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[Upfront] The Month
[First] It happened one night
[Book Review] Self-Made Man
[Trivia] In Pursuit - Part III
[Google] For some but not for me
[A CD Eye for the Arts] Dollypop
[In The News] Prison of Secrets
[Last Laugh] American Sensibilities

[Upfront]
THE MONTH

Gloria Fenton is up first giving thanks to this organization which opens it heart to all in our community, and returns later with another chapter of her non-trivial journey.

Guest writer, Marlena Dahlstrom - a crossdresser and frequent MHB contributor - graciously allows us to reprint her recent thoughtful review of the book "Self-Made Man" by Norah Vincent.

She's had number one records in three different decades, composed more than 3,000 songs, won seven Grammys, and after being set aside and then rediscovered by a younger generation, she is hip again. And yes, she is a TG supporter! Elaine profiles this superstar in the Google, Arts and Humor sections.

Enjoy!

Elaine

[First]
IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT

By Gloria Fenton

To Everyone Who Made It Happen.

Thank you all so much for the wonderful birthday surprise that you gave me at our meeting Saturday night. Be assured that I am wearing my Cookie Monster slippers as I write this, as is only fitting. Know too, how much I love everyone of you. Your caring means far more than even I can put into words. Each of you has a special place in my heart. It is not easy for me to accept compliments or praise, and I admit, that I am not sure I am worthy of the love and respect that you give me.

I am who I am, and do what I do, because of how I feel in my heart. Until seventeen years ago I was not Gloria. AO changed that at my first meeting. For the first time back then, I found the freedom to discover who I could be. That gave me life, and changed Martin’s life, too. For seventeen years we have both been on a path of discovery. For Martin it has been a path of rebuilding his life to be the man he is now, and someone who is worthy of Kathy’s love. For me it has been a path of learning who I am and want to be.

Through that journey I have had much help. At my first meeting, I was Gloria for the first time. And for the first time, I did not feel fear, guilt, or shame for being me. That freedom I felt led Martin to officially tell his family that I existed as a part of him. I discovered that I too had a family that could accept and love me. Having Kathy become a part of Martin’s life and then mine became an added joy for both of us.

As I grew, there grew in me, if you will pardon the phrase, a “magnificent obsession” to help others find themselves as I had. I also learned from my friends in Alpha Omega, as I saw their lives change. AO, for me, went far beyond friendships to being a part of my family. Over the years I did learn about me and others. I learned what was really important to me, and through that found purpose and meaning for my life. I also learned the unbelievable joy of seeing someone else at their first meeting, and then watching them blossom as they learned who they were.

I learned, too, the deep hurt of seeing some come to a meeting or two, and then never seeing or hearing from them again. It is a loss so deep to never know what happened, and I do wonder if I failed them in some way. That hurt never goes from me. I keep going because there is always someone else who needs that lifeline that I was given so long ago. It is who I am.

Except for Allexi, as it was her first meeting, I have seen every one of you blossom and become a part of my family. I am so proud of you all. You honored Kathy and me so much at the meeting. The cake, the gifts, Elmo Elf, Rambo Rabbit, the cards, and the stories will be long-remembered and cherished. You made it very difficult for me to maintain my composure, as I laughed and tried so hard to not just break down and cry. My eyes were watering so much and burning as my eye make-up melted away. And there are joyful tears as I write this, too.

Be assured, I will get even, but in a nice way, after all, you are family. Each of you has touched my life, and become a part of it. I hope I am a joyful part of your life, too. That means the world to me. I will continue to do what I can to help you and others, through what wisdom I have, my loving heart, and my twisted humor. I owe a debt to Alpha Omega that I will never be able to repay. You keep the obsession magnificent, and burning deep inside me.

Thank you so much,

All my love,
GSF

P.S. She says it all so well, doesn’t she? But I have to add my two-cents worth. A while back there was talk about doing a “little something” of a roast some time around Martin’s birthday. By the night of the meeting, I had totally forgotten about it. And, it was so much more than just a “little something”. --- And, I certainly wasn’t expecting to be any part of it except for being part of the audience. The tribute and outpouring of love from all our friends touched my heart deeply. As Gloria says, you are not only dear friends but also family. Thank you for a wonderful evening. And, yes we shopped until we dropped!!

