Burning

Interlude III: Burning

Tuesday, August 2, 1983.  Reagan Strongly Defends Policies On Minority And Women's Rights

I'd had enough.  I was done being a freak.  Goddamn it- I was a MAN (on the edge of seventeen!), and it was time I started acting like one!

Puberty finally kicked in about a year before, but I was still much shorter than my peers.  And still looked like I was twelve, which meant getting a date was all but impossible.  I used to go to dances with a friend named Cheryl, but I screwed that up a year before as well.  She'll probably never speak to me again.

Senior picture: July 1983

I was tired of being bullied by neighborhood kids, by my brother, by everyone.  So, I started studying martial arts in a dojo run by one of my mom's co-workers.  Beat the shit out of one of my bullies, and word got out.  His having a cast on his arm from a compound fracture was a good deterrent.

I would model myself after the men I saw in comics, but also after my dad and show no emotion, but Anger.  Endure no insult.  Defend.  Punish.

It was early afternoon when I started a fire in the backyard burn barrel using all my girl stuff: all the clothes, a wig I bought at Halloween in ’81, a little kindling wood, and lots of lighter fluid.  I put the makeup and shoes in a trash bag, and deposited it in the dumpster at Burger King, where I worked.  My family were all away in Delaware for the week, so no one would disturb me.

The hot, sticky sun beat down, as it had all summer.   As I watched and sweated, the flames rose to the music of my Sears boom box.

Since you've gone, I've been lost without a trace

I dream at night, I can only see your face.

 In the shade of the oak tree, our German Shepherd Sabre lay resting, indifferent.  He was an old dog at this point, and tired.  As the smoke and flames consumed my shame, I felt lost- Like I was burning a part of me I'd never get back.  I felt like a heavy veil descended over me.  Suffocating.  Drowning out all emotions.

Sabre.  1982

A week later, Sabre died suddenly of brain cancer.  

He'd been my confidante: the only one who I could talk to about all this.  I felt like he understood.  Or at least, didn’t judge.

Now, I had no one.

I spiraled into a depression that even my co-workers and few friends noticed. It's never left me, even after decades of denial and therapy.

No one could ever know.  After all…

Men don't share stupid feelings. 

 

 

 

 

            I saved Sabre’s dog tag and put it on my keyring.  It’s still there.

A month later, I started my senior year.  Priority one was applying to colleges.  Drexel University was my primary goal, but I also applied to Penn State, as well as Temple’s Tyler school of Art. 

Then in January ‘84, I met this girl from St. Pius high school at a school dance.  Her name (in my book) was Julianne.  A girlfriend would cure me of that… foolishness. 

Right?

First Dressing

Another new bit of my book.  I'm writing interludes about my transition as "in between semester" bits.  So meta!

            Back in the seventies, kids were left alone all the time.  “Just be home when the street lights come on” was the common time limit.  Still, being left for a weekend at thirteen?  That showed trust…

Interlude II: First dressing

Saturday, October 6, 1979.  Pope Firmly Depends [sic] Church Restriction On Contraception

Wow!  I couldn't believe my parents agreed to the idea!  They and John went to the house in Delaware that dad was fixing up for the weekend… and I got to stay behind ALONE.  John was on the football team, but they had an off weekend with no game.  As dad also had off that weekend, off they went. 

Interlude II: First dressing

Saturday, October 6, 1979.  Pope Firmly Depends [sic] Church Restriction On Contraception

Wow! I couldn't believe my parents agreed to the idea!  They and John went to the house in Delaware that dad was fixing up for the weekend… and I got to stay behind ALONE. John was on the football team, but they had an off weekend with no game, As dad also had off that weekend, off they went.

My jobs were threefold:

One- deliver papers for John's Evening Phoenix paper route. In addition to my own.

Two- take care of the dog

Three- Make sure the house doesn't burn down.

The third one sounds like a joke, but it wasn't.  During the previous summer (1978), there were a series of arson fires in a house across the street. The fifth killed four people: Father, mother, and two sons, the youngest of whom was John's age. The one daughter was convicted of murder.  

In any case, I was ready for this weekend.

