A Dahl’s House

Sayth a new study:

Middle age is truly miserable, according to a study using data from 80 countries showing that depression is most common among men and women in their forties.

The British and U.S. researchers found that happiness for people ranging from Albania to Zimbabwe follows a U-shaped curve where life begins cheerful before turning tough during middle age and then returning to the joys of youth in the golden years….

“It happens to men and women, to single and married people, to rich and poor, and to those with and without children,” Oswald said. “Nobody knows why we see this consistency.”

One possibility may be that people realize they won’t achieve many of their aspirations at middle age, the researchers said.

As someone turning 44 this year and who was a bit depressed for a quite awhile a few years ago, I think there’s something to the idea that taking stock of one’s life is a factor.

For me, it was a time of realizing that—for better or worse—certain doors had closed and—for better or worse—certain life directions (like being single) weren’t likely to change. Plus what I do for a living went from a calling to a career to a job. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy what I do, for which I’m really thankful. But I went from being obsessively interested in a new field to having reached master-level a decade later—and realizing that all those 60-80 hour weeks meant I missed out on a lot of living. Consequently, even though I had very good odds to get a book contract (which would be great if I ever go back into consulting), I’ve haven’t been able to muster the interest to put in the effort to land the contract.

OTOH… approaching 44 I’m happier in a lot of ways than I was in my 30s. If I’m no longer the name I used to be in my industry, I no longer define myself by my job. I’m rediscovering interests that I’d put on hold in earlier years. I’m out of the closet and having a great time going out en femme and doing drag. I’m in great a relationship—albeit a long distance one—with lovely woman. I’ve developed a lot more friendships.

So anyway… I guess the moral of the tale is that while there may be some lows, there can be even greater highs, and FWIW, it’s also worth dwelling on the doors that have opened. This definitely isn’t the life I imagined at 20—back when I was going to be a high-powered, world-traveling journalist. But to be honest, I think while I regret missing a lot of stuff in my 30s, I’m ultimately more happy than the path I originally imagined.

Friday night was the company holiday party (since we’re an internet retailer and December is crazed we hold it a month later).

Turns out that—after winning this year’s Halloween costume contest in drag (for those who didn’t see it here’s a pic from Halloween)—there were a bunch of people who were hoping I’d come in heels. (I’ve been open about the fact that I do drag and there’s been several co-workers who want to come out see me perform some time.) One of our Sr. VPs had a great time telling his wife all about the Halloween contest, as did several others.

‘Tis a pity, since I had a dress that would’ve been perfect.

The only reservations I had about going to the holiday party in drag were first that it would inappropriate, as in drawing attention away from the festivities, which I think has been resolved. (Probably over-sensitivity on my part. But my thinking was kind along the lines that of not overshadowing a bride at a wedding, if that makes any sense. As in using the occasion to be the center of attention.) And second there’s a lot of people from our manufacturing plant, who might not be as accepting. So we’ll see…

This past Saturday was Transgender San Francisco’s annual Cotillion, a formal evening featuring dinner, entertainment and the contest for Ms. TGSF —who’s the public ambassador of the group. Back in December, one of the board members talked me into running. I wasn’t really eager, since this year looks to be a hectic one with work, but once I committed to do it, I did a bit of talking to various people from the different trans communities to see how I be a catalyst for some bridge-building. (Yeah, I think every Ms. TGSF candidate focuses on building bridges… but that does sort of go hand-in-hand with being a public ambassador.)

To be honest, I’m not particularly thrilled with the “beauty pagent” aspect of the Ms. TGSF contest. If it were up to me, I’d drop the “active wear” and “evening wear” segments—which if nothing else are usually booooring—and keep the pre-Cotillion interview, the final question and the entertainment segment (which at least in theory helps predict how you’ll do in front of crowd.) Then I’d use the remaining time to make the Cotillion more of a party.

The interview, held the weekend before the pagent, went well although I’m not sure I always told the judges the politic answer. But I decided I that they’d have to take me or leave me as I am. The day of the Cotillion itself was hectic. Be at the hall in South San Francisco at noon for a run-through, run home and then back again because no one told me to bring the narrations I’d written for my segments to the run-through, then go up to San Francisco to have my drag mother do my make-up and pick up wigs for the evening. Then back down to the hall again to be there for a final rehearsal just before the doors opened.

