Deadlines

Deadlines, deadlines! Will have to bite the bullet tomorrow.

Posted in website

It is better to have loved and lost...

... than to have never loved at all. Someone said this to me 4 years ago and I promptly smacked him upside the head, then proceeded to explain relentlessly why I disagreed with him. How could anyone ever wish to experience the excruciating pain of having to let go of the love of your life? The indescribable pain that goes right through you, that makes your heart clench tightly and makes you feel like your chest is about to collapse on itself. The pain that makes you want to curl up into a tight ball and never face the world again? The pain that makes you truly understand the poetry of the terms "heartbreak" and "drowning in despair"?

4 years on, I find myself agreeing that it *is* indeed better to have love and lost than to never have experienced the miracle of true love. The feeling of being "on top of the world", the slight terror of doubt that your heart could possibly keep from bursting with amour. The absurdity of the fact that you could find one little freckle so fascinating, and the certainty that you would do anything to make her smile.

For me, it truly was the summer of love. We'd just rung in the new millennium, I'd just moved overseas and out of home, and I was in the best shape of my life. Our paths had crossed for a brief moment a few months prior, and neither one had even thought twice of it. However, fate threw us together again, in another millennium and on another continent, and we both knew straight away that we had met the love of our lives.

At face value we were as different as night and day - me dark-skinned, dark-haired, serious and logical, she fair, blonde, happy-go-lucky and superstitious. But the more layers you peeled back you'd see that we were more and more the same person. What more could you want in a person you'd spend the rest of your life with? Her gioia di vivere and talent for la vita bella opened up a whole new world to me, while my more sensible approach kept her grounded and productive. The year we enjoyed together changed our lives forever; she had the best season of her career, finding herself among the best in the world, and I had my eyes forever opened to the beauty around me, in every sense of the word.

We had to eventually give in to the fact that life simply had different paths to take us, that being physically apart for 6 months at a time was just too much to bear. Although we'd officially called it quits, neither could come to terms with the idea that our grande storia d'amore had ended until about a year after. Only more than 2 years later could we begin to fully enjoy each other's friendship without heart-wrenching thoughts of "if only" and "what if".

So now at the veteran age of 25 I ask, having loved and lost, will there ever be a greater love in my life? Or in this case, will I have a new greatest love in my new life...

Lovers under Il Ponte Rialto, photo by Jeff Booth

Posted in personal, sexuality, oats

The Tribe has spoken...

... you are the Weakest Link. (Am I mixing up game shows here?)

Ok, I'm being mean. Nikki wasn't kicked out, she was let go of with much sorrow and heartbreak. And so the Tribe is down to 2 active members.

Because I moved to a 1-bedroom apartment from a shared house with a big backyard, I've had to think about giving poor Nikki away for adoption. Being a Beagle, she's very high-energy and needs space to run around, so it isn't exactly fair to have her in the apartment especially during the colder months when we can't be outdoors too much.

Nikki under the doona when she was younger
The problem was that I didn't want to give her to just anyone. I needed to be sure that her new family would treat her with as much care and pay as much attention to her as she's used to. I can't stand families that just have the dog in the back yard for the sake of having a dog, and pay little attention to it. Both the little ones sleep in bed with me (even when there's *ahem* company over) and we all wake up in a tangle of limbs in the morning, so I couldn't imagine what it would be like for her to be kept outdoors permanently.

Anyway, the answer came when a good friend of mine had to put her family beagle down due to old age. They have a big back yard, they're used to beagles, my friend goes running every day, and they have someone home nearly all the time because her mum doesn't work! Also, they're a warm caring family and had already noticed a hundred little things about Nikki's personality in a couple of days.

So Nikki's got a new home and is better off for it. Now I've got to resist the urge to visit every weekend!


Sasha misses Nikki already.
(Sorry for the mess of wires behind her head!)

Posted in the-tribe

Oh, and...

What I'd give to get a jawline like that! (see post below) Let's see if anyone has any tips online!

Eta: The general consensus seems to be that it's up to genetics and body fat levels to determine one's jawline. And then of course there's cosmetic surgery involving jaw implants. The other school of thought is that doing facial exercises will tone and slightly alter the various features on your face, with allegations that it's common practice among actors. Not surprisingly, the only people claiming this are companies selling products.

In any case, I've got fairly fabulous cheekbones and jaw structure (the barf bags are over there, thank you) so the combination of lowered body fat and testosterone will hopefully render a satisfactory result. Then again, can't hurt to start chewing rubber bands. Will post pics soon after getting that first dose!

