Selfies, Self Acceptance, & Transition

Yesterday I posted and open letter to loved ones who intentionally misgender me. This post is a kind of sequel to that post. This post is for people who read that letter  and want to know more about my transition. And it's going to be all about me and how good I look. So buckle up as I use the following photos to demonstrate how I feel and probably appear much more authentic than I have in the past.

Now this may initially seem like a clean cut portrait of triumph. But it's not some simplified escape or easy liberation narrative. I'm not here to invalidate the person I was 5 years ago. Just because I feel wiser and feel more myself today doesn't mean I actually am. There are inauthentic photographs of me now and surely there were photographs and undocumented moments of authentic joy in my past. My pre-transition life was not complete misery and my life today is by no means free from discomfort. But what I most want to highlight here is the fact that the bulk to the selfies I take today are much more reliably expressive and forthcoming than photos I've taken of myself in the past.

I don't necessarily think I look better in these newer pictures. And actually I acknowledge that the way I look now deviates much more from common standards of beauty/attractiveness in my culture. I'm fully aware that I was “prettier” then and that prettiness fits easily onto my frame. But ease doesn't make a thing right. The contrast I see every time I look at these photos has little to nothing to do with physical beauty.

For instance this person might be called handsome but probably not beautiful:

You can see more of the person I am in the the more current shots. In older photographs of me I see a shrinking. I see myself hiding my features I see a sort of failed demure-ness that I barely recognize as ever being part of myself. I remember seeing photos of myself back in 2006 and deleting all the candid shots I could find because they didn't conform to the kind of pretty I was trying so hard to project. I remember comparing candid and posed shots of myself and thinking and thinking, “You look pretty good when you're trying.”

One of the most prominent differences that I physically remember is that while being photographed I never allowed my crooked and yellow smile to be preserved on film. Sure I would smile and laugh big a lot but when the camera was about to click I'd tell myself to “tone it down.” So it's a bit of a lie to say physical beauty has nothing to do with this contrast, because I did a great deal of work in acting out what I thought was beauty. I approached putting on femininity was like it was my job. And I absolutely knew what customers would like. Like most people at the close of their 20s, I've climbed through a world nauseatingly full of suggestions on how to best express myself.

It's taken something like 10 years, but I've finally become more comfortable and somewhat skilled at living in my body and using it to express myself honestly. In pictures today I am more playful, unafraid of taking shots that don't conform to what's been decided as my “good angles”. In the only playful pictures I could find of my early twenties self, I'm either drunk, completely unaware a photo was being taken, or there was a person I trusted very deeply behind the camera.

This is the sort of photo I usually took of myself:

And this is the only pre-transition photo I could find of myself as an adult that I felt honest and forthcoming:

And I actually hid this photo for a long time because part of me knew it bespoke things about me I wasn't willing to be honest about quite yet. I was afraid and doubtful of the my own vulnerability and openness.

The person in the above photo and more current pics is noticeably less concerned with how others might perceive them. In some sense taking selfies is a ritual for me. Getting to see myself distracts me from what others might think. It's important that I make it a ritual because I can't quiet the constant anxious mutterings of disapproval in the background of my subconscious that pressure me to pay attention to what others think of me. Before transition I barely ever noticed that voice was wrong. It was a fixation that drove me without even asking. One that, if I'm not being vigilant, will seep back into my habits and put its ghostly thumb on the scale of my decisions.

Even now as I write this I can feel it telling me that people who read this will think I am shallow, vain, vulgar, and wrong and so of course shouldn't be writing this piece, not in public at the very least. The voice only speaks in run on sentence. And sometimes I am too tired or anxious about other things to ignore it. If someone happens to snap a photo in one of these disquiet moments I can feel myself diverting. I can feel the false demure creeping back in. I hear Tyra Banks telling me to “smize,” I strain to hold my face in a blank sort of positive. The results, while not completely dishonest seem completely vacant.

When these moments of anxious self-doubt strike I avoid making eye contact with the camera, and if I do look into the camera it is not playful. It's deferential to any potential viewer. In those moments I am either afraid to be seen or just not fully connected to myself and my own body.

So while a cursory glance at these pictures looks like a simple FtM; sad to happy; in-my-shell to out, transition, it's not really. Please don't read this as a before-and-after fairytale makeover style story. Self-acceptance is not a product or prize one earns. It can't be bought or earned or tricked into becoming. It just comes when it comes. I can't control or regulate self acceptance and confidence, those aren't things I can control directly.

