This is very much my blog, so don't be surprised if this doesn't follow accepted patterns and norms. It is a place where I can be honest and I appreciate that. Here, I splurge. No one comes out looking good. It is a selfish place written by a pretty selfish person. It is a place of ranting and I am, ultimately, an unreliable narrator. Bear that in mind. I attempt to be honest, but things are very much from my point of view.
Highly subjective views of people in my life proliferate. It will deal with many things and new readers would do well to check out the "Story So Far" Page above. I can also heartily recommend that Dysphoria link if you're questioning or interested. Thank you!
In the darkness of the eclipse e is the one by the fire with the antlers, face shrouded from those about by the fronds of eir headdress, arms outstretched to call forth the flame. Drums beat a rhythm as the players move about the great circle, light glancing off the gold and metals in their garb, the sky strangely dark above the suffocation of the needles hanging from the black trees all about. A crooning, joined by the others around, still more of the group hold their own trophies from the forest, rising and falling with the deeper drones and throat-singing. But the other, e sits nearer the flames, surrounded by the smoke rising from burning herbs and wet wood, red coloured around eir eyes and ears, black beneath to show eir teeth, chanting the incantation.
Deep in examining. Deep into the work and the rhythm. My Union Rep's deputy rang to check the legalities of my name change - there has been an issue raised at the other end suggesting that I have not, in fact, legally changed my name - that somehow my transition is not legitimate (I'm not even joking) and the legal expert on the phone to me was asking me about the legal status of an unenrolled deed poll. And, after the conversation in which I tell him my deed poll was accepted by HMRC, the Council, my banks and the electoral roll, I was thinking: wait. You're the legal expert. Why not, you know, go and check? Why ask me? And, isn't the query from the other end something you should be defending and using against them as it is clearly ridiculous and designed to be hurtful? I shall ring tomorrow and say as much. I am tired of my Union deciding that I am a problem and then making me defend myself - they're supposed to be on my side.
Mona Laikaz looked about one last time, the rising sun streaming through the branches and the smoke from the embers left over from the days before, nothing to speak of the song or the spells woven but the battered earth. Breath frosting in the cold and still, hairs pricked to feel the barest hint of a breeze playing across the skin, furs pulled warm around. "Ek ef sveord," e intoned carefully, feeling the heft of the blade in eir hand, "Yedzt must ek geh." A salute, of sorts, of friendship and longing, of farewell and goodbye, at once an end and a beginning. Then e was off, bounding over the roots tangling through the undergrowth, barrelling headlong into the unknown.
Middlest round tonight, he is full of snot and struggling to make words. He's had fun painting miniatures but it has been a little frustrating for me, which is shocking but this is a place for truth, because he simply can't even make sentences and stands and sighs heavily a lot after saying he wants to do something but doesn't know what. Any suggestion is met with a shrug and another heavy sigh. Bless him. Luckily for me, I did manage to walk out to Ikea and back today. I applied to them too, for a part time temp job, and have a video interview - whatever the heck one of those is - sent just before I picked Middlest up. I guess I do that tomorrow inamongst the marking. Yesterday I applied to Aldi and Lidl for what I hope were managerial positions but may not be. It is looking increasingly likely that I shan't have a car after 2nd August as well... so, these are things.
On my walk today I had ideas again, another sleet, but this time related to the story I once held about something to do with Prehistoric society, coloured by the ghost language effect in The Wake which made the reader enter the society in which it was set by deliberately being written in something that required translation. To do such a think I would first need a language. My italicised paragraphs here are approximations, semi-written snippets, because I rely on my English. To create a language, something like graet dark tuk blau ffarb, red light ffrom heis fflamen, gleo ffrom stael blaed I'd have to work out what sounds I want. I tried in that second paragraph, using a character I have used before and semi-translating their name into Old Norse and Old English.
The most surreal part of the last few days has been working out pay. Looking at monthly income some £1k down from my current level and thinking that it's the high end of what I can find locally, that this is a 'good thing'. It's... well, it's what I've always feared having to do. I have long known that my employment has allowed me to be somewhat cosseted from such concerns, despite my wailings to the contrary here, because my income was reasonable, my life financially comfortable. The stress is building, panic is not far away, and I am scared, so very scared. My name change might not even be legal! I ask you.
Fight on and fight for futility, shame and vengeance. Fight out of spite, out of fear, out of pain. You will still lose. You will gain what you prayed for.
It is the recurring ones that detain me here. There is the one where my teeth literally crumble, which came true last year in two cases and required attention. There is the one about the expanding building awash with problems that need to be solved lest disaster strike which came kinda true in the Saga of the Many Leaks - I still have a couple. Then there were the stress nightmares about school where I would walk impossible routes to enter a room and fuck everything up in a lesson, I would lose my job, the dream would end or loop. And now that has come true, in a manner of speaking, and I shan't be able to re-enter the profession.
Gain your medals and your rewards. What are they worth when the cause is futile? What value would they even have in a world reshaped by the right and good? False service to a false ideal.
A decorated soldier bleeds the same as anyone else, dies the same death in a futile battle of spite for a lost and evil cause.
From the moment Tilly and I met, you could argue before, I had nightmares about losing a relationship, then a marriage. That already came true. There is no going back. Every nightmare I have had has sort of come true - the Third Reich dreams where I defended knowing that I was going to lose, that I deserved whatever was coming over the hill and would fight regardless on the losing side of the battle and of history because there was nothing left to do and surrender was impossible. That was the last few months, the two meetings, the ashes and dust.