Love,
Kathleen (Elf)

[Book Review]
SELF-MADE MAN

by Marlena Dahlstrom

Norah Vincent’s experience in “Self-Made Man,” her account of posing as a man named Ned off and on for 18 months, is a lesson in what being careful what you wish for. Vincent successfully blends in, but instead of the world of male privilege she’d been expecting, the strains of “being a man” (and of her double-life) lead to a nervous breakdown. For anyone who’s lived life as a man, Vincent’s insights often fall into the “well, yeeaaah” variety, but I suspect (and hope) many women will find the book to be eye-opening.

Like many crossdressers, Vincent seems to have a discomfort with her native gender. “Practically from birth, I was the kind of hard-core tomboy that makes you think there must be a gay gene.” That sentence points out one problem with the book and with Vincent’s conclusions: she fails to distinguish between sex identity (whether you feel biologically male or female), gender self-identity (whether you feel you’ve got a “masculine” or “feminine” personality) and gender role expectations (how others think men and women are “supposed” to behave). Vincent claims not to have transgendered feelings and I believe her. But Vincent herself makes clear her discomfort with gender role expectations for women and her belief that she’s got a “masculine” personality.

Ironically, Vincent assumes she’s butch enough that her personality won’t be a problem. Instead she frets about her physical appearance even though she’s got a physique (5'10" wearing size 11 men’s shoes) that female-to-male transsexuals would gladly kill for. Vincent spends several pages describing her physical transformation in the sort of loving detail one finds in postings on online crossdressing forums. But to Vincent’s shock, it’s her feminine personality that keeps comes bursting through the physical disguise. Vincent may successfully pose as a man, but she’s almost universally seen as a gay man—an example of society’s syllogism of “unmanly” = “effeminate” = “gay” in action.

Part of it that Vincent constantly stumbled over the subtle do’s and don’ts that men have incorporated into their behavior an unconscious level. (For example, one of the monks actually reprimands Vincent when she refers to another monk as “cute.”) As a crossdresser trying to blend in, I also find the hard part is less the physical transformation as much as trying to understand all the unwritten rules of behavior that women have also learned consciously or unconsciously growing up.

Crossdressers are often (and rightly) taken to task by wives and girlfriends for the assertion that feeling that one has a “feminine side” and putting on a dress somehow inherently understand those who are born and raised as women. And I confess I had the same reservations about Vincent’s experiment. The experiences she sought seem drawn from a rogue’s gallery of middle/upper-class feminist bête noires. The men’s hangout for working class stiffs. The strip club. Men-without-women (Vincent joins a monastery mainly because going undercover in the army or prison presented obvious difficulties). The Glengarry Glen Ross sales job. The Robert Bly-ish men’s movement weekend, beating drums in the wilderness. It’s only the chapter on dating where Vincent talks about something remotely like everyday male-female interaction.

Admittedly, choosing these sorts of extreme archetypes does highlight behavior seen elsewhere, and initially Vincent does caution that her experiences are a really a travelogue of carefully chosen outings, “certainly inapplicable to anything so grand as a pronouncement on gender in American society.” Which—for better of worse—doesn’t stop her from making exactly those sorts of pronouncements later on in the book. Many of those insights are dead on—if not exactly news—for this guy.

This is where Vincent’s lesbianism is advantage. She herself points out having dated men before she came out as a lesbian, she learned that romantic hurt gets inflicted by both genders in equal measure—whereas exclusively heterosexual woman often unfairly assign the blame for such hurt on the gender, rather than the morals of the person inflicting the pain. But more significantly, while a number of feminist writers have written sensitively and insightfully about the masculine psyche, as heterosexual women they’ve assumed that men’s relationships with women are the pivotal foundation of masculine experience. Whereas Michael Kimmel points out in his excellent “Manhood in America,” that American men define their masculinity, not as much in relation to women, but in relation to each other men. Not to say women are incidental to men’s conception of (and efforts to prove their) manhood—men do often take elaborate and extraordinary risks to prove themselves in the eyes of women. But it’s the fear that we won’t measure up in the eyes of other men that’s far more haunting.

