Trip Down Memory Lane #1

I've decided to go through all my digital photos and tell some stories. these will be things i remember, fun times had, or stories behind how photos came about. the photos i'll be flicking through will be either originally digital, or already scanned - i'm not going to get my photo albums out...

So, number 1.

I'm about 3 years old in this pic, but i remember it. Scary had made the indian outfit at school and i wanted to have a photo with her. Scary only wanted a photo if i could do the arms right, and i really struggled - kept crossing them instead of laying them alongside each other. It took ages to get this pic, or it felt like ages at the time... I still have those little red shoes too.

gender...

so, i am currently researching the story of Chaz Bono for a uni assignment. really interesting, very accessible, lots of meat to analyse.

but it's got me thinking. Cher, particularly, says "i love being a woman. If i woke up tomorrow feeling like i do and had a different body, i would be like 'get me out of here'"...

it's got me to thinking. if i woke up tomorrow and i was male, i don;t think i'd care. if i woke up female, i don't think i'd care... sometimes i go out dressed like a boy, even as far as packing, and i have seriously looked into strapping, and some days i wear a dress. i love all my skirts and dresses... so, am i really somewhere right down the middle. androgynous except for the fact that you can't hide these boobs? i have a friend who is truly androgynous, or possibly even butch, certainly in appearance but not in personality so much. spanky, referred to as male or female by different people, shaved head, always straps, wears men's clothing, doesn't pack, identifies as a lesbian...  i have a friend who identifies as Boi. always men's clothing doesn't strap, occasionally packs dates women...

so where do i fit in the slide rule of gender? some days i'd really love to have a pes, but i dn't necessarily feel the need to be male. i have never felt wrong in my body. but i also don't know that i would feel wrong in a male body either...

maybe one day i'll get some clarity on this, but till then, the word can see me as female, because it's easiest, and i don't mind.

family... huh.

Sitting in the back of the car, looking out the window. Mum and "dad" in the front, book on my lap. I could be 11 again, but the fact that i may be asked to drive belies the 31 i actually am. The farm lands we're driving through are green for a change, but the pine forest and bush land hasn't changed. the road has changed, but not the place it leads to. My grandparents house, our twice yearly holiday destination as far back as i can remember. My grandpa is turning 90. He was the age my mother is now when i first met him. He too, has hardly changed, if you ignore the hearing aids and the fact that he only bush walks now, having been forced to give up the tennis just last year. We're on our way to a big family shindig, something i would have groaned about recently, but am now learning to appreciate, as these are the people who don't leave, the ones i can always drop in on, unannounced, even on christmas day, and be welcomed and fed. Being fed is important ;). I'm almost old enough now to fit in with all the adult conversations, which is good as i am the oldest of the cousins by a good 12 years. And when i don't fit the convo, there is always aunty colleen. Love her. Married into this crazy family late, being the second wife of my oldest uncle. But she fits right in and quickly became my favourite on this side. No fuss, no nonsense. Couldn't give 2 hoots who i sleep with (though if any of my family do care, they hide it well). There will be family i don't know, haven't met yet. Some of my mums cousins. Not sure if the kiwi set are coming. I guess it's possibly a bit much to expect great aunt marjorie to be here, as i think an international flight at around the 90 yrs old mark would be a bit tough. But who knows. Tonight is take out dinner at the house, just family. I'll count how many and post later, but i'm guessing well over 20. Then tomorrow is dinner out - 90 years of friendships, work colleagues, societal peers - again, i'm thinking it'll be a big one!

life is beautiful.

this week work has been pretty hellish. 2 days in a row my staff didn't show up. do you know how much it sucks having to call people at 6am to ask them to come to work? and when that fails having to work alone for 3 hours? not so much fun, really. 

but, there are a few really happy bubbles going on at the moment. i got into uni. i am dating. choir is back and awesome. i am actually going to be able to survive whilst at uni.

so therefore work wasn't hell this week, it just sucked.

that is all

happy family...

there is a family out west. 2 mums, 2 kids. people look at this family and see happy. they see perfect. they see a dream. what they don't see is that the older child has. had. another mother. it isn't the perfect family, there is another person in all of this who isn't part of the dream, the happiness, the perfect. but no-one ever mentions that, do they. no-one ever "needs to know" about the past. lets just keep it all about perfect dreams and happiness.

that is all.

the new year....

ok, lets start with a random. i'm sad. i know what would make me not sad, but i am avoiding it because long term i need to get over it. on a more short term thing, i don't have a no-one i can talk to anymore. no real space to vent. my housemate knows all my posting places online (pretty sure she hasn't found this one yet) and she's too close to home, literally. if i post something that says i'm sad - i don;t want to get questioned on it, i just want to vent, just talk. to no-one in particular.

Today i sat with friends drinking beer, eating good food, feeling left out and sad. it was nothing any of them did, just a way i felt for a while. one friend noticed and asked me, i didn't want to make a big deal of it though. and after a bit, i was fine again. i don't exactly know what was going on, but it was there, and then it went.
i may just be tired. i've had a few big days. i've felt like crying fairly often, and have been triggered by the smallest things. walking around a ferry this morning with a 15 month old and i had to hold back tears. i love that little girl, she is so sweet. but she reminds me of so much pain that some days it's just hard to be with her without wanting to scoop her up and cry on her shoulder.

maybe i just need a few days of alone time, but i don't want to be alone. it leads to the sad. i don't feel like it's helping me settle emotionally. i dont feel like being alone is doing me any favours. but i also don't really have anyone i can just go and be with without ending up right back at the beginning of this post...

but...

moving on to the new year...

2011. a year when i may get into university. i may become a student. right now this concept makes me want to cry (not much of a surprise there) and excites me too. i have no idea what to expect. i already feel like it will be more than i can handle. everything i have one in the past year proves that this is not the case. not only can i handle it, i can do well at it. i just need to put my head down and my tail up and work.

well, that was that thought... the other day i managed to make myself completely miserable with an entirely hypothetical situation. how would i break the news of me being pregnant to a friend who had been trying to get pregnant for years. now, i'm not pregnant, and right now i'm not even trying. but i can imagine nothing crueler than having to tell a friend who has failed again and again to get pregnant that i have succeeded where she has not.

that is all.