Life gets even crazier

Most people who know me are aware that I am an avid Marxist.  No, not in the economic sense, but in the comedic sense.  Of the brothers, I would have love to have known both Groucho and Harpo - but for very different reasons.  Groucho was an underappreciated wit, and a man who, sad as it is, didn't seem to have a happy home life.  Harpo was the exact opposite.  He was a man who was cherished by all - including his wife and children.  No one in show business ever had a bad word to say about him.  If I had to choose between these two brothers, I'd have picked Harpo as a friend.

- - - - - -

Casual readers may be wondering why I start off this entry with a mention of the Marx Brothers. Well, the answer to this is that my life seems to be like a script from one of their movies - a thin plot coupled with a lot of insanity.

In my case, things with XGFJ may be coming to a head.  A while back, she threatened to expose me to my family.  But I blunted that threat.  The other day, I signed up for a meetup with "her" dinner group, and she signed up for one with mine shortly afterwards.  At the same time, a mutual friend of ours (who might be interested in dating me) signed up for the same dinner.  I told her that I'd be attending as a female, and she didn't mind.  (I'll bet she knows a little bit more about XGFJ's views than she wants to let on, as I caught her in a statement that XGFJ made to me.)  So, to have someone I could count on in my corner, Vicki decided to join me for this dinner with "my" group.

Sadly, I have to plan for the possibility of XGFJ going ballistic.  She threatened to out me earlier in the year for attending any of the groups - and refused to work with me on a reasonable accommodation for her discomfort in seeing me.  Now that I have blunted her weapon, I feel no reason to accommodate her feelings.  She left me because I was putting my female side more and more in public, thinking I was lost in a "pink fog".  This was never the case.  But without her making her real issue understood to me, she gave up on a relationship that could have worked.  Now that the relationship is defunct, everything I might have done for her while in a relationship is off the table.  And that bothers her in the extreme.

At virtually all meetups I have attended in the recent past, I have attended them all as a female.  It wouldn't make any sense to confuse people by showing up as a male and letting things slip up.  (What would happen if I referenced something that only that person and my feminine persona would know?)  However, I have also signed up for meetup groups as my male persona, as a male presence would be required there.  (Think of singles mixers, etc.) Two of those groups are known to XGFJ, as I attended them with her early on in our relationship. And my presence in any of these groups bothers XGFJ.

So what would you do in my size 13-W shoes?

PS: Our mutual friend also signed up for the theater group that XGFJ didn't want me to attend. Again, she'll be seeing me in female presentation, so I doubt she has as many problems with it as XGFJ.  Keep your fingers crossed!

Miscellaneous notes from the home front

This Tuesday, I took the day off from work and walked another 2.5 miles (1.25 each way) on the Harlem Valley Rail Trail.  As usual, I took some photos and captured some "MOOving" images.  This post is my way of documenting some of the little things that have occurred that I felt worth documenting....

- - - - - -

On a recent trip to the Walden-Walkill Rail Trail, I met two ladies cycling on the trail.  We spoke for a while about the history of the trail and why there is a break in the trail.  Then one of them mentioned that she was gay and that she was riding with her partner.  That didn't bother me, I wasn't out to pick either of them up.  But it did give me an opportunity to show them a picture of me in female mode.  At that point, any awkwardness was relieved, and I waved them off as they rode back to their starting point.

- - -

Recently, the host and hostess of our Thursday game nights wanted to try out some online gaming platforms.  So several of us logged on one Friday evening and had a nice time.  Too bad we weren't doing this during the worst of the quarantine.

- - -

I think I will need to set up a new OK Cupid profile.  It's not that the old ones are bad.  It's that I've clicked through everyone possible, swiping right as needed.  Instead of doing this, I should have written messages to the ladies I am interested in, using a strategy similar to that which I'd use when writing cover letters and resumes - customization.  We'll see what happens if I bother to do this.

- - -

Thinking of dating, I finally met a woman I've been chatting with from Forest Hills.  She's a nice gal, and it might be worth the effort to date her.  So I'll try to arrange another get together soon.