I think most people get the idea of self acceptance all wrong. Kind of like how they get the idea of coming out all wrong. They think both of these are just something you do, then you're done. You accept yourself and then the work is over or that once you come out as gay, or transgender, or whatever that you're all done and can just live peacefully after that. Well let me tell you this: self acceptance, has an aftermath (just like coming out). It often fails to land because of resistance, deeply ingrained self-denial, or just plain clumsiness.

I've come out to my parents at least three times. Each incident went seemingly smoothly to me. There was some vacant smiling and the requisite “whatever makes you happy” sentiments. They nodded quietly. They didn't ask any of the questions I'd prepared myself to answer. They didn't ask anything at all. Their confusion and resistance only came later. Usually when my expressions had forced them to confront what they'd hoped was a private reality they'd tolerate about me. Each time I came out I mistook their vacant vaguely pleasant looks for acceptance. Just like 5 years ago, when I mistook my own vacant and vaguely pleasant looks for expressions of myself.

These days I nestle affirmations into my daily life. I've surrounded myself with a community of people that see me for what I am and commend me for it. And then when these moments of self acceptance do flash into me I catch them (sometimes on film) and cherish them. I make evidence so I can remind myself of what's possible. I never know how long I'll end up getting with these moments or when the next one will come along, so I try and keep my life open to them as best I can.

<3

Hard Rituals. In which I resolve to keep my gender's yellow safety on.

My partner and I moved to Oakland from Seattle in January. And having cycled in both cities I have to say that it often seems like nobody in Oakland wears a helmet when they're riding their bike*. Now I totally see the appeal in that. I see cyclists wearing funky hats and rocking kick ass hairdos. And I kind of envy their freedom. Especially since (when properly trimmed) I like to coax my own hair into a something between a pompadour and a mohawk:

This hairstyle really can't survive being stuffed into a helmet. Despite how awesome it would be to ride around looking fly and feel the wind move through my bouffant, I don't feel safe when riding without my helmet. I'd get the chance to look more like me if I stopped wearing one. But I think I would stop acting like myself if I decided to stop wearing it. 

Wearing a helmet is part of my politics and process as a cyclist. It shows that I believe in prevention and preparedness when it comes to taking risks associated with moving through a world made for cars on something that is distinctly not a car. It's bright yellow dome is an advertisement about my concern for my own safety and my awareness of the risk I am taking on. It shows that I know how to take care of me.

Last night my partner and I had one of our first serious talks about the possibility of me taking testosterone (inspired by our new favorite TV show). When he asked me how I felt I took a long time and gave my answer as an incomplete list of feels (lists help me cope):

Complicated

Attracted

Conflicted

Frustrated

Ashamed

Scared

Complicated was a segue into everything else. But let's address the fear first. I fear medical procedures of any kind. I fear that my sensitivity to most medications and chemicals would make introducing testosterone into my system a change too enormous for my psyche to handle. I fear I will lose that very sensitivity. It can be a burden sometimes but I cherish it deeply. I fear losing the ability to cry. I fear that taking testosterone will make my masculinity (more) hostile, that it will turn me into a Bad Guy. I fear losing my ease of empathy. (this list goes on and on)

But the changes T would likely evoke in me are also attractive in many ways. I'd like a higher muscle to fat ratio. I want to be able to grow (more and darker) facial hair. I want to not have to hide curves to get the look I want when wearing mens clothes. It'd be a relief not to feel I have to "put on" any clothes or behaviors to be seen for who I am.

This is where the frustration, conflict, and eventually shame come into play. Granted I think I'd look good with many of the characteristics T would bring out. But I also feel angry and disappointed in myself for being attracted to/seduced by that. Because I like the way my body looks now. And I see the masculine in it. So do many of the people close to me. I love my body for the way it is now. I don't want to give it up. It kind of feels like I'd be abandoning a part of myself I am comfortable with, just to satisfy what I feel are the false standards of masculinity.** My demanding others see the masculinity in my big breasted, wide-hipped, and sweet-faced casing subverts these standards. It challenges convention by requiring those who associate with me to rethink what they learned about gender and body.

The ugly and common underside of this is that my demands are often rebuffed. People (even those I love and who love me) will refuse to recognize me by willfully ignoring my pronoun preference. And when I try to explain myself or my gender I'm sometimes blamed for the confusion and subsequent discomfort of others. If all that sounds tiring that's because it is. It's a lot of work. 

