Disorientation Redux

Since my sister's death, I've felt rather discombobulated. I intended to post the further story of my trip back to Wyoming, but have not yet finished it. Instead I started to explore this discombobulation I'm experiencing, and found it related to the human need for orientation I blogged about earlier.

We all orient our lives around the people who are important to us, and siblings form one of the basic foundations of our psychological orientation, especially when they are close in age, as Jenny was. I don't know if that relates to my grief, but I'm sure it relates to my discombobulation. My world has turned sideways again. I imagine it is really strong for parents, also; we orient around our children, mothers even more than fathers as the intense importance of those first days, of nursing, feeding your baby and keeping her alive with the milk of your body, must form a bond so deep and permanent and beautiful. How can no sense of orientation arise?

I imagine that the change in my gender presentation affects that need for orientation in others – not only for my family, but for everyone else! I wonder; do people who have a firm basis of psychological orientation find it easier to accept and integrate things like my transition, while for someone who orients around fundamentalist religion and the binary gender myth, gender transitions are very threatening as they challenge that orientation? Perhaps it is the nature of one's orientation that makes it harder for some than others. For instance, an orientation to Christian Science doesn't take much of a hit; the body, and gender, are mortal concepts, and the person, the spiritual idea, is intact and immortal. As my mom said when I came out to her, "Your identity is intact, and it doesn't depend on gender." On the other hand, for someone who orients around a strict brand of Christianity that holds rigid barriers between classifications of man and woman, it must be very disorienting, and alarming – it shifts the layout of their psychological map, as if you were to go to a place in your neighborhood and find that the street you'd traveled a thousand times was no longer there and had never existed. It threatens the fabric of their world, as they understand it; there is no room for acceptance, because to do so would be to change the entire orientation, to change the psychological landscape as much as, and as frightening as, to change one's understanding of the physical landscape. The order of nature has been reversed. The creek no longer appears to flow downhill; it seems to flow up – and never mind that they are finally seeing reality. But someone who orients around the science of observed phenomena might think my transition is really cool. "Wow! Look at that! How beautiful! Something new under the sun." I've seen that reaction from people. Some people seem hardly affected by my transition, but many have either a strong positive or a strong negative reaction.

Regardless, a death in the family is going to disorient the survivors. I believe that the feeling of grief is related to a need for orientation unmet. And until I get completely oriented to a world without my sister, I'm going to remain discombobulated.

Disorientation

Recently I started reading a book called "Hold On to Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More Than Peers," by Gordon Neufeld, Ph.D. and Gabor Mate, M.D. On page 18, they say, "… The orienting instinct is basic to our nature, even if we rarely become conscious of it. In its most concrete and physical form, orienting involves locating oneself in space and time. When we have difficulty doing this, we become anxious. If on waking we are not sure where we are or whether we are still dreaming, locating ourselves in space and time gets top priority. If we get lost while on a hike, we will not pause to admire the flora and fauna, or to assess our life goals, or even to think about supper. Getting our bearings will command all of our attention and consume most of our energy. … Our orienting needs are not just physical. Psychological orientation is just as important in human development."

As a student of Nonviolent Communication (NVC) (see sidebar), I try to relate the interactions I have with others to the feelings and needs they experience. In most cases, orientation is not clearly a need that is up. We tend to take our understanding of our physical world for granted as we move around our local milieus. However, I think the authors are on to something regarding the psychology of it.

When I first started taking hormones, I felt relief from a low-level anxiety that was so much a part of my experience and psyche I hadn't been aware of it. In its absence, however, it was very noticeable. In speaking with other trans people, I've found similar experiences following their first hormone doses to be universal. If it isn't, that's because I haven't spoken yet to a trans person who hasn't shared this result. In the past, I didn't connect it to the need to orient so much as a need for clarity, but reflecting on the truth of the author's statement, I think I was missing something.

The need for orientation, both physical and psychological, is universal. We all share it. The authors relate it to children, which makes sense in the context of their book, but I suspect that its psychological manifestation continues powerfully throughout life. I wonder how extensively it permeates our psyches and influences our actions, decisions, and lives.

For instance, how does it relate to alcohol and drug abuse? Is the abuse either an instigator or response to a lack of internal orientation? In my own case, prior to orienting around Kristin and transitioning, my abuse was so pervasive I concluded for awhile that I was an alcoholic. However, since transition, I find that drinking enough that I start to feel the effects brings an instant stop to any desire to drink more. I like sobriety much better. Is the psychological orientation found in matching my hormones to my brain responsible for that shift?