- - -

Some of my readers might know that my ex girlfriend (XGFJ) had a big problem with the idea of me attending any of her meetup groups' gatherings.  She tried to blackmail me by threatening to expose me to my family as Transgender, so that I wouldn't attend.  Recently, I attended a gathering of "her" live music group (I knew the organizer from "my" dinner group) and had a nice time.  The ex hadn't gotten livid yet.  She now wanted to "negotiate" how we'd share our groups.  To me, that opportunity ended with her blackmail attempt.  The other day, "her" dinner group opened up to newcomers.  I signed up, and saw the following in a Facebook message:

I have said this before but you ignored what I said. We need to talk about you going to my meet up groups. You have joined 17 of my meet up groups. There are plenty of other meet up groups that you can join especially going south in Westchester.

Although I never attended that group's meeting due to XGFJ's blackballing me, I accomplished what I wanted - I sent a message saying that I no longer need to care what she thinks anymore. 

I won't go into all the crap that occurred over the past few months, but I believe that even though she claimed to want a friendship after the breakup, her actions said otherwise.  Without any relationship, I feel no obligation not to attend meetings in the 4 groups where our interests intersect - Dining, Music, Theater, and Hiking.  I'm taking Vicki's advice, and signing up for any event I want to attend, not worrying about XGFJ's feelings about my attendance. There is at least one event where we are booked to be at the same place at the same time.  I wonder if she'll bug out, as she did for a gathering of the live music group.

Yet... I wouldn't mind it if we could be friends again.  But I doubt that she wants a friendship. She can not see me as a male without thinking of me as a female.  Sadly, that makes her extremely uncomfortable, and probably makes a friendship impossible. 

Conundrum

It's not surprising that the word "Conundrum" has come up today.  I first learned this word when I read Jan Morris' book of the same name. And I find it amazing that I now have a conundrum related to my transgender nature.

- - - - - -

There is one person in my life with whom I have patched up a "sort of" relationship.  No, it's not romance anymore.  But several things this person has said makes me wonder if she's having her doubts about things in our past. Although I have already started the process of meeting people to date (Vicki says this might be unwise), I don't want to rub this in my "friend's" face.  (I'm not sure of what to call my relationship with this person anymore, for reasons I won't yet discuss here.)  So I'm very careful what I say when the two of us chat online.

A couple of weeks ago, I attended a Zoom meetup with people from the hiking group that this person has attended.  (I plan to go on some of their hikes when I'm back in shape and have the endurance for their hikes.)  Today, I attended an in-person (socially distanced) meeting of the Live Music group.  (I met this meetup's organizer at one of my dinner meetups a while back, and invited me to come....)  We discussed the two dining meetup groups, the New Paltz group and the Beacon group.  The former is cliquish, and people have bonded tightly with each other.  Quite a few people have been bothered by this group's unwillingness to accept new people in Zoom meetings during the pandemic.  But the two key organizers don't give a damn about being open to newcomers.  The Beacon group is more welcoming, and Vicki wants to join me there.  Maria will occasionally go with me as well. 

Now that in person gatherings will likely start up soon, I now have a conundrum.  With the one exception of the hiking group, no one has seen me in male mode.  People would only recognize me as a female.  If I go to the New Paltz group in either mode, I will likely piss off this "sort of" friend.  Yet, if I let her tell me what to do and what not to do, I would lose all respect for myself.  We are not in a relationship - she has no right to ask me for this "favor".  If I go as a male, I might "out" myself if any one person other than my "sort of" friend connects my male and female sides.  If I go as a female, I would likely kill off the chances of friendship with this person.

What would you do?

Working as a woman

This picture was taken shortly before the pandemic.  The lady in the picture was one of my closest friends at the office.  And now, she's in the process of moving into the smaller apartment of her two family house. Her (and her husband's) dream is to live the RV life, pulling up stakes, and travel where and when they want.  Hopefully, they will be able to do it.

- - - - - -

Going in to the office as a woman was hard at first, when everyone in the office knew I was transgender.  There was no way to hide this fact, as all my correspondence had my male name on it.  Over time, I was accepted as just one of the girls - if not a vary large one.

