Welcome to Litsy!

To all my trans friends & family, it‘s an honor to know you. My life is richer because you are in it. I see you, I celebrate you!!! #TransDayofVisability

I am afraid for my trans friends & family.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/7kxpky/leaked-emails-reveal-an-anti-trans-holy-w...

Shown: Carl and his wife, Lynette.

I loved this book. I felt joy for him in some moments, and heart break in others. This is the story of Carl. He transitioned during the Trump years, during the time of ‘#metoo‘. He transitioned at 50 years old, experienced both misogyny and privilege; lost who he thought were friends, and discovered how strong his marriage really was. Highly recommend. Also recommend: stand up for your trans friends and

The time it takes to transition a life, just a single life. We know there is never enough time to transition a country to become its best self. The shock of living through this time is feeling all the ways that people do not change, do not want you to change, and do not want the very thing they have pledged since their earliest school days, right hand over their heart: “liberty and justice for all.”

Multiple truths and bodies are possible.

Shown: the pansexual flag. This means, one is attracted to personality, not gender. Carl‘s statement above, is how I feel as a pan person.

It was a conversation that disappeared into my body, a body preferring to risk sickness or death rather than have a vaginal ultrasound.

(This is how Carl felt when he was told he had a cyst on his left ovary). 💔

In the rare moments I have thought about my female anatomy, it‘s only to consider how to make it disappear. I yearned for my mother‘s breast cancer to be the genetic kind so I could have a preventive double mastectomy, and was disappointed when she called me gleefully to tell me it wasn‘t.

Transitioning for a time is like pushing Polly off the top of a mountain. I have to burn down the house of Polly so that Carl can come out. It is an origin story, a state of creation, an unearthing of the him who has spent his whole life locked up, shape-shifting, sticking his head out periodically, but mostly living in a fight-or-flight state, just trying to survive. Polly was my friend and protector, but I wasn‘t her and she wasn‘t me. The

Why would anyone insist on mourning Polly? The joy of knowing you can finally see what I have always felt is a euphoria I never want to let go.

Shown: me and Amber, on the day she finally got her new DL, after her name was finally changed & legally recognized! She was so happy. She never told me her dead name, and I never asked. Why would I need to know? She‘s always been ‘Amber‘ and I love her so much. 🏳️‍⚧️

Transphobia isn‘t simply a fear of transgender people, or a misunderstanding of the interactions between nature and culture; it is the inability to inhabit what another body feels and properly link those feelings to thoughts and words.

Carl conveys all the messy (and joyful!) feelings and experiences that come with transitioning, especially doing so while married. I did find myself wishing he'd spent more time talking about toxic masculinity, though. Loved his writing style.

I don‘t know how to rate this book. Carl‘s memoir is about his family, his marriage, his struggle with gender roles, and the effects of his transition to becoming a man. It‘s completely out of my wheelhouse but, as a teacher, I‘ve noticed a growing number of students asking to be called a different gendered name and I wanted to understand it more. I still have a ways to go, and this book had more to offer than just gender transitions.