In fact the central lesson Vincent learns is how constrained and powerless men often feel. As Kimmel notes, the paradox of male privilege is that while men as a whole have benefited from it, individual men rarely feel the power that feminist critiques tell they have. As Vincent puts it: “Somebody is always evaluating your manhood. Whether it’s other men, other women, even children. And everybody is always on the lookout for your weakness or your inadequacy, as if it’s some kind of plague they’re terrified of catching, or, more importantly, of other men catching.” In a meat-grinder job of door-to-door sales, the sale manager taunts the sales team with the fear of failure. On dates she’s shocked by the power women have and the icy precision with which they wield it. She hates how emotionally constrained she has to make herself to be a believable man.

One gets the sense that her breakdown may not have simply been the strain of the impersonation and the inevitable lies required, but instead may have been just as much do, as another reviewer put it, that “it was just as difficult—particularly for a lesbian, feminist, former Village Voice writer—to handle the disconcerting realization that being a guy is, as she plainly puts it, “really hard.’”

Men—particularly those in the men’s liberation movement—have been saying that for years. So one of the main values of Vincent’s book is that hopefully women will be more receptive to hearing about some of the downsides of masculinity—and differences in communications styles—from one of their own. Vincent notes that women have taken the attitude that their style of communication is the “correct” one and men are just incommunicative clods who need to be trained how to do so properly. And it’s true that many men are unable to analyze their feelings, let alone articulate them, not only lacking the years of training that women have in both skills, but also having been actively discouraged (by fathers and mothers) from developing them. But Vincent discovers there’s a masculine style of intimacy that women haven’t bothered to see is there, let alone understand. It’s more physical than verbal, it’s often more about letting someone know you’re there rather than overtly offering sympathy—but it’s no less caring. As Vincent says, she learned “about the respectful space a man often needs around him when he is vulnerable or in tears. It may be possible now to interpret the silences of men around me as something more than voids or standoffs, and to feel more comfortable about being present and available to them without always needs our exchange to be explicit or neatly resolvable in my language.”

But being a man isn’t all bad. In her sales-jobs-from-beyond-hell, nerdy Ned becomes a Big Swinging Dick. “Nobody ever thought this Ned was gay,” she notes. Vincent doesn’t comment on why the change occurred, nor is it really clear to me either. But in part it was the clothes. Ned finally gets to wear the blazers and dress slacks Nora had stocked up on. And in the hardscrabble door-to-door sales industry, Vincent in her sharp suits stood-out (as potential management materials) from the other salesmen with little cash and less fashion sense, who looked like exactly what they were: hucksters in cheap suits. The other part is it seems Vincent learned the same lesson men learn: fake it until you make it. The interviewers for these high testosterone sales jobs expected Ned “to brag about himself, to be smugly charming and steadfast, and so I did and I was.” (So much did Ned end up getting into Nora’s head that she ended up being mistaken for a man even out of disguise.)

That air of confidence—even if it’s sometimes actually whistling in graveyard bluster—is one of the few aspects of Ned that Vincent carried through her post-Ned “detox” and she’s appreciative that it allows her to expand her repertoire of behavior. In a similar vein, crossdressing at its best can allow men to flex the parts of their personalities that they feel they can’t express as men. Admittedly, as Helen Boyd, author of the excellent “My Husband Betty,” points out, crossdressers are expressing a man’s idea of what it’s like to be a woman, but again it can—especially for crossdressers who get out in public and interact with people—be an opportunity to step out of the “normal” constraints of masculinity.

Speaking of constraints, I enjoyed Vincent’s chapter where she joins a men’s lib group of the Iron John-Robert Bly mythopoetic variety where the men eventually get together for a weekend retreat out in the woods beating drums and getting in touch with their long-buried Wild Men. While Vincent sympathizes with the mostly broken men there—she says of one man: “you could see that his sense of self was in pieces all over the floor”—she’s a bit bemused by the “toothless mantra and aphorisms, or airy poetry that’s supposed to sound deep but usually isn’t.” As someone who flirted with the men’s movement years ago, but who was turned off for similar reasons, it was interesting to see Vincent also wishing the group would “offer a genuine obstacle, a real trial that would test the limits of a person’s character and sense of self” rather than their faux-Native American/pagan rituals.

