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The future in the mirror is closer than it appears. If, thanks to new technology, you had to become a girl for a year in the middle of high school, what would you do? Start a blog, of course. -- Kiai 28jun08 *Hi.* Seven whole years after the dot-bomb hit and it's still true. Most blogs are written by teenage girls displaying their awesome angst in badly spelled prose for the whole World Wide Web to read, just as if they were writing in one of those diaries with a lock on the cover to keep everybody in the world from opening and reading it. Which is where they should have written it in the first place, most of them. So what's my excuse? A week ago I wouldn't be caught dead posting to a blog. Now, here I am. But then, thanks to that wonderful state law that my parents and a whole bunch of other people voted for while I'm still too young to vote it down, starting a week ago and for the whole of my high school junior year *I'm* a teenage girl, so I'm clueing into my birthright. Changeright. Whatever. Or maybe it's payback to said parents, who will be shocked and dismayed and humiliated at just how much their son- turned-daughter is willing to talk about it all in public (in front of the whole *planet* no less). More than I will, anyway. I have this weird disconnection going, kind of like knowing that this was *done to me against my will just because somebody thought it would be a good idea means it has nothing to do with me. So I can say anything I want about it because I didn't do it. Or maybe these are just messages found in a glowing bottle on your desk just behind your keyboard (I know a few of you still use CRTs). Be sure to unplug the power cord before you shake the sand out. Computers start out as beach sand, you know. Some of the little grains grow up to be chips and some of them grow up to be bottles. Or maybe their parents turn them into bottles when they're just getting the hang of being chips so they'll know what that's like. No offense to the *amazing* friends (amazing because I didn't realize how much they were friends before because they were and are and apparently always will be girls) who are teaching me to swim in it, but... *Help -- I'm drowning in an ocean of estrogen!* -jen (yeah, that's me for the duration) ----------------------------------------------------------- 03Jul08 *Well...* Strike last comment from prior entry. Now I'm drowning in a whirlpool of progesterone, as well as... Motrin, yeah, Motrin, that's the ticket. (None dare call it Midol. In my hearing, anyway.) All of you guys who don't have parents who decided you *had* to go through this last year or this year, take notes: you *WILL* be tested on it before you graduate from high school, *it's a state law now*. All you guys who were born with this insidious leak waiting to happen and don't have to worry about it for a year right now: *:Pthththth~~~~~~~~~~~~~!* You'll get yours in, oh, _eleven months and three weeks and five days but who's counting, when you march right up to that little window and they say "That was your one free year-long pass on the guy-ride! Now, which do you choose, this lovely ornamental draft card that in one year can turn into your free ticket into the infantry in one of three global brush wars and your own personal close brush with death on numerous occasions in places where nobody even wants to *live* there except for the oil... or this nice fluffy tampon?"_ Don't rush me. I'm thinking, I'm thinking, okay? -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 05Jul08 *Butt of the Joke* I still can't believe that none of my own summer shorts fit me. I mean, I'm almost a foot shorter now, my wrists are tiny, my hands are so weak that I can't throw a decent curve ball anymore, and yet my hips are way out there mocking me from out at either end of my horribly extended pelvis, daring me to try on yet another pair of last year's oversize shorts. Tell me my Mom put them in with the white cotton wash by mistake and they shrunk, *please*? -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 07Jul08 *Fright Wig* "_We really need to do something about your hair._" This is a frightening statement. Silly me, I didn't realize that simple fact when I first heard it, otherwise my survival instincts would have warned me to *RUN*. See, there's nothing wrong with my hair. My hair is cool. It starts at one end, way up in my scalp, and the other end hangs free. Basic stuff. Now it even finishes up a lot lower than it did a couple of weeks ago. "It gives you a head start," they said. 'On *what*,' I should have thought. The nice thing with hair this long is that I can tie it back with a rubber band, and then it's out of my face and I don't have to mess with it again for a few days. The not so nice thing is that this is clearly not an acceptable response as far as the Female Parental Unit is concerned. "_A girl your age shouldn't,_" quoth the FPU. "_Can't have you embarrassing the family,_" uttered the FPU. "_Have to take better care of it,_" proclaimed the FPU, as if wearing it out was a problem. I mean, it grows back, doesn't it? Back before my body had its lumps shuffled around, the FPU was all for mowing off said hair at frequent intervals. Now it's out of my eyes, which was said FPU's primary complaint about hair back in those halcyon days of yore two weeks ago. Problem Solved, right? Wrong-o. Said FPU did utter the words at the top of this entry, and thus did declare war on my scalp, a war waged with such utter ferocity that you'd swear that I had an oily scalp and the Texas Oil Barons were determined to occupy it and drill wells in it. Now my scalp, with its concomitant hair, is occupied territory. Its once admittedly oily surface has been washed clean with a completeness that would make said Texas Oil Barons weep. The _something_ to be done about my hair included a visit to a Den Of Uniquity wherein lay in wait several specialists in the Art of the Makeover. Said AM-DOU leveraged its hold on my hair to invade and conquer my face as well. The hair no longer exists just to have two ends, one of them being emitted by my scalp. The face no longer exists merely as a functional and vaguely pleasing framework to keep my mouth, eyes, nostrils and ears from being pulled out of formation by their mutual gravity. Now the hair does decorative things in synchrony with the face, to wit, precision posing designed to make the girls giggle and coo and make the guys all have to find books to hold in front of themselves. As if that fools the girls, guys: I found that out the first day. Maybe I'll talk about that sometime, if I ever get over the embarrassment of having my recent history recounted to me in third-person picaresque reportage. As expected of occupied territory, I no longer have free rein over it. I scratch at an itch on my cheek and FPU doth decree, "_Don't do that, you'll mess up your makeup._" I tell her about the itch and she doth retort, "_live with it._" I brush the artfully sculpted hair away from my eyes and FPU declaimeth, "_Don't mess it up_". Mess *what* up? Hair is hair, invulnerable to casual hand motions unless accompanied by cutting tools, chemicals or open flame. FPU did decree that I must examine the work of the AM-DOU Occupation Forces in the mirror. I did so. This must be a trick mirror, I decided, because within it I see someone I do not know but would like to know, someone I could enjoy looking at over dinner a lot, and, maybe, someday, over many breakfasts. She should get rid of that funky tee shirt, though, and wear something closer-fitting instead. Something to show off her curves. That would be nice to look at for a very long time. Then I realize that I've been cheated, that all my earnest