What Becomes You

Image courtesy of publisher, University of Nebraska Press

I've known of this book for months, but haven't even mentioned it here... until now.

Transman Aaron Raz Link wrote a memoir called What Becomes You, which has gotten rave reviews. I first heard of this book because I know Aaron through his cousin, Karen Bradley, whom I befriended and met through her political online organization, Democracy Cell Project.

Now that I am looking at several weeks of privacy come May, and that I am re-casting Sarah's story into a focused fictional memoir, I need to get some inspirations from a real-life transgender memoir. Another significance here: Sarah was Aaron's girl name as well!

I've wishlisted the book and will be ordering it in May.

What Becomes You (official blog)
Book Information at Powell's Bookstore

Margaret Cho on transgender people

Margaret Cho is very impressed with Transamerican Love Story, the LOGO dating reality show around transwoman Calpernia Addams. And she makes very damn strong points on the reality of homophobia and transphobia, on her MySpace blog. Here it is:

Margaret Cho on MySpace

I'm also being told that iTunes carries Transamerican Love Story. I will surely look for a few episodes, even though some of the men wooing Calpernia are downright creeps! All the more reason to have a lesbian transwoman and female suitors next time!

Two classes at once!

I changed my mind, and went ahead and registered for the UCLA Extension course "Writing for Social Change." All the things I've been writing here lately about gay marriage and other passionate topics have led to this decision. That's two classes for me this spring. As of today, I am confirmed for both classes.

It won't be easy, but I am ready and willing to take on both classes.

With so many ideas that I've been brainstorming lately (thanks to a new scope of Sarah's story), at least some of these need to make their way to the written form. The memoir course will help me with the format and outline, and the social change course will make those points more poignant as I write them out. Might as well take the classes when I feel motivated, as in now.

It will help that I will be able to work undisturbed on both of these classes this spring, with my folks being in Alaska for much of the class duration (and even when they are not, I am spending 5 days in the Washington, DC area). This will also be the time when I take out the flight attendant career guide I recently bought, for fact-checking, as well as the Helen Boyd book She's Not the Man I Married, for inspiration.

Of course, it won't hurt that I will be working with instructors I already know - and have had good chemistry with. Some instructors don't have good chemistry with me, and can really drag my experience down, but that won't be an issue this time, which will really help me out as I immerse myself in two fast-paced classes.

Some more ideas on 2004

Two marriages and a layoff. This will be 2004 in a gist for Sarah and Kirsten.

The new anti-LGBT laws passed by the so-called "red states," in a brilliant maneuver orchestrated by Karl Rove in making W's re-election happen, will bring the two to a breaking point.

Sarah will consider jumping off of the Golden Gate Bridge, as her job search continues in futility and her enemies score a huge win in W's re-election. The only thing that stops her will be the long thought processes when being forced to take the long ride on mass transit to the bridge, when Kirsten takes her Beetle (see below). She may become one of those who give up job searches completely (helping the unemployment rate go down, in the process).

Kirsten will cut off contact with her mother, burn all 1988 Seoul Olympics souvenirs (which she had attended with her family) and trigger the apartment's fire alarm, put her Hyundai Elantra on the selling block (and borrow Sarah's Beetle until she buys another ride), and call it quits at her reactionary Financial District job. This is a change - Kirsten was supposed to be carless in Berkeley, now that's no more. Kirsten will also take the Radcliffe name, partly in appreciation of Sarah's father Kevin Radcliffe's unconditional acceptance of Sarah. Meanwhile, the fire alarm incident will even cause the couple's eviction.

Financially, the two will live off of Sarah's severance payment and unemployment insurance, until Kirsten gets a new job. It won't be easy, however.

Two possibilities await here: Kirsten becomes a Silicon Valley technical writer, or the very first plotline - a job in Hollywood - materializes. Actually, I am thinking the Hollywood move may work out well, because Sarah will have an even harder time finding a job in less tolerant Los Angeles, especially with small businesses run by homophobic immigrants. When United Airlines recalls Sarah, she can report to work in Los Angeles - United's other West Coast hub. (Or she can return to the San Francisco domicile, and split her time between her folks in Pacifica and Kirsten in Los Angeles.) And of course, Kirsten can pamper herself with a nicer car; I've always wanted to give her an appetite for expensive cars, and it also fits Los Angeles's "you are what you drive" culture.