The book does have some definite downsides. The chapter on sex is by far the weakest. For starters using a strip club to investigate men’s attitudes toward sex is both spurious and offensive. (I can only imagine the reaction I would get if I posed as a woman and hung out with strippers to gauge women’s attitude toward sex.) Moreover, the two clubs Vincent hangs out at sound like something out of the lower levels of Dante’s Inferno, but Vincent seems naively shocked to see the amount of sleaziness. Vincent’s attitude toward the male libido itself seems oddly Victorian—men are just horny beasts who can’t really help themselves. Now I’ve seen enough male-to-female and female-to-male transsexuals to have a healthy respect for the impact testosterone has on the libido, but the story isn’t quite that simple. There’s definitely truth in Vincent’s assertion that men on the whole think more from the groin and a better at separating lust from love, but on the other hand she wasn’t likely to meet the guys who take a more “womanly” approach to intimacy (i.e. attraction on more of an emotional basis) at a strip club.

The chapter on dating omits Ned’s dates with gay men, which Vincent has mentioned in interviews, which would’ve have provided an interesting contrast. Vincent did mention that they had far more sexual overtones than her dates with women and that the gay men immediately lost interest in her once they found out who she really was. But Vincent didn’t mention whether she also told them she was a lesbian—which obviously might have been a factor. A fair number of female-to-male transsexuals end up as gay men and manage to find partners even without genital reassignment surgery, so I’m not sure the picture is as clear-cut as Vincent might think it is.

In her chapter on her stay at a monastery, I think Vincent actually captures some of the problems of intimacy men have among each other and the sort of hazing that occurs as a new man seeks to proved himself to other men. But Vincent fails to look at how much of the hazing and emotional constriction is due to the environment rather than the gender. From what I recall of a ex-nun’s account of her time in the convent, a similar process of weeding out potential candidates went on, as well a tamping down on intimacy (also to prevent potential homosexual encounters as well as ensure each nun’s attachment remained on God), etc.

But it’s the conclusion of the book that for me is especially problematic. On the one hand, I’m glad she sums up the downsides to her experience. Vincent herself says that she became the “tired and prototypical angry young man” who she used to hate for droning on about his problems. “But after living as a guy for even just a small slice of a lifetime, I can really related to that screed and give you one of my own.” But Vincent is unable to move past the pain. Perhaps it’s too new to her. As men we’ve grown up with these constraints and as “Brokeback Mountain’s” Ennis Del Mar says, “If you can't change it, then you gotta stand it...” So we may chafe it our constraints but they’re not as raw as they are for Vincent. And Vincent’s lopsided forays into the world of men might have something to do the pain she feels about being a man—ironically the final bits written after temporarily checking herself into a locked psychiatric ward are written in a clipped tone that reveals almost nothing about what’s going on in her head (maybe Vincent hasn’t shed Ned as thoroughly as she thought).

For transgendered people (in the broadest sense of the word, including not only transsexuals, but crossdressers, drag queens, etc.), it’s heartened to hear that Vincent—who wrote some notorious trans-phobia things a few years ago—has developed a deep sympathy for us. (This isn’t explicitly mentioned in the book, but Vincent has mentioned on the talk show circuit.) However, Vincent does talk about the ever-increasing difficulty she had trying to sustain simultaneously maintain male and female personas—“this cognitive dissonance essentially shut down my brain.” Ironically, for someone who’s an advocate of androgyny, Vincent decides she needs to banish Ned entirely to maintain her sanity. “I could not live in both worlds at once, so I chose the side to which habit and upbringing have accustomed me….” Unfortunately, Vincent generalizes from her personal experience that “I can’t help almost believing, after having been Ned, that we live in parallel worlds, that there is at bottom really no such thing as that mystical unifying creature we call a human being, but only male human being and female human beings, as separate as sects.” I’m remind of Mark Twain’s adage that a cat having sat on a hot stove will never again—nor a cold stove either. Vincent has burned herself (perhaps deeper than she realizes) with her gender bending, and in talk shows she’s shown an unfortunate tendency to warn others against “messing with gender.”