The hall was nice—comparable to a hotel conference room—with a nice buffet, although I had to grab food and then go eat backstage. So I didn’t really get much of a chance to meet and greet people, including my friends Marla and Rachel who where there was a large group from the Sacramento Gems group. Back stage, the MC, Tommi Rose who runs a store for drag queens down in Palm Springs, had brought along some jewelry that she was planning to show to some of the queens in attendance. Some of the pieces were gold-toned rhinestone necklaces/earrings/bracelets, which are really hard to find, so I took advantage of the opportunity to spend more money than I care to admit. But I was able to wear one of the sets for my evening wear segment. Once the contest started it was rushing from one costume change to another. Since I thought the active wear and evening wear bits are a bit silly, I wrote a fairly silly—and hopefully amusing—bits for the narration that’s down while you’re posing on stage. I thought I looked far more polished, than the sole other contestent, Lisa, who’s one of the TGSF board members.

For the talent segment, at my drag mother’s (mentor) suggest, I did “Rose’s Turn” from “Gypsy” (it’s the climax of the musical, where Mama Rose, the archetypal domineering stage mother, has a nervous breakdown). I was a little intimidated by the song, in which Rose alternately fantasizes about her own lit-up runway and cheering audience, wallows in self-pity and the awareness she’s driven away everyone she loves, and finally admits that the it was really her dream that she was pushing her daughters to fulfill. It’s a lot of emotion range and definitely tougher than anything I’d done before. And if I say so myself, I abso-fucking-lutely nailed it.

I did bobble the final question, although I drew a question that was a bit out of left-field: what we I do as Ms. TGSF do to help reduce the high unemployment rates among some trans people. Annoying Lisa drew a question about the ENDA debacle, an issue that’s near and dear to my heart, and one I’m sure I would’ve answer better. But still I thought I owned the stage that night and did reasonably well in the interview, so while I was ambivalent about winning, I thought I deserved to win.

But when I got handed the Ms. Congeniality trophy, I knew what was coming next—and sure enough Lisa was crowned the winner. I’ll be generous and assume Lisa must have interviewed better. But it’s the other things that happened that really pissed me off. There wasn’t the usual statement that the runner-up will fill-in for Ms. TGSF if needed, there wasn’t the usual “let’s thank our other contestants” to let me exit the stage gracefully, there was no request to join Lisa in official photos (in fact no official photo whatsoever)—and I haven’t received any sort of formal thank you from TGSF (although I was thanked by individual board members). Needless to say that’s left a bad taste in my mouth.

Apparently, I wasn’t the only one who thought I should have won—when I went to Marlena’s afterwards, there were a lot of pissed off drag queens (word of what happened apparently spread fast).

On the good side, I really stretched as a performer and apparently impressed a number of people. Plus I got an awesome make-over from my drag mother. The first pic is down in the basement of Marlena’s after she did my make-up—it was mostly so I’ve got a reference to try to recreate it. It’s very dramatic and fabu-licious. This was my hair for the active wear and talent segments.

The second pic is my formal up-doo—taken around 3 a.m. when I got home from the Cotillion, so I was little tired at that point. It shows my formal wear and one of the new jewelry combos I bought from Tommi (that’s actually the more sedate of the two necklaces—the other is far more blingy).

So I guess that on the whole I’m glad I did it, but I’m not sure I’m interested in doing it again.

I did another outreach last night, this time to students and faculty at the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology. There was a good turn (I believe close to 100 people), which was the largest-to-date of the monthly series of talks and lectures that ITP has sponsored.

The format was pretty typical of the outreach events I do, with five speakers representing a range trans/intersex people. Besides myself there was the ever-fabulous James Green, an intersex activist, a trans woman and the parent of a trans man. (Incidently, it was great to see a parent represented. Too often SO and family are overlooked.) It seemingly went well. The audience seemed quite engaged, the moderator had to cut-off questions overwise we would’ve been there all night, and I had some nice informal conversations with people afterwards.