So many things are in flux regarding Sarah's story. Let's see how much of this I can nail down.

More on Sarah and Kirsten's marriage

Here are some more legal issues surrounding Sarah and Kirsten's marriage, first a San Francisco gay marriage, then a "straight" marriage when the first is voided.

• Even if the San Francisco marriage were upheld, it wouldn't have been of much comfort. US federal law would still treat the two as unmarried strangers, thanks to Defense of Marriage Act of 1996, passed by Republican Congress and signed by Democratic President Bill Clinton. That would mean taxation at the higher single rate, not to mention denied recognition of the marriage when visiting another state. This is also true of the Massachusetts gay marriages, the only legal gay marriages in the US.
• California does offer a domestic partnership program for gays as well as elderly straights. Domestic partnerships are taxed at the married rate, for state income tax only, but that's a perk that doesn't kick in until the 2007 tax year. This won't apply to Sarah and Kirsten, however, as their second, legal marriage will technically be a heterosexual one.
• Most states have amended their constitutions to forever ban gay marriages. Many, including Texas and Georgia, have banned recognition of other states' domestic partnerships as well. Ohio went as far as prohibiting private employers from ever recognizing any same-sex relationships and offering benefits based on them. Credit is due to nonwhite reactionary scumballs like Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell and Reverend Sun Myung Moon, loved by conservatives for their conservatism, and protected by liberals by virtue of their nonwhiteness.
• Arizona voters have shot down a similar constitutional ban on gay marriage - the only state to do so. California has seen renewed efforts by Christians and Third World immigrants to constitutionally ban gay marriages (and abolish domestic partnerships), but none have made it to the ballot.
• Since Sarah and Kirsten's second marriage is technically heterosexual, it should survive any and all of these sinister attacks on the civil rights of LGBTs.

The role of Kirsten's mother should be considered. Since she's one of the outcasts of the Korean-American community (having married a white American soldier), and since outcasts tend to be hard on other outcasts, she will be very opposed to Kirsten's marriage to Sarah, and supportive of the Korean-American community's powerful anti-LGBT lobby. I have to reconsider Kirsten's relationship to her mother at this point, as I had seen it as a controlled, amicable relationship, but no longer wish to portray it that way.

Information on the 2004 San Francisco gay marriage

I've been writing down the key points of Sarah's revised story, which will now focus on her flight attendant stint. Several things have changed: Sarah will return to her duty at United Airlines when she is recalled from layoff, and her relationship with Kirsten will bloom much earlier.

In fact, the new timeline makes the San Francisco gay marriages of 2004 ripe material for the story, instead of waiting several more years and moving the marriage to Canada. This will work well, as the San Francisco gay marriages had little legal standing but a lot of publicity. Here are some facts I've dug up, courtesy of Wikipedia and other sources, about those marriages.

• Gay marriage was banned through existing family laws in California, as well as a 2000 voter initiative heavily supported by Christians and Third World immigrants.
  
• Marriage licenses were issued beginning on February 12, 2004, under the orders of Mayor Gavin Newsom, incensed over W's homophobic state of the union that year.
• Newsom based his orders on the equal protection clause of the California state constitution.
• Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger ordered these marriages halted on February 20. Attorney General Bill Lockyer refused, even though he did not believe these marriages were legal.
• The state supreme court halted issuance of new marriage licenses on March 11. By then, over 4,000 couples had tied the knot at San Francisco City Hall, including Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon (first couple to be married, and founders of Lyon-Martin Women's Health Services). Rosie O'Donnell joined too, and so did David Knight, son of the late State Senator Pete Knight who had written the gay marriage ban voter initiative.
• The state supreme court voided these marriages on August 12, upon argument from Lockyer and other parties that they violated existing state laws.
  

Sarah and Kirsten will try again to be married after August 12, however, since court rulings in other states have decreed that a transgender person, even post-operative, is forever identified by his/her birth sex for the purposes of marriage. Pretty bad for a straight transwoman fighting for her husband's inheritance, but a blessing in disguise for pre-operative Sarah, who will legally be Kirsten's "husband." I see the wedding ceremony thrown in jeopardy, however, since I am throwing in Sarah's layoff right when the planning starts to gobble up money.

I hope this revision will give the story the drama it needs.