conversations with her would be soliloquy. All this was amid much giggling and cooing. Did I mention that the AM-DOU Occupation Forces had enlisted in addition my current best buddies, all of whom are direct descendants of the Tribes of Venus? That's right: born like it, y'know. Not only that, but every one of them already spent a year seeing how things stood in the Fields of Mars where I come from, and then crossed back over the frontline to report on their year of espionage, their loyalty to Venus apparently never in doubt. And now they've got me. Pink Rover, Pink Rover, send Jen on over! The hell of it is that, other than my grave disappointment at finding out that, not only was I to be trapped behind that face I found so interesting for the next year, but as the bearer of it I was henceforth responsible for the maintenance of that trick-mirror illusion... I like it. This is seriously weird stuff here. Far more than you'd expect from your usual 'boy meets girl by becoming same' scenario. Not only don't I mind having everything from the neck up turned into Performance Art, or at least Folk Art, but... I'm kinda looking forward to expanding the oevre to include the neck down as well. I still don't know if I'm hiding me from me, or bringing out the me-ness of me enough that even I can see it. Maybe that's the point. -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 10Jul08 *Okay, Okay!* You can stop IMing me now. The votes are in. I bow to popular demand. Yes, I will be going to the Beach Blast. Yes, I now have a swimsuit to fit the new girly me. And no, you'd *better not look*. I say that because it's so teeny that if too many people stare at it at once it will evaporate. And then I will cry a lot and run home. Or kick righteous ass. Or something. Don't expect me to swim in it, either. I am firmly convinced that the first touch of water will leach away all the colors leaving it perfectly transparent. Or it will come off and float away on the waters of the surf, mocking me as it is pulled out with the riptide, which is worse, because then there are *two* chances for your attention to be pulled to *where you should not look*. We are talking about paying good money for holes on a scale not seen since the invention of the transistor. This thing is more not-there than there. Or at least that's how I saw it when I tried it on. CK, GS, CA, you made me buy the stupid thing, you had *better* back me up. You promised pasties and you'd better wear them. You're professional girls, I'm a part-timer, you'd better be scoring all the eyeballs so I don't. Stop laughing. -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 13Jul08 *Aftermath* You can stop laughing now. It didn't come off, in fact I practically had to tear it off me when I got home, because... Are you ready for this? It shrunk. Who the *hell* designs bikinis that shrink? Never mind: I know who. The people who like to watch things like that. Guys. Girls. Dear friends. Please tell me I wasn't really like that last year. I would have watched, sure, but I wouldn't have done anything to make it happen. Yeah, yeah. That's because last year I was a wuss. I wouldn't have dared. Speaking of... Guys. Yeah, you, all the humans who were at Beach Blast who didn't have to wear anything above the waist to keep from getting, well, busted. (Stop laughing, I tell you. Do you think I make these things up on purpose? This is real honesty in e-motion here!) Guys, thank you for everything you did, and everything you didn't do, to set me at my ease, even when all I had on was that ridiculous little thing. Maybe I dared because you cared, okay? All of you, girls and guys. It's good to know that I still have friends, people I can have good honest fun with, even though I change in the other side of the bath-house now. Even if most of you guys couldn't give me a straight answer if I were to quiz you on whether my eye color changed, because you never got that far North. The machine does that, you know. It's not a bug, it's a feature. "Genetic Code Optimizing", they call it. "Brings out the best that your genes can offer", they put in the brochure. Brings out the most embarrassing parts of your gender, I put it. At counting-the-days-but-still-sixteen, I'm bigger than my mother, just because one of my ancestors, anywhere from the Pleistocene Era onward, was. So they catch the eye. They catch on a lot of other stuff too if I don't watch where I'm going. (Stop laughing.) So that's why I told you not to look, and that's why I can't blame you for looking anyway. When I was your shape, I did the same thing. I know how it is. Really I do. Really. Just try and come up for air every once in a while to let me know my eyes are still on straight, okay? (Girls... Hey, girls... You can stop laughing now. Please?) -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 17Jul08 *Emily, don't read this entry. Please.* I saw Jason Schmit's welcome home. It was closed-casket drive-thru. He got his E-ticket ride in Sao Tome, and despite the cute manga name he wasn't a girl when he bought it, but I hear he got the one-half part right: cut in two by shrapnel when his truck went over a mine. He wasn't even a combatant. Yet. We used to shoot hoops together over in the base housing courts while we were waiting for Emily and Jan to get done with their tennis lessons. Jason was seriously cool: he had a good reason for just about everything he did, even if it was a mistake. He wasn't afraid to admit it when he fucked up, either. He could tell you which reasons turned out to be the good ones, which ones were him bullshitting himself and the world around him, and which ones might have been good ones except for circumstances. I guess that last clause got him. I hear Sao Tome used to be a friendly little place when there wasn't a war on, but where there is oil we must send troops, right? If anybody actually reads this piece of shit blog (yeah, that's real guy talk for ya), Emily needs friends and family *now*. I went over to help her go pick out a black dress, because she needed a bunch of girl company to keep her mind on what she was doing and off why she was doing it. I happen to be a girl just now so I was eligible. Now she needs both kinds of friends. Girls that she can share memories and feelings with, and I'm not enough of a girl to be eligible--I can listen real good but I don't have anything to share. And guys, so when she breaks down in tears there's somebody strong there for her to grab tight and cry it out all over your shirt before it poisons her insides. I can't do that either because my boobs just don't feel like that kind of brick-wall protection right now, and it wasn't even a birth defect in my case. And, hey, guys, she needs it to be *non-judgmental*. If you care about her at all. I know a lot of you did (okay--me too). And *non-pushy* if you do. She doesn't need some jerkazoid trying to hustle to be his replacement, she's still trying to cope with losing him, he's the only man she can see and I think it's going to be just that way for quite a while. I think I can see deep enough into this girl shit to say that for sure. Why does she need non-judgmental support? I'll tell you exactly why she needs it, because she said I could, because everybody knows what already, seems like, but they don't know why. Jason couldn't marry her while he was in boot, then he got shipped out before he could even kiss her. Now the military won't honor Jason's standing-last-request for a posthumous marriage because he wasn't listed as a combatant when he died. So she's not even a widow, much less a military one, she doesn't even have that much of him, instead she's what's called an unwed mother in training. Guys, if you give her shit for this, in a year when I get my balls