5:26 a.m. - 2002-01-26
Ms Leslie Feels the Same
This excerpt from the facial feminization group I read strikes a note with me. Except for the poem at the end, which is dumb.

"When I went out before my surgery, no amount of radiated joy, peace

or feminine panache would have kept me from being perceived oddly by

some. I'm not talking about passing here, I'm talking about how, as a

human being, people saw me. There was something askew, unconsciously

noticed, registered and tainting their vision of me. I want people to

*see me* clearly, not instead through some filter of doubt about who

I might be and am. Even as happy and upbeat as I was on my best days

prior to surgery with Dr. Ousterhout, the lines, curves and geometry

of my face that didn't belong to me abraded my confidence, eroded my

sense of self as surely as a steam can cleave a mountain, were as

wrong as a lock of hair that stands away from your scalp that no

amount of coaxing can keep down, and no amount of diversion can keep

others from noticing.

"I am sure that if facial reconstructive work did not exist, I would

have made the best of it, but I suspect that as much happiness as I

would have desperately mined out of life, the difference between who

I am and who my face said I was would have eaten away at me. Who *I*

am would have remained, as she did growing up, largely invisible, and

what a long shadow of sadness that would have cast across my life.

Who knows.

"Specific results vary in the details, but every woman looks female,

even if she is not said to be pretty. Does that make sense? I wanted

only to look my birthright and in so doing let people get past their

first glance at me and allow me the opportunity to share with them

all that is beautiful about me, which resides no where in my face

(though the happiness shines through more clearly now). Results

aside, FSRS allows me to not simply move through and "just exist" in

the world and society -- the best I could hope for beforehand -- but

to actively embrace it, to begin the real journey to find peace

within myself, or the possibility for it. Others see and perceive

that peacefulness and joy, acknowledging it and shining it back at me

in their own smiling eyes. It is a wonderful resonant and healing

cycle as the relaxed comfort in my own skin radiates from me to

others, who in turn sense my centeredness and reflect happiness back

at me - - - ."

She then quotes a beloved poet:

Every morning

the world is created.

Under the orange

sticks of the sun

the heaped

ashes of the night

turn into leaves again

and fasten themselves to the high branches ---

and the ponds appear

like black cloth

on which are painted islands

of summer lilies.

If it is your nature

to be happy

you will swim away along the soft trails

for hours, your imagination

alighting everywhere.

And if your spirit

carries within it

the thorn

that is heavier than lead ---

if it's all you can do

to keep on trudging ---

there is still

somewhere deep within you

a beast shouting that the earth

is exactly what it wanted ---

each pond with its blazing lilies

is a prayer heard and answered

lavishly,

every morning,

whether or not

you have ever dared to be happy,

whether or not

you have ever dared to pray.

- "Morning Poem" by Mary Oliver

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