Budgeting. I have forecast. Keep in mind that I usually end up worse off than I suppose - I have never come out ahead of my financial planning and usually miss something - and I reckon that I have until October, in which month I come out nearly £2,000 in debt, to find work. That's without the cost of running a car by the way. There are mortgage rises on the horizon and I worry about that. Come next April will I be able to afford the payments on my own house let alone those on the matrimonial home? I am going to need to find work fast. And I already know that I was being paid at a high rate monthly, few people were as lucky as I in terms of my earnings, around £2,600pcm net. I doubt very much that I shall find a job that pays anywhere near that much.
Dreams, I had a few.
Not so long ago, I viewed this as an impossible dream, now it is simply shopping.
It is the recurring ones that deserve attention here. There was the one where I was a woman, which prefigured my realisation last year and is slowly becoming a reality. There were the ones about dressing en femme in public and living as a woman which are also kinda coming true as I continue with my social transition. But the rest have not come true: being a writer of fiction; retiring after 36 years in a single school to give a speech on leaving day; running an Ideas course of my own to succeed the one that currently runs; building a Politics Department; supporting the growth of a Sociology course and maybe, possibly, finding a partner again.
And now so many of those dreams are physically impossible.
138 days ago.
I stand by my assertion that the last 107 days have been a gift, specifically, from God - a chance to learn to live as me in the real world. An oasis of calm to grow into myself, get used to being out of the disguise and comfortable in the real world. Little things: being called 'Miss' at IKEA, passersby using feminine pronouns and nouns as I pass in walks, being counted among the 'ladies' by friends in chats (yes, it is still amazing). I needed that time.
And now He doesn't want me in teaching. Whatever it was He had for me there has passed, or I missed it or ruined it, and now the Plan is for me to be somewhere else, to do something else. And I don't know what that might be. I am scared of what lies ahead for I have never lived in the Real World. I have lived in my bubble, my academic bubble, where timetables are created for me and structure clearly defined. The rules have been clear, or so I thought, and my life has been relatively easy. Clear, defined, holidays and stressful months. Solid, dependable, pay with clearly defined roles and tasks. Stress, but dependable stress. Stress one can plan for. Or not, then ruminate on why one doesn't.
11 days ago.
The Real World is not so forgiving, not so kind. People online and in debates BTL in newspapers and BBC articles have always told me, as a teacher, that the Real World was not a place for a snowflake like me - low pay, hard grind, no long holidays, hard knocks. Real responsibility. No sense of fulfilment in the jobs undertaken. In my ivory tower. I fear the Real World. I don't doubt that people that said these things were right.
I never wanted to be a block or crimp on His plans, but what if I have been? What if I was supposed to continue in education but now He has to work around me. Of course He can - He already has, the joys of being outside of time - but from my perspective I have to wonder what I have ruined. In a role-playing game run by Tim many years ago, I missed an opportunity that he set up and I hadn't spotted - Tim withdrew it and it was his genuine confusion over how I'd missed it that clued me in to the fact that I'd missed it. Now I have done it in real life. Except the DM is God and the game is Life. I have sunk all my XP in teaching but a run of natural ones means it doesn't matter. What good are those stats now?
Yesterday's dress. Showing amply how I managed to get bitten again.
I think it fitting, perhaps, that I was at Chams tonight - what better way to note the passing of one era than with something that kick-started the new one? Then I was out dressed for the longest time I had ever managed outside of a safe place I lived in, worrying about people giving me side-eye at the lights and whether or not I would return home and be seen. Tonight it was the most normal thing in the world to check my foundation, touch up the mascara, sort my hair and then go. I mean, I did have a shower and apply a new face, but that was because I'd run out of time this morning (late morning, issue on the marking, Middlest over) rather than for any special reason. The times I would cut myself shaving, rue the extra shave or just plain run out of time to plan what I was wearing? Those days are gone.
As are the days working where I worked. Confirmation has been received and it's all over bar the shouting. What does that mean? It means that I am now officially on the job market but I am mid-marking so I haven't looked properly yet. I am luckier than most, my cut-backs over the last four months have netted enough surplus to provide me an extra month's worth of income, the drawn out process has provided a month's back-pay and my examining ought to provide another month at least. Maybe even two. We'll see, a month is likely at any rate. That gives me a broad outline of how long I have to find another source of income and, frankly, that's not so bad. Better than most people get.
The road goes ever on and on...
I'll miss it terribly. I already did these past four months. But now I am different to what I was then. It's only been 104 days that I have lived full-time out in the world as myself. Less than that for having officially been Joanna. But that time, short as it has been, has been saluatory in what I have learned and discovered. For example: I now know that Joanna is here to stay. I now know I have many friends who care about me and are good friends. Better than perhaps anyone deserves. Now I must work to continue in this new era.
It was always results that scared me, never...
Izzy wasn't at Chams, which was a real shame. I think she was having fun though (and I shall leave it to her blog to tell her story) but she was missed. Lynn had a wonderful skirt (and top, to be fair, but the skirt drew my eyes), a couple of people reasonably new to the group were also looking very nice indeed with some just amazing fashion. And a Goons Show reference landed, what more could I ask for?
Oh, and there are three, yes three, bites on my leg. I suspect a single horse-fly that I killed with fresh blood in it (probably mine) so I'm on the antihistamine again and hoping that this time I'm not infected.