An even bigger question arises in relation to religion. Certainly religion is an orienting entity. Many people focus their lives around the larger guiding principles provided by religious texts and authorities. It seems to me that religious authorities often use this orienting need or principle to manipulate their flocks into quite negative directions. People everywhere cling to religion even when scientific evidence refutes religious myth. Hence, Galileo was sentenced to death if he didn't recant his conclusion that the earth revolves around the sun, that the sun is the center of the solar system. In my own case, when I joined the Marine Corps and found myself far from home, disoriented from anything I'd ever known to that time, I fell to the religious (Baptist and Pentacostal) proselytizers who infest military bases, preying on young military personnel in their vulnerability.

I have often wondered about the power of religion. Clearly it meets human needs, but what needs are really up for us when we cling to our faith, even in the face of fallacy, so fiercely? This intense need for orientation, starting with our first breaths, seems to explain it.

Read more on orientation here.

Aging and Death

This is the last post on original sin, following up on those before.

"This world is only a stage in some longer journey we do not understand. To fall in love with our physical beauty, wealth, health, or capacity for pleasure is to kid ourselves, because all that will be taken away. … The only thing that gives our choices any deep significance is the fact that none of this will last. Awareness of mortality gives relationships an urgency, makes our choices matter."

I don't think the importance of our choices imposed by mortality is disputable. For me, there's a special poignancy and urgency in those choices, imposed by a body that doesn't reflect my spirit and the hopelessness of attaining one that matches close enough to embrace the fullness of relationships without an operation that will cost nearly $20,000. My choices in the past have precluded the possibility of obtaining the funds necessary. Heading into the simultaneous transitions of adolescence and middle-age, the urgency of mortality imposes an impossible catch-22: how do I prepare for aging and death when I want so badly to live fully, and how do I live fully when I want so badly to die.

There is certainly a part of me that will welcome death, welcome death as a lover, embrace that oblivion and the release from this body that is a prison more cruel than concrete walls. That part is overwhelmed, however, by its twin, the love of life, the urgency – desperation! – to live each day fully, to embrace every moment of every possibility of every relationship I have as a woman. If I could change this body I would do so, I want release from it so badly. Yet I cling to it, precious as it allows me into the grace and beauty of this life in all its complexity, contradiction, and ambiguity. Yet the possibility of the lycanthropic transformation that will enable the greatest extent of my self's manifestation is precluded by a single line item exclusion in my employer's health plan – an exclusion specific to my diagnosis, specific to my personal demographic. Were I to suffer from a different ailment, this treatment would be available. This exclusion is reserved for transgendered people, because, obviously, our medical needs don't matter.

For most people, the urgency of adolescence is self-centered exploration of identity and sexuality and a passage into the responsibilities and privileges of adulthood. For me, the urgency is to delay the onset of old age long enough to explore any aspect of my sexuality at all, and to do it with the full burden of family and parenting. At the same time, that family, those children, are the center of the richness of my life.

And so I face the looming specter of old age and death with bitterness and gratitude, and a crowning conundrum: How do I enter gracefully into that good night?

Rage, rage, against the dying of the light.

Good and Evil

Part 3, or the third penalty, is good and evil: "In a spiritual life everything is morally charged; nothing is neutral. Choosing between good and evil is a daily effort, but taking responsibility for your choices makes you fully alive. … When we intensify our moral awareness, everything becomes a big deal."

On one level, I have a lot of skepticism regarding this. "Good" and "evil" are both evaluations. They are terms of relativity and judgment, vague and indistinct. What makes something good? What makes it evil? A few things are clear, but most – the vast majority – are situational. The same behavior causes harm in one circumstance, healing or help in another. For instance, killing somebody in one case is pure murder, and harms the individual and his family. In another, it saves someone's life and prevents harm. The real question, is what is the reason or motive for the action? What needs are being met or unmet, and to whom do those needs belong? And is there a different way to act, which will meet the needs of everyone involved.

Too often, the concept of good and evil leads to an abdication of responsibility, not a taking of it.

On another level, the idea that the meaning of life is found in spirituality, that choices are morally charged, and that taking responsibility for those choices is vital in a well-lived and honorable life – that resonates. And the more aware we are of the implications of our choices, even the most minor ones, the better we are equipped both to make choices that serve life, and to take responsibility for our failures. We are also better equipped to deal with the nuances that arise, and to choose the most honorable, and least harmful option when we are faced with situations that cause harm no matter which way we go.

