I'm going to talk about Andrea now for a bit...
ok, now get your minds out of the gutter, nothing like that, in fact, that's what I want to discuss.
I have a pattern in my life, I was always a serial monogamist, and since I have always connected with women almost too easily, I have found that if I am interested sexually in a woman, I need to make a move before we become friends... because once I get "friended", well, we all know where that leads, and it isn't to the bedroom. So the women I ended up forming long term relationships were those that I approached fast, I didn't give them time to become friends with me, like what happened with Becca.
Related to that is another pattern in which that I would meet a very cool chick, who I happen to find attractive, yet she doesn't trigger that "protective male urge" in me which I have always felt strongly with all the women I have had long relationships with, and is what drove me to be able to overcome my shyness and seek relationships with those women at the speed that was required.
Women like Andrea fit the second pattern, as have Nat, my old friend out in Vancouver (ack, names!), Murrr in Ottawa. Strong, independant, very intelligent, into some weird crap like me (seriously, I "friend" Andrea on FB and her splash screen is a Nietzsche quote, how cool is that), women who stand up for themselves, loud, assertive, etc. These are the types of women that I have looked up to in my life, that I respected the hell out of, that I was true friends with, and I always wanted to go after them like the women I ended up with, but I didn't, I was intimidated a bit, but more than that I realize now that I identified with them, I looked up to them, I wanted to be like them. Ultimately, at one point, since I was sexually attracted to women, and these events happened a lot more during school and high-hormones-teenage years, and on top of all of that, I had always had that slight.... urge.... towards them (again, I like girls a lot, and I was a teenager), my testosterone would win out and I would try to form a relationship with them.
which always ended after a few hours, as they realized that uhh, no, he is awesome, but they don't know why, but there is simply ZERO spark..
(well, we know now eh?)
So, now that I've wandered a bit and filled you in... Andrea is one of those women, if I had met her pre-transition, in a different life, I could SO see the same pattern happening with her... feeling that connection, sincerely enjoying time spent together, identifying with her, but a part of me would always want more, that sexual connection, and I would ruin the friendship at one point like I've done many times before.
now, like I said, IF I had met her pre-transition.... here's the big difference, and it's something I discussed with Maya today.... I still feel everything I described, except for the actual attraction. Those feelings confused the hell out of me, I've felt the exact same mix of admiration, respect, friendship, "wanting to be around them cause you feel it's a really healthy relationship" kind of person, but where is the sexual urge?, the desire, where is that?.
(and just for the record, I DONT want it back)
the hormones have calmed that aggravating testosterone in me, a drug which I honestly think my system, psyche, soul, what have you, I honestly don't think I've ever been able to handle it properly.
I look back now, and it's like in reality I never wanted to date those women, but I just couldn't understand what I was feeling, why would a boy identify with a woman, even though I see SO much of that now when I look to my past, for me at that time, what could that feeling be other than sexual attraction?, after all, they're attractive, they're a girl and I was a boy, we get along amazingly, I get aroused when thinking those thoughts about them (I was a teen, I could have gotten aroused with a table lamp), desire and lust MUST be what I'm feeing right?
right?
I described all of this to Maya today at lunch, and I could see from the look on her face that she knew what I was talking about, she knew those types of feelings towards women, cause she isn't exactly straight. I won't get into trying to define her, and I think she would be happy with that, but for the most part she had been with, and dated, women. She understood the difference between admiring a woman, wanting to be around her without wanting to be WITH her, and on the flip side, other women that you enjoy being with, but you also want to be with sexually. She told me that yes, the women like Becca that I had had sexual relationships with, all of that was real, no worry there, but what I felt with women like Nat and Murrr, that was just women that Dawn, nestled deep inside me, was trying to identify with, and they felt it too, which is why the sexuality never worked out....
and that's pretty cool.... I'll be able to enjoy a healthy friendship with Andrea without getting confused.... and if one day far in the future feelings form, or form with a woman like that, I'll be able to explore them honestly and properly, interesting....
so, finally, the last part of all of this, Maya herself!!!!!!. Oh, how lucky and fortunate I feel that we got a chance to re-connect today. As I said in the first part of all of this, it's been a full frakin twenty years!!!.
you'd think that this was one of my BFFs with all the exclamation marks that I'm using, but truthfully, we weren't terribly close back in grades 9 and 10, which is when we knew each other. We knew each other by name of course, and I spent a lot more time with one of her friends, but here and there, sometimes in class, sometimes out of it we would share some conversation, about this that and the other thing. I remember that she always blew me away with her confidence, tall, strong, take no shit combat boot wearing punk chick, she made no apology, but wasn't an asshole about it, she knew what she wanted (or appeared to, lol), but didn't stomp on people to get it. I remember I wanted to absorb her strength, as if being around her I could become stronger, I could figure out how to be that awesome, that powerful, that sure of herself. She may have looked like an angry fuming tough as shit punk, but unlike the rest of us, she had love and support at home, she wasn't rebelling against her parents, or acting out, she was simply exploring being herself without any care what others would think and judge.... and we were in a suburb outside ottawa in the early 90s, so yes, people cared and judged
and I wanted that super power all for myself..... took me a while, but I got it :)
The other thing that makes Maya very very special to me, is that she was the first person to ever see Dawn, only fleetingly, when we were 14. I must have told the story before, but I'm long winded today, so... from how she told it (I don't actually remember this, so I'm paraphrasing a memory she kept for me for twenty fucking years!!!): we were both in the "gifted" program for the 'smart' kids, and we were doing some group work thing in a large room, or maybe the gymnasium. I had finished my work and I wandered over to her desk... she was sitting there with her hair flipped over to one side of her head, and supposedly I commented, complimented, that she looked like Veronica from Archie comics. She was surprised by the compliment, it didn't feel like it was a flirtatious remark, and she looked up at me, and she saw Dawn, and she wanted me as her girlfriend (remember, she was dated almost only women). The problem was that we were only 14, she knew what she felt, but she didn't know how to express it, and even if she were to try, she was worried that she would cause me to run screaming, which I probably would have, I wasn't ready to know that when I was that age, not in my family....
so she chalked it up to just me flirting awkwardly.... but she kept it in her mind, just incase, and last year, when I came out to her, she got to give me one of the greatest presents I have ever received in my life.... that memory
We got to spend a wonderful five and a half hours together today, chatting, eating, drinking, walking, and I went back home, and she'll by flying back to her house on top of a mountain in a few days, and if we're lucky we'll be able to do this again one day, and hopefully it won't be another twenty years from now!.
I really feel lucky that I got to have that time with her today, oh goodness my makeup is running now, so emotional these days.
she told me how she felt bad that she didn't take more care of me when we were kids, and I love her for saying that, cause I know she means it, but I wasn't ready then, and if she had given me all of that strength I may have ended up on the street with it after my parent's threw my ass out. It's OK Maya, never feel a second of guilt over it, even though we were never that close a bit of you stayed with me all these years, just like my truth remained in your mind, and you gave me just what you were supposed to, and you're here for me now even if you're up a mountain in Alberta.
and I love you, thank you for being such a powerful part of my story, even if you may always be a fleeting one....
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