn’t last long in the spouse chatroom.  The only bits of advice I remember were (1) Don’t let her EVER wear your clothes and (2) be prepared for her to turn into Uber Diva.  

Pre-Uber Diva

To be honest, Siobhán’s clothes are nicer than mine, so I steal hers.  And Uber Diva?  Puh-leeeeeze. The woman’s a huge softy, quietly in the background making sure everyone gets more than what they need.

At least pre-transition, she was.

Fast forward to last June. 

Between the two of us, I don’t know who was more excited about Siobhán’s transition.  I certainly showed it more, although I did have a sense that neither of us could know how much this would challenge us. 

And it was exciting, all the firsts.  First pre-transition talk at work, first hair, first posh do.  Four months into it, though, I started not feeling well You go without me, missing out on this and that until my life gradually became days of watching wildlife in the trees outside my bedroom window.

Blech!  Not this kisser.

For years, they tell me, 

                  an 

insidious medical problem 

quietly sneaked up on me

until . . . 

         POW 

right in the kisser.

Although I didn’t have the focus to write, my brain still worked like a writer’s brain, so I did what writers do – observe, observe, quietly and mutely observe.

As a result, I became a spectator rather than a supporter of Siobhán’s transition.  

And I noticed a few things.

(1)  I'm extraneous to everyone in her life, friends and involved professionals alike.  As any non-professional SOFFA* will tell you, we’re excluded from the process for confidentiality reasons, but there’s also no supports for us in place.  The most important people in the trans-person’s life and no one takes care of us.  As if that doesn’t negatively affect the trans-person.  I’ve offered my professional skills on occasion to develop support groups for myself and others, only to be patted on the head and sent back to my hole where hopefully I’ll stay.

(2)  I suspect when a person waits this long for validation, it becomes addictive once she finally gets it  This means that advice given by casual strangers or the sudden interest from people who’ve not been overly compassionate with Siobhán in the past, carries more weight than the last 10 years of my consistent support.  It’s maybe this particular dynamic that prompted the warnings in the trans-spouse chatroom to watch out for Uber Diva.  There’s certainly been the rare sighting of her in my house during the last year.

(3)  The dominant culture for male-to-female transition equates 

female 

    with 

glamorous. 

Many, many people, both trans and SOFFA, refer to the beginning of transition as a second adolescent.  All of the above, even Uber Diva, is stuff Siobhán should’ve done as a teenager.  And although I’m not her mother, the spouse is often put into that pseudo-parental test-the-limits-in-a-safe-place position as the trans-person explores their representation of gender.

I understand this, but I'm tired from being powed in the kisser.

A year after starting her Real Life Test, Siobhán’s finally had her first appointment at the NHS gender clinic.  In case you're not familiar, the clinic's supposed to help in transition, not rubber stamp it once it's done.  I've been there, done that with El Punko’s struggle to get adequate medical care; the memory wears me out.  

Siobhán’s friends come over and discuss hair, voice, hips, until my eyes roll back in my head.  All my adult life, I’ve dealt with this What A Woman Should Be shite. 

I’ve paid my dues.  

To hell with social norms.  

Be a goddam trans woman, 

not Cait feckin Jenner.

I’ve become a trans-heretic. 

Our woodpecker.

If I were healthy, this wouldn't be so in-my-face because I’d be up to my eyes in writing and gardening, painting furniture and chasing a Doodle over the moors.  With my own interests taking centre stage, I’d be supportive.  I’d play fair.  

But you know what?  Fairness is a social construct with shifting goal posts.  A 16 year cancer patient taught me that.  She said there’s no reason for anything.  

Life just is.  

Get on with it. 

Out the window, I see woodpeckers nesting in the back garden.  In my pantheistic mentality inherited from a Leni Lenape grandmother, Woodpecker is birth medicine; it beats the drum of honouring ones unique path, rejecting conformity.  

Appropriate for a heretic.

If I were healthy, I’d be writing.  Or gardening.  Or painting furniture and chasing the Doodle across the moors, although not at the same time.  I’m not healthy but I am a realist.  Woodpecker says, even though I’m sick, get up from the trans table and find my own project away from the sound of other people’s drums.

I’ll let you know 

when I get there. 

*  Significant Others, Friends, Family, Advocates

The Shaman, My Fire, My Stalkers & Me

Recap for old & new readers:  Last June, I turned this blog over to documenting my partner’s transition from male to female, hopefully to give trans-SOFFAs* a voice.  During the autumn, chest pain and fatigue made me increasingly ill until I lost the creative energy to write.  (See Bounty Hunter Awaits)  In March, I got a treatable diagnosis that requires a lengthy convalescence.  This medical condition had no causal explanation connected with my medical history or current lifestyle.

So I went to the shaman.