But for now the set of demands my identity requires is an honor and a privileged I'm willing to pay for. Making these demands is a ritual I give my energy to every day.*** Just like the practice of securing the straps of my helmet under my chin, it's tiresome and restrictive. It keeps me from appearing to others in exactly the way I'd like, but for the most part the security it grants me, and the hard message it sends, are currently necessary to my being.

*In California the law only requires that those under 18 wear a helmet. While there isn't a state law regarding helmets in Washington state, King County law requires all riders to wear one.

** This is absolutely my personal perspective on my own transition process and is in no way fit to apply to or reflect the transition or rationale of other trans people.

*** I'm no martyr. I know that I may not be able to "pay" this price of my energy forever and that a transition into a gender role society will readily accept may be in my future. I just want to fight while I feel I can.

Book Review: Ordinary Genius

Note: I've got less than a week before my next work packet is due for grad school. So um... today's essay/post is actually my annotation of Kim Addonizio's fantastic Ordinary Genius.

Seriously, if you are at all interested in poetry (writing or reading it) buy this book. It is extraordinary. 

It was difficult to read quickly because the rich slew of wisdoms and practical exercises/suggestions constantly tug the reader toward their own notebooks and ideas. Ordinary Genius leaves its reader hungry for the possibility of their own literary actions (whether its reading or writing). It reads like an intense flirtation, extremely playful and forthright. All of the challenges/exercises arouse rather than intimidate the reader. Which is admirable considering the wealth of materials Addonizio refers to/recommends as well as those she quotes or includes wholesale. She never lets the book get dull and it is clear that Addonizio has love, joy, passion, frustration, and fascination with the craft of poetry.

Ordinary Genius was viciously difficult for me personally to get through quickly because I wanted to stop and respond to every prompt. Consequently I wrote much more poetry this month thanks to these prompts, my notebooks is now littered with the heading “prompt from O.G.: ”.

Not only does it include multiple specific examples of craft elements Addonizio also includes non-examples and portraits of what not to do (usually written by herself). Because of its well controlled and wide ranging references and its approachability Ordinary Genius would be an absolutely fantastic textbook for a beginning or intermediate poetry course. Its sections are equally well suited to being used in a modular take-what-you-like fashion or as a workbook that students could move through slowly and consecutively.

For use in a modular fashion I highly recommend the following sections for beginners: 1. leaping into the dark; 10. read this; 11. identity 1: boys, girls & bodies; 12. three meditations; and 15. me myself & I. And I recommend the following for more advanced/intermediate poets: 22. metaphor 1: the shimmer; 23. white heat, necessary coldness; 24. bag of tricks; 28. music & meter; 29. write a sonnet; and 34. do-overs & revisions.

As a poet who often has the habit of overwriting I was the most intrigued and challenged by section 23. white heat, necessary coldness in which Addonizio quotes Anton Chekhov:

*see below for my feels about the "he or she"

This is a balance I am now on the lookout for in my revisions. Addonizio's identifies of this poetic principle in simple terms. her doing so clearly demonstrates an ability to create space in her work for readers with different levels of skill and experience with poetry. This “coldness” is a sophisticated balance to strike. One beginning (and even seasoned) poets may not succeed in achieving, but one they will absolutely benefit from being able to recognize.

Addonizio has an absolute knack for selecting appropriate examples of craft principles she's trying to illustrate. The range of examples chosen restricts itself to no time period or specific poetic style. But it's not just the exercises and suggested readings that make Ordinary Genius such a gem.

The way she groups and explores concepts of creativity, practice, poetry, and human experience is succinct and inviting. In the section read this she frees writers and potential poetry enthusiasts from what I see as the biggest barrier to entering the world of poetry: 

This comes after her personal anecdote about being touched by a Keats poem but not understanding many of its complexities for years. On the first page of the first section of Ordinary Genius she states that

There is a lot of uncertainty in any creative act. Some people love this—it's what draws them, over and over, to make something out of nothing. Other people can't seem to get past it; they don't want to confront the unknown. It's useful to recognize that uncertainty is going to be there, however you feel about it.

My only critique of this book has to do with its somewhat simplistic presentation of gender roles and gender rhetoric. Despite how transgressive and important I find the content and exercises in the section on gender identity I was bothered by assumptions that go along with her use of “the opposite sex” and her use of *“he or she” where “they” would be more inclusive. Because of the section's either/or approach to gender I found myself ill equipped to participate in many of the exercises. However, I definitely think they are very valuable prompts!

