What's in a name?

One of the first obstacles that any transgendered person has to navigate is the usage of names and pronouns. I have chosen to use male pronouns and have asked people to call me Jack or Jackson. I accepted that people would inevitably mess up. Intellectually, I know how hard it is to train yourself to say something different than you've been saying for years. I can even remember before I realized that I was transgendered, I would mess up here and there when referring to my MTF friend. I didn't do it maliciously or intentionally, my tongue was just quicker than my brain. I would always think she was overreacting when she'd get angry at people who said the wrong word.

Now, I understand why she used to get so upset. It is beyond frustrating when you are obviously presenting as male or female, yet the people around you consistently use your old pronoun. I believe that there is a reluctance or inability among most cisgendered people to recognize the full import of gender transition. I can't say for sure, but it is as if they believe I want to play dress up for the rest of my life and that they must humor me because they love me. My father in law is earnest in his desire to call me he and him, Jack or Jackson, but he continually makes errors. I look at him with his mustache and beard and wonder how he could look at me, with my mustache and beard, and still say she. My mother in law is worse. She says "the girls" and "she" all of the time. She's more of a space cadet who gives very little deep thought to anything, so I chalk a lot of it up to that blase Seattle attitude. Yet, despite knowing their good intentions, I often want to bang my head off the table when I'm with them. I get tired of navigating the gender waters all of the time. I don't want to have to correct them ten times during the course of Thanksgiving Dinner or during a family breakfast outing at the local diner.

One day, my mother in law said if people called her "he" all the time, she wouldn't notice or care. I responded that she wouldn't care because she doesn't have a gender issue. This is really the sticking point. Cisgendered people really cannot wrap their heads around the transgender experience because it is so amazingly individual and personal. They think it is simply a matter of "wanting to be a dude." I hate that phrase. I don't want to be anything other than who I already am. You see, it's not that I'm in love with the words "he" or "man," or that I will ever 100% identify with the biological male experience. It's more that in this society, I need to pick a label. There are gender neutral terms out there such as "ze" and "hir," and I have no issue with other people using them. However, I feel that they are inconvenient and unrealistic to use outside of the gender variant community. At this point, I am only interested in getting through life with as little drama as possible. Thus, being a realist, I acknowledge that no major linguistic movement is going to take place in mainstream society within my lifetime to add new pronouns to daily English language. Accepting that means accepting that there are four pronoun choices left. I can be a she, which obviously isn't working. I can be an it, which takes away my humanity. I can be a they. Being a plural is somewhat alluring, but it will be very confusing to those who don't know me. They may infer that I am schizophrenic. Thus, I'm left with he. He suits the appearance of my outer shell and the expression of my inner spirit. I wear my hair short, I have a beard. I have a mustache. I have sideburns. I like flannel, white v-neck t-shirts and boxer briefs. I wear ties and men's button down shirts. I sport men's shoes and men's cologne. There is no more appropriate pronoun for me to use. So, when cisgenders act exasperated that you insist upon being called a new pronoun, point out this dilemma. Point out that you have to pick a bathroom every single day. Which sign do they suggest?

I don't pretend to have a solution for anyone. For the moment, I try to explain what I can, when I can. At times I feel it is my duty to educate. Other times, I just want to blend in. Sometimes I still just pretend I didn't notice the mistake. Mostly, I silently wonder how I'm going to withstand all this change. I've never had the easiest time sticking up for myself. Transitioning is a constant act of sticking up for oneself. Apparently, becoming a fighter is just one more change I have to make.

The Immaculate Conception (of this blog)

Ok, so I haven't had a sexual visitation from any god, but it is time for me to start this project. I thought a lot about what to name this blog. Names are so important. It sets the tone, sometimes for your whole life. The name I am shedding meant dark, melancholy, you get the idea. I loved the sound of it and the look of it. I loved that my mother first heard it in Gone With The Wind. I loved that my father decided how to spell it, to make sure it was different, rhythmic, and balanced. But it no longer suits me. We name things to understand them, sort them, identify them, and remember them. I now find myself in the peculiar situation of having to rename myself. My wife suggested that I use a last name that could be a first name. I wanted it to be literary. I needed something new, yet struggled to lose all of my old name. But once the parameters were set, the choice was perfect and obvious. I choose (removed for anonymity). A little bit of old, a little bit of new, a sailor, a writer, a New Englander, a romantic. It suggests the image of a little town, somewhere quaint, still with a strong sense of the vast countryside that surrounds it. It could be a new board game, a movie title, a concept. It looks and sounds French. It seems just right.

Now that I've introduced myself, it brings me back to the name of this blog. It is my goal to write commentary that will be entertaining and useful for the masculine leaning side of the transgender community. I write from the perspective of an individual who was born into a female body who does not identify with the female sex. My gender identification is decidedly "male," although that term means many different things to many different individuals. Although I write from this perspective, it is also my intention that anyone who is not trans masculine identified, will enjoy reading and learning from this blog, regardless of sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, race, etc.. I sat for a while and pondered what I'd like the FTM to stand for. Female to Male was the obvious implication, but what else could I make of it. For The Men, Fuck That Man, Feel The Movement, From The Mouth, Feel That Muscle, Fondle This Mustache. I could go on forever. FTM will remain a constant, but I'll change the biline here and there just to keep it interesting and to reflect my state of mind, like a textual mood ring. But the inaugural title must be dedicated to my father.

Of all the male role models I've identified with in my lifetime, he above all others, is my template for masculinity. I haven't told my parents that I am transgendered, yet. I hope to do it in the next few days. I just started coming out. I've just started a lot of things, with many more firsts to come. With all of these firsts come daily learning experiences. The observations are endless. Every time I walk out the door it's like going to Boy School. I wish my father could be here. I wish he could teach me everything I should have learned these last 37 years. He has taught me some secrets over the years, but neither of us knew it at the time. I'll expand upon those lessons in another post.

It is enough for me, for tonight, that I made a start. I will check in tomorrow after I've had my coffee and see what surfaces.