back I'm going to kick your fucking ass--you have been warned. This means you, Jan-who-went-back-to-being-John. Shit, I sound like a guy. I hope they don't take my blog away from me for that. If it helps Emily, though, it's worth it. -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 01Aug08 *It's A Girl Thing* Guys, I think I have a clue to pass on from the girl side of the playhouse. That is, if I haven't gone girl too much to be able to explain it in guy-ese. It's about shopping. It's about a little all day trip that ended up with me driving home with three big bags full of stuff I never thought I'd dream of owning when I started. But that's okay. And that's part of it. It's about four other girls who I won't indict (hint, they've all got blogs, line up dates and times and do your own detective work) dragging me out of bed in the morning and making me dress up pretty at gunpoint and then taking me prisoner in my own car and one other while we convoyed to alien territory and then... Well, let me start over before they start mocking me over on those other blogs. Ready? I was lonely. They knew I was lonely. They took steps. Drastic ones that put them in harm's way because of my exceedingly bitter involuntarily- female outlook and viperish tongue. Better? It's still not the truth. Let's try that again. We all planned this in IM. I didn't lie about the lonely and viperish part. They, kindhearted veterans of the monthly hormone wars that they were, knew how to read a calendar and *expected* me to be bitchy, and forgave me beforehand. Then we got to planning, and yea, verily, it was fun. There are a lot of shops in that mall, y'see, and one or more of us knew how to read its map. Despite us being girls. We could even read the words, so we knew what they sell beforehand. Without even being told to study the map by me, the temporarily-ex-guy. So when we set out in two cars, we knew exactly what we were going to do, and we knew to bring a lot of money to do it with. And what were we going to do? Go look. That's right, guys, we were going to go look to see if it looked (and sounded and smelled, and felt, and even tasted, as appropriate) as good as it looked in the online pages. We did not go unarmed into this mission-critical expedition, no: we each had a cellphone. Thus could we summon our comrades to help us to subdue a particularly good bargain, or judge with a weight of decision worthy of the Supreme Court (albeit with much giggling, something we girls do in our off-hours to mark our territory) whether that green really went with that off-white. Not that I knew all the names of the colors, but hey, I'm usually a guy at this sort of thing. Now, here's the thing. All of this was done in a spirit of utmost teamwork and cooperation. There were no leaders of the pack, no superstars, no drill sergeants. Nope, not a drum majorette in sight as we trekked through this virgin territory. (Watch that, buddy, I know what pun you were thinking of just then. Ha ha.) It was all done in a wondrous air of calm. And that was comforting. It *felt good*. Guys, you know how, when you hang out, there's always a little badder-than, a little extra spin you put on things to liven it all up? And the more you feel you have to measure up, the harder you push? For fun? *All the friggin time?* Girls aren't into that. Not when they're not actually in- your-face competing, like in sports or something, and when it's over it's over. The rest of the time, there's that comfort thing going around. Girls don't feel comfortable if the edginess doesn't end. They like the calm with some excitement tossed in sometimes, not the other way around. So, lose the extra edge and dig the calm when you're around the girls, that's all I can say. You can actually enjoy the calm if you let yourself trust it. I can remember a few times when I got that part right, back before I changed, and I remember now that it was fun then even if I couldn't figure out why at the time. Now I know why. You might even enjoy the shopping. Hey, she *does* look good in most of that stuff, right? Oops, there's my guy side peeking out again. No girl feels that she looks all that great when she's trying something on. She knows everywhere she isn't perfect, even if it's in a place where you can't see it. You don't; you see how it all comes together. That's why girls bring other girls with them to help shop, because the others see that coming- together too, though usually not with the same intensity of interest that you do. If she brings you along it's because she wants to look good to you: consider yourself highly praised. Shopping can be good for you. Nuff said. -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 15Aug08 *WHILE YOU WERE OUT* Guys, we lost Emily. For those who joined us late, no she didn't die. We got her there in time. It didn't even cause a miscarriage, which is just as well because I really don't think she could have taken losing that last little bit of Jason that was floating innocently in the ultrasound. They're pretty sure he bequeathed her a Y, by the way. If you should so much as care. And they let her out after her 72-hour. And she quietly thanked them and us and I could see that there were no tears left in her eyes because there wasn't any her in her eyes. She'd left. So it's no big surprise that she packed her bags and vanished the rest of her over the weekend, is it. She'd already left, after all. You can stop ringing her phone at all hours, now, all you're doing is harrassing her parents, and they've got enough to deal with. And, before you ask, don't ask. Maybe I have a line on somebody who might possibly let me know how she's doing, but my lips are sealed. If you have a birthday card to send to her, or an *apology*, maybe it'll get there if I read it and see that it'd be good for her, but that's all. Just letting you know. Oh, and John? You are dead to me until I get my guy shape back. Don't call, don't come around. And once I get that back, dude, you're as good as dead. -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 24Aug08 *Does the phrase "Back To School Sale" strike terror into your heart the way it does mine?* It didn't used to. Back then, it was, "Oh, yeah, school supplies. Fine, any colors will do as long as they're primary or dull and don't have too many pictures." Clashing was when they wouldn't all fit into your backpack at the same time. Girls have got that calmness thing going, remember, and that requires harmony. Colors have to work together, accessories have to cooperate, and not just across your own ensemble, either. If you customarily hang with four best friends, you'll be on the phone with all four of them making sure that nothing you carry will clash with anything they carry. The consequences of failure are enormous, you understand. A minor clash, say, a three-ring binder with the wrong stickers, will only result in feuds, food poisoning, stock market crashes and dogs falling out of the sky. A major misstep in coordination, however, such as your whole collection of binders focusing attention on someone's least-favorite pair of socks, can cause the decor to get so badly out of coordination that the color-clash tears open a hole in space-time and then strange octopus-headed gods will step through it looking for directions to the Mountains of Madness... Yeah, yeah, how odd, a girl that's read most of H. P. Lovecraft. Every zoo must have exactly one because they're a rare and dangerous species, and they must never meet each other, either, lest they decide to accessorize using the Color Out Of Space, which is the chromatic Three-Finger- Salute for the current Universe. Then there are affiliations and affections. These must be carefully considered as well. Such as, do I like this Boy