For instance, when I chose to transition, it meant betraying a marriage of 16 years, and it meant taking my sons' father out of their life. It was the hardest choice I ever made, because I could see so clearly the people I was hurting by doing it, and they were the people I loved most in the world. Yet I could also see that choosing not to would hurt them even worse – in fact, that it was hurting them day by day. Kristin suffered my depression and dishonesty. I could not connect with my children very well – I was not emotionally available to them. And I was so damn close to suicide – how much worse that would have hurt them! Making that choice, my boys have two moms who love them and are fully available. I set an example of courage and integrity, to replace my former example of deception and depression. The price was large, and continues to be large, and there are plenty of people willing to condemn my choice from the comfort of their own moral armchairs. That's okay. They know not of what they speak. I met the needs of my family as best as I was able.

So I agree with the meaning behind Gatto's words, but not with his language. I think it's a lot more useful to think in terms of needs and feelings, than in terms of good and evil. Not only does it offer more flexibility when it comes to choosing strategies to meet needs, it also is a better path to embracing the responsibility, beauty, and pathos of life.

Pain

The second penalty of "original sin," as Gatto sees it, is pain. "Pain is a friend, because it forces our attention away from the world and refocuses it squarely on ourselves. Pain of all sorts is the way we learn insight, balance, and self-control. The siren call of "Feel good!" lures us to court desirable sensations and to despise pain as a spoiler of pleasure. Pain, however, is the road to self knowledge."

When I think about the pain in my life, I am convinced that Gatto is right. Pain is a friend. Perhaps not always, and not for all people, but for me, it has been a road to self-knowledge, and it has been a blessing. I used to be afraid of it, and run from it; but I never escaped. Then I turned into it and embraced and felt it fully. I found that not only did I survive, not only did it pass, but now I'm not afraid of it anymore.

Pain is the body's or the mind's signal that there is something wrong in your life, with which one must deal – and heal.

It was psychic pain that taught me to accept and embrace who I am, and enabled me to face a society that often disapproves of my transition, and holds me and it as insane, depraved, and contemptible. It taught me the value of integrity and connection, and enabled my courage. It taught me the value of marriage, and how very much I treasure that potentially happy estate.

Physical pain taught me much, as well. A back injury taught me the limitations of my body. Working through tendonitis taught me endurance and toughness, and inspired creativity. (I was on a boat without access to splints or anything, so I cut up a coat hanger, shaped it to hold my hand immobile, and taped it on with electrical tape. Crude, but it worked. I did, too.) I've learned a lot through pain – how to breathe into it, face it, experience it, relax into it, let it pass through you. If you tense up, it stops and stays inside.

Pain has taught me compassion. That alone makes it worthwhile.

While it's true that pain is not fun, and it's not desirable for its own sake, its effects are often salutary. Like anyone else, I'll do what I can to avoid it. Yet I've found that the best way to avoid it is to face it full on and experience it fully. Somehow, that makes it bearable, and often seems to enable me to go through it and out the other side. It's not fun, but it is a friend.

Original Sin?

In his book, "A Different Kind of Teacher," John Taylor Gatto has an essay called, "In Defense of Original Sin." I don't usually buy the notion that somehow we've fallen from grace and are all guilty of sin – I usually disbelieve in sin itself. I tend to see behavior as harmful or fulfilling, rather than sinful, evil, or good. Yet here Gatto has a new way of looking at original sin that I find intriguing.

When Gatto says, "The primary goal of real education is not to deliver facts but to guide students to the truths that will allow them to take responsibility for their lives," I think he's getting at the same thing Pete Seeger was saying in the quote directly below the masthead on this blog. I think he's right. Facts are easy, just a Google search away. Truth, responsibility, and wisdom are not so easy, and they get right down the heart of the human condition. Gatto puts this in the context of American Christianity, relating it to original sin. The penalties attending expulsion from the Garden of Eden are work, pain, free will, and death – and each one of these is a burden for every single individual, and the path to fulfillment and a happy life.

Then Gatto breaks these four down. There are all the ways we try to avoid these penalties in our modern, corporate culture – pain pills, denial of aging, lack of morality, work is a nasty four-letter word, and a lot of it is meaningless pencil-pushing. Then there are the meanings he ascribes to these in the concept of original sin.

"On work: Work is the only avenue to genuine self-respect. Work develops independence, self-reliance, resourcefulness, and character. Without real work we will inevitably find despair, no matter how much money or power we have. Work … produces spiritual rewards unrelated to the reinforcement schedules of behavioral psychologists, but only if we tackle it gladly, without resentment."