New version of that dress. Honestly, I really felt comfortable. I would add lipstick later.
This is an entry to record how I dressed to my meeting back last week at work. It may be the only chance, for a while, to record my attempt at professional teacher chic. Also to record, as I am wont, the fact that I was sacked from one of my marking contracts today. I kind of expected it, to be honest, I've long since lost my touch in that unit. I have sort of thrown my lot firmly in with another board and am much better there and with that process. Also GCSE marking. It's a shame, I may end up ruing the loss of about £700 worth of income shortly, but at least there's a modicum of less stress.
Also had about three hours' conversation with my Dad's wife about how to fill in a Discrimination questionnaire sent to me by my Union Rep. She's got a doctorate in HR and is a Fellow of some HR thing or other so I very much value her advice. Several times she was disappointed in things I hadn't said or challenged at the time as we went through events. She has counselled that I have a weak case unless I am dismissed, where it may indicate that I was dismissed for discrimination reasons. Basically, if I am not dismissed, this goes nowhere anyway, so I am happy with that. Still not finished. I am nothing if not draining of good will and time.
0627 one day in 2014. A holiday, I think, before anyone else in the house was awake. The bed is made up behind me - maybe I had slept there? I do not recall. Posted here as it happens.
First full day without make-up since sometime in March today - it meant that I could lean on my hands a lot and rub my eyes as I went through a long meeting for standardisation (the joys of no video link) which was good. But... honestly, not worth catching sight of my stubble as I pass the mirror in the hall. I think I shall wear make-up tomorrow again. Strange how quickly I got used to a face without a dark shadow on it. Or, rather, how quickly I have become accustomed to seeing myself in foundation only, rather than without I mean.
I had cause to revisit the time I felt I was packing more and more of myself away in the box with my femme clothing today. It was... a reminder how far I have come I suppose. How much has changed. The prices paid for the things I now treasure. I missed what I had lost, but I treasure what I have gained. Then a reminder of some very very old photos I took of myself - perhaps for GetDare? I cannot recall. They date from 2014, 2015. Things were so different back then. To any readers who look longingly at clothes they feel they cannot have, who look at photos of me now (like the one that adorns this entry) and marvel at such a thing - before letting the guilt and the repression claim them anew: take heart little one. You will find a way through to something that fits you. It doesn't have to be transition. It doesn't have to be fetish. It doesn't have to be anything. You don't have to. To myself, in 2014: you will miss what you fear you will miss, but you will also be yourself.
It was very hot on Friday, but also a bit breezy, so, whilst this is by no means the best shot of my walk, it is the most 'real'.
Things are unclear: I am not yet able to go and find a new job. I am still largely in limbo, but with less hope than previously. However, I had that thought way back in March didn't I? I thought about if I had the choice between job and Joanna. I thought I could choose job. And then I tried to parcel Joanna back into a box and... I couldn't. Pandora's box had been opened and there was no wa- Joanna's box was opened. For good or ill. So, if faced with the choice: I had to choose Joanna. So, in many ways, I have already made my choice.
In the meantime, it is the time of the year where I do extra work for extra pay. That has taken up a bunch of time. And it has been wonderfully affirming. Someone with whom I last worked directly face-to-face back in 2016 was online and I 'came out' and she was wonderfully supportive. Apparently she 'thought as much' - we worked online in 2019 - and that was that. My immediate boss was also hugely supportive and... well, the working relationship, already positive, just went even better!! It's been really lovely and I am not complaining. A new boss, on another contract, was informed and she, too, has been just wonderfully supportive and affirming.
Part of my walk: a woodland path in over 30 degree centigrade temperatures and bright beautiful sunshine.
Friday was a very very hot day. I went for a walk in a big skirt, the blue broomstick one from back in 2013, and it was just glorious. The kids were over in the afternoon and it went reasonably well. Smallest has now vocalised what his issue is at the moment and it's clearly that I am not living at home any more. Poor thing, he keeps saying all he wants is for Tilly and I to be in the same house with him and his siblings. I get it, Smallest, I do - that hankering after what you percieve to be a better past that may never have actually existed and, even if it did, you don't really remember anyway. Today he got upset as we packed up from a walk to a park in a break in the rain because it meant that Tilly and I would go our separate ways. I'm not sure if Tilly has fully clued into this yet or not. She's aware, certainly, but she avoids the issue - it could be genuine misunderstanding or it could be a desire 'not to go there' and I would respect either.
Tonight, Middlest and I watched a couple of Quantum Leap episodes and it just reminded me of how much I loved the show and how much it touched a nerve back in the mists of time when I was semi-aware of how much I would love to be a girl/woman. It made me think of Toby as I took my Eldest to Dance - because Toby was the one who bought me the first season of it on DVD about when we broke up for the last time. Toby had guessed that I liked the show without me ever having mentioned it somehow. Maybe, given his past, he liked it for much the same reasons I did. I wish I had enquired further at the time, maybe even convinced him to watch it with me. We'd still have broken up, but we both may have discovered parts of ourselves a little more and a little earlier.
And, right now, there is a beautiful rainbow outside.
I don't know what the future holds. But I do know that, right now, there is a rainbow, a Boy upstairs in bed and some marking to do. London, it appears, can take it.
That didn't fade away? Sometimes I need to see... the way it used to be.
