Trans

I am enjoying the audio book, Before we were trans, a new history of gender by Ktt Heyam.  It begins with the dissecting of gender assigned at birth (ex AFAB or AMAB) and then looks at the fluidity of gender in different cultures and different times.

I’m sensitized to this as an old hippy. Long hair was gay and the Beatles long hair was obscene to many in my parents generation fresh from the wars when men fought with crew cuts not so much an expression of gender as a prevention of lice and better fit for helmets.  I was called gay when I supoorted women wearing pants to school, a huge scandal in my school in which I was roundly vilified.  It was a time when women wore skirts and skirts represented feminity.  Such silliness diddn’t consider Roman Legionaries or Scottish Highland Warriors.  

The great song of my youth was ‘are you a boy or are you a girl with your hair like that you look like a girl’.  When I got into a fisticuff with a redneck looking for a fight and too full of beer my ‘long hair’ like the Beatles of the day was hardly over the ears, executive cut for today.  

I enjoyed therefore this book reminding us of the absurdities of gender laws through the years..  Men wearing coloured vests scandalously gay while women wearing short hair was obviously a sure sign of a woman being lesbian, I think of my poor elderly mother cutting her hair because managing her glorious long red hair , fond memories from my child, was just too much trouble in her late 80’s . I fear she’d be aghast if she was accused of late age lesbianism but historically this would be true ,  Men wearing jewelry was suspect especially more than one earring.

Now what’s fascinating is that in other  cultures gender hasn’t been as reductive as it has in western patriarchy.  I was most interested in the separation of gender and sexuality. A role in Angola was masculine but it could be held by a woman until the patriarchal Portuguese invaded and subjected the country to th catholic patriarchy of the day.  Women holding these masculine ‘roles’ were evicted from their jobs as an ideas of female inferiority was introduced.

Recently there’s been a spate of chauvinist humor directed at world leaders like Trump as the female patter of Putin and Trudeau as the bitch of Singh.  I tend to think of trans as gender and sexuality despite knowing that 90% of ‘cross dressers’ are heterosexual , mostly married and not interested in men.  

The author also points out the history bisexuality where leaders female and male are historically known to have had sex with the other but it’s not affected their ‘gender’ assignment. Alexander a notorious bisexual is never depicted as such an is gender queer. His maleness is  never in doubt.  This is because the chauvinist patriarchy demands the greater world leader be male and heterosexual .  So bisexuality  is downplayed.

 Hitler’ s murder of the gays along with Jews as discussed in the classic ‘Pink Swaztika,was not of the ‘discrete’ gays but rather the ‘feminine’ .  The macho men are this,  like prison ‘top’s who will kill you for calling them gay or a bitch.  “I fuked men’ but I was never fucked.  I ‘let fairies suck my divk but I never sucked dick’.  The Mexican police I met insisted they has so much ‘Sex’ they needed to have sex with men and women because they were so male. Sexuality and gender were not necessarily linked. Yet in different cultures gender is linked to spirituality.

The book unpacks this ideas separating gender from sex and role, considering it academically with fascinateing examples from history. I just listened to the story of Ann Lister, a famous early last century lesbian whose fault was her fashion more than her sexuality. She apparently dressed in clothing more from 5hemlikes of Mountain Equipment Coop than Holt Renfrew because  liked to hike with her girlfriends. Male attire though scandalous was  more appropriate for the climbing.  

I’m here on Commercial and seeing the whole kaboodle of gender expression.  Personally I’ve painted males and earrings .  But then at one time men shaving was considered feminine.  I like that Jesus apparently had long hair without the aquiline nose. The dandies of the Elizabethan court were frowned upon because they washed .

I think my poor dog who was groomed yesterday must be seen as gay today. .  He is really omnisexual  being discouraged frequently from humping Laura’s leg, boy and girl dogs and pillows.  Humans are a funny lot. Too band wanker isn’t a gender category.

Sex is biological and genetic. 

The judgemental are amusing. I loved reading the Golden Bough of Frazer which describes the need for a community to be the same for difference could  lead god to cause floods or droughts. When people dont know which red berry causes death or which snake venom is deadly then stereotypical behaviour is safe.  Primitive society is extremely fearful repetitive  and superstitious. There is no doubt that sameness may lead to longevity of centuries. Tried and proved. Mainstream. Not bad and certainly a common template for raising the young.   The obsession with rules is what is needed to appease the Gods.  

As a Christian I know Jesus was a good guy. I don’t feel such fondness for St. Paul. Alot of themOld Testament as history is little different than the murderously  barbariaric Koran.  