While the doctors did their thing, I wanted to pull my psychological issues into my healing.  Most people would go to a mental health specialist, but after 30 years as a trauma therapist myself, I make a really shit client.  And as Bitler says, shamanism turns psychological theory into a tangible narrative, which means I can’t hide behind my cognitive egotism. 

But mostly this experience demonstrates the healing power of the personal story.

So what’s it like, going to the shaman?

After taking my history, the shaman felt I’d traded my creative energy to protect my family during a time when we were stalked and harassed by a group I call the Flying Monkeys (FMs).  As you know, engaging with genus FM draws you into uncharted delusion; your most innocuous act or remark take on complex and evil meaning.  Bitler’s skill at not being drawn in by the FMs scared me.  I felt she under estimated their intent and left me to protect us.  Which I, an inveterate communicator, had to do by keeping my feckin mouth shut. 

The shaman had me lay down on a heated massage table, relax and do nothing.  She sat beside me and went on her journey. 

The Shaman’s Journey

The shaman’s guide told her to pack an invisibility cloak, then follow her to the Middle World where a Dark Entity held my Fire (creative energy) hostage. 

They rescued my Fire under guise of the invisibility cloak and brought it to the Upper World where the rest of my Spiritual Self waited in a pine grove with Elders.  Bitler’s Spiritual Self came in and we exchanged gifts that rectified our interpersonal conflict about dealing with the FMs. 

The Elders wanted to bring in the FMs but my Fire was frightened of them, so my Power Animal came to protect us.  The FMs were escorted in, returned a waterfall (my vested emotion) that they’d stolen from me, and I was revitalised.  They were escorted out with a wooden object of mine.  The shaman wasn’t sure I’d given it willingly – they may’ve stolen it to maintain the connection.

My Fire replaced by Self-Lie stones

The shaman and her guide led my Spiritual Self and my Fire to the dark dark dark Underworld.  The guide lit a fire and had my Spiritual Self lay down.  She directed the shaman to look at the roof of the Underworld which was made of black tourmaline crystals.  Earth Elementals came in and took my Spiritual Self apart, then removed three self-lies that looked like stone but were actually ice.

The lies left holes in me that the Earth Elemental filled with burning wood to melt any residual ice.  They packed the rest of me with black tourmaline except my chest which they filled with carnelian crystals.  My parts were bound together with plants and vines, then washed and anointed.  They repeated the process with my Fire. 

My Fire and my Spiritual Self were then led into a fire where we slowly burned to ash.  The shaman’s guide mixed the ash with water and clay which she used to reform me.  The guide wrapped me in a garland of fire lilies and I reanimated.  My power animal took me on a walk to be fed and nourished.
 

The shaman could see us on this respite walk but was also at my home with her guide to smudge the rooms with sage and protect all the windows with holly.

Nice story, but . . .

A bit crazy?  Reframing, actually.  Much like a therapist helping a client release her sense of responsibility for being abused – if dinner were on time, he wouldn’t hit me. 

The invisibility cloak.

There’s no fire or water or holly, and certainly no invisibility cloak here with me as I write.  They’re images layered with conceptual metaphors that reframe my perception of what I’ve been through.  When I think of my energy, power and creativity as fire, I see it as something that needs tended rather than an inexhaustible flame.   The physical symptoms that come with my illness are so closely aligned with fire and heat sensations, they remind me to stop playing the Little Red Hen who does everything by herself because no one will help her.

My self-neglect gets shored up with fiercely protective holly, the FMs kept away by an invisibility cloak.  Bitler’s policy of not-engaging with their havoc isn’t head-in-the-sand denial; rather, it’s water, a constant flow around objects, malleable yet unstoppable, energetic and free. 

A nice story, indeed.  One that puts parameters round what was a thoroughly out of control and unpredictable situation. It gives me the tools (metaphors) to contemplate my illness, my relationship, my identity as someone who was stalked and harassed.

What happened next? 

My shaman told me the FMs weren’t done with us, surprise surprise.  Sure enough, a week or so later, news of their latest campaign trickled in.  (People let you know it’s still going on without you.  They’re good like that.)

In this instance, the FMs’ method was as hilarious as it was nuts.  They disparagingly ‘outed’ Bitler to everyone, 9 months after she’d started her Real Life Test.  I mean, as my son El Punko put it, a transition isn’t an inconspicuous tummy tuck that people may wonder about – did she or didn’t she?  The FMs’ chosen listeners included people who work in Bitler’s medical specialty but’ve never met her.  Like, if you were a bus driver in Stirling, you’d be interested in a bus driver who transitioned in Wales.

I figured here was a chance to regain my fire by doing what I do best – communicate.   So I lifted the invisibility cloak and sent a mischievous wee missive to the FMs, pretending their latest campaign had no malice aforethought.

