The C word

For the first time today a doctor was brave enough to tell me it might be cancer. We should know next week after surgery. Best case is I end up with a little scar on my throat. Worst case is that I never talk again and so can’t complain as I die of cancer over the next few months. Sorry, but I’m really grumpy and cynical these days. I feel like shit, I have a cough that will clear a subway car of all passengers in a single stop, I feel so weak, so tired, I ache. I don’t like the idea of having a blow hole punched in my neck. I get asked all the time how long this has been going on. My answer lately is that I guess it’s been getting worse over a period of years. Of course, two years ago I weighed 70-80 pounds more than I do today. It was easy to shrug it off, saying “of course I get out of breath, I’m fat!” But then I lost all of that weight and people still often commented on how easily I would get out of breath. I still ignored it. Just today Lisa stopped by my office to check on me and was asking this question, and I was saying that it had only been really bad recently. She immediately countered “that’s not right, you were telling me last summer how you couldn’t swim across a pond.” Whoa. Smart cookie, that Lisa, she was referring to this story from last August. It made me wonder, did I document earlier cases of breathing problems? I searched, but apparently the answer is no. It’s not that I didn’t have problems. See, by August there, I was so familiar with having trouble breathing that I just mentioned it in passing in that story. I was just ignoring the unusualness of it, and the seriousness of it. It wasn’t until I started having those terrible muscle spasms that I finally went in to see Dr. Bershel. Then that little jail sentence got in the way, then the house arrest, so here six months later I have doctors scheduling surgery for me on a day they previously had scheduled vacation time. It’s scary.

Happy Sonia news is that I had lots of fun Friday at the goth/fetish “Night of the Dolls” at TT The Bear’s Place. I went with Jessica, the only one I could claim for sure as being there with me. But then Ashley ended up bringing the whole Sisters of Boston gang, so I had a wonderful time seeing lots of my friends. I was really struggling with the coughing and stuff and so stayed off the dance floor for the whole night. Finally had a nice conversation with Michelle, after we had traded emails over the last couple of months. Also–I know I’ll miss people–but also seen that night was Holly, Jacinda, Danielle, Wendy, Denise, and Sabrina!

Saturday I was at Jacque’s for a FoRCC Diana roll call. Again lots of fun. Three girls there were kind of Sisters of Boston girls and sat together. I wanted to get them to meet Diana and mix with some of the other girls but was only partially successful. Diana is always in demand and I’m too timid to just interrupt and say “Diana, I have some friends I’d like you to meet…” Lace kind of stepped up to that role though. She was great at talking with everybody. Fun girl. I do hope I don’t die, so I get more chances to go dancing with her. They came with Michelle, but then there were I think four Michelle t-girls there before the night was over. There ended up being a nice little crowd from FoRCC. Sharon came! Rebecca. Paula! Again, lots I’m forgetting.

Stay tuned for tomorrow. Busy day. I’m going to start with a visit to Dr. Bershel’s office. Then work, I think, and then the theater!

Delicious

For the rest of the evening, (yes, after seeing Lynn and Rhonda) I decided to spend some precious dollars going to Jacque’s. Jessica had said she would be there with Debra, and I rationalized it further telling myself I might involve some people in conversation about my ideas for a new social group. Jessica was there already when I arrived. She introduced me to Debra. Both Debra and I thought each other looked familiar but otherwise didn’t remember meeting before. I spotted Deanna and waved hello to her. A number of other people there are familiar faces, but sadly, I haven’t been social enough to get to know them. (Hm, some chance I have of engaging anyone in conversation.) Debra and I were reading a posted flier about next week’s bands downstairs. I said I had never gone downstairs to listen to the bands. She said “don’t. the music is awful.”

Well I can’t pass up a challenge like that! I went right down to find out for myself. It was a cool punk band making an incredible amount of noise. Drums, guitar, guitar, bass, vocals. The vocalist wore her Manic Panic hair up in tight little pig tails, was young, cute, fat, dressed in black PVC, and was just shredding her throat into the mic. I liked watching the bass player. The band had a good fan club there to support them. I’m not sure, of course, but I may have been the only trans person there. No one else was very obviously trans anyway.