Which is probably one reason Vincent doesn’t seem like she’s a found integrated sense of manhood. On the one hand, she sees men as the sorrier sex. On the other, she still seems to harbor “gender fantasy” ideas about masculinity—such as her rhapsody to the “authenticity” of the male handshake. Girlfriend, lemme tell ya, men’s handshakes may not involve the fake smiles that women-to-women greetings can have, but there’s also a lot of subtext going on there too. Believe me, I’ve endured more bone-crushing let’s-see-who’s-top-dog handshakes than I care to remember. That said, if Vincent has contradictory attitudes toward masculinity, it’s undoubtedly in part because society also does.

Had Vincent participated in more “regular Joe” male pursuits, she might have discovered that there many times when being a man isn’t “a series of unrealistic, limiting, infuriating and depressing expectations constantly coming over the wire”—in fact it can be a joy (and not just from the privilege of being the cock of the walk). Or why, although I enjoy putting on a dress and taking a gender vacation from time to time, I’m happy to remain a man.

Click on the cover below to learn more about and buy Self-Made Man via Amazon

[Trivia]
IN PURSUIT - Part III

By Gloria Fenton

I wore clothes, shoes, jewelry, accessories, make up, and even wigs when I found them. Three women in particular had several things I wore, and I probably knew what they had in their closets and dressers almost as well as they did. I took chances, too. Once I wore one woman’s bra, pantyhose, and girdle while she, her husband, and Sandy were all downstairs visiting. Somehow, I got away with it. Bernice got pregnant, and got married. Sandy was the matron of honor, and got a beautiful, long, dark blue gown to wear. The night of the wedding Sandy and I stayed at her parents in Bernice’s old bedroom. Sandy surprised me before she rolled over to go to sleep by telling me I could get up and wear Bernice’s clothes that were still there, and even wear them to bed. Though tempted, I decided not to.

I was fairly sure Bernice knew that I had worn her clothes before, and that Sandy had suspected I did. Sandy offering me Bernice’s clothes to wear had shocked me, though. Bernice and her husband moved out of state. A few months later Bernice had her baby, and Sandy and her mother planned a trip to visit Bernice. Sandy encouraged me to take some time off work while she was gone. She even worked it out so I could spend a few days at her parents during that time.

Without actually saying it, Sandy was giving me time to dress up at home, and then at her parents, too. I took the time off work because I wanted that time badly. Just a couple days before Sandy left for her trip, Sandy gave me another shock when I got home from work. Sandy literally threw a plastic bag with something in it at me. In the bag was a wig. A friend of Sandy’s had given her the wig because it was like Sandy’s hair in style and color. Sandy had long refused to get me a wig like her hair, so I was shocked when all of a sudden she did. Sandy could have easily gotten rid of the wig without my ever knowing about it. Giving me the wig made no sense, since it would help me to dress as a woman. I put the wig away and after that, Sandy acted as though nothing had happened.

Sandy and her mother left for their trip, and I planned for my time off work, and dressing up. Knowing I would have so much time alone to dress up, I wanted to do everything in my power to look just as good as I could. To that end, I did two things that Sandy never would have suspected that I would do. First, I bought my own makeup. Second, Sandy had left me a bra, and her girdle to wear, but had taken her pantyhose, so knowing the brand and size of pantyhose Sandy got; I bought my own pantyhose for the first time.

On my first day off, I did needed errands, and then got ready to become a woman. I started dressing, but stopped and did one other drastic action that would be obvious to Sandy when she got home. At the moment, though, my looking like a real woman was the most important thing. When I started dressing again, I not only had a very close shave on my face, but had also shaved my legs, my hands, my arms, my underarms, and any hair visible above my bra. My body had not been hairless in at least seven years.

Sandy had once seen me in a dress and pantyhose. Even with the leg hair showing, she had told me my legs were too pretty to suit her. My legs shaved legs looked good in pantyhose. I chose to wear the new dress that Sandy had never worn. The dress had long-sleeves, was yellow with white lace trim, and a bit shorter than Sandy’s other dresses I wore. Right then I wanted to be the first woman to wear the dress. To go with the dress, I chose Sandy’s white heels. I had first seen those heels on Sandy on our wedding day when I lifted her gown to remove her leg garter at the reception. Seeing my legs in stockings and feet in heels reminded me of that time. I knew then that I would wear the heels again at her parents place, and also wear the same leg garter that Sandy had worn. (My best man had caught the garter and given it back to me.)

