“New and Improved”
by Emery C. Walters
I can cuss all I want about my computer upgrading itself, but when I could no longer live as a woman, I was blessed to be able to upgrade into my true self. I’m not always crazy about being me, but at least I’m true. Pictures of the old me almost always show sadness. Or emptiness, maybe, while pictures now usually show a smile. I don’t know how much on the inside has changed, but at least what’s on the surface, is accurate.
How am I seen? Surface only, check. Past pain, nope. How the hell I got here (the hell I went through to get here), nope, except perhaps by those who have also walked through these particular woods, or similar, even worse perhaps, woods of their own. Those people see me, they see all of me, and love me anyhow because they’ve been there, same woods, different path. Others only see the ground beneath their feet and blame me for the rocks in it.
How do we separate how we see ourselves from how others see us, or how they used to see us? I have no idea. I sometimes struggle to only see the good parts of myself.
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A long time ago: His dreams are painful, full of hurt Are we two souls; are we berdache, |
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| And, decades later, after transition: | And right smack in between the two: |
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How much of her do I dare keep? |