I hear you’re spreading the news about Siobhán’s transition, and I’m here to help. 

Treating it like a press release (Spoiler alert – you learn Bitler’s real name).

Grp Capt Siobhán Smyth is the highest ranking openly trans officer in the UK military; she also shares with one other person the honour of highest ranking openly trans officer in the WORLD.  How great is she?

Suggested they read this blog for more intimate details, and attached a dead good photo of Siobhán. 

No longer invisible - Siobhan & Doodle

So knock yourself out, spreading the news.  The more people who know what a trans woman can do, the more trans folk who’ll be inspired to lead amazing lives.

Gave them our blessing and belled the cat.  In Flying Monkey form, that is.

I felt grounded.  Not spiteful.  Not helpless.  Not under attack or on the offensive.  There they were, the FMs, living their story, and here I was, fully visible and living mine.

When I started work on this blog entry, I remembered when one of the FMs forced her way into our house.  Siobhán’d been all waterly about this invasion (i.e. politely asked the FM to leave).  The memory infuriated me and vwooosh! I was consumed with rage, imagining violence, feeling impotent against them, let down by Siobhán.

Then I noticed that my chest muscles sizzled.  Well, shit.  For the sake of being my smartass self, I’d undone all the shaman’s work.  What an eejit.

The power of story.

I reread the shaman’s healing journey, taking time to visualise each part of her trip with all of their metaphoric actions and nature symbols.  My rage did a sudden switch, a sort of fireworks explosion of mirth through my body. 

Powerfully instructive.  My fire isn’t one that consumes and destroys.  It cackles and dances like my gleeful Doodle dog.  It counts coup with your soft spots, rides away laughing.  But never destroys someone for revenge.  Never seeks violence.  And isn’t impotent or betrayed.  Mirth and joy and creativity are the only ways I should use my fire.

And that, my dear, is something worth dancing about.

* Significant Others, Friends, Family & Advocates

Bounty Hunter Awaits

Meals in bed

Life is like being on the run from an anonymous Bounty Hunter.  If my family medical history’s a good predictor, my own Bounty Hunter’ll be chasing me into my eighth or ninth decade.

I can’t see myself as a sweet old lady, taking all my meals in bed.  Not exactly the sit-on-my-duff sort of person.  Most likely my carers’ll help old Bounty Hunter take me away.

So when I got sick, my patience surprised me.   Surprised everyone, apparently.  Loving son, El Punko said that, since my symptoms were respiratory, a bit of oxygen deprivation might be helpful at peace negotiations.

Cheek like that, he’s off my Christmas list, but don’t tell him.  He’s great at gift giving.  He got me this really kickass Witch Ball last year.  I’d hate my next Christmas spoiled just because you can’t keep a secret.

Admittedly, there were less patient moments on the NHS conveyor belt.  The day I stood in the surgery parking lot screaming, ‘I hate the NHS.  I hate this surgery.  I hate all doctors.’ 

Probably a daily occurrence for them, now that I think about it.

But anyway, how a person responds to illness has nothing to do with what you’re made of.  I’m about as demure as a wet cat, but other than that one hissy fit, I’ve patiently told my story to a cast of thousands and never once pointed out that none of them were paying attention or that yes, fatigue is a symptom or that when my heart danced the Flamenco after taking the prescribed steroids, the cardiology referral was to cover their over-worked asses.  Or arses, I suppose it should be.  But not because I had a heart problem.

Witch Ball

Which is why I didn’t go immediately.  To the cardiologist.  Plus, we were coming up to Christmas –the Witch Ball Christmas, to be exact – and I’d been referred for 3000 unnecessary tests as they do when your heart goes biddly boo bee doo deee doo, even if the reason it did is because you’ve been on steroids. 

Mostly I didn’t go because, although I’d been told not to talk about my fatigue – fatigue isn’t a symptom – I was fecking tired. Not exactly the behaviour of a wet cat, but I had to choose my battles.  So I only went to the respiratory specialist.  Because, you know, my symptoms were respiratory.

They treated my respiratory symptoms, but I was still tired (which is not a symptom).  My short term memory took a handbasket to hell (along with several bottles of homemade damson gin, I suspect).  I stopped walking dogs, pruning trees, writing.  I sat out Samhain and ghost walks, candle services, Yule parties, New Year champagne and more.  I gave up my life but unexpectedly, didn’t mourn it.  Something inside me, some magical cottage in the dark wood of my psyche felt this was a time of waiting.