I took the store tags off the dress and put it on. Sandy had been right, the dress was too small for her, but just right on me. I had all my clothes and shoes on, added some jewelry, and put on Sandy’s favorite perfume. All I had left to do was makeup, earrings, and my new hair. I learned how to apply makeup by watching Sandy put it on herself. I was glad to see my face in make up again - to once more have a woman’s face. I had worn wigs before, but never one similar to Sandy’s hair, so I wasn’t sure what I would look like.

So many times I had worn Sandy’s clothes, shoes, make up, and jewelry, and my body had been so much like Sandy’s in size and shape. I could hardly wait to see me with Sandy’s hair. With my new hair on it was more of a shock than I had expected. The hair and make up made even my head and face take on a look so much like Sandy’s. I put on my earrings and lipstick, and knew I had to add one last thing. I got and put on Sandy’s spare glasses. The resemblance might not have been perfect, but it was uncanny.

I closed the bathroom door so I could look into the full-length mirror on the back of it. For all practical purposes I was Sandy standing there. Even Sandy, when she was smaller, had not looked better than I did then. It was an unbelievable rush, as I saw myself as a total real woman. From the time I began dressing like Sandy, I had practiced her stances, her movements, and even the way she walked. That, too, all seemed to fall right into place. I had expected to look like a woman, but not to the extent that I looked like Sandy. Knowing this now was going to make the next few days even more interesting than I expected.

The thought came to me that even from a short distance, just about anybody would look at me and believe I was Sandy. Part of me was scared as hell, but part of me wanted to prove that I could make someone believe I was Sandy. I had not even dreamed of doing what I did next. Taking an old purse of Sandy’s and my car keys, I went out for a drive as Sandy. Only a couple people knew Sandy was gone, and they did not live close by. It was dark, but the main street of town was well lit, and there were people about. I drove slowly down the main street and wanted people to see me. Some did, and I was pleased.

At a stop light a man in a pickup truck pulled up next to me to make a right turn. I knew that if he looked over that he could get a good look at me. Just before he turned he did look over, and I could tell he checked me out. He also saw I was looking at him. I saw him look right at me, smile, and wink. He might not have known who Sandy was, but he had checked me out as a woman, and I believed had liked what he saw.

I drove around a bit more and went home. The front door light was on, and I knew that a neighbor that was out walking his dog saw me as I went into the house. That was my first venture in public as a woman, and though it may not sound daring to some, it was very daring for me. I had been seen as a woman, and it felt so wonderful and exciting.

As a point of irony, Sandy called shortly after I got home, and we talked for a few minutes. Sandy had early on referred to my wearing her things as “my having fun”, and as we talked she did ask if I was “having fun”. I told her that I was. She knew I was dressed up, but not as much as I was. She did not know I had makeup, pantyhose, and had shaved my body and legs. Sandy would have gone ballistic if she had seen me so very much like her.

After the call, I did not want my excitement to end. I checked my makeup and added some powder. I took off the necklace I had worn and put on a shorter one that I knew was one of Sandy’s favorites. Next, I took off my dress and put it back in the closet, knowing I wanted Sandy to know I had worn it when she got home. After that, I put on the prettiest nightgown Sandy had. Feeling as I did, it seemed the perfect thing to wear. In the mirror I saw the reflection of Sandy in a pink, short nightgown, and I liked the look.

I knew the man in me would be back in the morning, but right then I knew that no man could look and feel as beautiful I did then. As was fitting, I slept on Sandy’s side of the bed that night, and I slept very well. Reality was back the next morning, but only for a short while. A shower and needed shaving refreshed me. I was back as Sandy in a different dress and shoes in short order. I began to pack for my trip to my in-laws. I packed a lot more of my things than his things, but then I didn’t plan on being a man any more than I absolutely had to. Being Sandy was a lot more fun.

Miss a chapter? You can find them here:   Part I    Part II     Part IV

By Elaine Suede

One of my morning rituals (after making coffee, feeding and med'ing our beloved calico cat, and declumping the litter box) is to check the LFS web statistics. One of my favorite pages is "recent keyword activity" which shows the words and/or phrases that people type into search engines, which ultimately result in them clicking into our newsletter. Occasionally a hit is so out-of-place, amusing or intriguing that I explore further.