Meeting over. It became apparent quickly that a particular interpretation was being used on the reports - that this interpretation was objective based on the langauge used and that if I wanted to challenge then why had I not done so before the reports were submitted to school? Oh. The Big Chief laid out his concerns, angrily, and would not hear any mitigation. He listened, wearily, to my laborious and wordy explanations. Then ignored them.
At the end, my Union Rep pulled the ripcord. A settlement was suggested. I shan't know the outcome or the contents of that discussion for a few days at least.
I failed to convince the Big Chief of my case. I failed before the meeting began. I knew which bits he would quote of the ASD diagnosis and I was right. I did not anticipate which bits of the OH report he would zero in on to 'prove' that I was not safe in a school context. The contention was that my stress at disclosure was the cause of issues, not the stress of transition - thus, the fact that I was now 'full-time' meant nothing, the stress of disclosure remained. This is not what was said but the wording of the report was vague enough to allow for it, so it was clearly objective fact and if I didn't agree with that, well then, why had I not challenged it. (Because it was fucking vague and I didn't see this as a potential interpretation). No amount of disgareement was allowed. Deputy remained scrupulously silent throughout - someone has had a talking to.
It matters not. I am now on the job market regardless. Hopefully, in one version, still looking in the same sector. But there is another outcome, where I am not. In the meantime: examining calls.
I committed to this course of action, it was locked in back before the March meeting. Now I have to continue to see it through.
Yesterday afternoon my Rep explained over the phone that she couldn't recall anything from the meeting back in March, but had no reason to doubt my account. My employers have said they do not recall anything I have submitted and postulated that I may be making it up. My Rep checked her notes and found only disjointed parts of explanations, she admitted that they weren't great and sparse. I talked a lot, she reminded me, and said a great deal - she couldn't be expected to get it all down.
She asked me to compile a timeline of events surrounding my transition after I pointed out that the media circus my bosses could be attempting to avoid was not complaints from parents (none had yet complained) but my workplace transition getting to the press. I have done so. I shall print it today, I do not trust my Rep to have seen nor read it by the meeting today. Along with a document I penned back in February that she, seemingly, has not read.
The prognosis was gloomy at best. My Rep seems to think that a complaint from November is enough to sack me fairly despite it not forming any part of the current allegations nor appearing in the minutes. She was ambivalent about the possibility of appeal - "we won't know if it is fair until it is tested in a judgement and I cannot advise on that." I raised the thing about being eaten alive by the Union if minutes were not accurate, she chuckled, "well, that is our reputation, certainly." So, would she challenge them? "It is hard for me, I did not take many notes, you did say an awful lot. I have no reason to doubt your account." I see.
It does not look good.
I did not sleep well last night, I was up early this morning, I am dressed in blouse, dress, tights and flats.
Before I spilled beer down my top. Spot who went out in glorious sunshine and warm weather but went home in cooller temps!
Positive:
I recovered, sorta. I got an e-mail from my Union Rep on Sunday morning telling me to send my amendments as they were important. I did. I felt proactive, good even, at having finally done something. I was worried and concerned that it took since Monday to do it, but I had done it. Also, I managed to facilitate Middlest doing some miniature painting and got Smallest through being sad he couldn't stop over at mine again on the Saturday. I even managed to help Eldest feel good about some life choices. Then I went on a walk and ended up at the pub, where I had some good beer and smiled a few times. Also, spilled beer down myself because... I don't know. I have no excuses, I just managed it. Had to put the t-shirt in the wash when I got in. Mind you, I did weed the yard and that was mostly positive. Not completed, but a positive nevertheless, even if I ended up aching becasue of how I did it (not being used to weeding with a bra on, I guess, I'll get used to it).
Negative:
I forgot to phone my father, like I promised, and [redacted]. So he got in touch today and I felt awful at having missed it. Even a relatively good phone conversation with my Mum ended strangely because I suck at conversations, it appears. The fallout from Friday was worse than I had assumed, let's just say I very nearly burned a bridge I didn't even know I was setting light to. Well, okay, no, I realised that I may have done so accidentally but my efforts to stamp out flames ended up spreading more hot embers than I had realised at the time. I think the relationship is saved but I do worry about my propensity for stupidity that does this. Also, small stabs of dysphoria as I was walking to the pub yesterday and realised that I had hurt myself weeding, and why, and thought about having breasts. I am nothing but a Reddit cliche sometimes.
Earlier still. That wall behind me? The reason I don't go to this pub more often. I'd be bankrupt!
Concerns:
The usual, finances, timings. I seem to have a habitual worry about examining that I can't shake, but, in theory, this ought to be the easiest first and second week ever with the enforced time off. Finances... well, I have hacked everything back so there's some room for mistakes (cf. going to the pub last night) but... we'll see I guess. My biggest concern remains, obviously, the upcoming meeting and the fallout from that. If, if I manage to keep my job... I don't know. Trying not to build my hopes up too much.
Future:
Planning to wear one of the twin dresses I have in navy blue, with some nude tights, new blue shoes I got a week or two ago and a blouse under the dress (white with black spots or long sleeved white, depends on weather) for Wednesday. Either that or, if my leg is still not healed properly, my Roman brown trouser suit and a flowery blouse from M&S I picked up on a whim back in June last year (I think). Whatever happens, I am going in fighting and as myself. At least there's that.