Band enough to commit binder space to them for a whole school year? (Mmm, yeah, Boy Bands: that's a topic all its own, we'll have to get to that sometime.) Maybe it's better to select a new fave for the year and hope that they'll still be on the charts come June. That's a safe option, at least until Yog-Sothoth starts showing up in multipage spreads across the pages of Tiger Beat. I can't wait: him and Shub-Nigurath, oh, yeah, baby. Then there are the signals. Clues which have the force of tribal markings, or the friend-or-foe insignia painted on military aircraft, and they've got to be done right too. This is why the obvious solution to the color coordination problem, that of buying the same colors in bulk and passing them out to everyone, will not work: that much sameness sends the wrong signal to the other teams. It says that you're too religious for your own good and your sanity is in peril. All the other teams will avoid you, lest you go postal without warning while they're in the room. I used to like black leather stuff. I still do, but apparently black leather sends the wrong territorial signals to Real Biker Chicks, and even though in my life as a guy I sometimes rode a (borrowed) dirt bike, I don't know enough Combat With Broken Bottles to cover that bet. Oh, and the Boy Band stickers you put on things send important affiliation signals too. If your band goes out of favor and you don't replace the stickers in time with someone who's *in*, you could get burned at the stake. As you can see, the stakes are extremely high for that Initial Entrance on the First Day Of Class. Wearing the wrong color blouse, I surmise, has been known to provoke Yet Another World War. Yes, I'm nervous. Very. Now. What's personally frightening to me is the *calm* (Remember the calm thing? Girls are all about the calm.) with which these girls-at-birth friends of mine can, in the course of two hours of shopping, quickly and quietly resolve *all* of these life-threatening issues, while I am relegated to stand-and-gape status, utterly at a loss to comprehend the magic that they somehow weave to make all these coordinations come out right. Even *my* stuff. Somehow I don't feel that I am ever going to measure up. -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 04Sep08 *Show And Tell* It's just a locker room. I can do this. After all, I've been through the time machine. Picture the New Girl, dashing into the locker room at gym where at least a classful of half-dressed girls are busy changing into and out of gym uniforms, sometimes All The Way Down To The Metal. Picture said New Girl with a terminal case of embarrassment and trying very hard not to stare. Picture said New Girl not doing a very good job of it. I mean, stumbling against people she's trying not to look at, and then needing help from those selfsame people in getting things taken off her own body and put on again the right way. Picture said New Girl being helped by those same half-clad girls, and finding to her amazement that it was all right, that it wasn't such a big deal after all, because everybody knew who she was, knew all about her sordid guy past, and nobody cared. And as long as we're being embarrassingly honest here, some of those selfsame girls are people I've had crushes on in the past. How did this happen? See, there's this thing that some of you may not know, but it's vital to understanding all of this. Girls go into puberty two years before guys do. So, while the guys are still doing little boy stuff out in the playground, the girls are measuring themselves against the adults. Adult women, to be precise: they know what they're going to be, they just don't know all the details yet, like how big they'll be where. Think about it, guys: that's right about when the girls all got *really* mysterious and incomprehensible, enough to be more than a little scary, right? It's because they knew something that we didn't. They knew they were growing up; we didn't. We thought that recess would last forever. Now, here I am on the other side of the playground, and I've gone through *two years* of the stuff in an instant. (Or however long the change-machine takes to do its thing. They put you under for that, in case you don't know, so I didn't get to see any of the gory details, I just woke up a day later and had to learn how to walk upright all over again. Because of the hips, you dork, not the weight of... Stop laughing, this is serious!) Even for somebody as clueblind as me, that's a big enough change in my own awareness to get noticed. At first I thought it was just me being a girl now, you know, ovaries instead of testes, estrogen instead of testosterone, that kind of thing. Now that I've had a chance to talk it over with my friends, though, I'm pretty sure it's that jump in physical (as in, brain as well as body) maturity. Suddenly I'm two years older than I was, with a lot of catching up to do because of it. Why do I suddenly know this? Like I said, some of this is from talking with my Best Buds, my dear girlfriends. And, hey, why is it that if I'm a girl and I say 'girlfriend', people know I'm talking about a close friend that I hang out with and do friend stuff with, but if I was a guy when I said that, people would automatically think we were doing that whole Mating Thing, you know, going steady and preparing to spawn? Why doesn't this stupid culture allow guys and girls to be friends except in the bedroom? I think it goes back to that mystery thing. The girls are clued into the mystery for two whole years before they let the guys in through the gate. There's a culture gap there that never closes. Never. It's why I'm thinking now that maybe this Year On The Other Side thing is healthy even if it *is* mandatory. A lot of this is from doing a lot of reading followed by a lot of thinking. (Hey, we've gotta have something on our minds when we're giving the hair its Hundred Strokes, otherwise it gets boring even for us. Calm only goes just so far, at least for me.) The rest of it is probably me taking a time machine two years into my own future and noticing the difference, catching the change-fairy in the act. Suddenly I feel a lot better about certain girls my age that I had crushes on getting together with guys two years older than me. They were the same age inside, after all. I don't need to say who; it turns out they all knew at the time, every single one of them, and were kind enough not to say anything. Well, guess what? Now we're friends. I don't get shy and tongue-tied around them, I don't lose track of what I'm doing when they show up, instead I can really enjoy them for what they always were before this whole hormones thing turned them into Mysterious People From The Future: my friends. Maybe the change has insulated me from all that by hiding the testosterone under a layer of estrogen. (What? Check your Biology books: girls have testosterone, just not as much of it, and there's this whole estrogen/progesterone thing running on top of it.) And, let's face it, I've got girl-programming running in my brain now, making me more apt to notice guys than girls; it's a part of this whole I'm-a-girl thing that I've had to accept. Or maybe the mystery is gone now that I've arrived in the future myself. I don't know. All I know right now is, right now they're people who look Just Like Me. And we're friends. This is cool. I guess. -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 17Sep08 *Seventeen on Seventeen* Thank you for the party. With the following qualifications, it was a lot of fun and I really enjoyed it. Qualifications: I have officially sworn off Themed Birthday Parties. I shall not run the gauntlet, and if elected I will not serve the cake. Truly, the mind boggles at the refined levels wherein