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Saturday, 10 February 2001 (sealed up with virgin stitch) 7:04am From Salon's extremely negative review of Hannibal:
Well, heck. Now I have to see it.
After an emotionally grueling morning, we found ourselves at the gym. Finally. It was a spur-of-the-moment decision, the only kind which seemed to have a chance of working—less buildup means less of an opporunity to talk ourselves out of it. The idea, of course, was to make it a habit again. Whether that happens remains to be seen. Sunday's no good because we'll be at Howard's most of the day, and Monday night Maddy has her belly-dancing class (not to mention it's might be a long night at work for me), Tuesday morning I'm taking my car to the garage...et cetera. You get the idea. Being Saturday afternoon the place was crowded, but I managed to find one of the crappy old treadmills that A) wasn't being used and B) wasn't displaying the words "REWAX BELT" on the LED. Some of the machines have been saying that since '98, and I'm guessing the belt-rewaxing won't be happening anytime soon. '98 was also when the gym stopped carrying magazine racks, so I'd had to start bringing my own along. Presently, on the rack was the fascinating but physically unwieldy book I was reading—Celluloid Mavericks, the kind of film history book which is like porn to me—and my discman, spinning Holy Wood. The book didn't really need to be there since I'd rediscovered how hard it is to read on a treadmill, but I'd already gotten started and didn't want to stop to put it on the ground. That kind of peculiar laziness that comes with running at 4.5 MPH. About fifteen minutes in I wished I had, since it all went flying. I'm still not sure what I did wrong; presumably in moving my arms one of them went farther than it should have, making contact with the rack. Newtonian physics took care of the rest, bringing to me much more attention than I'd desired. (Maddy, who was half a gym away at the time, didn't seem to notice.) I picked up my stuff and got back on the proverbial horse. In spite of that, we'll be going back again. And again. Really. I'm sure.
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Friday, 9 February 2001 (prosthetic synthesis with butterfly) 9:13am When I was in the fifth or sixth grade, I broke a chair. More accurately, the chair broke when I sat down on it. Perhaps it might have happened regardless of who it was, I don't know. But it was me, and was a source of no small amusement for my classmates. (The person whom I considered to be my best friend never let me forget it, and it wasn't always in a good-natured manner, either. By the time we reached high school, we barely had anything to do with one another. He'd made it with the cool kids, and I spiralled into my own kind of social ineptitude, a Veronica Sawyer/Betty Finn kinda thing. But there were others.) It was a perfect example of why I hated my body, even then. I had been taller than most of my classmates since kindergarten, I was expanding horizontally, and it was getting to be that time in a young boy's life when things start to happen down there...anyway, the point is I'd always felt like the proverbial bull in a china shop, and that just made it worse. I was big and uncoordinated, and I didn't want to be. Everything I touched, I destroyed. When I read Of Mice and Men a few years later, I identified with Lenny far more than I wanted to. (And don't even ask what it did to me when Sherilyn Fenn played Curley's wife in '92.)
Anyway, that's what it felt like when I broke the mechanism that opens the hood of my car last night.
It's a curved lever with a silhouette of the car with the hood up, and when you pull on it, the hood
goes up. Except for last night, when the thing broke. I'm sure it's probably just shoddy engineering
(the lever is made of light plastic) and was bound to break eventually, but still it feels like I did
it. As always, everything I touch, I destroy. Because that's how I was made, whether I like it or not.
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Thursday, 8 February 2001 (burning world) 10:02am So I responded to my father...
...and he replied.
It's either very strange to hear him talking like this, or it's exactly what
I should have expected. I'm honestly not sure which. My mother's reaction
was certainly much more intense, the opposite of my father's laissez faire
attitude. Which pretty well sums up how they've always reacted, I suppose.
My mother has accused my father of being too self-absorbed to care
about his children's lives, and she may be right. I'd be lying if I said I'd
have it any other way; I suppose it would be different if I was his only
child, rather than his fourth. (Well, fifth, but pick pick.)
But he has the son with his name, the red sports car, and the blonde he's always wanted.
So it's all good.
I also just realized how incredibly thin she is. Like a rail. It goes without saying that I'm jealous. But why? Her body type is very different from mine. I'm not built like that. Period. It's not like she's accomplishing something which I'm capable of. I'm reminded of a girl we saw at the Jonathan Richman show in December. Costanza and I agreed that in body shape (very thin) and hairstyle (short hair with bangs) she was reminiscent of Emo Phillips. The truly sad part is, I still admired her for her looks. Hell, I was once told when I had my hair down and sunglasses on that I looked like Howard Stern. That one hurt. Emo would be a vast improvement.
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Wednesday, 7 February 2001 (the process) 6:48am Ah. Now we've made it into the "legitimate" media. Even our own. I'm expecting a frantic call from my mom. 9:17am On the F line this morning, a woman sitting behind us was reading a story to her son, aloud. And the kid was certainly old enough to read. I haven't decided if my level of annoyance was justified—among other things, it was difficult to concentrate on my book—or if I'm just grouchy.