ADDENDUM:
E-mail at 3pm today tells me that my employers 'do not accept my amendments as accurate' as they checked with the impartial note-taker and 'a few of those present in the meeting' and they didn't remember any of what I said. Thus, they claim, my amendments were all things thought up after the fact that they are prepared to question me about further. Not sure how that extends to the panel telling me that they were prepared to accept some instances were down to my transition or the question asked by the 'impartial note-taker' about whether or not I would continue with my transition if I were to keep my job. At least I know one thing: I am likely, very likely, to lose my job on Wednesday. My Union Rep doesn't do Union work on a Monday (which my employers know) so I can't talk to them about this. 'A few' is also an interesting choice of wording - there were only six people in the room - me, my rep, the Big Chief, the 'impartial note-taker' (Big Chief's deputy), employer's lawyer and the investigation lead. So, 'a few' implies more than two but not all of them? I don't know. To say I am alarmed and scared is... an understatement.
The outfit for Chams. Alas, I have now scratched the lens on the sunglasses.
Why not, let's live blog my day!
1505: Chams was good. After a day worrying about the itchy rash I woke up with on my leg, opposite the bite, it was nice to get there and have a chat with people like Izzy and Lynn. Oh, yeah, this morning I wandered back to the walk in centre, later than planned, and it turns out the rash indicates an infection. On top of that, examining. One contract has changed all the dates so that it runs the day after another with the same board - nice, no stress there then - and the other board continues to be condescending and vague in equal measure. Conversation with my Union Rep showed they hadn't read my amendments, a check just now went to answerphone so...
The plan is to hit a new scene tonight on a rare Friday off from children. Toby was strangely vague then explained a lot of drama meaning we couldn't meet. I maybe should have taken the hint when he was simply vague!
Me and my new brolly, Wednesday.
1632: Car charging has been oddly complicated too. For some reason my usual charge haunts weren't accepting my card so paying twice as much per kW at another charger currently to see if I can keep going to the new scene in an old place I lived. Coupled with the late morning and slow getting ready this morning before confirmation of infection and I can feel the stress rising like a tide. Honestly, if I do return to my job I might find the stress kills me. I've always been bad but this is levels like the Years of Hell and the stressors have been tiny even by my standards!
1839: Arrived in the place for the thing. I used to live here. I am strangely at home but mostly out of place. This was somewhere else when I was last here, I was a very different person. So, whilst there are familiar places and sights it seems more like Tilly's city than mine. I have no memory of this place. I end up buying tea from Tesco, because I know how to splash out. After eating it, I find myself back in the square outside where the event is to take place, watching the occasional trans-femme go in.
View from a local bridge on Wednesday. You can see the rain that would necessitate the brolly a little later.
2041: Now at the new scene, on the lemonade and in a bar with over 30 trans-femmes. Izzy and I were talked at by an Irish lady on holiday with her husband trying desperately to be nice, but being strangely condescending. Again, she was desperately trying to be kind and ask all the questions. It was funny in a way, I hope she found out what she wanted to know.
In many ways this is like every time I've ever been 'out' in a city (no, not the Ladies' Night, that was just amazing and I am still coming down off that high!) in that the urge to hide in a corner is strong. We have been joined by someone that Izzy knows, it's how Izzy managed to get the Irish lady to stop talking at us, for which I am grateful.
You get a feel for how out of place I am here in this shot, I think.
2105: I travelled two hours to be here. Not sure it was time, or mileage, well spent. Great to meet up with Izzy but stymied by the enemy of Joanna.
2122: I make the least subtle plea I know, trapped in a corner, to go and circulate. Izzy sort of gets it, our new companion does not and begins talking about which pubs she's been to but with a voice that gets lost in the noise - I can't understand a word. She then moves in to further trap me in the corner. I can feel myself getting frustrated. Fuck this for a lark, I'm pissing off home.
2128: I leave. I really don't think I 'get' the trans scene. Bar was too loud to chat properly, half the group left (presumeably to the next bar), lots of elderly trans-femmes dressed up and running insular cliques. Which events they've been to. Putting in the effort. Nothing wrong with it, but not my scene. So, what is Joanna's scene? Not this sort of thing. I was a fool to come. Foolish to think I could de-stress enough to enjoy being hot in a dark bar with music too loud and mingle groups solidified. Izzy knows people, they flock, she presides. I sit in a corner and get pissed off by and about myself.
Last Friday, same bridge.
2134: In the square, outside, Izzy finds me furiously tapping. I say things, angry things, that are not fair about the people there. And I compound things by trying in my ineffective way to compliment Izzy. In reality, I am angry at myself. I have ruined a potential good night out, I have pushed myself too hard and not enough all at once. I have wasted the time it took to sort out everything needed to go and will waste the drive home. You can change the wrapper but the insides remain the same. And I do not do going out.
2354: Rumination. I perhaps should not have gone. Most of my day has been spent getting ready to go to the new place, a two hour drive distant, getting progressively more stressed. The issues charging had me on the phone to my Mum at one point because it was that or pass out from hyperventilating and I was driving. That ought to have been sufficient warning that it would not go well, I feel. Along with feeling sad that a. I have an infection (I know, but this still feels like a personal failing to be ill) and b. I paid £10 for the anti-biotics to treat it. Compounded by the late morning, slow getting ready, it meant that I have not shaved my legs (the rash is such that perhaps I wouldn't have been able to go bare-legged anyway) and so tried to attend a bit of a big deal night out in jeans and a t-shirt. God, could I have been more 'old-me' if I tried? Well, yeah, I could have not shaved I guess.