the Theme Creators' intellects must dwell, and in the absence of comprehension I must henceforth abstain. The Twin Peaks birthday cake was a study in subtlety and understated aberrant psychology. Particularly expecting me to make the first cut, and to take that first bite right *there* without using hands. Of the themed party games, 'Pin The THAT Back On The Jen' was a triumph of sophisticated symbolism over native common sense. Especially when people with perfectly good blindfolds somehow unerringly wandered over to me rather than towards the two-dimensional cardboard replica on the wall while armed with said THAT already impaled on a pin. No matter who I hid behind. You will have duly noted that I did not venture _near_ the Hooters Dartboard game until well after end-of-play, when I had accounted for _all_ the darts and verified the absence of any spares in private hands. I just wanted to make sure that the three-dimensional Jen was not targeted by mistake instead of the cardboard one. I mean, Basic Biology here. If stuck with a dart, the two balloons that I went home with would not go softly _pop_, neither would they politely go _hiss_. Instead, they would cause the owner to emit extremely loud and unfriendly noises involving commitments to perform mayhem on the perpetrator. With extreme prejudice. At great length. So it was in your own interest that I would not pose alongside Miss Sudden-Deflation 2008 for photo-op. All things considered, I think it was a master-stroke of party planning and a Very Good Thing that no Responsible Adults were there to witness the festivities. As it was, both Male Parental Unit and Female Parental Unit were duly appreciative of the humor presented in the inevitable debriefing. I doubt they would have been so appreciative had they received the full visual impact. I mean, I'm female enough to be flattered that you think me attractive, but some of these things I would be embarrassed to wear in *bed*. Under a heavy quilt. Who is this Victoria person anyway and why can't she keep a secret? Which is why I was so thoroughly opposed to modeling said secrets. No matter how loud the chanting got. Seriously, guys, there were a few times where you scared me a little. I'm glad you girls were there with me. Not because of any 'us versus them' kind of thing, but to help keep it on an 'all one us' basis like a party's supposed to be. -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 24Sep08 *I do not think the Last Beach Blast of '08 was a good idea.* Let me count the reasons. That was the wrong beach to be an alternate. I don't care if it was the last one still open for the season. It had mosquitoes. It did not have cooking grilles or firepits. It did have Rangers to object to our creating same. Cold hot dogs is oxymoronic and the first two syllables are silent. Seeing how much *IT* had shrunk was not an adequate excuse for an all-day festival, not to anybody but guys and mosquitoes. Particularly for the girls, who see such as a minor curiosity rather than being of particularly major prurient interest, and are not fond of mosquitoes. Plus there were mosquitoes. Was there repellent? No, but there were mosquitoes. It got cold after dark. Blankets were duly brought out. One per two people. Hm, methinks there was a plan at work in how those blankets were divvied up one per guy. Perhaps he was meant to share it with the mosquitoes? Sunset comes earlier. So do the cold winds. So do the mosquitoes. They were goosebumps, okay? Both of them. So now you know for sure that when they vacuum-molded those things onto me they did not forget the detailing. Just like on all the other girls. Now that we were all reassured and satisfied on that point we could all go home. Away from the mosquitoes. I lied. They were mosquito bites. -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 04Oct08 *Report from the Front* Oops, that didn't sound right. I *don't* think I'm going to use that header anymore. (Stop laughing.) I think I'm beginning to understand this Boy Band thing just a little. But for me to pass on that understanding, we (meaning those of us who were or are or will be guys, me being in the once-and-future category) are going to have to talk about centerfold models first. That's right. Playboy, Penthouse, even (ecch) Hustler. You know, the ones where you're 'only reading the articles' if anybody's looking. The stuff we under-age types aren't even supposed to be exposed to until we're released into the wild, without a clue, to mate. As if that stopped us. All this estrogen flooding my system now hasn't erased *those* memories, it's only changed how I feel about them; I think I'm in the middle somewhere right now. Maybe that's why I can be so analytical about it. You know, the both-sides-now thing. Okay, think about it. There you are, out in public where you can't really do anything about it, maybe over at the Pubic Library downtown where they're sold, and you're staring at the latest centerfold. Why are you doing that? Repeat, this is not about you hidden safe in your own room with the door locked where what you do is your own business. This is in public where, however it makes you feel, you'll just have to put up with that for the rest of the day. What makes you look? What makes you *want* to look? I mean, let's face it, she's an impossible goal. You can look but you can never touch. You do know that, right? Look at her expression, no, look at her *eyes:* she's thinking about the money she's going to get for this photo shoot, money that will put food on her table. It's strictly business to her: she's a camera hooker. If you talked to her and she mentioned love, and she was honest, it'd be something like, she loves how people like you are good for business. No matter how much a vampire says she loves you, she's only comparing dining experiences. You know all that on some level. Yet you make an effort to look at her anyway, right? Why? It makes you feel more alive, right? On a gut level, it makes you feel a little more like you matter, like you haven't quite faded all the way back into the two- dimensional painted backdrop of real life yet. And that's a feeling we all need. We need to feel real. And, let's face it, she's a *safe* impossible goal. She's a specimen, pinned (or staked) down by the camera onto that page where she can't get loose and enter your life for real. You can stare at her as long as it suits you, but you're never going to have to experience how grumpy she is before breakfast or what she looks like without her makeup. She's never going to say something utterly vapid, or blow off something that matters a lot to you because she can't understand it and it doesn't matter enough to her for her to try. She's never going to spoil the mood. And, until you grow tired of how limited that all is (I mean, let's face it, she's just a printed image, made up of dots of colored inks on white paper, that's what you're really reacting to), you won't ever have to cope with your disappointment in her by hurrying to find someone else to stare at. You can dump her but she can't dump you. She's unattainable and *that's why she's safe* for you to fixate on. Not only for raising the flag on the old flagpole, but for something a lot deeper. Okay, *now* we can get to the Boy Band thing. Are you ready? Same thing. My buds have introduced me to the Boy Bands, and my _(remember: female now)_ brain wants to get caught up in that whole thing just a little. We girls can compare notes and fantasies, defend favorites while we keep an eye out for something better, and it stirs that something-deeper and makes us feel alive, just like the guys who are passing around the centerfolds. *Just* like the guys. See, they're safe, those boys. They sing and dance, they pose, and