Number 54

"Diet?" Did Someone Say "Diet?"

It's been awhile, I know. In the first place I had to get my diatribe about the Rock n' Roll Hall of Fame out of my system. In the second place I took some time to focus my writing energy on reaching out to individual friends and family. In the last place, by the time I accomplished the first two things, I had so much I wanted to blog about that I got stuck because I didn't no where to start. "Pick one, Nora,"
I said to myself, "and get going." So that's what I'm doing.

To the shock of exactly zero people, I make the following admission. I am a political liberal. Who knew, right? When it comes to social issues, I am a fierce ally to the many different groups of people whom those with privilege and power continue to marginalize. Heck, as a trans woman, the current president is actively trying to legislate me out of existence. The fucker.

But I'm not here to write about my political leanings today.

Just after the latest bloodletting in El Paso and Dayton, I took to FB and wrote the following: "I'm trying to diet using just thoughts and prayers. So far I've gained 10 pounds." I thought this was a most excellent example of the literary technique known as 'sarcasm' to describe the blathering inanity of politicians who offer "thoughts and prayers" after each mass shooting, but nothing else. Many, in fact, do their damnedest to prevent anything constructive from being done.

But I'm not here to write about my support of various gun control measures.

I received a fair number of responses to that post, but what was fascinating was that three women, from three different parts of my life, interpreted my comment literally. No shade on them - my wit tends to be rather dry, and I've been told by others that they don't always know if I'm being serious or not. Picking up sarcasm is even trickier when it's written.

In any event, these ladies offered my support with my dieting, that weight loss was a daunting and tricky proposition. One of them "welcomed me to the club, " because, as a newly minted female, I now got to experience the trials and travails of weight loss. I marveled about this apparently ubiquitous, socialized pressure to not appear over-weight which led three different, intelligent women to immediately assume that my comment, which actually had nothing to do with weight loss, was about weight loss.

As my transition continues, and I feel more and more at home with my female identity, my feelings about many things have shifted subtly. Sex discrimination is an example. Before, when I identified as a male, I certainly objected to it and knew that it was wrong and detestable. It made me angry. Now, while sex discrimination still conjures up all the same old feelings, an extra feeling of personal affront has been added to the mix. "How dare these things happen to us!" as opposed to "How dare these things happen to them!" if you will.

It was both powerful and unsettling feeling to be confronted by the various stigmas that women in our culture face when it comes to our physical appearance. They're bullshit, of course, these messages that women are bombarded with on the daily. Too fat, too skinny, too much make-up, not enough make-up, blah, blah, blah. I'm fortunate that I'm already 53. As a middle-aged woman, the 'Rules of Appearance" aren't quite as strict. I'm also lucky that I didn't grow up having all this shit about 'proper appearance' shoved down my throat when I was younger. But I sure as heck had a personal encounter with it the other day, and that was enough to know it sucks.