Aftermath: Like, what if I've bet the farm on happiness and it turns out that I'm happier than I was but I'm still the same as before?
She stands, slightly side-on, maybe a teensy bit on the road to maybe, perhaps, being a bit proud - if she has permission...
First and foremost: thank you to everyone for the very kind comments on the last entry. I will point out that it wasn't all awful, but it was isolated comments from people who were otherwise lovely that I fixated on and... one of my responses to new situations is to withdraw and hide in a corner and, well, it wasn't as bad or as pronounced as it has been in the past.
Now, onto today's good news!
I have updated the records at my Doctor's! Hurrah. Yes, I should have done this ages ago, but I genuinely forgot until I went to the walk-in centre this morning to check my insect bite - I was a bit spooked on Saturday when it was so angry, big, red and painful I went to ask a pharmacist and they said it was infected. A triage nurse said no, take antihistamine, which I did but then had that werbling around in the back of my head whilst my Mum came to visit. I digress, I was seen, nowt was wrong, it's just a big bite and it'll take a while to clear up. Phew.
Sunshine! Viaducts! Local bridges for local people!
Other good things! I am looking forward to Chams this week, that will be nice. A chance to speak in person to Izzy again, and hopefully see some friends more generally, which is always nice. there is also the possibility (as yet unconfirmed) that I can utilise a rare free Friday to attend the thingummajig on the First Friday whatsit. That would be, well, out of the ordinary for me. And I haven't been to that particular locale in an age so it would be nice to see what has changed and what has not. I imagine there will be some decent ales about too. It would be expensive, mind, and there is the added cost of increasing my mileage on the car - I'm already over and they charge 8p per mile when I hand it back - but... Yeah. We shall see. It depends on whether or not I shall be required to take eldest to dance on the following Saturday - if so, I shan't really have the option of stopping overnight (thus no ales) and would have to drive back late in the evening. It's not that far, but it is far enough, if you see what I mean. Still, better than evens chance of meeting up with Izzy and seeing what other social scenes are like.
No jacket, no IKEA, much 'glow'. (yeah yeah, I am sweating)
But, yes, I have been more discombobulated than I had realised (tell me something new! No, you will have only the old news I have figured out, like normal) recently. I think an e-mail from my Union rep about the upcoming meeting (and crap minutes) coupled with the insect bite, added to a dash of the littlest coming over and mixed liberally with my Mum visiting made me a bit stressed. Saturday went reasonably well, apart from the stress of being told my insect bite was infected and I needed to see someone as soon as possible about it as it was dangerous and then finding out the nearest clinic waiting time was 5-6 hours whilst also trying to look after Middlest and prepare for the youngest stopping over. Youngest's stay was remarkably fine. He had a bath, listened to some music and then slept. No big deal, he was really happy about it, it went well. But he had some time at home before coming over to see my Mum in the afternoon on Sunday and the transitions were too much for him - having kept it in, he exploded and it was a trying time. I did not cope well.
Mum took me out on the Monday, we had meals out for dinner and tea, and that was nice (really, it was) but also a tad stressful as I'm not used to being out all day. I like my routines, you know? Also, she was asking about things, supportively, and in trying to answer her questions I ended up dredging some of the last decade up again, in a stressed situation (I'd been writing my additions and changes to the minutes that morning) and that... well, it went about as well as you'd expect. Also, examining is coming up, they keep changing meeting dates (because of course they do) and now, next week, I have a one meeting on Tuesday, my disciplinary meeting Wednesday, then a meeting Thursday, another Friday and Saturday and a final one on Monday following. Lovely. That's a fun week right there. I've been having the stress dreams again, and... this may just be force of habit, you know, like this is how I react and have been used to. This is the first set of examining and extra marking I've done since the demise of my marriage so... maybe it won't be so bad? Maybe I'll just fly? I dunno. I can't complain, I did volunteer, no one forced me to do this.
Izzy already posted this on her blog (you should read) and so I feel I am alright in sharing it. I have since washed my hair, you'll be glad to know, but this does serve to show how good Izzy looks. Gonk on the left for reference. :)
Now, understand that what comes next is me fixating on things in an otherwise supportive and nice visit by my Mum! First she called me by my old name at the till in IKEA getting lunch, which was heard and noted by the assistant - now, give Mum her due: this is just autopilot, she wasn't thinking, it's a stock, pre-programmed phrase she was using (yay for autism) but it was a needle for me. Then she did similar when talking to someone when we were eating, again, she just went on autopilot, stock phrase, but it was heard by the people we were interacting with, who noticeably reacted, but recovered, and did not do more than note it silently - well done them. Then, later, my Mum tearfully revealed she was struggling about getting cards: she wouldn't do 'son' but she wasn't yet ready to do 'daughter' - this is fine, by the way - and I had to comfort her and do the human thing. She also watched Douglas and was disapproving of the language and that I had shown the eldest two, which was valid, but... Now, this is all fine, I'm just pointing out that I am depleted on resources now and need to take some recovery time. And, in writing that out, I hope I shall stick to it!
I wear two hats!
Mind you, this morning, I got a message asking if I had a copy of a lesson observation I did back before Christmas. I did not. But I can write from notes. So I did. Minor stress there, the message arrived whilst I was out at the doctor's doing the record updating, so it was a quick walk home to type and send. Turns out, I did write it up after all but managers hadn't checked, thus stressing out my colleague!