It still feels a little strange to put on make up every day before leaving for the office.  If I were to have FFS, I would have an easier job of appearing as a female without makeup.  That will only happen if I were to decide to go full time.  By then, I'll have had to have lost about of a third of my body mass before doing this.  And that kind of weight loss will be a great effort for someone who has over eaten for all of his/her life.

- - - - - -

I figure that it'll be much harder for me to get my next job working as a female because of the now high unemployment rate. But I may just float a few resumes out there to see whether I get any bites.  If I do, I'll go to the interview and hope for the best.

Opening up from Quarantine

This dress is something I picked up from Catherine's, thinking it would be  perfect for summer. I sent a copy of the picture above to Vicki #1, and she said it looked great.  What do you think?

- - - - - -

Unfortunately, I wore the dress to work the other day. So I settled on wearing another outfit to work that I bought at the same time - an aqua gauzy shirt, with a breezy patterned skirt with aqua as its dominant color.  (Sorry I didn't get a picture of it before going to work.)  And this is what I wore before dinner with Vicki in Connecticut.

As virtually everyone is aware, the recent Quarantine has gotten in the way of everyone's lives.  My former girlfriend has had to make major changes in how she runs her small business, and she no longer has the physical endurance she had before contracting the virus and having places where she could regularly pursue her favorite exercise routines.  As for me, I've tried to go for walks on the days I have free from work, and am gradually building up the endurance I'll need to go on hikes with meetup groups in the region.

Back to dinner with Vicki.... 

We had different, but compatible, reasons for "chancing" this dinner.  I figured that going out in the early stages of reopening would result in the least risk of catching the virus before the second wave hits.  She believes that we must get back to living our lives, knowing that this wave will come, and that the hospitals should not be overrun with new admissions, now that the first wave has passed.  Both are likely to be true.  And I'm also at the point where where I think we should gradually reopen the economy until the second wave hits - then deal with that wave when it comes.

Our first problem was choosing a place to eat.  We needed an inexpensive place which had outdoor seating.  This meant looking through all of the options available to us in a google search, specifically noting "outdoor dining" as a requirement.  And we settled on Southwest Cafe in Ridgefield, CT as our choice.  Our next problem was seating.  We had to be sure to get a seat when we arrived.  The place took no reservations, but noted that they never reached their capacity limits. And the third, but minor, problem was my work schedule - I  got out of work at 5:30,. This left us a short time to make it to the restaurant on time to enjoy a leisurely meal.

Of course, it would have been easy for me to have stayed late at work.  As a non-manager, I am prohibited from doing so. This made it ethically possible to rush out the door at 5:30 and head over to Vicki's.  After picking up the money I'd need for the night, I had to take Route 129 to Vicki's and pass by the Croton Dam Park area.  In one sense, I'm glad that they have closed the park - the "tourists" will be taking their walks elsewhere.  However, we still see people wanting to talk with the cops policing the entrances, getting in the way of people (like me) who have places to go.  And yet, I made it to Vicki's by 6:00 pm.

After picking up Vicki, we got to the restaurant by 6:30, and were seated by 7:00.  Everything that came to the table was disposable - the plastic cups, the plastic tableware, napkins, plates, etc. were all disposable, according to guidance from Connecticut's department of health.  Yet, this wasn't an issue.  Both my drink and my dinner's portion size made up for everything.  I was glad to help a restaurant stay open in these hard times.  And I am looking forward to the days where Westchester will be allowed to reopen as well.

I won't go into the details of what Vicki and I discussed over dinner.  A casual reader of this blog will take things the wrong way.  But I can say that we had a great time, finally achieving some normalcy that we haven't had since Mid March.  One minor drawback was that she misgendered me in public.  It seems that I'll have to watch out for this in people now that things are returning to a new normal.  It took a long time for a former friend to get used to correctly gendering me when presenting as female, and I think that Vicki made a casual mistake of someone finally being able to relax in public for a change.

