You Were Once an Asshole

Since the beginning of time, people of all kinds and types, flavors, and shades have graced this globe. There have been gays since day 1. Lesbians since day 1. Transgender people since day 1. Plus all the pans, bi’s, and aces. The list is a bit daunting for noobs. 

Sure, sex is for reproduction, but it’s also a communication method and may even have some biome-regulating features to it – all you little booty munchers. If sex was just for reproduction we wouldn’t have sex. We’d just chop off a finger and plant it in the ground. Surely we’d do something easier than date?

Here’s where that intersection works for me. I’m a transgender woman, which means until my transition gets a little more settled in if I want to have sex with a man they do too, kinda. The pilot is a gal but the print is a guy. For now. 

The gay and transgender communities have long been intertwined. We often get called the same names and run out of town on the same rails. 

The transgender “issue” baffles me. It’s a documented biological phenomenon that happens at a fairly regular and predictable rate. I’m a transgender woman and I got roped into the “I don’t gotta call you lady, bro!” stuff back when I was a strapping young lad chugging off the tit of the military-industrial complex. I get that, I watched it happen. I said it all too in a parrot attempt to appear as if I were the thing others wanted of me. I assumed it was our duty to suffer. For Queen and Country and all that jazz. 

That mentality impacts a lot of people. It is not your duty to suffer for someone else’s comfort or opinions or any other horseshit in their head. You’re allowed to suffer to cause others to eat, drink, and be merry. You’re allowed to suffer when you have someone you must protect or look out for. 

I, Jenny Durden, Great Khan of the Earth … just kidding … but I, Jenny Durden (*Stevie Saile) former United States Air Force Staff Sergeant at least, say “no more.”

Just as I’ve had to re-leather my skin after coming out, you will have to toughen up. That doesn’t mean being a brute it means being a wall. Be in the way. Be a thing that can be leaned on. Be a thing others can shelter behind. Be ready for the catapults and battering rams. 

At the time I write this, I am knee-deep into my transition and I have the facial hair and breasts of both a thirteen-year-old boy and girl. I have what I call “Cop Head.” I have the jawline of a Jeep Cherokee and the hairline of Jean Luc Picard. Not to mention my Johnny Cash voice hands and basketball palm grip.

I’m also told none of this is true. I’m told the stubble is either not noticeable or kinda hot. I get told in makeup, without it, dolled up, and dressed down, get told that I’m pretty or handsome; that I have bone structure to kill for – man or woman. I have wild smokey blue eyes. One of my laughs will be your favorite memory of me. Dysmorphia is real and it blows.

Find a friend that tells you you’re cute and always trust them before you trust yourself. At least until you get the hang of realizing how great you are.

I love everyone, but my circle is close. Right now that circle is two people – including myself. My Hand is a fella called Gunny Ender whose name matches both the book Ender’s Game and the concept of being an ender; one who is somehow outside the “end” because they are the thing that ended it. Nicest fella not to fuck with.

There is a well-deserved fury in him that he graciously tempers for those around him. I see it kill him. He sees this kill me. He doesn’t butter me up but he does let me know I’m an asshole for worrying about how I look. Among veterans that is very close to being the same. 

“Do I look good in this?”

“Of course you do, Bitch.”

Get you one of those and never let them go. Back to biology.

Human beings are these things called Deuterostomes. That’s a big fancy word that means the first identifiable feature on all human fetuses is their asshole. Every one of us starts this life as a tiny little asshole. Remember that.; you used to be an asshole.

Gradually in gestation, the fetus develops more fully and in its first full form where it looks like a thing you can guess will be a person, well, it’s a girl. You were a girl; for at least a little while.

At some point, the little girl fetus gets a signal to kick into boy mode. Their little parts go inside out and they start getting new data to get the process of becoming a fella underway.

So the trans in transgender happens somewhere in there. Somehow the 

For me that happened very late. Fetal me looked like a girl and carried like a girl and sonogrammed like a girl—until the very last minute.

Not all of us end up in this situation due to the same reasons, but all to the same circumstance—we are human too. We are the tip of the smear just like any other. Whether we are MtF or FtM or NB (I’m learning codes, kids!) we all began as things on our way to something else; and we were interrupted. 

I think it’s pretty cool. I always did. I’m a chef and variety is the spice of life. Mix it up, gang. Get interesting friends.

Until this point, I’ve simply never let myself have these thoughts. I never imagined a life lived on my own terms. I never imagined a life lived for me.