Tout le reste: A Portfolio.

0. This is my first piece for the portfolio I am submitting to the Committee to Re-Adjust the Mind (CREAM). It is an attempt to address a therapist who once said I was the most non-linear thinker he had ever had as a patient, “a gift, that poses many, many challenges.” (Like the challenge that non-linear thinkers can't make a living by describing non-linear art for quarterly journals, but that's another portfolio.)

It is an attempt to answer the boys, and occasional girl, who said I was pretty in a sad way, or with said eyes, or needing to smile … those that looked at me while their hands crept up from their pockets, thinking to straighten my jacket lapel or my hair or to just do something with me. People were always interested in my looks, and not necessarily because of attraction. I just look like someone who needs to come inside, take a shower, calm down, and have some hot tea already.

Maybe, at my best, I'm someone you want to have in your shower, drinking tea on your catch. On your couch.
As you picture me now, Honey, don't think of someone classically rugged, nor of a string bean druggie. Think instead – won't you? – of those physical markers, whatever they are for you, to which you can't react right away. Maybe it's a slight chin that isn't totally receded, not yet inbred looking. Maybe it's a meaty knee atop a beautifully slender calf. Maybe it's long toes, or one long toe. Think of it: a second toe that looks like it could be a child's finger. Such an endearing little finger, but please don't wear flip-flops today, okay?

Mind is an acronym too. For “Me-independent.” Me-independent does not refer to a financially independent me, nor to my ego, but rather to the exterior me that is not defined vis-à-vis my relationships with other people, like … “your friend's friend who everyone fucked with at the party, but he took it good naturedly.” Me's not like that richoceted me. Rebótela, chingados. I need to turn the gaze back to the core and I'm convinced in spite of everything that I'll convince the committee.

Reading A Thief's Journal the other day I found myself thinking that the only thing really worth talking about at all would have to be the inner life of the bacteria on a homeless man's cock in the 1930's. Because, otherwise, I mean what the fuck are you talking about? No one who ever talked about me was ever talking about anything remotely related to me. Who I am. So why bother saying it unless you go to the core? This is the argument I will make in front of the CREAMers, whom I imagene to be chaired and paneled by someone I know and respect, but not the closest person to me. An old co-worker who makes boats maybe.

I have a co-worker now that doesn't seem to have this problem. Janelle. She seems to more-or-less go along with other people's descriptions of her. I guess she could chair the committee, but she would probably just tell me not to worry about it and let all of those people go. I suppose the part of me that leads my other life has already let them go. Or never really expected to connect in the first place.

It wasn't that I didn't try. À la folie, jusqu'à ls mort. It's just that I failed hard so early and so often at being known.

So hard, so early, so often.

Just failed. Every time I put my heart on my sleeve I wound up less known, less understood. Janelle doesn't have this problem because she doesn't do anything to throw people off. An Oakland churchgirl, hair braided and tied, but she says she writes screenplays.

Oh! (Turning back.) This is also a chronology of how I became a cross-dresser, but it's not a cross-dressing story. I found my womanly curves just as you might have naturally discovered something about your body, because at some point it was just obvious that the mirror wanted it. Like, oh hey, that's where my waistline is supposed to be. But it's not really a big thing. Just something I need to do to think. Or not think. So when the guys call me “Honey,” and point out a cute guy, it's only natural, see? I don't have to think about it, I don't have to think about it, I don't have to think about it. The committee needs to understand this, because their job will be to wipe some things away from their eyes, to understand me aside from these particulars, tout le reste. On y va ...