"On pain: Pain is a friend, because it forces our attention away from the world and refocuses it squarely on ourselves. Pain of all sorts is the way we learn insight, balance, and self-control. The siren call of "Feel good!" lures us to court desirable sensations and to despise pain as a spoiler of pleasure. Pain, however, is the road to self knowledge."

"On good and evil: In a spiritual life everything is morally charged; nothing is neutral. Choosing between good and evil is a daily effort, but taking responsibility for your choices makes you fully alive. … When we intensify our moral awareness, everything becomes a big deal."

"On aging and death: This world is only a stage in some longer journey we do not understand. To fall in love with our physical beauty, wealth, health, or capacity for pleasure is to kid ourselves, because all that will be taken away. … The only thing that gives our choices any deep significance is the fact that none of this will last. Awareness of mortality gives relationships an urgency, makes our choices matter."

And to sum up: "The best lives seem to be full of contemplation, solitude, and self-examination; full of private, personal attempts to engage the riddles of existence, from the cosmic mystery of death to the smaller mystery of exchanging secrets with a cat. … What constitutes a good life is clearly spelled out: self-knowledge, duty, responsibility, compassion, acceptance of loss, preparation for death."

In other words, things we must do for ourselves, which no teacher can do for us.

To be continued…

Arabs

Am I the only one, or does anyone else out there find this exchange from a recent McCain rally as disturbing as I do?

["I don't trust Obama," a woman said. "I have read about him. He's an Arab."

McCain shook his head in disagreement, and said:

"No, ma'am. He's a decent, family man, a citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with (him) on fundamental issues and that's what this campaign is all about."]

I think if I were an Arab, I'd be rather offended. As a European-American, I just feel very sad.

I know some Arabs and Muslims. My friend Noor identifies with Mohammed Atta about as much as I identify with Tim McVeigh or Bull Connor. The Arabs and Iranians I know are peaceful, honest, hardworking, "decent, family" people.

I give credit to McCain here for trying to correct the impression about Obama, and I don't think he was intentionally speaking out against anyone. Yet by choosing not to confront the comment about Arabs, he reinforced a stereotype that Arabs can't be trusted, and implied that they aren't decent, family people, as well.

But the saddest of all is that this attitude is common in my country. I am glad I'm not an Arab-American right now, but I want all Arab-Americans and Muslim Americans to know that I support you. I believe in you. I will speak in your defense. I will judge you by the "content of your character," and not by your religion, your ethnicity, or the color of your skin.

And right now, I grieve for my nation. I feel so sad to see this violent rhetoric split us apart.

Blessings upon you all, and on us. May there be peace.

Stuff and Poverty

Okay, back to the Peace Conference I attended about a month ago. It was a powerful event, and I met some rich and powerful people.

I met Marshall Rosenberg, who travels around the world mediating conflicts and creating peace. He chooses to live on a poverty income so that he doesn't have to pay taxes that support the Iraq Occupation.

I met Julia Butterfly Hill, who spent over two years living in a tree to save its life.

I learned about Mohandas Gandhi, who gave away all his possessions to live a life of poverty in service to his people.

I met Bonnie Tinker, who lives on her non-profit, and has been arrested many times in nonviolent demonstrations against oppression.

After the conference, as I drove to pick up my kids, I thought about that, and how I couldn't give up my stuff to live a life like that. I've got kids, for god's sake. A job. How could I give all that up?

Like a ray of light, I suddenly understood how I could. It was so clear that I exclaimed out loud.

I can surrender all my stuff in my heart, right now.

So I did. I gave up all my stuff; essentially gave it away. I don't own anything, I just use it. If I lose it, loan it, or have it taken away from me, I'll use something else.

I don't own my house. It's just where I live. If I lose it, I'll go live somewhere else.

I don't own my job. It's just where I serve right now. If I lose it, I'll find a better way to serve.

I don't even own my kids. I love them, sure, but if something happens to them that separates us, I know that they will be taken care of. And they're going to grow up and leave anyway. They're their own people.

A sense of freedom swept over me. What a celebration to have an insight like that! I realized in that moment that I am free. I can make decisions about what to do without fear. And that's pretty darn cool.

Now the only problem is how to keep that sensibility. I've had moments since when the cares of everyday life creep in and take that sense of freedom and choice away, but for the most part, it's been working. I still have that sense of possibility. I've still given everything away in my heart. I'm still free. And I've set an intention to keep that freedom and unattachment to my stuff.

Laura Bush

My mom sent me a printout of this article from Salon.com. It's by a woman who calls herself liberal, but who has great admiration for Laura Bush. I didn't find my own esteem of Ms. Bush affected in the same way. Instead, I felt deepening bewilderment and sadness about her.