it's something to get the blood flowing. (And no, we are *not* going to talk about where it goes when it does that now. This whole subject already puts enough of it in my cheeks as blush that I'm going to have to change my whole makeup scheme to work around it, without any Comparative Anatomy.) But they're never going to get grabby when you're trying to have a serious discussion about how something makes you feel. They can't keep you nervous all evening that they might decide to use force when charm has failed. Their eyes always meet yours instead of CAT-scanning your chest or trying to use their X-Ray Vision to see if you're wearing a pad. They're never going to put you down for having ambitious goals because you're just a girl. They're airbrushed perfection *because* they're perfectly unattainable. Though that's the part of the illusion that my best buds don't want to focus on, because it would dispel the illusion. Any more than you want to zoom in on Miss June enough to see how the ink dots line up. What? You didn't think they're airbrushed? Come *on*, I know the crowd around the standup urinals taught you to be more cynical than that. They're airbrushed. Just like Miss June. Even their adorable paint-by-the-numbers quirks go through the Art Department on their way to Page Layout. Just like hers. But it's fun for my _(remember: female now)_ mind to imagine. They're safe, and it makes me feel more real. Just like you. -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 21Oct08 *Tell me again why I was supposed to be a cheerleader?* Oh, yes. I have friends who are still guys. Guys who want proof that I'm a girl. It's not like I need proof that I'm a girl. The identity police still come calling every month like clockwork just to see if I have the requisite plumbing for them to "palp" (lovely gynecological word, that, palp, almost like "pulp", which is what it leaves me feeling like--try it on your balls sometime), and leave the Red Badge of Inevitability at the door on the way out. They've been doing it since I started being a girl, and they'll keeping doing it until I start being a guy again *(they'd better).* So, why is it that I felt impelled to engage in an activity in which I am to wear skimpy clothing and *jump up and down*? Because they (G, T, G again, W, F and N, and not to forget S and S and S) *asked* me to. They thought I would look _cute_, they said, which is a word that I know from my guyhood days to mean _sexy_. Let me clue the guys in the congregation: by half-time, those secondary-characteristic orbs do _not_ feel sexy, they feel *pummeled*. Wearing a normal bra merely confines them in a smaller chamber which mitigates, or, if it continues long enough, *refines* the punishment by enabling its extension. Sports bras would help, but they do not match the Cheerleader Aesthetic, now, do they? That's why girls who are naturally apt to such work by virtue of possessing a trim physique are not recruited for such work, right? As opposed to those of us who were born to be mighty, or to whom the change machine returned coinage in improper fractions, right? (Betcha didn't know a girl could use such big words. Hey, my buds suggested most of 'em, and they were born that way! Ha!) I have in mind a slight revision to the tradition known as 'cheerleading'. It goes as follows. In addition to the current scantily-clad females of the girl persuasion (no matter how temporarily persuaded), there shall be boys clad only in jockstraps and speedo shirts. Where the girls carry pompoms, the boys shall each carry a large nerf *priapic wand* (if you don't know what that means, follow the link, dickhead), to be held in such a way that, each time one of the girls leaps up, daring her mammary glands to tear themselves free at last and float off into the stratosphere (or so I remember the standard guy impression of their contents, judging by the jokes that I unthinkingly believed when I first heard them--who starts these stupid things?), and extends her pompom-bedecked arms to the side as she does now, she shall fetch a mighty wallop to the top end of said wand, causing the nether end of said wand to clip the adjacent male mightily in the groin. I expect to see every one of you guys out on the field at 0700, dressed to rehearse. Equal pain for equal work. That's fair, isn't it? -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 01Nov08 *Ha, ha, ha.* I blame myself and that last entry for giving you all the costume idea, but... The sight of the nine of you in Jen's Cheerleader Kickline, with all the helium boobs floating away... I would have fetched all your Priapic Wands a mighty wallop if I wasn't laughing so hard. And if you hadn't won first prize with it. I had _no_ idea I was embarrassing myself in public in front of so many local people with this blog. Yeah, I get a little full of myself sometimes. Thanks. I needed that. I want a copy of the DVD. Maybe we'll do a fundraiser with it. Can we add all of you to the lineup, just like that, for the Thanksgiving Game? -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 27Nov08 *Let's not salute it, and not even say that we did.* Okay, guys, before we even get started... I've been there, done that. Okay? I *know* what that little head of yours is thinking while the big head is just trying to cope with the sudden loss of blood pressure. I know because I've been socially betrayed by the very same mutinous uprising. Now that we've got that out of the way... We're going to talk about that woody now. Yeah, I've talked to my friends, dealt with my own embarrassment, and now I think I'm ready to talk about it. It's natural, of course. It's what happens when your thoughts dwell on some goodlooking babe who's got your attention, and then you find that your body has just assumed that it's about to go on active duty, so it comes to attention too. Most of the time you've got a book handy to carry in figleaf position. A jacket over your arm, the back of a chair, almost anything will do. Don't think it's not noticed anyway, but what you do about it does send signals which we'll get to in a moment. What if you don't have anything handy to cover it with, to take it out of public view? Simple. *Leave it alone*. Don't apologize. Don't pay *any* attention to it and it'll go away. That I do know. And it really is the safest move. See, the problem is, if you draw attention to it, suddenly it's not just Nature in action anymore, now it's *you* doing it, and now it's a threat. Girl brains are just as capable of mentally undressing people as guy brains. As expected, girl brains normally mentally undress guys, and normally this goes back to that feels-more-real thing and there's no more harm done than when your guy brain is mentally undressing girls. Until something changes. Therein lies the problem. While you're sitting there, content to mentally undress me and not do anything about it other than that, behind your clothing One-Eyed Pete the Pirate is running up his Jolly Roger. And then my X-Ray Vision nimbly strips away the cloaking device and sees that snake coiled and poised and ready to strike. At me. This sudden vision is hard to accept with equanimity. It's okay, though, as long as it's *only* natural. That means that Nature did it and you're probably not going to go along with it. If you call attention to it, though, it suddenly feels like you mean it. And then I feel threatened, for reasons that haven't changed at all since Nature first started stocking this planet with human herds. They are as follows. You are male; I am not. You've got big muscles; I don't. You can probably force things before I can damage you enough to make you stop. And then you can get up and walk away afterwards, while I will probably get to feel the results