Sears Catalogue 1979.  I had this outfit (note the clogs!)

Once the previous spring, while the rest of the family were a way visiting relatives, I tentatively tried on one of my mom's dresses.  By then, I was able to articulate my dark secret: inside I was a girl.  That made me a freak. I also had to make sure I never, ever, let anyone guess that truth.  Learned that the hard way when I was four.

In any case, I tried on one of mom's dresses.  It was way too big on me.  I felt so guilty.  What was I doing?  Stupid, STUPID FREAK!  She would figure out I did this.  How would I explain it?  I was going to be caught!  Add to that the whole idea of me being in a dress to begin with…   After some guilty and desperate thought, I figured I would feel less guilty if the clothes I tried were my own.

So, using the paper route money, I ordered some things from the Sears and JCPenney catalogs:  A dress that should fit my short, tiny frame, a skirt, blouse, and (Horrors!) a bra!  As I was always home from school before anyone else came home, it was easy to intercept any packages in the mail.   Then it was just a matter of waiting for an opportunity.  Hiding the clothes was easy: my bedroom was in the attic and was also the family storeroom. I hid everything among the boxes and things.  No one ever found them.

So, this weekend, I was going to try on this... this… gay freak girly stuff.   And I did!  I used bunched up tube socks to fill the bra cups. (Eventually, I’d use water balloons.)  The clothes pretty much fit.  Lucky me.  And what’s with the buttons being backwards?  Anyway, I borrowed a wig that Mom never wore anymore and looked in the mirror.     

Oh God! I looked TERRIBLE!  Like a boy in a dress!  But past the guilt and shame, I felt… What was this feeling?  Years later, I figured it out.

I felt Right.  At Peace.

Yes, I looked awkward and ugly, but I felt that I finally was seeing myself.  Who I should have been all along.

 

Over time, my presentation improved.  As the girls in school were changing- blossoming, I was left behind. But for these short, blessed times, I could pretend I wasn't.  I could be the girl I was inside.  I knew eventually I would hit puberty (I was thirteen), and it would change me into something… I didn't want to be.

I just had to be very careful in these times.  If I were caught...  I didn’t even want to think about it.

But for those fleeting moments, I had peace. 

 

 

I never dared dream that the girl in the mirror would someday become a woman.

Story of Four

I've told this story so many times giving talks, but I've never written it down.   So here it is.

This story begins in June 1970 on a beautiful morning.  I was across the street playing with the neighbor's daughter, I’ll call her April.  She was my age: four years old.

It should be noted that even then I knew I was different.  I knew that I was called a boy, but I knew I wasn’t one.  That said, I didn't really know what a girl was either.  I just kind of knew our parts were different, also that I kept being told by my father that I was going to be raised as a man. I didn’t know what I was- so I must be a freak.

Freak at four

In any case, I was across the street with April, playing house when I was called back to our house by my older brother.  After looking both ways and crossing the street, I went into the house and found my father in the living room.  My mum and brother were nowhere to be seen.

Dad was sitting on a stool, his belt in his hand. I knew what that meant.  Every kid back then knew what that meant. I was told to come over and drop my shorts, which I obediently did.  He bent me over his knee and proceeded to give me the beating of my life.  

I can see it now, over fifty years later, as if it were still happening- feel the frustration and confusion.  

The whole time, he was saying "I'm not raising no fairies, I'm raising MEN!  You don't play with girls.  Girls are good for two things, and one of them is cleaning the house.  You're a MAN, and you will play with the boys.  Boys are better than girls!" 

I was then sent to my room for Eternity- which is what the rest of the day felt like back then.

So, what that beating taught me was that I was different, that this was bad, and that I would have to hide this difference for the rest of my life if I wanted to avoid punishment.

Oh how right I was!

 

Hall Street from the air, 1969.  My home was just a shade above dead center

Decades later, when I came out as transgender to my parents, I asked my dad if he remembered this incident.  He didn’t- and why should he?  To him, it was just another day and one of his kids needing punishment.

He was performing the role of father as he knew it- as it was shown to him by his father, and probably all the men in the family going back through time to Germany and beyond.  As most other fathers of the time did.