In mid-February someone "Googled" the phase shown above and clicked into our site. Click on the image above and you will find that La Femme Silhouette (May 2005) is in the number one position for reasons totally unrelated to what the person was searching for. Fiddling with the phrase a little and "re-Googling" brings the most likely desired result - a song titled "Not For Me" by Dolly Parton. Serendipity.

If you are American and breathing, you know Dolly Parton.

But did you know that Dolly is in the running for an Oscar this year for her original song, Travelin' Thru, which she wrote for the TG themed film Transamerica? (See last months LFS for Diane's review.)

As a tribute to Dolly's support of the TG community, I have featured her in this month's "CD Eye for the Arts" and "Last Laugh" sections.

Good luck Dolly!

DOLLYPOP

By Elaine Suede

Andy Warhol - painter, filmmaker, publisher, actor and gender-bender - is arguably, the biggest artist/celebrity of the mid-20th century Pop Art movement.

Dolly Parton - singer, songwriter, actor, entrepreneur, Grammy award winner and gender-bender - is arguably, the biggest star country music has ever produced.

So it should come as no surprise that in the mid-80's, when these two larger-than-life personalities collided, this artistic collaboration resulted.

Notes:
[1]   Tyler, Carole-Anne. "Boys Will Be Girls: The Politics of Drag," in Inside/Out: Lesbian Theories Gay Theories, editor Diana Fuss (1991) p. 57

[In The News]
PRISON OF SECRETS

By Bo Shell - February 17, 2006

Edee King Mastered the Art of Keeping Secrets.

Perhaps known best as the cleaning lady at the Heretic, where she has tidied up each night’s chaos for the past nine years, King has lived two fascinating lives: one as the happy-go-lucky woman she is today, and the one she lived as Ed King, a successful engineer desperately seeking refuge for the part of himself he kept in the dark for 40 years.

King identifies as a heterosexual man who leads a "multi-gender" life as a cross dresser and prefers to be thought of as a woman. The life she leads today comes after a guilt and shame-ridden adolescence and young adulthood that turned positive through acceptance in gay Atlanta.

Born in 1938 in Tennessee, King says there was never a time she didn’t want to dress in her mother’s clothes. The family allowed the behavior in secret, telling no one but King’s grandmother, who took the secret to her grave.

"I remember coming home from the first grade and taking my clothes off and putting my mother’s clothes on," King recalls. "It just seemed to be natural. My parents didn’t understand that it wasn’t just happenstance."

Tragically, both parents died before King turned 10, forcing her to take an attic room in a home with several extended family members. The money was short, but the work on the family farm was plentiful.

The move ended opportunities for the young boy to dress in female clothing in everyday life. But a stash of clothes stored in the attic room exponentially increased the secret wardrobe she donned every evening after the chores were done and the door was closed.

"I never went out," King says. "I took every opportunity to dress, even when it was such a secret. I thought I was the only boy in the world that wanted to dress up because back then it was very hush-hush." King also learned to play the flute, a hobby that later leant itself to a scholarship at Peabody College in Nashville, where interests in math and physics eventually overtook music.

After three years at Peabody, King left to work a technical job that later led to enrolling at Rochester Institute of Technology, a degree in optical engineering and a contracting job with government agencies including NASA and the Department of Defense. As Ed, he married and fathered children.

King didn’t dare talk about the truth behind the suit and tie. When the secret was finally revealed, the family didn’t take it very well.

"I told my wife about the dressing, and she told everyone, my friends, my family and my job," King says. "She could not handle it. Neither could the family."

Shortly after the news broke, King followed an ad in a transgender magazine featuring affordable high heels at Carousel, a now-defunct store in Atlanta.

The owner noted King’s withdrawn nature and asked if she ever went in public dressed as a woman. When King said no, plans were set, make-up was done and she enjoyed a night that changed her life forever.

"It was like being shot out of a gun," King says of her first appearance at the old Onyx bar at the corner of Peachtree and West Peachtree streets. "It was just such a revelation that there were thousands of people that just didn’t care. I just thought, ‘I’m in the wrong town.’"