Head of Hair

So, I finally got a haircut. For those of you who don't already know, about 2 1/2 years ago, I lost my mind and put my hair into dreadlocks. Summer came, summer went, and not being able to run my finers through my hair started to drive me nuts, so about 18 months later, I cut them all off and ended up with the shortest hair I've ever had, about 2-3 inches long all over.

I've had a year to grow out my hair, and it's grown to the longest I've ever had it (my hair grows out pretty fast, don't ask me what's in the water), which was really starting to bug me. Being sporty and rolling around the grass/sand with your dogs means washing your hair a lot, and with thick wavy hair like mine, washing and drying it was a real pain. The reason I've let it frow this long is so that I can get a proper cut, instead of having it too short in places.

So anyway, I finally got my haircut today while out picking up my new amp, and I'm so glad I did! The lady asked what sort of haircut I wanted, and I described it to her as best as I could - back to just shoulder-length and layered, sides cut to just tuck behind my ears, with an undercut near the front. She then asked if I had any photos of what I wanted, and I thought, "Damn, I couldn't think of anyone with exactly what I wanted," and then it hit me! Francesco Totti when he used to have his wavy mane of hair! Thank God I had an Italian lady cutting my hair, she immediately knew what I was talking about and cut it perfectly. And thank God for World Cup fever, else I don't think he would have come to my mind!

So the main thing today was, I had the guts to ask for a haircut which has obviously male stylings. The lady didn't bat an eye, keeping a professional attitude (if you don't count our eyebrow-raising conversation) and doing what I wanted instead of offering alternatives and discouraging comments, etc. I'm going to try a place a little closer to home the next time I get a haircut, and if they don't get it right, she may just have gained a new regular!

My parting gift to you: a couple of pictures of Francesco with my haircut! =)

Posted in transition, new-id

Duke of my Dreams

The last couple of weeks have been cold and rainy, but as expected, it's turned warmer and sunny this last week. Experts predict a mild winter for us in Oz, which has brought back thoughts of zipping through the countryside on my bike, enjoying the splashes of red, orange and gold that line the country roads.

Now that I've left you with that image, I might introduce you to the Duke of my dreams. No no, I do not harbour secret feelings of love for a member of the male species, but rather feelings of lust for a little Monster:

Red with Black Stripe
The Ducati Monster S4R, in all its naked glory. Nothing in my mind will ever match the stylings of the monster, and I hope that Ducati never stops producing them. Try as you might, I'll never give up the compact, street-fighter feel of the Monsters for the laid-back ease of the low rider or the fairings of a CBR. Besides, it'd go so well with a nice Italian leather jacket. :)

While I'm at this, I might mention that the good man that he is, Ethan Niko's set up a trans-men's Motorcycle Club based in Australia (but all are welcome to join) on Yahoo! Groups called FTM Grease Monkeys. It's only just started and is still pretty small, but I hope it'll take off and maybe we'll organise a ride to kick off the summer!


Blue with White Stripe
Posted in motorcycle

I can see the starting line!

Yes, I know the saying is "finish line" and not starting line, but then it wouldn't make all that much sense now, would it?

So the last counselling session at The Gender Centre was pretty much a waste of time and left me in a bit of a funk three weeks back, making me feel like I'm going nowhere with this. It was such a let-down that I didn't know what to expect from today's session. However, it turned out infinitely better than the last time, and it looks like I'll soon be getting an official green light to move on with things! More specifically, I feel that I'm getting close to getting that all-important presciption for T - that precious Essence of Man (eeewwww!!!). Just a couple more hoops to jump through!

Rant: What is it with the world nowadays and processes? I mean, I'm an engineer so I understand the importance of protocol and processes, but are we taking things too far? Are we expecting such high safety standards that we expend too many resources and put things on hold for too long? Recently we had 2 coal miners trapped underground when a part of a coal mine in Tasmania collapsed. Both men escaped none the worse for wear, but the furor over the incident was embarassing. These 2 men weren't heroes, they were just lucky that they were in a reinforced cage-like structure during the collapse. While they were underground, they were supplied plenty of food, protection from the cold and harmful gasses, and even luxury items such as chocolate, beer and mp3 players! Now the mine will be shut down and repercussions will be felt across mines all over the country. It's a fuckin' coal mine! Danger is a part of the job! Are we that surprised that this happened?!

Tying this back to the topic, us trans-people are made to jump through so many hoops because of the few who were either dumb enough transition without thinking it through, or couldn't take the responsibility for being in a difficult situation and chose to point fingers instead. Is it really the health care professional's fault that the person regretted undergoing hormone therapy/surgery? How much caution must the psych take in determining whether a candidate is lying or unsure about the things s/he says?