One of Sarah's coworkers in a movie

I just watched The Terminal, starring Tom Hanks as a traveler from Eastern Europe (a citizen of Krakozhia, a fictional country) who gets stranded at New York's Kennedy Airport when a coup renders his passport worthless. While stranded, he befriends several people - one of them is a United Airlines flight attendant named Amelia Warren, played by Catherine Zeta-Jones.

The more I think about the movie, the less I like Amelia, a very calculating and temperamental woman. I don't look forward to flying on a flight with her, and certainly don't look forward to having Sarah work the same flight as someone like her - though it will have to happen someday. In fact, I am not even sure how Amelia passed the flight attendant training!

When Sarah interviews for the flight attendant position, she will have to answer questions on how to deal with uncooperative coworkers - and I'll certainly be thinking of Amelia when I write the answer down for Sarah.

The movie itself was full of inaccuracies and inconsistencies (i.e. no transit lounges at US airports, and United's terminal at JFK is nowhere near that big/nice), not to mention product placements (Burger King, Borders, and of course United). I didn't like the movie at all.

The Terminal at IMDB

Update from The Sims 2

I mentioned a long time ago that I was playing The Sims 2 on my computer, with myself, Sarah, plus another woman living together in a house.

Since then, The Sims 2 has had a few new expansion packs, including one that allows the three of us to enjoy hobbies dear to our hearts. One of the ten areas of interest available is film and literature, and a sure way to stoke interest is to sit down at a computer and write a novel. (If my interest levels are high enough, I can blog about film and literature too.)

Well, as it turns out, I spent a few weeks at the computer writing Perfect Girl, and sold it for $2,600. Now, a copy sits on my home bookshelf, being read by none other than Sarah herself! She is certainly enjoying reading what I wrote about her life and work. Meanwhile, I continue to write another novel, this one a sequel (presumably dealing with Sarah's possible future activism in CodePink, since I included a bomb and the peace symbol in the plotline).

I'm enjoying playing Sarah's life out on the computer, even though she is an entertainer, not a flight attendant, given the limitations of the game.

Another class I could use

So far, I am signed up for one UCLA Extension class this spring, with Lisa Dale Norton, on writing a book-length memoir. It will help not only my own life, but also in plotting out Sarah's story into a more focused format. Having taken a previous course with Norton, I know this will be a very productive class.

UCLA Extension is tempting me with another course though. My longtime mentor Gayle Brandeis created a new course on writing for social change. Both Sarah and I have lots of social injustices to address and tackle (not just homophobia, but sexism too), so this course could really help too. But I don't think I will be focused if I try to take two courses at once. Oh well.

I did ask Gayle to offer it again in the future, so that I will be able to take it then. In the meantime, once I have large chunks of Sarah's story back in place (now that I've received relevant materials on flight attendant career), I will also contact Masha Hamilton for another course with her. (She did want me to take her spring class, but I had to pass.)

Transgender Reality Show

I am NOT a fan of reality TV - it was already old when the original Survivor was airing. But this particular one caught my attention.

Transamerican Love Story follows a beautiful transgender woman, Calpernia Addams, as eight eligible bachelors vie for her attention and love. Calpernia is a tall redhead, just like Sarah, and that's another reason for me to pay attention. Calpernia is advised by another transwoman, Andrea James.

The show airs Monday nights at 10PM Eastern, on Viacom's LGBT-themed Logo network.

Of course, I would've vastly preferred bachelorettes vying for a transwoman's attention. But even for a gay audience, the prospect of a lesbian transwoman takes a bit of getting used to. Perhaps Perfect Girl, and Sarah's love life, will be what turns things around, and get people more familiar with lesbian transwomen - I hope that will happen.

Transamerican Love Story
Calpernia Addams
Andrea James

Memoir class update

Class is confirmed. I look forward to doing some outlining and plotting, both for myself and for Sarah, come mid-April!

Possible class

At this time, given that I may change the focus of Sarah's memoir, I may end up returning to UCLA Extension for another memoir class.

It will cover the techniques of outlining, and writing the introduction to, a book-length memoir. It will be taught by Lisa Dale Norton, whose previous 5,000-word memoir class I took in late 2005. I had really enjoyed that class, as I was actually finding myself visiting various locales, from DC to Seoul, that my memoir was going to encompass.