The author lists a lot of interesting and admirable traits about Laura's life. She talks about Laura's "integrity, unpretentiousness and intelligence." My confusion stems from trying to reconcile this with the fact that she continues to sleep in the same bed with a man who, confronted with the proof of conspiracy to commit treason by Cheney, Rove, and Libby, yet refused to ask even for anyone's resignation, much less prosecution; who ordered the invasion and occupation of a sovereign nation without cause, and lied to get the authorization for it; who blatantly broke the FISA law; who allowed or ordered torture of perceived enemies, some of who are innocent, in direct violation of the Geneva Convention; who commissioned a study on global warming, and then swept the study under the rug when the conclusion came that human-caused global climate change threatens the future of the planet, mankind, and our children; who refused to hold anyone accountable (except underlings who were themselves victims) when the crimes of Abu Ghraib and others came to light – and she has, to my knowledge, still spoken not one word of protest against those acts.

I think of the quote from Martin Luthur King, Jr., that is permanently posted on the left column of this blog.

Other people of integrity have chosen to at least resign their positions, as a number of diplomats in the US and officials in the UK did following the invasion of Iraq. I find these people admirable and understandable.

Laura Bush, however, appears to hold a great deal of power. Apparently George holds her in great esteem. Yet I have seen nothing to indicate that she has ever spoken out against him, even in private; nor has she taken any action, such as removing herself from the White House until and unless he changes his policies. She continues to live with, and apparently sleep with and condone, a war criminal.

Ms. Sittenfield says Laura Bush is a role model for Americans. I respectfully disagree. The First Lady's refusal to take any action against her husband's criminal and cowardly acts and his policies that damage and disgrace the American society, people, and environment is not worthy of emulation. It is, at best, abdication of responsibility.

My confusion grows, however, when I think about what I would do if the war criminal were someone I loved – if it were Kristin, or Trinidad, or my brother. I'm not sure I would do differently, though I hope I would; but I'm not putting myself up as a role model, either. I don't know whether she's taken George to task privately; whether his recent quiescence has been caused her influence, or the naked evidence of his failed policies, or both. I don't know enough to judge her, and couldn't do so fairly in any case. She is human, and is acting in response to her needs.

I just know that I feel deeply saddened and confused by her situation, and I am very grateful I don't have to deal with the conflict between love and loyalty, and integrity and compassion that she faces.

Some of My Heroes

• Gandhi
• Julia Butterfly Hill
• Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
• Marshall Rosenberg
• Harriet Tubman
• Mary Baker Eddy
• Sylvia Rivera
• Henry David Thoreau
• Kristin
• Bonnie Tinker
• Lynn Conway

A Conundrum

I love this quote from Jan Morris's autobiography, Conundrum:

"I never did think that my own conundrum was a matter either of science or social convention. I thought it was a matter of the spirit, a kind of divine allegory, and that explanations of it were not very important anyway. What was important was the liberty of us all to live as we wished to live, to love however we wanted to love, and to know ourselves, however peculiar, disconcerting, or unclassifiable, at one with the gods and angels."

I think she really gets to the heart of our whole situation with this statement. Does it really matter whether being gay or transgendered is genetic or hormonal, or if it's just "sin?" What matters is that we live free, that we can define our own lives according to what seems most ethical and natural to us, whoever we may be. We don't live in science, we live in the mystery of our own minds, and though we live in community with connections to the people we love or live with, ultimately the only person you have to live with is yourself.

We are all alone with god.

Hierarchies and Institutions

Look at what happened to Jesus. He gave his life teaching some really cool stuff, which boils down to unconditional love and nonviolent resistance to injustice. Then people start a church institution, and create a hierarchy of people who are authorized by their great education and expertise to interpret what Jesus said and did, and the next thing you know, you've got the Spanish Inquisition and the genocide of indigenous people around the globe, all in the name of Jesus. Mohammed – same thing. Even Mary Baker Eddy, with the care she made to create a democratic, non-hierarchical institution to protect her teaching, is effectively revered as a god by some Christian Scientists, her teaching skewed.

It seems to be pretty universal. Any time you create an institution to protect a precious teaching, a hierarchy is created to run the institution; the hierarchy separates those who have passed the written test and received the diploma from those who haven't, and the credential becomes more important than the teaching. The teaching is corrupted.

So maybe it's better to produce no institution at all, and to keep the teaching at the most accessible, equally available to all.

