September sucks . . .

So September totally sucked for birthdays.

Two days before my birthday, my niece died.

Two days before my daughters birthday, my mother-in-law and my daughters grandmother had a major stroke.  Yeah, I’m glad September is over.

Fire Any Bites

Fire Any Bites

I’ve been in pretty poor health this last year and so a lot of stuff has piled up around the house and yard, and I’ve just started to make my way down the list. This weekend I was out working in my backyard, which has gone completely wild. About four hours into it, I conceded to myself that I was in very poor shape, and so I got down on my hands and knees to continue yanking weeds.  Any half-wit who has lived in Texas could have told you that this was a remarkably bad idea, but I was exhausted and not thinking straight. Anyway, about an hour later I realize the magnitude of my mistake when I start feeling these sharp little pains all over my stomach and hands.  I’d had to remove my glasses because they were getting so coated with dust and sweat that I couldn’t see through them anyway, but I didn’t need to see them to figure out that I was covered in fire ants. Now I’m a fairly shy person, but I didn’t hesitate at all – I ran like hell for the back porch and ripped all of my clothes off faster than a prostitute that had just been offered a thousand bucks. Yup yup, my clothes and I were both covered in hundreds of the little bastards and I got the snot bit out of me. I still can’t believe that I forgot to watch out for them . . .

I had a bit of a paradox when it comes to height. My 14 year old daughter Audrey had a checkup with the doc, and I guess she kind of surprised him when it came to her height. According to my daughter,  he pointed at her chart where it showed her height steadily increasing through the years, but then tisked when he showed that it had leveled off at just under five feet.

My five foot two inch tall wife laughingly explained to the doc that most of her family was relatively short, and that Audrey’s dad (me) was “only” five foot eight inches tall.
“Sweetheart, you might be done growing!” the doc told my daughter with a grin.

Ok, so later in the week I was picking out an outfit for my trip to Denver, and showed my wife a killer pair of heels that I thought would be perfect for the outfit, but they were four or even five inch heels and I feared the attention that might bring. I don’t recall her exact words, but she basically said it didn’t matter, that I was so damned tall that I was going to attract attention regardless.
What the hell??!!

One minute my daughter is doomed to be short since mom and dad are apparently both considered runts, and the next moment it doesn’t matter what heels I wear because I am so damned tall that I’ll draw attention in any case. Grrrr. . . .

I’ve always tried to be real in my blog and share the good with the bad, and so I think most of y’all are aware that my confidence, and hence my attitude, morale, and spirit are all suffering. I’ve noticed that this is a common thread with many of the TG’s that I know lately – they don’t appear to feel confident, safe, or welcome these days. Now we can argue all day long about whether this feeling is justified and reasonable or not, but in the end it really doesn’t matter. Justified by the current backlash in America or not, reasonable or not, the fear, depression, and anxiety that so many transgender people feel these days is very real. I don’t know where I am going with this, and don’t really have a point – I’m just yapping I guess. Really, I can’t blame my own recent depression and lack of confidence on US politics though. Mine is due to a combination of advancing age, retreating health, and increasing weight.

Not much that I can do about getting old and the damage that it brings with it; the bags under my eyes and the wrinkles all over my face.

The weight I am just starting to work on again, as I am getting up at 5 AM every weekday morning to jog and am paying more attention to how much I eat.

My health I hope to at least influence by trying to stay in decent physical condition, but all of the jogging in the world isn’t going to make the large and painful nodules on my legs go away. Sigh . . .

So as I was boarding the flight to Denver, I ended up stopped in line on the airplane right next to a flight attendant. She was about my own age and turned out to be a bit of a chatty Cathy. At one time, I would have had fun with this and enjoyed bullshitting with her, but refer back to the above paragraph denoting a lack of confidence on my part. Anyway, she went out of her way to tell me that she loved the color of my hair, and when I turned to thank her, she exclaimed about my eyes.
“You have the brightest and prettiest blue eyes that I have ever seen! Now me, I got stuck with brown eyes.” She said, with an exaggerated pouty face.

Here was my big chance to make a good impression for the TG community.
I could have chatted with her.
I could have made her laugh.
I could have told her that her brown eyes were beautiful.
No, I just smiled, thanked her, and slunk to my seat. I’m kind of ashamed of myself for that . . .