Back upstairs after that band’s set, I chatted and mingled a little bit more. One guy interested in talking to me was rather younger than most of the other guys, and very good looking. He was interested enough to buy me a drink. He was interested enough to invite me to go to another club for dancing! I was defenseless at this point. I told him I knew where we could go, said goodbye to Jessica, and we were out the door.I led us one block over to Rumor where, at midnight now, the line was wrapped around the block. My date took one look at the line and asked where else we could go, but of course I thought there might still be a chance. I walked right up to the ropes at the door and sure enough, there was Maria. “Sonia!!!!” she shouted, stretching out her arms to me. “Long time, no see, blah, blah, blah…can you get me in?” I pleaded. With one motion she unhooked the red velvet rope and waved us in. Inside, I got the same reception from Mandy when she saw me. It was so cool to be known. The place was the same, the music was good. I loved being back at that place. I loved being there with this lovely little snack cake of a man. House music obviously wasn’t his thing, but he didn’t care. He was just there entertaining me for a bit. I had to explain Rise to him a few times before it finally sank in that at 1:30 then, there were five more hours of dancing left. Ha. He, of course, wasn’t up for it. That’s ok. He bought me drink at Jacque’s, paid our admission to Rumor, paid for the coat check, paid for another drink inside, paid for a cab to his place in Cambridge. Omg, and he was so cute. He was very shy about admitting it, but he was a doctorate student at MIT. At his place, we used each other well and then I took a cab home. Omg, did I really just do that? Omg, how awful am I? Omg, and how delicious was that?

Actually, before “home”–Stacy’s place–I went to my office to shower. Crawled in bed with Jessica *very* late, slept,

Bachelorettes to capacity

The next day, I processed asteroid data from Dina’s bedroom computer and we took our time getting cleaned up and ready to go back out in the evening. We met Danielle and went to Lauren for dinner. It was really nice to spend time with just the two of them, trade stories, and get to know each other better. They were wanting to come up with some activity that we do next, they suggested Jacque’s, and I couldn’t resist. It was Saturday night and Jacque’s would be fun. It turned out not be fun getting through the door. When we arrived we were told that the place was at capacity and we couldn’t go in. Dina snuck in through the smoking door after a while, but when Danielle and I tried, we got caught and sent back outside. We were standing around talking when Jon came out. He discovered that we weren’t allowed in an threw a nice little fit for the bouncer, deploring that the girls that the place exists for are kept out while the bachelorette parties fill the place. Who knows if the protest did the trick or not, but after a few minutes, we were allowed in. Inside it was fun to hang out, it was fun to see Jon and Vicky again, since I’ve met them a couple of times but still hardly know them. And it was fun to see the other Sonia again. I heard someone say “Sonia” behind my back, and my first thought was, “that’s right! I remember meeting another Sonia here on a Saturday night.” Funniest line of the night was from Vivian (? I think that was her name) who was listening as Jon and Vicky were explaining that it was her who introduced them eighteen years ago. There was a little pause and Vivian shyly said “I was ten years old”–A funny way of saying either “I’m embarrassed at the lower bound that was just placed on my true age” or “I’m 28 now” which is of course a funny reference to the way that through makeup, clothes, and starry eyes, we all typically look much younger than we really are. Just before midnight I dashed out the door to catch the subway before it turned into a pumpkin. Home after a long Friday, I slept hard. In fact, all of Sunday went to sleep and rest, with the cell phone turned off.

Daphne’s girlfriend

Saturday I was sitting around being lazy until Al came home and reminded me that today was Art Beat, an annual street fair here in Davis Square. I remembered going last year with Jessica and thought it would be fun to go again. At least I think the fair was called Art Beat last year. This year, it seemed to be named Art Beast. Maybe I got it wrong last year? Maybe it got renamed? I kind of had in mind that I might buy a little something, and was going from booth to booth making mental notes of possibilities, when I found a necklace. I touched it and just couldn’t take my finger off of it. I had to buy it. It was nice and only $14 when I thought similar necklaces were running around $50. I also kind of had in mind running into someone I knew. It’s become so common that I run into people I know that I just expected to be surprised. I’d wandered through most of the fair and hadn’t seen anyone I knew when finally I ran into Laurie that I knew from MTPC. I showed her my necklace and modeled it. She said it was nice but the one I was already wearing looked better with my outfit.

Home, I started getting ready to go to Tiffany Club in the evening. I got cleaned up a little, put on a different top, decided it worked better with the new necklace, if the necklace were only longer. A silver chain did the trick, and I was out for the evening. Tiffany Club was nice. I talked a lot with Jessica, a little bit with some others. It was a quiet, easy evening. Took the bus back to Cambridge and walked into Charlie’s Kitchen a little after midnight. Drank, read some of “Trumpet”, drank more, talked with some of the regulars, drank more, walked home.

Woke up around 11 on Sunday, but it wasn’t until after 2 that the hangover started to fade. I made some really good chicken salad and started getting cleaned up to go out tonight to Jacques. The special event tonight was an Imperial Court fund raiser where Daphne was going to perform. Daphne looked fabulous of course, the show was good, but it was especially fun to be there as “Daphne’s girlfriend.” The Court crowd seems really warm, friendly, close.