My father wrote last night. He was able to finish my taxes without last year's
return; I owe, but I have enough in savings to cover it.
Now, I could point out that I haven't been a teenager for several years (and that I was extremely mellow by teenage
standards), but I won't.
I'll just take it for what it is: that my father's cool with me. Which is a good thing.
today i am dirty It's hard to tell what you've lost, what you ever had in the first place, what you can get back. It's best not to think about it, or anything at all.
lamb of god have mercy on us
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Tuesday, 6 February 2001 (love's secret domain) 10:24am Along with thick hair, a slow metabolism and a tendency towards alcoholism (the latter two I battle with varying levels of success), being a pack rat seems to run in my family. I've been trying to overcome it lately, in the form of throwing stuff away. Lots of it. Lately it's been in the form of videotapes, and I have a fair amount of paper products awaiting extermination. And, yet, I can't find my tax return from last year. I filed electronically, and part of that involves printing out a copy of the return for my records. Which I did. I'm sure I did. I have it from the year before, the first time I filed electronically—both printed out and as a pdf—so if I got it right the first time then I surely I got it right the second time, yes? Or was I just so distracted last year that I neglected that step? I've looked in all the obvious places, particularly the big stack o' tax forms. Not there. Time to go through everything in the office again, and if that doesn't work, a Level 3 diagnostic at home. And, if worse comes to absolute worse, I'll call the IRS and ask for a copy. Which would take forever, but might be my best bet.
Although I have most of my tax returns from the last ten years, this is the
first time I've actually ever needed one after filing. It's at the request
of my father, who's doing my taxes this year. So, you can well imagine why
I don't want to tell him that I've apparently lost it. I'm not worried that
he'll get angry or anything like that, but, good lord, I'm not sure I can
handle that level of embarrassment. I'd like him to think that I have my
shit together, and this would suggest otherwise.
The tricky part will be sticking to our original plans of going to the gym tonight,
rather than just plopping down on the couch and continuing our MST3K marathon. I suspect
the potential guilt of staying home will be a strong motivator.
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Monday, 5 February 2001 (candy apple grey) 6:34am Many people hate San Francisco for many reasons, all of which are valid. There's a lot wrong with this place, and I wouldn't try to convince anyone otherwise.
When you're driving here from Fresno, though, it takes on the air of
Paradise, and you can't reach it soon enough. For the time being,
I'd rather be here than anywhere else.
Madeline's going to a belly-dancing class tonight. I'm very proud of her for that.
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Sunday, 4 February 2001 (zen arcade) 10:18am So, am I prodigal?
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Saturday, 3 February 2001 (reoccurring dreams) 8:44am I managed to shave without cutting myself, which I'm going to interpret as a good sign. I'll probably be tempted to do a quick touch-up at my mom's this afternoon. I suspect that would be bad. The question is again raised, at least in my mind, why did I wait so long for this? I'm not sure. All I know is that two years ago, when the coming out process more or less began, it didn't seem like an option. The energy necessary for it simply wasn't there. Between the breakup and dealing with my mom and everything else, having to explain all this to my father just wasn't a priority. After all, it he hadn't made a priority of telling me about getting remarried, or of my older half-brother. Little things like that. So this could wait, too. I suppose I went with the path of least resistance in terms of who I told. I think I told jonco first, on the phone sometime in early '98, before I'd even started to see a shrink. Then came barefoot, whom I told in person later that year when we driving back to the Bay Area from Fresno. (I don't remember the exact circumstances, but presumably we'd both been in town, and The Ex had to stay longer for some reason.) I'll always remember the look on barefoot's face; it was somewhere between shock and incomprehension. It wasn't that he unfamiliar with the concept of transsexuality, or had a problem with queerness—after all, among his best friends was his wife's openly gay (some might say flaming) cousin, who had been in their wedding party the previous year. No, he simlpy hadn't expected this sort of thing coming from my direction. I'd totally shattered his veneer of ironic detachment. It was a proud moment. I officially came out to my mother almost exactly two years ago, but that story's been told. Anyway, this is going to be a little different. He already knows, and although he doesn't really understand, so I'm sure I'll have some explaining to do. Not the first time it's happened.
We got him a Borders gift certificate for his birthday, and as I was filling it
out, I realize that no matter what the nature of my relationship with him has been,
there's still something very odd in presenting myself to him as "Sherilyn."
Anything to get my taxes done, huh? (I kid, of course.)
