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

So let’s look at this word “normal.” It’s a pretty interesting word! We use it in SO many ways, with multiple layers of connotations that have nothing to do with its original meaning. We use it to mean “healthy,” as in, “Your blood tests came out normal.” We use it to mean “common” or “expected,” as in “It’s normal to feel weak and tired after a long bout with the flu.” We use it to mean “socially acceptable,” or at least “socially predictable,” as in “Why can’t you just listen to pop music like a normal teenager?” (Which was my mom’s response to the constant strains of Mozart and Duke Ellington emerging loudly from my room during my 80‘s teenhood. Heh.) So what is the original meaning of the word, the one from which all of those others somehow evolved and diverged? I could half-jokingly say that the answer is written in the stars. Fellow astronomy buffs and lovers of Latin will know what I’m talking about: there’s a small constellation up there that everyone ignores, becaus...

So here I am again at the far edge of a several-weeks' break in posting... I hate it when that happens, but occasionally life just gets very, very full of Other Things! I haven't finished my ongoing topic from late April yet, but today's post will be a short side-trip, because I want to talk about something that feels very current and present to me right now. Today I am thinking a lot about an old friend I lost touch with some years back. I'll call her Sue... and if she ever reads this, she'll know why. Our losing touch wasn't accidental. I stepped back from the friendship intentionally, in order to let her go her chosen way unimpeded. I tentatively and temporarily got back in touch with her several years ago just to see how she was doing, and it seemed that she had succeeded in her goal. But I can't help wondering if she's really happy. I say "she" out of respect to the inner self she hesitantly chose to let me see, which did not match...

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...