every day for nine months, plus at least eighteen years of motherhood afterwards. Plus having to be female for most or all of those years because the kid needs me that way and my needs don't matter as much. Plus years and years of therapy. In other words, the threat is that you are going to make *all* of my life-choices for me, right now, against my will, by invading my body, and that I am physically helpless to oppose that. The hell of it is, I *know* that the big head doesn't intend any such thing; I've had this happen too, remember. But the big head might not have a choice if it hasn't learned caution. See, I've also had the little head do that sudden-reality-inversion thing on me, back when I had one, where stupidly aggressive actions suddenly seemed to make sense in a hazy sort of hormonally-overly-simplified way. It's that kind of 'what the *hell* got into me just then' self-humiliation that teaches you, or taught me, anyway, to be wary of letting my thoughts dwell on such things in public, as in, if there was anybody else in the room. But what if you haven't mastered that kind of being-wary thing yet? Remember, if it goes too far, you play but I pay. I think (since some of my good guy friends privately apologized afterward and asked me just what it was that crossed the line so we could avoid a repeat) that this also pins down just what was scaring me so much at my birthday party. I think that, without ever meaning more than good harmless highly-suggestive fun, you were triggering fears I didn't realize I had inherited along with the rest of my XX-Files. Fears of being raped. Believe it or not, the "carry a book there" figleaf cover does reduce the tension. It sends a signal that you don't really mean it, and that the big head is firmly in charge here. But do it so as to dispel attention, not attract it; if you're obvious about it, we're back to that "_uh-oh, he really means it_" thing again, and it is scary. This is probably a reason why us girls tend to cluster in herds large enough to repel a predator. Damn, I never thought the change would be this intense. -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 23Dec08 *Settle the Score* Two more guys from our school came home for Christmas; that makes an even twenty this year. This is not a Merry Christmas for their families. It was a joint service. I got to use my black dress again like I hoped I wouldn't. I knew those guys. It was not a happy time for me. It's strange, you know. Those guys were decent but not close friends. I knew them only when I was a guy. Had I attended their funerals as a guy, I would have been really depressed, and I would have missed those guys terribly, and maybe I would have gotten righteously pissed at how they died and why, but I would have probably stayed dry. Instead, me being the girl that I am now, I cried. The tears started when their parents stood up to say a few words, and they just wouldn't quit, I mean, TK had to drive for me because I couldn't see clearly through them. It really really got to me. That meant that it stayed on my mind, though. Preyed on it is more like it. Until I paid attention. We're not all that big a student body because we don't live in a big town. That makes the numbers harder to ignore. We lost twenty guys this year to one Oil War or another (because, let's face it, that's what they are: our government is holding up other countries at gunpoint for their oil). That's about three percent of our student body, over seven percent if you just count guys. That's *PER YEAR*. How long is a tour of duty? How many will come home alive? *ALL FOR WHAT?* We don't even have a Selective Service Lottery anymore. When you're old enough, you *will* go. It wouldn't be so bad if there was really any way to justify it, but this isn't a Hero War like World War II was, where people knew that the enemy would reach our shores soon if we didn't help stop them while they were fighting our friends, and a bunch of the guys volunteered to help save the world for freedom, even knowing that it would cost a lot of them their lives. This isn't that. I really really think we're working for the bad guys here. And, because of that, I'm wondering if I should skip the change in June and stay this way, rather than go kill somebodies and then have one of them kill me, for something I not only don't believe in but can't even excuse. There's something wrong when I have to tell my guy friends, "I think maybe you should be a girl for a few years because our government is going to *waste you for sure* if you're a guy." But... I think that's what I'm doing right now. Guys, it's a big change, but I'm still me. And, if I'm going to stay this way, I'd really rather a lot of you stayed *that* way, for purely natural and selfish reasons. But, more important, I'd really rather you stayed alive, all of you. I've learned a lot so far; I can help. And there are a *lot* of incredible friends of mine who helped me and I'm sure they'll help you. Maybe we'll be awfully short of guys for a while, but we won't lose as many permanently, like we've lost GAC and RP and CW and TN and... Dammit, am I ever going to stop crying?? -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 29Dec08 *Slight Change* One of my both-sides-now girlfriends just clued me to something. I just found out that you're allowed one final change for free, just after you get your diploma. So I'm going over to the blue side in June, because I feel that I need that. Especially if it's for the last time, I need to be a guy for my senior year. And then, if things haven't changed, I'm going back to the pink side, maybe for life. You guys who are currently guys and who aren't currently seniors, maybe this makes your plans, whatever they are, a little easier. I thought you should know. In case you missed it like I did. -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 13Jan09 *Fashion Or Survival* My amazing best buddies made sure I got some long skirts well in advance. As in, August. "You'll need them," said they. "You've got to be kidding me," said I. "It's damn hot outside," said I. "You'll see," said they. Now I see, and I am supremely grateful once again for the timeless girl wisdom and attention to girl details ( *my* girl details) with which they have guided me. Never mind that we look like an Eskimo choir when we walk around together all bundled up; at least we are halfway *warm*. Not that that sits well with the guys in the group. I get questions like, _Why don't you wear miniskirts anymore_? _Why do you hide everything now_? _Is this part of that new plans thing_? Now, I'll admit that I got lucky with that change machine. They said it tweaks up your genes, and that was _no lie_. So this is not something I did, this is something I got given. And this is not me bragging about me, this is me being grateful to a stupid machine for that Genetic Code Optimizing thing, for not having anything in the looks department to be really ashamed of. That said, I can admit that I like my legs. I like the way they look in a skirt. Even when I catch myself giving me a guy-look and spend way too much time staring in a mirror and get all embarrassed about it. I like the look and I want to show it off. The problem is, the air gets *cold* in the winter, and that air is not sitting still, it's got some real wind backing it up. So what little warm air is inside that little skirt gets replaced real quick by air that's freezing, and that's seriously not fun. So maybe you guys who are complaining about us girls hiding everything need a little object lession. Like maybe being thrown out in the snow in your underwear for an hour or so. Because that's kinda what a miniskirt is like. Maybe I need to stop shaving my legs. You know, get some real fur