Once again, the masses pay for the mistakes of a few.

Posted in counselling, transition, rant

Tags

I've just put tags on all the back posts and will be using them from now. I was thinking of using del.icio.us and technorati to organise them, but didn't like the fact that my tags would be stored on a different server, as well as the fact that users would have to browse to an external website in the course of surfing through the categories, so I've kept it in-house and gotten rid of the tags that were on here before.

Posted in website

Pets n Vets

Ok, so my little bubba Sasha had knee surgery a year ago because her knee-cap kept popping out of place, due to her genetic predisposition to having a shallow groove where it's supposed to sit, as well as the fact that she's a little bow-legged in her hind legs. She was only 2 years old at that point so it wasn't really bothering her, but she'd have to sort of kick her leg back increasingly to get the knee-cap back into place. Not wanting her to develop arthritis over the years due to the abrasion this would cause, I shelled out the $2k required to surgically correct this.

Now, a few months ago, I noticed that she'd started limping on that same leg. This worried me, because it had only been about 6 months since the surgery and I had a strong feeling that something was not right. So I took her back to the vet, who said that she may have jarred it and caused some soft-tissue damage, gave us some anti-inflammatories and told me to keep an eye on her. Things didn't change, although she limped more one some days than others, and the vet maintained that everything was in place and that she probably just needed some time to recover.

Fast forward to 2 days ago, when I finally had enough of the situation and demanded that the vet take the case a little more seriously. I felt that he'd thought that Sash was just a whiny dog and me an overzealous owner, which I can understand from his point of view considering the types of young owners he often sees. However, he should have believed me when I'd said that she's a very bright, cheerful girl who never complains about anything, and we're so close that we know what the other's going to do before either one even moves a muscle. My fears were confirmed when he finally admitted that the best shot would be to have the pins and wire removed from her knee since they'd already served their purpose, and see how she goes. He admitted her immediately and performed the surgery the same afternoon. I should also add that he quickly got me to sign the waiver including a paragraph at the bottom stating that I would pay about 800 bucks for the surgery.

I called in in the late afternoon and asked how it went - the guy left another vet to handle the call (there are 3 vets there, all of whom I'm familiar with and 2 of whom I'm not-so-fond of. Unfortunately, the same 2 vets are the most senior and very experiences vets) and she told me that the tension band in her knee would definitely have been causing her discomfort because it was too tight and had started CUTTING INTO the bone! She recovered quickly from the aenesthetic, so we got to pick her up before closing time. The poor girl was so happy to see us despite her bald leg (which looked really funny since she's a little shaggy dog) and we had to be really careful to get her not to jump around on her leg.

Anyway, she's been so active these last 2 days it's not funny. I'd thought that she'd gotten lazy in the recent months, as she'd been a little less eager for her walks, and had gotten tired a lot quicker on our daily jaunts. I'd tease her about struggling to get her fat bottom (which really wasn't fat at all) up the stairs, and now I feel HORRIBLE about not having pressured the vet to do this sooner. The poor dear's been so frisky and playful since coming home, it warms my heart to see her back to her familiar self, yet I'm heartbroken to think that she'd been suffering all this time while keeping a brave face.

So anyway, today's little Sasha's birthday, and her $800 birthday present is her poor little leg working all better again. Now if only my wallet felt a little better...

The tribe: Sasha (left) and Nikki

Posted in the-tribe, rant

Blogger's Block

There are so many things I want to write about on here! I just can't bring myself to sit down and write it... maybe at the end of the week when I'll finally be done with this damned project.

One thing I can write about right now is my new nickname (hee! Get it? Nick. Name.) that I've been christened with. You'll probably have seen it all over this page by now, and I absolutely love it! Nickles! Hee!

I am starting to get used to the idea of my outside matching my inside (even though it isn't totally happening yet), and I really find the idea quite tittilating. It helps though with the fat-loss and big gain in strength (which reminds me, I really have to update my damn "healthy lifestyle" blog too!), and I'm not sure how to explain it, but I feel my "inner structure" and "inner image" more now than my actual external self. It's scary sometimes, sort of like stepping out of a cave you've been living in to find yourself suddenly exposed to a wide-open field in the bright sunshine. It's beautiful, but it's scary and strange at the same time. I get more and more frequent "glimpses" of this feeling nowadays.

ETA: Now I just gotta get past those damn "nickle n dime" jokes.

Posted in new-id, personal, ala-mode