Amy Bloom, in Normal: Transsexual CEOs, Crossdressing Cops, and Hermaphrodites with Attitude, lays out her case against crossdressers. She finds them immersed in the erotic in a way that makes her queasy when they are about in open society. That Eros may be fine in private, but in the wider world, it seems a bit … Continue reading Sensation Or Success?
People love flow. It feels so good when we are carried along, with a purpose a focus. Andy Rooney still misses WWII; the shared goals made everyone feel closer. But flow has mostly given way to fragmentation and multitasking, to separation and serving the machine. Marketers and TV producers — basically the same thing — … Continue reading SimuFlow
In management, there are two basic ways of creating structure in a business. The first is imposing structure; creating a system that you have invented and then training the people to play their roles in that system. This can easily be seen in an assembly line. In that structure, people are just mostly just playing … Continue reading Imposed or Organic?
I just woke from a dream of a different gender conference, held in a combination of a mansion and a mall, where a group of smart people got together to talk and indulge, in a way that was anarchic and hedonistic. People were flowing, tables were full of offered food, and the conversation went on … Continue reading Raw Life
Let’s face it: trans is about desire. It is about knowing what we want and getting it. Call it passion or bliss or Eros or desire, it’s all about getting what lifts our heart. Of course, those are the two hard parts. First, how do we know what we want? Do we just want to … Continue reading Right Desire
A police officer is shot, the bullet dances in her body and ends with a complete severing of the spinal cord, leaving her parapalegic. She just wants to be normal again. The team from Extreme Makeover: Home Edition come in and offer her the best of everything, from a recovery room with the workout machines, … Continue reading Anything Is Possible?
To a correspondent who is beginning to put together an inclusive women’s gathering: = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = Your note made me think about what I might say to a diverse gathering of women. I was at the first “Full Circle Of Women” and have watched … Continue reading Conscious Womanhood
When I look back on my “years of longing,” what hits me most strongly is how dillegently I worked at staying stupid. Of course, that’s what longing does. It gives us tunnel vision, and tells us that if we focus more tightly, if we become even more blind, things will get better. Longing is the … Continue reading Staying Stupid
You know, those Opus Dei flagellators are not wrong. In many ways, God is in the pain. Sensation is sensation, pleasure to pain, and that sensation opens the space for focus in a way that moving through the routine never can. I don't drink often, and I rarely drink a lot. But that once or … Continue reading In The Pain
“There is no safe space for trans people. There is only safer space.” — Alexandra Billings You cannot join into the conversation until the conversation exists. I was along for the ride as a father drove his eighth grade daughter to one of her first boy-girl parties. “Golly gee, learning to date was so hard,” … Continue reading Silence Is Not Safety
Contrary to the photos in the media, most transpeople are not pretty. Of course, that’s true about all other humans too. The images editors pick are most often designed to be pleasing to the eye and that means they tend to be pictures of pretty people. Pretty & shiny is an easy way to use … Continue reading Eye Apple
Somewhere tonight, in this cold, longest night of the year (at least up north), there is a party that you are invited to. It’s where we gather together to help each other get through the darkness, where we celebrate the light that comes to the world not from the outside, but from the inside of … Continue reading Celebrate Light
Helen Madden, the licensed joyologist played by Molly Shannon on Saturday Night Live, understood the key for moving from shame to joy. You have to “Love it, love it, love it!“ Helen was joyously exuberant in her love, over the top and unable to sit still as she delighted in very single part of her … Continue reading Love It, Love It, Love It!
I deflate too fast. This is a world that rewards the bouncy, those who rebound quickly. Get your feelings hurt, make a faux pas, have a set back, whatever, then learn from it and keep moving on, take the next step and live. For many, trying to find a technique to bounce back is the … Continue reading Bouncy
Experience is what you get when you don’t get what you want. How you use that experience is up to you. Do you complain about it, about how it blocked your desires? Do you use that experience to help you find a different way to get what you want? Do you value that experience as … Continue reading Torture As Service
“It’s so nice to see you!” “It’s so nice to be seen!” I imagine, she said, that it must be nice to be seen. Sometimes it amazes me how little human contact I have. For my birthday, I got two e-mails and a text message. Later, I got to accompany my sister while she bought … Continue reading So Nice To See You
Scrutiny is the daily experience of women. The most obvious scrutiny is the ubiquitous male gaze, always assessing women for sexual desirability and availability. Being a woman is a terribly difficult task, since it consists principally in dealing with men. — Joseph Conrad This male gaze also requires men to watch over his women in … Continue reading Welcome To Woman
While I have supported any changes transpeople choose to make to their bodies, when I first came out I looked into the mirror and decided that I would never be able to female my own body to my liking, to anything that would make my passage though male puberty less than visible. Bones don’t lie. … Continue reading Present Callan
The last few years have stripped away my momentum, the steely will that drove my service in the world. Being so deeply immersed in scarcity, my pellicle has been washed away, leaving me raw and exposed. In that process, the micro terrors I have held all my life came to the surface. My experience, from … Continue reading Micro Terrors
Women are often amused by the presence of a guy in a dress because they feel that, finally, some man is understanding how the other half lives. “Oooh!” they say “he’s wearing a bra! Don’t you hate bras? And now you know what it is like to have to wear those shoes! Did you have … Continue reading Goose, Gander
Callan 