Besides, things like certification or ordination are based on fear – fear that the teaching will be corrupted if it is allowed to be taught by someone who hasn't had the "proper education." Yet if the teaching is true, it will always be there. It cannot be corrupted. If someone gets it wrong, it will show in their life.

When you don't have credentials, you stand on equal ground with your students. You have to prove your knowledge. If what you offer meets their needs, they will come to you.

A Constitutional Aside

I've heard a lot of people say that this country is one where the majority rules. I don't think it's as simple as that. I believe that our Founding Parents wisely established a three-legged stool of government to balance the convictions of the majority with the needs of the minority.

In high school civics class, I was taught that the purpose of the legislative branch of government is to make laws, the executive branch to enforce them, and the judicial branch to interpret them. I think this is really their roles, not their purposes – what they do, not the intent behind what they do.

The real purpose of the legislative branch is to establish the will of the majority of our citizens.

And the purpose of the judicial branch is to protect the minority from tyranny by the majority. In other words, to make sure that any law passed by the majority impacts all people equally; and that the majority cannot make laws that violate the rights of the minority.

This system doesn't work perfectly – the judiciary is too easily swayed by majority opinion or personal conviction – but often it works pretty darn well. A good case is California, where the California Supreme Court made the correct call in requiring that the laws of marriage apply equally to all people. That is the purpose of the court, doing what it is meant to do, doing what it does best.

Discussion?

Courage

I've been thinking about courage lately. It's one of those virtues I've held in high regard for my entire life, perhaps because I spent so much of that life without it. Also thinking about transition, and all that that means and is – a chaos of thoughts and experiences: Sitting on a gender dysphoria panel talking about my life, and one of the audience says, "The two of you have more courage than everyone else in the room put together." Walking up to one of the most awkward and obvious transwomen I've ever seen, prior to my transition, and she said, "It's not courage. I'm just doing what I have to do." Coming out to my sister, and she turned to my brother and said, "I never knew we had a limp wrist in our family." My friend Devin downplaying her own courage after someone complimented her on the way she faces life and surgery.

It's actually a common theme among transpeople, that people say we're courageous, and we reply with something like, "Nah. It's not courage. You just do what you have to do." I certainly feel like that, most of the time. You just reach a point where you're so tired of hiding who you are, of lying to everyone, of loneliness, you just don't care anymore. The truth is better than a lie, no matter how badly the truth hurts. And you rip the mask off your face, stomp it into the gutter, and go out into the world with your self laid bare.

It's not courage that enables us to strip off the mask. That's exhaustion.

But it is courage to show who you are to a world that judges you and hates you because of who you are.

It's the courage of the Muslim woman who dons her head scarf to walk down an American sidewalk.

It's the courage of the black man who walks through the doors of a Fortune 500 company to ask for a job.

It's the courage of a gay couple holding hands in public.

It's the courage to raise your head up in the face of a life that's kicked you around, and living that life – and not only living it but embracing it with your whole heart.

It's not unique, and it's not really all that special. It's everywhere you look – it hides in every human heart – yet too often it's hidden away in a life not fully lived.

When you get right down to it, though – it is very special indeed. And when you're a transwoman, every time you step into the public eye you make a statement of courage. It gets to be such a habit, you don't even notice. It's just life, normal, boring, and taken for granted.

I don't want to take it for granted. I want to cherish it, value it, hold it close and raise it high like a candle lit on top of a hill, for all the world to see. Not to show you I'm special and have something you don't have.

No, I want to hold it up so that you can see what it is, and know that you have it, too.

Whoooo Are You?

What defines who you are? Is it your mind, or your body – or some combination of them both? Or is it society – how the people around you perceive you to be? How do you know? Is it inside you, or do you look to an outside authority, like science, or psychology, or the Bible, or your friends and the clerk at the grocery store?

The Bible says, "God created man in his image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them." What does that mean? Is god male and female both, like a transperson? Are humans all created as both men and women, some combination so that there is no such thing as "all man" or "all woman," but each human a unique mixture of both? Or that everyone is split into two discrete identities of sex, and the matching gender to go with it?

We've all got at least one X chromosome.

Are you defined by society? Do the people on the street see the real you? What if one person thinks you're beautiful, another thinks you're ugly. What if everyone thinks you're ugly. Does it make you so?

I don't think so. Society sees only the physical presence. It knows nothing of the real person behind the body's mask.

My friend B__ thinks mind and body can't be separated. "Mind and body are one and the same." By that logic, am I not defined as both man and woman? Nobody can see it, but I know with absolute conviction that my mind is female. I am female. My body? It's obvious to everyone that my body is more or less male, and certainly my genetic makeup is male.