The challenge, as always, is how do you condense a life into 10-15 minutes? Particularly when I was doing double-duty as both the representive crossdresser and representative drag queen. Likewise, how do you educate people about the group(s) that you belong to in 10-15 minutes? (Aside from talking too fast.) While I’m leery of speaking for someone else—and prefer to stick to talking about my own experiences and what I’ve personally observed—given that crossdressers are the “dark matter” of the trans universe, I do feel a need to try to speak on others behalf. Because just (as James says) there’s no one way to be trans, there’s no one way to be a crossdresser or drag queen. Consequently, I want to make sure people know that while I can talk about my story in detail, it’s only one of many stories. Likewise, I also think it’s important to provide some context to my story with the occasional statistic, observation about differences/similarities among my peers, etc.

It’s a challenge…

I have to say I’m disturbed by the latest profile on Susan Stanton. First off I’m really sorry that she’s lonely. That sucks no matter what. And for someone who undoubtedly is ambitious (you don’t get to be a city manager if you’re not) applying for 100 jobs and not getting one of them has got to be crushing. And facing a massive loss of male privilege is a tough thing. But I’ve far more disturbed by this:

“…Susan has said all along that she’s not like other transgender people. She feels uncomfortable even looking at some, “like I’m seeing a bunch of men in dresses.”

Eventually, she decided it was too early for transgender people to be federally protected. People need more time, more education, she says. “The transgender groups boo me, now, when I speak. Isn’t that ironic?

“But I don’t blame the human rights groups from separating the transgender people from the protected groups. Most Americans aren’t ready for us yet,” Susan says. Transgender people need to be able to prove they’re still viable workers — especially in the mainstream.

“The biggest issue against the federal legislation is that politicians think the ladies’ rooms will be invaded by guys in drag,” Susan says, “instead of someone like me.”

Oy…

I’ve heard from those who know Stanton that she’s distressed by the article and feels that many of her remarks were edited or taken out of context. It’s possible she was misquoted, and I’m willing to hear her version of it. But the thing is… she’s said these sort of things before, albeit not as bluntly. She’s been chided about the “men in dresses” comment before, and at a Human Rights Campaign event last month she defended Barney Frank pulling gender identity from ENDA, implying the community hadn’t done enough educating.

At best Stanton appears to be woefully unprepared for the position of spokes-trans that she’s intentionally put herself in. As a post-op acquaintance noted, much of what she’s been through is typical for transitioning MTFs: the unexpected support and the unimaginable cruelty, the loss of work and marriage, the feeling (of various durations) that you want to be thought of different that those folks who give you the creeps. But the thing is… if you’re going to be a “community leader” you’ve got to have your shit together. In my non-trans life I once led a major grass-roots lobbying effort and it’s hard because in many ways you have be a Jackie Robinson—always be calm, cool and collected in public; as well as always careful with your words (to minimize them being misquoted or taken out of context) and aware of their impact. And if you can’t do that, then you don’t belong in the job.

If I’m being harsh on Stanton, it’s because having been a city manager she ought to have known that. (While city managers are careful not to outshine their city council members, they’re definitely political critters who deal with the press and public regularly, and know the weight that their words carry.)

I’m sure she’s well-intentioned—and as I said earlier I’m sorry that she’s having such a rough personal time of it. But there’s a saying that you can’t manage others until you’re capable of managing yourself—and frankly I’m not sure she’s doing the latter at the moment. In other words, she shouldn’t be trying to represent the trans communities until she’s sorted out her own issues, including what appears to be a fair amount of self-acceptance issues that are getting projected outwards. So in suggesting that she needs to step out of the spotlight—both for her own good and the communities’ good—I don’t think I’m being any harsher than Stanton as city manager would’ve been on an employee whose personal problems were getting in the way of doing their job effectively.

At worse, Stanton could cause a lot of damage for the trans communities, given that she’s reportedly being courted by HRC, who’s seemingly eager to anoint a “trans leader” without bothering to consult the trans communities. Barney Frank has already said he plans to strip gender expression protections from the next ENDA because the American public Frank finds trans people too icky and the last thing we need is Stanton giving Frank and the HRC political cover. But again, Stanton appears to be incredibly naive about LGBT politics and unwilling to listen to those who’ve been in the trenches.