Doodle bed games

Tired but not sleepy, I knitted like Madame DeFarge.  Played bed games with Doodle, discovered how really awful telly is.  Watched Youtube videos, read blogs and You Won’t Believe What Happened Next web stories I’d not had time for before.  Witnessed twenty-first century literary wisdom buzzing through reams of Tweets about 99p e-books and cover launches, how-to-write essays and book reviews,

gradually becoming invisible myself,

not blogging or tweeting or posting on Facebook, not pushing a manuscript in this or that person’s face,

quiet and patient until I saw it differently, this Writer's Life we'd all been told we had to live.  Like editing someone else’s writing.  Seeing clearly what’s not plain to the writer herself.  And I thought blasphemy.  I thought . . .

That’s not the way I want it done.  That’s not the person I want to be.  A thought which initially scared me, because any twenty-first century writer knows what that thought means.  If you're not socially aggressive, you commit publishing suicide.

So I let the NHS distract me from scary and blasphemous thoughts.  All my tests were negative, and since fatigue isn’t a symptom, my Bounty Hunter’s name had to be heart disease.  And who’s the naughty wet cat who didn’t make an appointment with the cardiologist?

There’s blasphemous me in the cardiologist’s waiting room, sitting next to the Bitler who’s convinced I’m in heart failure.  Mine is an intuitive soul.  This isn’t the end.  This is a time of waiting.  A threshold.  But I don’t say that because the Bitler’s a woman of science, and she’s waiting until science has spoken.

That’s when I notice her lipstick’s only on one side of her mouth.  We both laugh for a who-gives-a-shit moment that transcends science and blasphemy and the expectations of people who won’t ever give you a Witch Ball.  The kind of moment that makes sense when you’re in it but doesn’t translate into words, yet leaves you knowing that you have to do what you can live with.  The kind of moment that matters.

A little touch of fatigue.

The cardiologist says my heart’s fine.  In fact, he thinks I’m suffering from fatigue. 

Airbrushed Transition

Doodle & bra.

Bit-ler’s too busy with curling irons and HRT patches and chasing a bra-snatching Doodle to realise, but it’s true – there’s power in transitioning. 

We weren’t the easiest couple to work with, Bit-ler being a doctor and myself still a trauma therapist at the time.  A handful of tattered professional egos lay in our wake when we met with Newest Counsellor.  She stressed not putting me in the position of co-counsellor, so Bit-ler and I thought we’d found a keeper.   

Until Bit-ler admitted to being trans.  Newest Counsellor gushed about her one and only other trans client, someone who hadn’t transitioned (please transition o goody o goody o goody).  I was a bit creeped out.  

When Newest Counsellor realised I’d been side-lined, she made a rule that a portion of each session be allotted to me.  The next session ended with her saying we didn’t have time for me that week, Bit-ler’s issues had been so pressing.  The following session, Newest Counsellor decided I was an attention seeking whiner who got plenty of air time. 

Our wonderful Newest Counsellor was more than a bit trans-fixed, one of those folk who have a diversity bracelet and’ll give their eye teeth for a trans charm.  This is the power of the transition – it shows people for what they are.

Like Bit-ler’s friend and colleague.  The more she had to drink, the more honestly (offensively) she expressed (1) her fears of how Bit-ler might’ve presented as female, (2) her relief at being wrong, and (3) her conviction Bit-ler should never wear a bustier and fishnets.  Ever. 

What could’ve been an afternoon of culinary debauchery and raucous laughter became a ‘First Viewing’ of the female Bit-ler in an environment where, if necessary, awful things could be said.  In other words, while the transition was the catalyst to Friend & Colleague’s reaction, her emotions had more to do with her needs.  It’s what I call subjective compassion. 

Bit-ler’s patient with this onslaught of subjective compassion from her friends.  Gender transition is uncommon enough that however a person may think they’d handle it, they’re never prepared when a transition’s happening in the office or living next door or is attached to the memory of changing clothes in front of someone before they knew.  Normal concepts like gender, friendship, honesty get turned on their head.  How you apply those concepts to the person transitioning, well, that says something about who you are.  Maybe something you never expected yourself to be capable of.  Something you really don’t want to know.  

Me, I’m usually not so nice as Bit-ler, but when I watch this struggle in people, I witness a psychological awakening of sorts that often forces me to accept harsh things about myself.  It’s honest and intimate.  It’s a process that demands patience from everyone involved, even the little dog SOFFA, too.

Unfortunately, this interpersonal process gets swept away by advocacy guidelines on what language to use, protocols for sharing information, agency expectations on getting it all done and dusted after a 30 day absence from work – for both the trans-person and innocent bystanders. 

Airbrushed transition, I’d say.

Little dog, SOFFA, too.

We stopped going to Newest Counsellor because she objectified us.  As to Friend & Colleague, Bit-ler loves and respects her as much as ever.  I, as the little dog SOFFA, feel gifted to’ve seen Friend & Colleague’s bravery at facing the power of transition full on.  She was real and that’s all anyone can ask for.  It’s the best a friend can be.