But my body is changing. I'm growing breasts, losing body hair, my skin is growing softer, fat is moving from my stomach to my butt and thighs, and, I suppose, the back of my arms. Does who I am change when my body changes? When my testicles are cut off and my penis inverted? When hormones and surgery change my body so irrevocably that even my gynecologist can't tell whether I was born male or female?

How then can I – the core I, my own deepest identity and truth – be both male and female?

Having lived over 40 years fighting a dichotomy of sex and gender, I cannot agree with B__. My self, my soul, my being, resides in something that cannot be seen. It is that part of me that is alive, and so is completely immaterial, ephemeral, and probably immortal. When I die, my body will remain, unchanged except for the lack of action within it. Yet it will not be me; I will be gone.

My body does not define who I am; it plays little or no part in that definition.

It does, however, define a great deal of my experience, and it defines how others see me.

That is the crux of the transperson's dilemma. It is telling, and it is tragic. Because B__ is not alone. People – especially men – see me, and they see male. They do not see me, and so they do not respond to me as they would if they saw my soul. Men want me because I'm male – or they don't want me because I'm male. Those who would rape a woman's body would kill mine. But who wants to take me tenderly for the woman I am?

Because, no matter what my genetic makeup, no matter what my body morphology – I am a woman.

Judge not…

… lest ye be judged.

So spake Jesus, and what exactly did he mean by it, anyway?

I thought about it a bit, and talked it over with Kristin, and came to some conclusions.

It all ties back to the Garden of Eden and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Does anyone still think that story is literal rather than allegory?

Judging is when you say what someone else is, a statement about the quality of their being rather than a statement of the quality of their actions. For example, "You're so intelligent!" "He's a good kid." "George Bush is evil."

When you make statements such as those – when you judge – you eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and set yourself in a position of dominance over the person judged. After all, you're the one hereby qualified to make that judgment of hir!

But by accepting that paradigm – eating that fruit – you accept also that others can (and will) judge you, and thereby grant them authority and dominion over you. You accept others as your judges.

It is the heart of the domination culture in which we live and suffer, the one that says the rich deserve to keep and waste all of their immense wealth, and the mentally ill deserve to be cast out to beg on street corners and sleep under bridges.

We don't have to leave the Garden of Eden. We don't have to buy into the paradigm of judgment. We can choose.

Because if you don't believe in good and evil, if you don't make judgments about the quality of other people or animals or events, if you don't judge them – their judgments have no power over you.

This is the paradigm that NVC teaches.

I believe that this is the heart of Jesus' gospel, even more than "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you," or any other aspect. Certainly more than damnation and hellfire, or sin.

I'm starting to get it, but it's still too easy to judge. I have so many needs unmet when I hear of the crimes and policies that the Bush administration commits, that even though in my head I know they're just human beings doing their best to meet needs, just like me, I still feel in my heart that they're evil. And when Christians judge me so harshly because they don't like the way I live, and try to keep me from marrying who I want to or entering restrooms appropriate to my gender, I still think they are ignorant hypocrites. My own judgments that cast me out of the Garden and subject me to the power of their judgments.

I'm working on it.

I want to get back into the Garden.

Guilds

I have been fascinated by the concept of guilds since Kristin first introduced it to me after/during reading Gaia's Garden, by Toby Hemenway.

So what is a plant guild?

From the Alternative Gardens and Landscapes
website:

Plant Guilds
A plant guild may be easily established in the area under a fruit tree. Each variety of plant in the guild, or community, performs ecological functions such as fixing nitrogen, building soil, or purifying water. Some plants repel pests, help create mulch, or cultivate soil. Guilds are designed based on the functions of each plant, their needs and yields, and the relationships between different plants.

I'm not that much of a gardener, but this concept makes so much sense to me that I celebrate it. It's a society of plants, each with its own purpose and function, with the symbiosis of the whole contributing far more to plenty than the sum of its parts. The idea as I understand it is that there is one main species that defines the guild – the fruit tree, for instance – and the others gather around it and support it, and it supports them. Very different from the monoculture of our current agricultural model, it does not lend itself well to mass harvest via $100,000+ equipment. It only quietly makes life wonderful for a wide diversity of life.

The concept also stretches into other aspects of life, and that is the part that most fascinates me. For instance, social guilds, formed around one dominant personality. (Dominant not in the sense of domineering, but in the sense that one person can define hir social guild.) This can be seen in various forms – in business, for instance, where the boss creates an atmosphere in which some people thrive and others shrivel; in families, where the archtypical matriarch or patriarch drives the personality of the whole even after 'retirement.' I think, in fact, that it manifests in almost any social network you can find, to some extent.