After that, it was a walk to IKEA, without stopping, and back again for a discussion on the phone with my Union rep regarding minutes and... well, there you have my day. Thrilling!! Still no curtsey shot and I must try that dress (you know the one) with a sword at some point. Chilli con Quorn calls, so that'll do for now. Less discombobulated, seriously considering a trip out of my comfort zone in terms of distance and content and, yeah, fave t-shirt on, feeling very much the dream that I had around 21 about that short story idea that came to nothing but a doodle on an order sheet in a warehouse. And, if that's not convoluted enough, I have the FAMASO DAWK-TA from Hufflepuff, Dr. Cock Biscotti, stuck in my head.
When I watched Hannah Gadsby's second show, Douglas, I enjoyed it so much I watched it a second time in short order. In the first case I was in the kitchen, I watched it with tea, and I ended up spontaneously dancing to the outro music. It's a show about autism and it is created and performed very much as an autistic person would. For that reason, and the fact that it's funny, I loved it. And, for that reason, I danced. It felt natural, it felt right. I haven't actually danced like that and felt un-embarrassed since... 2005? For a long while anyway.
I'd been to IKEA, where I had been tempted into pink capitalism month with a big rainbow cake by way of a half-price meatball dish with gravy, lingonberry jam and chips. Oh, yeah, I just realised I'd asked for mashed potato. Never mind, it was nice. I had a big sharing bowl of garlic bread which I shared with nobody and thoroughly enjoyed myself. I even went shopping and bought myself some herbal tea because I was murbling about having some herbal tea. This was reasonably costly but I was apparently unsatisfied because today I went to the nearest urban centre and got myself some loose leaf fruit teas because I am an easy mark. They are lovely and I love them. Went for a walk around the local woodland afterwards and played with the timer control on my phone camera to see if I could get myself in shot. It was something to do.
Capitalism Cake, hot chocolate, meatballs, garlic bread and a cup of tea. I enjoyed it.
Toby got in contact to say that when he hears a Pet Shop Boys song on the radio, he thinks of me, which was nice of him (and entirely unexpected) and I took the boys on a wander over a local bridge (I know how to show people a good time). And it means I walked everywhere in my Chelsea boots today, so that's a thing. The eldest two then watched Douglas with me and enjoyed it because of course they did - it's a show about autism by someone with autism using autism as a lens through which to make a comedy show.
After the last entry on this here place I was enticed out to a meeting of local trans-femmes in a pub by Izzy, which was nice. I got to see her (and completely forget to pass on a skirt I'd been gifted) and saw her in her element - it was quite something (for the avoidance of doubt, I am complimenting Izzy). The ladies there were nice, but I quickly realised just how out of my depth I was. Lovely bar staff, but no stouts (or beer - no, Abbott doesn't count - I am horrifically judgemental about pubs that don't have a stout but have three lagers on tap), lovely people (I got a reference) but there was something else at play. A memo I wasn't getting.
Posed shot eating meatballs.
One of them there revealed she had nearly killed herself with hormones a couple of times, then revealed it again later in the evening but, this time, added that she had done so deliberately and that's why she'd been bumped up the treatment waiting list. Another, her friend, asked me how long I had known but got bored about three minutes into my story and just... drifted off. I realised reasonably quickly, stopped, and then sat alone for a while. To be fair, I don't blame her for doing this, I can get weirdly technical and boring when telling a story - supplying details that aren't relevant and going off on tangents - and I think she had been being polite before I fired the broadside of my life story. As she pointed out, she'd known since she was about four or five and my convoluted 'not knowing but knowing' story wasn't really a good conversational response to such a gambit. More like hitting a cute animal with an oncoming truck and about as offensive in conversational terms. I mean, at one point I did show off my credit card in my name and I'm not entirely sure that goes down well with people who are struggling to maintain marriages and getting out and about part-time on the sly, you know?
Then the suicidal one returned to talk more about suicidal ideation before stopping abruptly, touching my face and saying "ah, you're still shaving. You ought to have shaved before coming out, some of the girls here, they're gorgeous. They've put in an effort," she gestured to Izzy (who was unaware of this conversation I was having!) "and it shows. You know, a bit of foundation and mascara," she ran a hand over my chin, "they aren't going to cover this." She shrugged. "For a night like this, you should put in some effort." She smiled and turned away. I know she thought she was being helpful and kind. Maybe it is I who am making this out to be more than it is. The uninvited touching was, I shan't lie, most off-putting. Fuck off, it's my face.
Sorry Izzy.
The lesbians are coming! Get the herbal tea out!
To be fair, I hadn't put in any effort. I'd managed to make and eat tea then just head on out. And I had forgotten to apply blusher and highlighter that day for some reason. And I was just wearing the clothes I'd gone out in that day. It may have been that day I got bitten by a horsefly, it may not have been. I don't know. My tights were the cheap ones from ASDA, so I wasn't expecting much. And I know that I can be a bit much. I told my Duran Duran joke (the one I stole from Toby, funnily enough) and was met with incomprehension - it takes a moment - and I did a spiel on anarchism, always a good one to ensure I can kill a conversation dead.
I just don't do very well in social situations.
Still, it was well attended and everyone seemed to be having a whale of a time. The main organiser of the scene, if not the night, made a point to invite us newcomers to her birthday party coming up - even going so far as to offer places to sleep should we need them. But... Yeah, there was just something about it all that implied I hadn't got a memo. Izzy and another attendee got on like a house on fire (they're both reasonably big on Insta, my phone refused to connect to the internet). I counted over twenty people there at one point - making it bigger than my church congregation on a Sunday.