Madigan and I had fun having a mexican lunch with Laura on Davie street. She’s noted that the once young gay street is now much more populated by older gay male couples .I told her she was definitely gorgeous and voluptuous, with pink nails and sparkling sandals .  She liked my the multi colour glass frames. Today they would just be considered trendy and far too square for Elton John. My rugby playing woman I know  delights in gowns and pears when she goes out to concerts.. My other  female friend changes to black jeans and black tshirt when she works on her truck engine,

I feel less than because I’m not a macho man with  a safe certainty.  Like many men who were sexually abused I feel identification with the aggressor who considered my youth at the time feminine and his being a chauvinist partricarchal predator saw me as a hole in the mattress.  There’s been an effort to address pedophilia, sexual abuse of children and serious questions about man boy ‘love’. Meanwhile a girl from  Iran told me peoophilia was normal for the Ayatola and his fellow clergy. Their approach to pedohilia is way behind the Catholic Church and the education system here in Canada which have been exposed and vetted unlike parliament and congress. 

I often comment on the Khan gene that suggest his brother and he had many hundred of thousand of mates, A one man rape of the sabines  Certainly the Unwillingness of Biden an Trudeau and others like the British royal family to let out the Epstein list shows that pedophilia is enmeshed in the leadership in Washington, Ottawa, London, 

Also I’d trust a pillow with my dog than anyone or anything with Xi Jin Ping in Beijing.  If Putin did anything untoward inecrophilia would follow. Indo Europeans and celts popularized the family while South African success was having as many cattle and wives as possible. Trudeau lowered the age of consent for bestiality as obviously that would get him more liberal votes.The silliness of multi culturalsm is the homogeneity and ethnocentric who project their own ignorance  on the world .  Thank God for the Darwin awards.

I was criticized by a woman doctor administrator who never realized what a butch bitch she was when I explained the Berkeley gender sexuality scale that had hard wired homosexuals and hard wired heterosexuals who on questioning would rather die than have sex with other.  Meanwhile the majority of people were opportunistic with a middle bisexuality blip. . The test results  reminded me of the great movie scene where the man asked the woman would you have Sex with me for a million dollars an she answerd, I’dconsider it . Then he asked,  what about for a dollars.  She sthen said what do you take me for. ‘He responded  , well that’s established I’m just dickering for price.

I’m enjoying the book because it’s expanded my ideas of gender and made a place for the Mad Mollies of Ireland , the female soldiers and others but most importantly that it separates the ‘chauvinist patriarchal’ idea of the woman and transwoman as inferior.  Dirty.  I think of myself as that.  I mostly think of my self as less than because I’m not a father and the only baby I had was aborted.  That’s a whole other history. 

Before genetics and viagra a king could still be king if his knight was happy to pregnante the queen.  Not so today.  Confusing complex times when so many are anxious and afraid . 

Madigan was so happy to see Laura today demanding her whole attention, He was jumping up and down between us that I let her go without hugging her.  I miss hugging her.  

Getting old is unmanly too.  

Commercial Street Saturday

I love Commercial street for the sights. Madigan loves it for the smells.  Lots of people and dogs from all walks and all breeds.  `I’m having a cafe late and grilled cheese sandwich. It’s an open weekend.  I walked Madigan ,meditated this morning then attended a on line professional recovery meeting. We talked of tribe and family and belonging.  Now I’ve just come from seeing Dr. Ready, my chiropractor and my back and neck feel better. 

This grilled cheese sandwich is delicious. A young woman with spectacular breasts just walked by.  They were prominent but the attraction was the firm ‘jiggle’.  If I guessed it was the breasts and not the bra. An early dissappointment as a pre teen boy was the promise of x ray glasses that would see through clothing.  It seemed they were advertised in every action comic book and one of my friends insisted they were a scam.  Besides we weren’t interested in skeletons. More soft tissues affiondos from afar.  We’d first been excited by Sears Catalogues, then black and white true detectives and finally the Playboys of an older brother brought out from his under mattress stash to be shared about for a glimpse.  These pictures were so very different from the girls in our class who were only just blossoming.  We were riding bikes and talking more about fishing

Now I’m on Davie Street still looking at women as exotic birds.  I’m interested in fashion too, the plumage, and the projection. What is she trying to say with her choice of colour, jewelry, bag.  Commercial street is popular with lesbians. Is she a lesbian? Is she a spy?  Is she an actress, drug addict, doctor or lawyer?  I like the variations.  Used to enjoy people watching with lovers and the Paul Simon song, off to search for America.  

The story teller in me makes up scenarios.  I’m geriatric so I’m not the object of romance in the comedy. I laugh at my writer friends who are in their 70’s and 80’s yet write love stories of robust 20 year old. Our memories or dreams or wishes.  I chuckle at the stereotypes that run through my mind, flotsam from a varied past.

My fiend walking dogs with me tells me he met a neighbour who asked where his wife was and he told him ‘his husband was at home.”  “He’s not talked to me since”. I laughed annoyed at the predjudice but then thinking how I objected to hearing from my Parisian friend that Hijab wearing women had assaulted the French girls in bikinis on the beach, I am so disappointed by the pro Palestinian college LGBT and feminists.  Israel is the bright light of liberty in the Middle East but the university political departments are hundreds of years out of date mired in the Marxists fantasy world. Canadian media is offensive. I’ve just read a few books of history, the latest and up today and even on on climate change by a leading geologist.  Books are so much more informative than censored social media .  