I guess one of the things I find saddest is that Stanton doesn’t seem to be reaching out to other trans people for support, nor listening to the advice of people who’ve got her best interests at heart. To be honest, I think she’d benefit tremendously from being part of a place like the My Husband Betty forums (even if she felt the need to do so pseudonymously).

BTW, I just finished reading Steven Seidman’s “Beyond the Closet,” which looks at gays and lesbians and the closet—but which is applicable to trans people as well. Seidman notes that the gay rights movement has had two competing schools of thought: the assimilationists, who have typically framed things in narrow terms of civil rights; and liberationists, who’ve sought to change the system entirely. Seidman sees faults with both positions and advocates a blend of rights-based agenda as the starting point with a push towards changing society (since legal equality can co-exist with social discrimination). Seidman critiques the “we’re virtually normal” argument made by folks like Andrew Sullivan:

A narrow rights agenda ignores the way ideas of sexual citizenship establish social boundaries between insiders (good citizens), and outsiders (bad citizens). And, while same- or opposite-gender preferences is surely one boundary issue, there are many other dimensions of sexuality that are used to separate the good and bad sexual citizens… In particular, a rights-oriented movement does not challenge forms of social control that sexual victims and outsiders of individuals who sexual preferences are between consenting adults. By narrow its agenda to gaining equality and integration, a rights-oriented movement leaves the dominant sexual norms, other than gender preference, in place and removed from the political debate.

The strength of a liberationist perspective is its understanding of hetrosexual dominance [as in being the “default”] as being deeply rooted in social life and as part of a broader pattern of sexual and social inequality… [A] rights agenda can’t avoid being implicated in broader patters of sexual and social inequality; it should, then, be blended with a liberationist politic.

To which I’d add is that the “virtually normal” argument invariably leads to tossing someone over the side—or at least distancing oneself—in an effort to prove one is not like one of them.

I think it’s worth noting that the article mentions Stanton was a “conservative man” before her transition. I’d be willing to bet she’s still got a lot of self-acceptance issues, and her statements are all-too-reminiscent of the “we’re virtually normal” crowd of gay conservatives.

Anyway, if you’re reading this Susan, please step out of the spotlight for the time being, for your own sanity and for the good of your peers.

The Transgender American Veterans Association has a new survey more accurate picture of the state of the transgender American veteran population—including crossdressers, who they’d especially like to hear from.

This survey is also for those transgender people who are still serving in the military and those veterans who identify and are diagnosed as intersex.

The detailed survey of 117 short questions only takes between ten and twenty minutes of your time and it is the first of its kind to be undertaken. Many of the questions have several choices to them, but just a few will take multiple answers. A large percentage of the questions are a simple “Yes/No.” Some require a written response. While transgender veterans who do not, or have not ever used the VA for their medical needs, can skip that entire section.

If you’re a vet or active duty service member, do make your voice heard.

I was planning to go to a New Year’s Eve show up at Marlena’s, but got a last-minute case of the blahs. Just a bit wiped out after a week spent: hosting my Mom, then flying back East to visit my brother and his three small kids, then flying back Sunday. And it was a bit bittersweet to be without my East Coast galpal, who I met last New Year’s. Plus seemed like I may have another low-level sinus infection. Yeech….

So I stayed home, put on the “holiday fireplace” DVD, poured myself a drink or two and sat down with the “Pro Digital Photographer’s Handbook,” which I’d been looking forward to reading and which I picked up at the library that morning. Galpal beat me at dialing at midnight her time, and we had a nice conversation catching up. By quarter of midnight, I was nodding off, so I called it a night. Getting boring in my old age, I know…

Right now, I’m down my traditional half-watching the Rose Parade as I wake up. (One of the things I miss as an ex-Angelo is going down to the Rose Bowl on the afternoon of New Year’s Eve to watch the final preparations of the float and seeing them cranked up to perform for the judges.)

I guess this is the point where I’m supposed to reflect on 2007 and look ahead to 2008—but that’s gonna have to wait for more coffee and then breakfast.