Anyway, important thing: I enjoyed watching Douglas three times. It did not diminish in hilarity for me and I danced each time. I have herbal fruit tea gubbins and a strainer for the loose leaf stuff. I have put in for a name change with the examination people and cut my nails - almost looking normal now without bits peeling off the tops - left over from when I spent all that time in bed and stress.
It wasn't when I held aloft my sword and said "for the honour of Greyskull" that fabulous secrets were revealed to me, and one can quibble the definition of 'fabulous' regarding the content of those 'secrets'. Still... Not bad for image manipulation on powerpoint. I mean... It's not good either, but...
Over the last week or so I have been reading Hannah Gadsby's memoir Ten Steps to Nanette after being sent a link to an article culled from it in the Grauniad (today began with reading an article there about Scotland's Self-ID gender law being called 'bad law' by transphobic groups typified by the article as 'gender-critical groups anxious about the rights of biological women' but with the only credible evidence being supplied by the majority that support the change in Scottish law - despite the article placing the GCs front and centre and as the 'normal' from which all other views deviate - it was a fascinating insight into how language can be used and weaponised). I finally finished it in the IKEA cafe over a couple of cups of tea and a hot chocolate. It has been an emotional read. In order to avoid crying, which I did successfully, I posted on the Book of Faces and used some glib commentary.
Then, after walking home and making lunch, I watched Nanette on my Mum's Netflix account as I ate. This may have been a Bad Idea.
"Straight white men: pull your socks up. That's right, fashion advice from... a lesbian. That's your last joke from me."
For much of my life- No, up until very recently I have viewed myself as a pretty average cis heterosexual white middle-class man living in a part of the world where people like me get to be in charge. I have never been terribly comfortable with what other people I assumed were like me did with the power they accrued and, well, was aware of my privilege - for all the good that seemed to do. I was aware of the ways in which I did not fit and assumed that these were fine. After all, no one knew about them and I could mask any parts that slipped out reasonably well. My ASD diagnosis in 2017, for example, was fine - I looked mostly the same as the dominant neurotype and knowing the difference was okay. Then, of course, there was the whole gender thing - but I'd stuffed that deep down until very recently.
As a consequence I had always assumed two rather huge things:
1. The best thing I could do to promote diversity was sit down, shut up and listen to the voices of minorities. Or, if I couldn't do that, at least make an effort to amplify and shine a light on their voices and experiences. And women too - they're not a minority, they just had less power than the patriarchy.
2. I did not have any trauma.
I don't recall the date; but the exact location, on this map, is burned into my mind with such intensity that I have never been back.
The field no longer exists, thank God.
The bit everyone knows is that, at University during a game of rounders, I wigged out over the rules and stormed off. Indeed, I would often get angry and waspish with others throughout University and beyond, into my life as a teacher, which manifested without warning and often over things others could not see nor understand.
Less well-known is that the reason I stormed off in that game of rounders was my profound and total shame at why I was upset. We were playing a silly game, there were no rules. It was a stupid point and I had no right to be upset about what was happening. But I couldn't stop the anger, I couldn't control whatever the Hell the emotion was that was bubbling up and I was aware of how silly and stupid I was. In shame, with burning ears and tears, I walked two miles back to my student digs and locked myself in my room, rocking and sobbing for an hour or two. Alone. In later life I would often storm off, flounce out of online spaces, then diligently return when I had the strength to apologise or delete the worst of my typed invective. In shame. I argued with people and they had it worse than I, being white middle-class heterosexual cis male, and I had no right to get upset over the things I did the way I did. Shame. Shame. Shame.
And, of course, since last April I have had to warm up to the notion that I am not cishet. Or male. Indeed, that I actually am a minority. And I am struggling.
Because I do have trauma. About my autism and my gender. But I have internalised the notion that, as a white cishet middle-class male, my trauma is not the same as the kind of trauma others experience. I have internalised the incorrect lesson that I should not go intruding in spaces that have been carved out of the cishet white middle-class male dominated everywhere else because they were specifically created to be away from people like me. Except that I am not people like me. I never was. I am autistic, and always have been, and I am trans, and always have been.
The last written page. Sums it up nicely. Without spoilers.
So I read the memoir with baggage. And I analysed some of that on my walk home. And I made lunch. And then I watched Nanette, with my raw wounds opened a bit, and I didn't cry, but I came close. And, as I wrote this entry, my Mum rang. She's been with some of the older family members and their children - people of my grandparents' and parents' generation. Some she has told some she has not. She's coming to visit next week, not sure when, and is not yet ready to come along with me to Chams to ask questions. It's hard. Like it was for Gadsby's mother, the heart-rending admission: "I regret raising you as if you were straight when I knew, before you did, but knew the world wouldn't change for you; so I tried to keep you safe." That bit wasn't in the book, so it hit me like a sledgehammer. My Mum: "I never knew and I think about how hard it must have been for you to hide something like that, I only did it briefly with your Auntie June [it's Mum's Aunt, not mine] and I realised just how hard it must be, must have been, for you, your whole life..."
I just don't know how to speak to that. Because she's right. And I spent so long doing it and got so good at hiding things that I forgot what it was that I was hiding which is why I get confused so easily by little snippets from the past in diaries or stories.
Hmm, needs more cooking. I'm not sad, I'm not angry, I am mid-whirl and analysis.