action going down there. Then I can wear those miniskirts and sheer pantyhose and still be warm. You guys'd like that, right? -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 14Feb09 *You Must Know This* You had me in tears. You know that. But you don't know why. Please sit down while I tell you. Today was... Well, it was a surprise. Valentine's Day was never too special for me before, for a lot of reasons, most of which amounted to my being too immature to appreciate it, and at least I realized that. To get cards today was... interesting, for what they illuminated about my current form, my current role, my current self, as seen by others. Thank you, everyone. Then there were the gifts. Not the chocolates. I threw those away. I thought they might be drugged and I didn't want to go there. On the off chance that you meant more than I thought, please accept my apologies. We do have a history, and I reacted to that. There were... three. One of you gave me a pin, and one of you gave me a charm for my bracelet, and one of you gave me a scarf. I want you to know that I was touched, deeply, by each of these. Individually. I'm telling you which ones because I really want each of you to know that I'm talking about you. Yes, you. You know who you are now. Now, please, listen, because you have to know this and I couldn't say it in person. You are special. Why? Because you took the trouble to understand, which didn't come easy. I know, because I don't find any of it easy to understand myself. I have dear friends who can help me with some of it. They're girls. They've seen both sides and they know which side they belong on. They can only help me just so far, though: they were born female, you see, and, as you know, I was not. And, as you know, I will not remain this way. So trying to pin down my female feelings is like catching wind in a Klien bottle, like halting a wave, like painting on a rainbow. Yes, I know I've just named those three gifts again, their symbols, as you each explained them to me. I told you they were special. You each told me that you cared about me, even knowing that things are temporary, and that you wanted me to have that gift so that I could remember being cared about. Even though the caring had to be, in some ways, as volatile, as evanescent as the form. That you hoped we could be good friends, without embarrassment, after we were back on the same side of the world, but that right now the caring went deeper than friendship and you wanted me to know that. I would tell you that I wasn't offended: how could I be? You understood. But that's why I don't have to tell you that: you understood. I just want you to know that I wasn't crying out of sorrow that it couldn't last. I was crying out of happiness that it could happen at all. You made me feel so good that even the crying felt good. You know who you are. Thank you. From the bottom of my heart, thank you. -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 22Feb09 *So she told me today...* (Those of you in the know, I don't have to tell you who _she_ is, and you can guess the rest. All the rest of you, just kick back. You don't need to know exactly who all the players are out here on the field to see how the game is going, and staying in the bleachers means you get a better chance to dodge the inevitable stray bullets, right? We are professionals at this, kids; do not try this stuff at home.) She told me today that she thought I should be a little nicer to someone, someone who was too shy to come and tell me outright how he felt about me. And I thought, but this is silly. I'm trying to treat everybody fairly, just because. Friends get all the behaviors in the Friends Agenda. Jerks get all the behaviors in the Jerks Agenda. Unmitigated Contemptible Assholes get... You get the drift. So why should I change all that, just because she surmises that she suspects that she has an inkling that someone might possibly in some respect and regard have feelings for me? I mean, feelings are nice, everybody's got some: they come in two main colors, Appropriate and Inappropriate, and some of the Inappropriates you have to pretty well put aside, bundled up and carefully labeled, until you're wearing a form in which they are Appropriate. I've *done* that, believe me, and it's really not something that you feel that you want to do, but it's something that you have to do. It feels like you're letting yourself down, letting opportunities go to waste, but you're letting yourself down if you don't. You don't pull them out and wave them around and blame everybody else *LOUDLY* for being in the wrong shape because the feelings don't fit. People aren't like that: they don't owe you feelings. We're not just talking about trading Manhattan for trinkets, here, this is a _life_. People don't owe you _let's-pretend this until that changes and then it will all fit together;_ nobody knows that it will, and the one thing I know is that the _let's-pretend_ won't work. Right now my girl brain likes guys. Prior to this latest adventure, I've got a sixteen-year history of just liking girls. The fact that right now those feelings are not there for those girls _(*NO* I'm not going to tell you who they are. Trust me, they don't want to know. They don't even want *me* to know.)_ tells me that when, at the end of this school year, the change machine returns me to the blue side of the gym, those feelings for guys won't be there. So expecting me to like a guy when I'm a guy again, when the guy won't even be honest that I'm a girl right now because he only likes guys, and is loudly unhappy unless I'm a girl-pretending-to-be-a-guy around him, is wasted emotional blackmail. I'm not anti-gay. I'm pro-truth. And for those of you guys who might have been wondering why I don't settle on one of you and get close, just think about this. In June I go back to being a guy. Unless you've got a change coming up then, that's exactly how long anything can last. And even if you do have a change scheduled, we don't know that either of us will have feelings for the other's new shape. Not unless you've got fourteen to seventeen years of guy-liking history behind you, and unless you're on that short list of girls, the one that I won't even look at right now because I literally *don't feel like it*, and unless I was and will be on *your* short list. Not that I blame you for having feelings right now. So do I, and I like feeling them. Some of you are very good about helping me feel good about feeling them, too, and I hope I help in turn. If you feel like this fits you, you should be feeling the gold star on your forehead right about now. Believe me, some of the other girls, the permanent ones, have that star's coordinates carefully noted for no later than when I leave the starfield. (We've talked about it; we've even gone over stellar navigation and orbital strategy. I *want* them to be good for you. You deserve it and each other.) But I know how long we don't have before those two bundles, Appropriate and Inappropriate, change places. So I zoomed out the camera and looked at everything all over again in the wider context, scrutinizing everything for potential conflict resolution, and reran the Standardized Temporary Girl's Evaluation And Selection Criteria For Association Classification, and you know what? Nothing changed except I reclassified a supposed friend as a neutral. Way off in the background, the UCA remained a UCA. Warning: The creep in the mirror is closer than (s)he appears. If there's someone in the room with you, stick out your elbow. It's good self-defense practice for you and for them. If not... take a good... long... hard.. look... for... yourself. I did. So should you. -jen ----------------------------------------------------------- 04Mar09