U-Turn: a UU transman ponders sex, spirituality, and the power of stories

So, while still pondering the many faces of “normal” this past weekend, I was graciously offered some field experience by the Universe: a chance to go hang out for a few hours with a broad cross-section of other NH transfolk - young and old, tall and short, fat and thin, pre-transition and post-transition and in-transition and non-transitioning, along with those who identify as genderqueer, gender-fluid, or gender-nonconforming... and, of course, Allies. This cool little get-together was a “wellness event” run by an organzation called Transgender New Hampshire (TGNH) and held at a local UU church. It was attended by around 70 people, more than enough to make the downstairs Fellowship Hall feel nice and full. Let me tell you, “normal” was strained to the hilt in that room - to which I can only say, WAY COOL!!! It was an all-day event of which I missed the first half, alas, due to my work schedule. (Not too much “alas,” as I was working with my very fun little group of madrigal singe...

So, as promised, this begins what I suspect will be a multiple-post exploration of the concept of “normal.” My initial temptation was to launch right into etymology and mathematics - but instead, in keeping with this blog’s title and theme, I’ll start by telling you a story. I've mentioned puberty once or twice before, I think. Now, I'm aware that puberty pretty much sucks for everyone. And in fact, today I'm barely even going to mention those aspects of puberty that particularly suck for Transfolk. No, today I'm going to tell you about a moment that actually would have sucked much worse for me if I hadn't  been a Transgendered person. Yes, really. So... puberty. That time when (A.) you’re hugely self-conscious and anything that makes you socially uncomfortable feels like the end of the world, and (B.) your secondary sex characteristics start to develop. Thus proving that (C.) Mother Nature really does have a sadistic streak! For female-bodied persons, of c...

Okay, so... twice in the past couple of days, while casually listening to a female acquaintance of mine talking (two different acquaintances, not the same one twice), I suddenly noticed that my eyes had strayed to her... um, yeah... that. I mean those. I mean... you know. And I thought... Really? I wasn't ogling, or leering, or anything. There wasn't anything particularly sexual going on in my mind. In fact, I don't think there was anything going on in my mind at all. (Okay, let me just pause here while half the women I know exchange knowing looks and say, "Yup, that sounds about right..." *sigh*) I wasn't upset, merely mildly surprised, at finding my attention thus engaged. And I don't think either of the women involved even noticed it. Really, it was pretty innocent, as such incidents go. And geesh, it's not like I haven't looked at women before. On the contrary. Having identified as lesbian for most of my adult life, I have b...

So it’s April Fool’s Day, and I was a little wary of posting anything today, lest I not be (*cough*) taken seriously... But as it happens, today I’m having flashbacks to a lay sermon I wrote and delivered several years ago, when April 1st fell on a Sunday and our church celebrated Loof Lirpa (spell it backwards and you’ll get it). And it seems to be begging for some further exploration. I admit, I enjoy the odd service-frameworks that our fun-loving Worship & Music Committeefolk sometimes come up with. (My favorite will always be the Oct. 31st Rocky Horror extravaganza... I figure any church service in which I get to perform “Sweet Transvestite” from the pulpit is automatically a winner!) But at the same time, it’s also important to me that they have a deeper meaning, that they make people both think and feel. And often I will aim to push uncomfortable buttons. (My Rocky Horror sermon was about owning your own dark side -  not merely distinguishing darkness from actual evil...

The other day I accidentally admitted, in the presence of both our minister and our RE committee chair, that persistent nagging is a technique that has sometimes worked if you want something from me. Oops! Of course they both immediately made “Hmmmm!” noises and pronounced this a VERY INTERESTING revelation... which presumably they intend to make good use of at some future time. I laughingly protested that they shouldn’t assume it’ll continue to work... after all, I’m a rapidly changing personality right now! Our minister just grinned and reminded me that he has been through this before (a close friend of his having transitioned some years back) and knows better... He’s right, of course. Transition changes many things, but not the basic essence of who you are. No matter how much I change, the person who comes out the other end will still be ME, with all of my strengths and weaknesses, gifts and faults and personality quirks. He’ll be long-winded, extroverted, and introspective, j...

Sorry, couldn’t resist. Well, okay, yeah, I  could have resisted, but it’s just not in my personality to deny a good Star Trek reference. In a previous entry (titled Clarity, back in, um, December, I think) I talked a little about gendered social spaces. One friend requested that I say a bit more about that. Now, I’m not talking about formally gendered spaces, such as bathrooms and locker rooms, mens’ clubs or womens’ colleges. (Though of course there’s lot to be said, discussed, and argued about those!) No, I mean the subtler kind of spaces, the ones that aren’t officially defined in any way, but exist nonetheless. For instance: you’re at a family gathering, and after a while, you suddenly realize that all of the women have congregated in one room (maybe the kitchen, or a craft room) and all of the men are hanging out in another room (probably the workshop or garage). It didn’t happen on purpose... no one consciously said, hey, for God’s sake, let’s slip away from the menfo...

This is a hard post to write. I’m a little nervous about how certain friends of mine might take it - especially my female friends. And yet, for honesty’s sake, it’s a topic that needs to be opened up and looked at. There is always a danger, in choosing to make a gender transition, that those friends of the same apparent gender as you (i.e., the one you are leaving behind) will feel somehow insulted, or even abandoned... like you’re somehow letting the team down. You’re defecting, as it were, to the other side - at best, a deserter; at worst, a traitor to the cause... whether the cause is preserving traditional masculinity in a confused world, or fighting for the rights of women against a powerful patriarchy. Leaving the gender of your birth sometimes feels, to others, like an intentional and possibly insulting dissociation: “I’m not one of THEM.” This seems to happen especially with transguys, particularly those who were who were active in the Lesbian community prior to transitioni...