King left her family, quit her high-powered job and packed her belongings for a new life in Atlanta. Ed could finally become Edee.

"If you keep personal secrets, they will form a prison around you," King says. "And the key is having the courage to say ‘This is what I am, like it or leave.’

In Atlanta, King started dressing as a woman full-time, married her second wife in a "friendship marriage," and eventually began hormone therapy, with no plans to undergo gender reassignment surgery.

After years of secrecy, King’s life became an open book. Three years ago, Joy Fox, a graduate student at University of Wyoming, heard King’s story by chance and shifted her masters in counseling thesis to focus on King.

"I was struck by Miss Edee’s story that so clearly portrayed innocence, curiosity, shame, determination and ultimately self-actualization," Fox says.

Fox was familiar with "people who cross dressed and fantasy dressed at any opportunity," she says. "But Edee is not masquerading. She is determined to exercise her right to identify as a heterosexual male who prefers to express and enhance the feminine part of her identity."

Happy and healthy, King rides nine miles a day on her stationary bicycle and relishes "multi-gender" life among Atlanta’s gay men and lesbians — as a woman in her personal life and as a man when cleaning for clients.

"My challenges today are to continue to give back to the community what it’s given me, which is my freedom, my piece of mind, my self-worth more than anything," King says. "The gay community has given me my self-worth."

[Last Laugh]
AMERICAN SENSIBILITIES

By Elaine Suede

Dolly Parton says she's "always been a weird, out-there freak," herself so she has no trouble relating to outsiders - no offense intended. This openness helped her earn an Oscar nomination for "Travelin' Thru", a song she wrote for the movie "Transamerica", where the main character is a pre-operative transsexual.

"Some things are strange to me, and some things are odd," says Parton. "But I don't condemn. If you can accept me, I can accept you."

A few of my favorite Dolly Parton quotes:

“It's a good thing I was born a girl, otherwise I'd be a drag queen.”

“I'm not offended by all the dumb blonde jokes because I know I'm not dumb, and I also know I'm not blonde.”

“How long does it take to do my hair? I don't know — I'm never there!”

“You'd be surprised how much it costs to look this cheap!”

“I was the first woman to burn my bra - it took the fire department four days to put it out.”

“I look just like the girls next door... if you happen to live next door to an amusement park.”

“I never let a rhinestone go unturned.”

“Plastic surgeons are always making mountains out of molehills.”

“Am I always recognized when I go out? I sure hope so, I spend a lot of time making myself look like Dolly, and that's who people expect to see.”

AND...

“I'm not going to limit myself just because people won't accept the fact that I can do something else.”

“I feel like I'm fighting a battle when I didn't start a war.”

“If you don't like the road you're walking, start paving another one.”

“Find out who you are and do it on purpose.”

"We cannot direct the wind, but we can adjust the sails.”

“Storms make trees take deeper roots.”

“The way I see it, if you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain.”

“My aunt in Knoxville would bring newspapers up, which we used for toilet paper. Before we used it, we'd look at the pictures.”

Alpha Omega is a non-profit social support group for heterosexual crossdressers and their wives or partners. Also, members from related organizations, helping professionals, and approved guests are welcome when cleared through Alpha Omega’s officers. We serve Cleveland and nearby Northeast Ohio communities.

Meetings are the second Saturday evening of each month unless a special event is scheduled that takes the place of the regularly scheduled meeting. The location of the meeting or event is only released to members or others with the approval of an officer. Members and visitors must be 18 years of age or older.

This newsletter is copyright 1998-2006 by The Alpha Omega Society. All rights reserved. Articles and information contained in this newsletter may be reprinted by other non-profit crossdresser organizations with advance permission of the author AND provided a copy of the issue containing the reprinted material is sent to Alpha Omega within two months after the material is published and proper credit is given to author and source. The opinions or statements contained in this newsletter are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Alpha Omega.

Contributions of articles are welcomed, but may be altered in the editing process, with the author’s intent retained, or may be rejected, whether solicited or not. Absolutely no sexually explicit material may be accepted or printed.

We will exchange newsletters with any other similar group. Send all correspondence to Alpha Omega, P.O. Box 2053, Sheffield Lake, OH 44054.

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