It’s a sunny day. I’m loving the views. A woman with a name tag on her purse asked if she could take Madigan’s picture. I said yes but he didn’t wish to sit still. Now I’ve finished the grilled cheese he wants to walk and piddle and sniff.

I dropped off my laundry in New West before coming here.  They say it will be ready Tuesday.  I do my own laundry but after the cleaning ladies changed the sheets a couple of weeks and some towels gathered up I didn’t feel like doing a laundry since I’ve not a lot of room for drying.  

I actually had this weekend figured for doing a medical legal report I spent all day doing yesterday and completed.  It just needs an edit for typos and page numbers which I ‘ve asked the staff to do.  That’s given me two ‘free’ days. I’m committed to reading and doing the homework for my Oxford Ritual and Religion course. I believe the secular religion of addiction is tied to ritual and enjoying this course as thought provoking.  It appears religion increased the cohesiveness and survival of groups.  That’s cerntaly consistent with the failure of communism, the main religion of aetheism, very good at destruction but poor at creation.

It’s Mother’s Day. I should get gifts for the main girls I know who also happen to be mothers and grandmothers.  Amazon is good for that.  I do miss my mom.  She was amazing and the older I get the more I wish that I just made the space to spend time with her. I could have taken her for lunch more. I remember she loved when I did that.  She loved going out for dinner with Dad and anyone else in the family. I appreciate that now, her joy in the family and being part of creation.  I am a loner I admit but do appreciate those experiences of togetherness. We’re born along and die alone though we are not alone given the spiritual yet it’s the connections that count. I miss those who I became close to who have died. I miss George a lot, and there are others. They come into my mind and I remember that grief is like a passing cloud. It helps me appreciate the sunny days more,

Today is a sunny day.  I like when I can sit on a street like Commerival and watch interesting people passing. I loved Ireland for this.  My joy in travelling is really about experience the place and writing about it.  I remember in Gr 3 studying geography and having the task of writing letters home to our parents.  

Adell, my sister in law, is sorting and cleaning up in anticipation for a move to a smaller space. She’s been going through my aunts slides which apparently havent’ weather time too. well. I loved that my aunt travelled and sent gifts from far reaching places , like the camel from Cairo.  She used to take slides and show them to her church friends on her return .  A night of Aunt Sally’s slides.  I remember Dad’s super 8 movie nights of family vacations.  I am truly blessed to have had my family and the child hood I did with such loveing incredible people.  

Laura texts me her walks with her sisters Australian sheep dog Molly.  Molly bolts after squirrels and pulls Laura after her sometimes airborn sometimes dragged along behind her.  She told me she preferred Madigan because he’s smaller.  He can be stubborn too but there’s only 20 lb of him and Laura can match him in the weight and muscle class. He mostly dominated us with attitude.

New week I’m hear and rabbit hunting. I dropped off Steaks for the camp fire with Anna so she could figure what she’d want for the kids.  

Some young guy is styling with a hat I’ve only seen on Afghan elders.  It’s a young street, this Davie.  That’s a lot of the attraction.  All age but more young adults than old adults. I’m at an age where my cohort is dying off.  I ‘m looking forward to returning to Europe and seeing the older folk those who fought off the fascists.  There’s a pragmatism in those I meet there that’s no as present in the easily swayed urban intellectuals here.  Maybe it’s just young all over. Churchill saying, if you’re not a socialist at 20 you have not heart but if you are not a capitalist at 40 you have no brains.  I’m thinking there’s a need for the soulless like Trudeau who is pushing euthanasia under the euphemis MAID for the elderly.  When the old have only cockroaches infested basement suites food banks and waitlists for health care Trudeau’s ignorance and arroaganc wand mismanagement of the economy makes MAID seem okay for the old.  I’m at times troubled by the future he promotes but am hopeful as Canada before this attempt to turn it into the third world has a history of care for the old unlike the utilitarian communist who use prisons to collect body parts for their elites. We’re still pretty good in Canada and elections may still work.  

An obese woman has fallen and several folk have come to assiste her.  She’s not old but does represent the issues of our society where the problems are those of excess.  Drugs is the issue here.  Wealth for excess.  Yet homelessness and problems of isolation and joblessesnes with loss of purpose.

I’m blessed it’s family friends, a dog, and today time to observe.  

In a couple of week I’m taking Laura to Harrison Hot Springs. I’ve done this dozens of times over many years and we’ve always enjoyed the mini vacations in the hot springs, great dinners and rustic walks along the lake with the dogs.  

Life is good.  I’m thankful.  God children. Nephews. Colleagues.  I was at church last week and most likely will be at St. Barnabus tomorrow. I’ll be going to the symphony again in time.  

Thank you.