A strong social guild will be one in which the primary personality most feeds those around it. I once worked on a fishing boat, and got to observe the effects of such a guild in a closed environment. We had one skipper who acted in an imperious, domineering manner, and assumed each crewmember had little motivation to pull hir share. Moral was low. The work consistently went overtime, and was poorly done. Then we switched captains. We had the same crewmembers, yet suddenly it was a crack crew. Moral was high, the work quickly and well done, regardless of whether fishing was poor or fish were pouring in.

No difference except a new primary personality, the basic element of the guild around which the others gathered and functioned.

That second skipper – the one who inspired such quality and cheer – is my brother, and in my humble opinion he's the best overall skipper of the Alaskan black c0d/codfish fishing fleet. I've worked with him enough to know. I was a member of his guild for a long time.

Then I met Kristin. For the last 17 years I've enjoyed autonomy and support in my life with her, yet without a doubt that she drives the overall arch of our lives together. Hers is the more dynamic personality, perhaps just because of who she is, perhaps because she's an older sibling and I'm a younger, perhaps both. I've watched her blossom from the young woman she was when I met her to the confident, competent artist-of-her-life she is today. It's pretty cool.

I'm in her guild now, and even though we are no longer a couple, I never want to leave it.

A Question of Privacy

In my work I view the plans of the houses that are soon to be built. I see about a fifth of the new houses built in my city, so I think I've got a pretty good idea of current housing trends. I've noticed, for instance, that almost every new full bath is designed with a little sub-room separating the toilet from the rest of the bathroom.

It's not a style I particularly care for. I find the use of materials for the extra room to be wasteful and unnecessary, and the tiny rooms so created to be claustrophobic and uncomfortable. Besides, I enjoy interacting with my family while one of us is sitting on the can, and when I want privacy, I can always ask for it. My boys aren't shy about that at all. They tell me in no uncertain terms when they want the bathroom to themselves, and for the most part, I find it easy to respect their desires. (I might not find it so easy if they were teenage girls.)

I can't imagine that it isn't even easier in these new houses, which all have two bathrooms, and more often than not, three or more.

It's not that I don't value privacy. Every time I use a public ladies' room, I'm very grateful for the privacy of the stalls – even as I frequently talk with friends on the other side.

The question that does interest me, though, is this: What does it say about our society that we have come to value a standard of privacy from our most intimate family members that is greater than the privacy we expect and ask for from the public at large?

How Much Is Enough?

Last week I reviewed a plan set for a 7000+ square foot house, built across two lots amounting to over 16,000 square feet total. Stretched across the lot in a sprawling mess of gables and hips and intertwined trusses, the house extended from property line setback on one side almost to the setback on the other. It had seven toilets – and only four bedrooms. When I saw the extravagant wastefulness of it, I almost felt physically ill.

By contrast, we live on a 9400 square foot lot, in a 960 square foot house (including about 230 square feet of unheated garage). The house is a little undersized for the four of us, since K and I no longer share a bed – we have plans to add a room – but the house is comfortable and functional, and despite the occasional “pee-dance,” one toilet seems to be enough. Our lot functions beautifully – we have a big comfortable deck, a modest but functional front yard, and two small, functional sideyards (one of which, the “sanctuary garden” is very private and is currently alive with blue and white columbine, foxglove, a climbing rose, and native bleeding hearts, as well as other flowers). Our backyard is large, comfortable, and varied, with a pond, a chicken yard, a circle lawn, berries, fruit trees, and a plethora of garden beds. It seems to me that, despite the modest extent of our living conditions, we live more comfortably, and certainly in a richer environment, than the poor rich folks who will occupy this new monstrosity.

So I wonder – just how much is enough, and when, and how, do we recognize it? Does ‘enough’ meet human needs better than too much? What do we do with the surplus when we do have too much, and how, and why, do we make that decision? What are the moral implications of that decision, for our society and ourselves?

She Should Write a Book...

Some blogs are better than others, and some blog entries really stand out. Okay, maybe I'm biased. And granted, she's preaching to the choir when I'm reading her stuff. Still, this one is profound in its compassion and meaning for our world. How grateful I am I live with her!

Part of me wishes I'd written this, or something like it; but it's her story, not mine. I have a different message, a different track, and as much as I respect and honor hers, I'll keep to mine. Stay tuned.