Ordinary Genius is so much more than just a workbook about “how to write good poems”. It breaks open the how's and why's of what makes poetry so powerful culturally and personally and then tied that back to actionable craft elements. All of the advice and exercises come from a deep and true observations about how poetry functions as a force of human nature. I highly recommend it to any poet/writer looking for a good read and a little something to kick their practice in the ass. I especially recommend it to writers new to poetry or just feeling insecure about their place in its admittedly strange and intimidating depths. Ordinary Genius is your perfect guide.

A(n erotic) poem from the oppressor inside me

I really hate the writing advice "write what you know". I sincerely do. It stops so many people from exploring their thoughts about stuff they aren't experts in. Now I'm not saying that writing about stuff you don't know and haven't researched is going to be publishable, but it will teach you some pretty important stuff.

It will reveal all of the assumptions and bits of knowledge you already do have (but might not know that you know). Chances are that thing you're interested in learning/writing about is something
you probably have at least a few facts and assumptions about. And it's probably a good thing for any writer is to get to take stock of the knowledge base they already have (regardless of how skewed).

For instance last week I was prompted to "write a celebration of the opposite sex". I have no idea when "opposite sex" even is to me as a person who identifies as both bisexual and genderqueer. I experience a bristle of discomfort whenever I'm asked to distinguish between (two) sexes/genders.

My gender and sexual identities are in many ways inherently against that sort of defining. But some parts of are still attached to those separations. Even though they aren't the parts of me I choose to express most of the time they still exist inside of me.

So I chose to explore what I knew the least about, how my masculinity relates to the supposedly opposite feminine folks. This is what came out when I gave that space to speak:


I don't want to be just one more guy writing creepy sonnets about Women

So it's a good thing I'm awful
at sonnets, because the slow-quick,
then whiplash that any small impact
dances through breast to nipple
makes my iambs incredibly tense.

As my heart double-dactyls I
imagine our chests pressed together
the way her nipples might drag
all their implications across my storyline,
until their hard milklessness tattoos
hunger through rib to lung to liver.
The lust in me she pricked
drops sudden into hip sockets
and opens the honest horror of its being:

I love women because overwhelm is what they're used to.
I love being cast as the stimuli that she will react to.
I get off on her ceding to my protagonism,

The sashay of her ponytail's enough to
set off my engine. Her eyelids
flick faster than any lip could
transmute the notion "come and get me.
I am aching to be got."She yields
and I develop my character all over her.

The lines I wrote are both earnest and satirical. I do enjoy embodying the sort of masculinity that requires femininity to be ancillary. But I also at the very same time I recognize how very damaging, fucked up, and prevalent this dynamic is. I see how it ruins lives.

As erotic as I find these assumptions they are false. "Real women have curves" the same way real women are all reactive, submissive, and only interested in cuddling after sex. In the way that one person's experiences doesn't fit into/reflect all the stereotypes associated with their cultural group.

As damaging and confining as these roles are to people of all genders, I still enjoy them. In the same way that I cannot consciously stop my self from having a panic attack, I cannot consciously or instantly change my own desires. And I refuse to apologize for my thoughts and fantasies.

Now this whole "heart wants what is wants" bit is absolutely not an excuse/free pass to behave in ways that hurt or dehumanize others. We all experience complex and often baffling desires and we all decide how to actualize or not actualize them. I have decided to try not to dehumanize others, but that doesn't mean I'm not interested in playing out dehumanizing roles with other consenting adults.

Acknowledging that contradiction is scary. And often takes some time (and some uninhibiting substances). While writing the above poem my body and pen resisted (there's another 3 stanzas I wrote before and during drafting it that critiqued/resisted the voice I was writing from).

We like to see ourselves as Good Guys always fighting the good fight with all our thoughts and desires. But none of us really is. In this sense the revolution starts with honest self-reflection; with realizing and recognizing one's own monstrous and dehumanizing impulses.

If we let go of needing ourselves to be Good we can stop denying our problematic impulses and desires. What's revealed in this process are the deeply ingrained biases and assumptions that live in our minds.

For me, seeing this disturbing information has shown me which parts of myself I choose to share universally and which impulses I chose to be more careful about expressing/exploring. Reading the words of my more vulgar impulses is important to me on several levels.

It lets me know that my desires are participating in and benefiting from the male gaze.  It also lets me know that I am not above the tantalizing effects of a power imbalance I'm on the luckier side of. It reminds me that parts of me enjoy and pine after being the oppressor.