From my father, anyway, about the obvious. Almost immediately after the introductions we started talking taxes. (For the first time in pretty much ever, he's doing them for me. I left my various forms with him—which, I have to admit, makes me kinda nervous, though I'm not sure why—and will be faxing him a few others that he needs. No more quick'n'easy online filing, I guess.) Over the course of the next five hours the conversation veered in many directions, but never once was I and what I'm doing the topic. My mom had warned me ahead of time that might be the case, to not take it personally if he doesn't appear to show a, well, personal interest in me as a person. So to speak. And I didn't take it personally. He was still accepting me into his home with no apparent objections, and still seems to think highly of me, making occasional references to what he considers to be my high level of intelligence. It wasn't "It's a shame that you're wasting that intellect" kinda stuff, either. I suppose an argument could be made that he's boasting about his seed, but even I'm not quite that cynical. (Really, I'm not.) Both he and his wife referred to me in male proper and pronoun, but I wasn't expecting anything different. I did happen to notice that on his calendar for tonight he'd marked "Dinner w/ S." Which must mean something. His wife—whom, I should point out, twice made reference to them being married, thus raising the total number of times either of them have admitted it in my presence to two—talked to Maddy semi-privately shortly before we left. She said they weren't sure what to expect, but that I looked good (a few minutes later she upgraded it to "beautiful") and that my appearance was quite feminine. I don't suppose either of them have seen me since I lost the majority of my former weight, so that probably has something to do with it, but it was a nice compliment nonetheless. She also confirmed that my father has no objections to my transitioning (perhaps proving my mother's theory, perhaps not), and that they're glad that Maddy's with me, that I'm not going through it alone. I couldn't agree more. My 14 year-old niece, the younger of the two, happened to be spending the weekend with them. She joined us for dinner, and spent the rest of the time at the computer. Heh. That's exactly what I would have done at her age. Hell, I once hid from a birthday party for me (thrown by my parents over my objections) in that very same room. Benjamin Braddock is still the voice of the young generation, it seems.
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Friday, 2 February 2001 (song for dead time) 6:34am Leave it to Salon to shatter the myth of el toro rojo. Oh well. Manson isn't playing Willy Wonka, either. (Which is a good thing, because, y'know, he sucks and he'd ruin it.) 8:52am Yesterday, John Ashcroft was confirmed as Attorney General. That same day, the parking lot next to my office raised its rates from $12 to $15.
Coincidence? Not damn likely. Wake up, people!
I can't help feeling guilty that I'm thinking in those terms. I probably shouldn't, though, since even my mother
encouraged me to use taxes as a means of communicating with him. But it seems wrong, somehow, which is one of
the reasons why I haven't mentioned tax stuff to him at all in the context of tomorrow. Although he probably knows it's
coming.
Anyway, ten years ago when (digital) laserdiscs were just starting to make inroads, the most we could hope for was a decent transfer of the film, and maybe a trailer. In the unlikely event that there were extras, they'd cost a lot more, often between $60 and $100. (Side note: this is often what the regular VHS versions of the movie would cost, since video stores would often have to buy dozens of copies of certain titles to meet demand. This is called being "priced for rental." Later, after it ceased being a "Hot New Release," the price would usually be marked down to ~$20 for the consumers who actually wanted to own a copy. The fact that brand new DVDs are regularly priced in that same range, it seems to me, is a fundamental shift in the economics of the video business, and if you'd told me in the early nineties that it would happen, I'd have predicted that the entire industry would collapse. One of these days I should ask Stanley how much it's really changed.) I drooled over a lot of laserdisc box sets, eventually breaking down and getting a few like Tron and Natural Born Killers. Oh, and 1941. Yes, I have a weakness for big-budget flops. (Though I haven't seen Battlefield Earth yet. I'm working on it.)
Not every movie released on DVD has extras, of course, not even if they'd had them on laserdisc; the aforementioned Tron
and especially Coppola's Dracula are positively skimpy compared to their laserdisc ancestors. Still, though, these days
even commercials for stuff like Coyote Ugly and Shanghai Noon trumpet all the extras on the DVD, the kind of thing
which only used to be marketed to select geeks such as myself. To me, that's proof we're in the World of Tomorrow.
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Thursday, 1 February 2001 (when she breathes) 9:13am Shaved this morning, finally. I guess it's been three weeks since I last shaved (the morning of the Neil show), and a week and a half since I got zapped. Seems about right. I'm feeling no small amount of anxiety about the condition of my face. It looks blasted to me, and of course my upper lip still appears dark. I suppose it probably always will, to me. Even if nobody else notices. Since I can't think of anything else to get him (I kinda shot my book-giving wad with Cryptonomicon over xmas, and I haven't read anything else lately which he might like), I'll probably be getting my father a gift certificate from Borders. Yeah, it's chickenshit, I know, but I think it falls into the "better than nothing" category. Or maybe the "it's the thought that counts" one. Something like that.
The really sad part is, we won't have a chance while we're in Fresno to eat at
The Chicken Pie Shop. Next time, definitely.
I've been off the Meridia for a few months now, and I'm really feeling it. My appetite feels more like it did
a couple years back, before I started. I don't like that. It scares me. It means it really is coming back
down to me and my willpower.
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