Exercise

Lately, I've been getting out and about on days where the sun is out and when I'm not working.  I've been trying to build up my time and distance endurance before I decide to do some serious hiking with groups in the region.

- - - - - -

Given that in male mode, I am bald, wearing a wig and going out for a long walk doesn't make any sense.  Without makeup, my face looks masculine, and that's not the image I want to present on the trails.  So I have decided to exercise in male mode.  😢   This is a hard choice for me, but one I needed to make.

Since the quarantine began, I've been out of the house as much as Mario as I have been as Marian.  It's certainly strange to be finding some practicality for my male presentation.  But with a life like mine, I'm used to "strange" by now.  But after one outing as Marian with a little bit of blush on my face, reality hit me in the face.  If I had decided to go all the way and have FFS, plus hair transplants, I'd be out as Marian.  Yet, I'm not uncomfortable as Mario anymore.  I can live in a half and half mode.

- - - - - -

Recently, people have started to go outside to enjoy the outdoors.  Theaters are still closed, restaurants are only open for takeout in New York, and there are few diversions open to the public, save for walking in a local park.  And the local parks have been overrun.  In the case of Croton Dam Park (and its vicinity), the park is overflowing with cars, the road stub which once crossed the dam is packed with cars, and the overflow from that stub led to cars being parked on both sides of the road for a half mile up and down from the road stub.  The county has had to put up signs to tell the public that this overflow parking is prohibited, and that cars will be towed if necessary.  This has caused me to drive further North to enjoy my nature walks.

Virtually all of the walking I have done has been North of me, save for two walks along the Old Croton Aqueduct.  I'll save walks along the aqueduct trail for days I don't have much time to drive to a trail head for walking.  Most of the time, I've driven North to places which are (at least) an hour away from here, such as the Harlem Valley Rail Trail, Walkill Valley Rail Trail, and Dutchess County Rail Trail.  Some of these trails are well maintained, such as the Dutchess trail. And others are poorly maintained, such as the Walkill Valley trail.  I wonder what the O&W Rail Trail will look like when I go there.  However, I will need to make sure to avoid certain sections of it for personal reasons.

- - - - - - 

Soon, I expect to see restaurants in the Hudson Valley open up, now that the region is meeting the governor's criteria for reopening the economy.  Once this happens, I'll walk a trail in the Kingston area and visit The Little Bear again.  Hopefully, they will have survived the shutdown, and will again be serving great meals.

I'm Back online again!

The above picture was taken on the Old Croton Aqueduct path.  Considering how many people have been out and about, now that the nice days are here, I usually have to travel far to find nice places to walk and get back into shape.

I've decided to reopen this blog, so that I can continue to journal my life as quarantine is gradually being lifted.  At first, I won't be publishing daily posts, as I don't have that much to say.  In addition, I won't have much to say about either of my two formerly closest friends, now that bridges have been burnt.

- - - - - -

To catch the casual reader of this blog up to date, quarantine has been hell for me, as I've been dealing with grief caused by the loss (not death) of my two closest friends, the death of my father, and the virtual shutdown of my social life due to the quarantine. I won't go into details, save that anger made me a person I didn't like being, and I had to decide to let go of many things so that I could move forward with my life.

Since I don't know if my ex will read this blog or not, let's simply say that before the quarantine, I had a couple of nice dates with a nice woman, but things didn't work out.  Lately, I've had some pleasant calls with other women, and it would be nice to see them after quarantine ends. 

Work at the census bureau has started to return, and I'm still adding money to my bank account.  If all goes right, I'll have saved up enough, that by the end of the year, I can take a Hawaiian cruise.  However, this poses several interesting issues.  I want to take the 3 day land + 7 day sea cruise tour deal, but an ex girlfriend from 23 years ago will be on that cruise with 3 of her girlfriends.  Should I take it and out myself to her first?  Or, should I simply go on the cruise and say nothing?  (I'm assuming that she will not recognize me as Marian.)  I'm gambling both that the net price for this cruise will drop due to cancellations, etc., and that things will open up for cruising in the fall.

- - - - - -

So much I could say, but not the time to collect my thoughts.  More later....



.