Summer love

Nearly two months since my last post. I don’t know why. I do have a lot of notes from June. I’ll add them later and just write a couple of little things for now.

In my last post I wrote about seeing Daphne at RCC on May 26th. I guess that’s our day. Cuz…we’ve kind of been together since that day. Is it love? I don’t know… Sometimes we use the l-word. Not very often though. I think it’s a little bit new and different for both of us. Maybe because of that we’re both being a bit cautious. I just counted though and it’s been 7 1/2 weeks. Something’s there for sure.

It wouldn’t be a Sonia post without documentation of a night of drinking though, so here was last night at least. I’d decided not to go to the FTMSOFFA gathering, I’d decided not to go to Sisters of Worcester, and I was just sitting in my room picking at my face when Stacy called and invited me over. I told her I’d be over after I ate. I fixed a nice dinner of a chicken sandwich, some cauliflower and some soybeans, went over to Stacy and Jessicas, and (um, with the way they were dressed) suggested that we go to Jacques.

We went and had nice time. It was nice to see Deanna still working there as cocktail waitress and talk to her for a bit. It was very nice to talk with an admirer there named Steve. Otherwise had a simple evening of hanging out with my girls and drinking beer.

Disappointment

Sunday when I got home, Al surprised me by asking if I wanted to shopping with him at Garment District. Of course I did! He bought a couple of pairs of jeans and I bought a couple of tops. I could have spent so much time there though. Home, I took my time getting ready to go out to Jacque’s. The special attraction was that Daphne was going to perform on stage as part of an Imperial Court fund raiser. Now, the advertised start time for shows at Jacque’s is usually 10pm, and for drag queens, that means about 10:30. I walked in just a few minutes after 10 and expected to be just in time to find a seat and order a drink before the show started. Wrong. The fundraiser was just ending. I had missed Daphne! I felt awful! Apparently when Daphne had told me that the fundraiser would be *before* the regular show, it went in one ear and out the other. I’m such an idiot. So, I got to see her for just a few minutes. Got to see her pout, got to apologize for being an idiot, and that was all. She had to be up early for work and couldn’t stay out late. I stayed and watched the regular show, Mizery and Crystal were amazing as always, even performing for an almost totally empty house on this Sunday night.

Youth Pride

Saturday, I was up and back in Meredith’s 5 1/2” heels to go to Youth Pride. Gunner had put out a call for supporters for Youth Pride, explaining that they had each other, a few parents, and possibly otherwise just protesters. It would be nice if there were some supporters to balance out any protesters. I was impressed with the size of the rally. Lots of people, lots of vendors, a big march through the streets of Boston, escorted by police. I saw a few people I knew from the community, but not many. Gunner, Aliza, and there was a small contingent of drag queens. I don’t know them well, but I recognized Becca and went and said hi to her. She was pleased although a bit surprised because she didn’t recognize me. I didn’t really expect her to though, I’d never talked to her before more than complimenting her after a performance at Jacque’s.

Home, changed out of the queer look and into a blending look, and went right back toward downtown to go sailing. Went out by myself for just a few minutes then was back to get gloves out of my locker to protect my delicate little hands, then went out for a nice long sail by myself. I was putting my sails away when they called over the PA system for any member to take someone out for instruction. The day was beautiful still, I had no important plans for the evening, so…it was time for my next big acceptance test. I went up to the dock house and said I could take someone out for instruction. The guys at the dock house looked a little flustered and started to make excuses that they didn’t know where this person was. I thought I’d give them an out if they wanted it. “I have to go to the restroom real quick” I said. “I’ll be right back if she shows up.” That would give them a chance to talk amongst themselves, maybe ask this person if they would go out on a boat with a tranny, maybe make up some lie. Do I give myself too little credit? I don’t know. This is all new to me. I went to the restroom as they paged the person that wanted instruction. I came back and she was waiting for me. I introduced myself and she blinked, just slightly startled at the realization that her instructor was a tranny. Obviously the guys at the dock house had decided to just play it straight, and watch what happened. Turns out we had a good sail. It was her first time in a sailboat. She did great. It was my first time to take anyone out for instruction since summer before last. It felt like old times.

Like a good girl

After the salon, I went straight down to the dock in hopes of sailing. Sadly, there was no wind so I ended up just watching the sunset. Later in the evening, deciding against a late night at Rise, I went to Jacque’s, looking to see just how different the place is on a Saturday. It turned out to be really cool. I talked to a couple of regulars, including Jon from URNA. I think I’d met him just once before, at First Event, and that was just an introduction and nothing else. I recognized him though and thought it would be good to say hi again. We ended up having a nice conversation. It was cool to, like, hang out with a celebrity. At midnight when they closed, I hopped on on the train and came home like a good girl.