Transgender Liberty

  So this is a special post...  I tried a dating app... and my experience was bad, except for the one exception of someone I really connected with. Yet Bad regarding the app.....Oh for so many reasons which I will go over after my share... yet first I have something important I want to say and its also a shout out to a person I met who in a sense gave me hope.  I met someone in Seattle through a dating app (ya I gave one a try) Their name Meghan. She has her PHD degree, lives a few hours from me, exceptional human being. We are practically the same age, same interests, educated, see eye to eye on politics, religion, same career backgrounds. A lot of the same likes, hobbies, interests. We just have a lot in common. They had one picture that I got to see of them and I found them attractive. Thinking...'ok... so this is going well.' We interacted for days, mornings and evenings...  in chat, going back and forth asking questions and giving answers and all that early dati...

    1440.......  What is it?  Is it, a police code? a military time of day? a clever l337 hacker number? a drug culture reference?, something the ancient aliens left behind?, or something else entirely? A friend of mine who passed away and whom I think of often, used to say.. '<my dead name>...  There are only so many minutes in a day... 1440 of them and we should use them wisely!"  I loved that.  My friend and father in law to my then wife, was smart, kind, warm, and accepting, and honestly a good F#cking friend.  One time.. .and I wasn't out yet,  they said to me "I saw this person getting out of their car.... they are clearly transgender and strugglig' and he paused as if to see what my reaction would be to that and then he continued, 'and I know their life must not be easy and how difficult some of their challenges must be. Can you image what they must be going through?" and I agreed with him, he was pretty intuitive and had good in...

 Movie Spoilers for 'Blade Runner', if you haven't seen this movie. Stop, go watch it now! :)  =============== One of my favorite movies of all time "Blade Runner" has an incredibly deep scene where in the final moment, we see the pain and humanity and anguish in someone (a replicant played by Rutger Hauer) who has been deemed less than human, demonized, diminished, and reduced to a thing. when in all reality they are living brighter and more human than human.  IMO, one of Rutger Hauer and Harrison Fords best scenes ever!    I think about that scene often, what it means to be human, to be treated as "less than Human", to know and be a conscious observer of the universe and a flicker of flame in a moment in time, to then be lost in the currents of time and to know your time is up.  I am deeply moved every-time I watch and observe this moment. Not only for my empathy towards this character in his final moments but also for the loss...and fleetingnes...

  My ex (when we were married) and I used to love the old seasonal tv special " Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and the Island of Misfit Toys "    yet we'd acknowledge that there were some hidden messages this show was trying to teach audiences, the obvious being First Rudolph is born different Second there is an elf that, doesn't want to be a toy maker, but ( quoting my fingers here in the air ) wants to be a "Dentist". And then there is this place called "the Island of Misfit Toys"   All of these crafted analogies clearly was the networks way of addressing being "different" and their message to the viewers; " It is OK to be different, in fact its a super power and we should not fear it"   So how does this relate to my journey and maybe yours.   Before my ex asked for a divorce we would watch and laugh because it just showed some of the history of how uncomfortable and uptight America is with sexual orientation, not to be confus...

Trigger warning..  I almost quit my transition(this would be the 3rd time).  My wanting to quit has been coupled with my divorce grieving. I went through a divorce this year and I miss my ex. I admit it. Its been rough without her. We are friends but I can't stand to listen to her talk about the man (the human person) that replaced me. And I want nothing to do with him at this time because I'm not ready to see my replacement.  I'm angry, hurt and feel abandoned.  And to be real my marriage was rocky, I did a lot outside of being transgender that was not fair to my partner, so ya I take responsibility for ALL of that. And...we had great times but there is much that wasn't so great. Robert Frost says "we love the things for what they are, not for what they ought to be" Our marriage failed that test. I wasn't accepted and was expected to be a CIS male only. Once that was not a truth, my marriage was over. I wish it had been different but that's a reality....

 I grew up in a place that was a melting pot of two ideologies, one side highly liberal, because of the university near by and the other side highly conservative, and driven by the main working industry, Timber. The side of town I lived in was round 50k people, and main street consisted of bars, pool halls, and strip clubs and full of bullies, was a tougher town, w a drug culture and lots of drinking. Growing up there was no such thing as "Transgender", I had never heard of "Trans..anything, and Gay and Lesbian wasn't even a word... though thinking back there were rumors. And my personal experiences... I was awkward growing up... with 3 siblings, a mother who was a good loving mom yet a quiet working and functional alcoholic because of trauma in her childhood. My dad, a loving father, protective, and a good man who had done much in his life. With pictures of him in life magazine as well as pictures of him in an encyclopedia as part of an organization his adoptive fat...

Thomas Covey has a rule. "Win Win" the idea is that for anything; any negotiation, discussion, argument, social change, the goal is to seek "Win Win" not "Win Lose", or worse "Lose Lose". The goal is that if we work together we ALL can win.  Life isn't a football game, it isn't red team versus blue team, it isn't them and us. Yet there are forces that seek to pit us against each other, to stir the pot, to keep us ALL living in fear, to keep us divided. The news does it, politicians do it, and religious forces can also do it. All of these forces generally resort to using Fear to control people. In Frank Herbert's book "Dune" there is a moment where Paul (a character) chants "I must not fear. Fear is the mind killer..I will fear no fear"  something like that.. paraphrased here, he is not wrong. I use this all the time, especially when facing a decision or something difficult I have to do.  So how do we address th...

My first blog post. I like to think this post is a little like attempting a first contact. First contact I would imagine would start with a question "Is anyone out there, anyone listening?" And ya.... I do believe we are not alone. So... going with that loose analogy I've decided to put thoughts and observations, my ideas out into the universe from the standpoint of my life as a human, and more specifically as a transgender woman. And since this is my first post let me share a little about myself, an introduction if you will. I am an older Transgender Woman, in process of transitioning.  I have an older brother and sister and a younger brother, I am single, divorced,  I have 3 kids all grown (well mostly),  I have an Ex who I am friends with, I work in the high tech sector, I read wide and deep, similarly I listen to and enjoy all kinds of music. I love animals and nature, hiking and quiet too. I am a human, fallible, I have feelings, I bleed red like we all d...