I should make the decision and sign up for the class within the next few days. I hope this class will help with my self-discovery - and by extension, a better framework for Sarah's story.

On a different note...

My third post today already, after weeks of inactivity. And this changes subjects completely.

I've known for ages that Sarah loves leggings. They remind her of the looks popular during her high school years, when she was still Sanford and couldn't wear any female fashions. Sarah immediately buys a pair in 1995, when she starts living fulltime as a woman. And when leggings come back into fashion in 2006, Sarah takes out her old pair - and buys a few more.

For the same reasons, I myself wore leggings (actually, footless tights) quite a few times in the last year or two. I also like the fact that they pack easily into my travel luggage - even with the added bulk of the tunics that go with them.

But that may change soon. One person who's worked this leggings trend to death is Lindsay Lohan, wearing them just about 24/7 everywhere. And word has it that Lindsay, running low on money, will turn her love of leggings into a business, selling her own line of leggings. I think this is insanity, and my prediction is that the Lindsay Lohan line of leggings will get everyone sick of the trend (already many are sick and tired), and kill the trend entirely.

Time for Sarah and me to look for another trend to follow (or set).

MSNBC

A possibility

Perfect Girl is a fictional memoir of Sarah, of course. And given that a memoir can cover just a specific portion of a person's life as opposed to the entire life, I will seriously consider writing a more focused memoir, one that centers around Sarah's flight attendant stint, since it's the major component of what I am trying to write anyway. Other events in Sarah's life can be handled in the form of various references, maybe a flashback or two.

Some of my previous instructors and classmates suggested that I try not to rely heavily on flashbacks. And I know there are risks to that approach. But if I can get a much more focused memoir that still manages to show the reader a lot about Sarah and her life, that will do the trick. (A side effect of this change: Sarah and Kirsten can fall in love much sooner, and get married in San Francisco in 2004.)

Another thing I could do is to have Sarah return to work at United Airlines, when United recalls all its furloughed flight attendants in 2006. I could use two years of layoff as a time when Sarah tries to get meaningful employment, with little success, to show the bleak employment situation that is the reality of many transgender women.

Lots of possibilities. I may need to write this new outline out, and see how it works out.

And when I get home tonight, I will fire up my iTunes and see if its online store offers Rhapsody in Blue - the composition United Airlines uses as its theme music. I need writing music that sets the right tone, and none better than the music that has represented Sarah's employer for decades.

I'm applying to be a flight attendant!

No, not really. But I'll get as close to being one as possible.

The best way for me to understand Sarah's flight attendant stint would be for me to go through the experience myself - apply with various airlines, go through the interviews, pass the training, and live the life of a flight attendant as a transgender woman. But seriously, the last thing the airlines need in their applicant files is someone with my temperament. I'll never work as a flight attendant, and I don't have much of a desire to work as one anyway.

I have, however, just placed an order for some materials online, written by a current flight attendant and career consultant, that will demystify the process for me. The materials include a Microsoft Word document with specific interview information on United Airlines, which I have already downloaded and emailed to my home computer. A book will follow next week, and it will detail everything from how an applicant will need to present, what kind of mindset she'll need to have, and what kind of a work schedule a flight attendant can expect. These materials will fill in most, if not all, of the holes I have regarding Sarah's flight attendant work.

Now, I need to start formulating the whole process for Sarah. What will bring her to apply for a position as a flight attendant? Which airlines will she apply to, in addition to United? (Alaska, another airline with crew base in San Francisco, could fit the bill, but its homophobic management will get in the way. I'll make it discreet though, as I do patronize Alaska Airlines often and do not wish it any harm. But in any case, only United will offer Sarah a job.) How will Sarah answer the interview questions, and what will her posture be like? What will she wear? Will Sarah overcome the bitterness from her high school years (especially regarding Latino jocks) at the interviews?

The process will also be repeated for Martha. I also need to invent a way with which Martha will pass the 10-year background check, which all airlines conduct (having applied in the past for a Northwest customer service position myself, I know the drill). The fake reference from a former customer may not be enough. Or I could bend reality and have Martha luck out.

I hope to have large pieces of Sarah's life, and virtually all of her flight attendant stint, in place, before too long. But to get there, I will need to know the process well enough to a point where I will myself be ready to interview for a flight attendant position. I look forward to it - it will be the next best thing to actually working as a flight attendant.