A Changed Mind and Heart

by Barbara Sinacore
Albany Meeting

Two scenarios brought about my transformation of mind and heart regarding Trans people.

 

Snapshot:

As a senior citizen, I listened to a song:

I Only Want to Be Pretty

By Debra Burger

It’s not the coarse hair on my chest that defines me.

But a knowing inside about who I am

I’m missing the round breasts that should be there instead

But I do the best that I can

I only want to be pretty,

In a red velvet dress

With the scent of perfume in my hair

To feel the soft touch of 

French silk on my skin

To gracefully dance on the air

They called me a homo, a

Sissy, a queer

I ate all my lunches

Alone

There’s no place in 

School for a girlie-boy

No place to be welcomed 

and known

I tried to be normal.  

I packed up my pearls

No lipstick or lace for two years

I went through the

Motions, gray day after day

With no laughter, thin

Smiles and dry tears

I’ve made friends with 

the mirror and my new

lipstick brush

I’ve a red velvet dress that I wear

Some folks snicker, some

Laugh, when I walk down the street

Some hold their breath 

while they stare

And I wonder why they 

Would care

I only want to be pretty

 

My heart hurt and enlarged.  Just because of that song.

 

Snapshot:

Years earlier two naive girls hitched rides in the UK in winter with dark approaching. A truck pulled over. We got in. The trucker did the usual courteous talk. But then: “You girls wanta see something?” Below workaday jeans were black fishnet stockings and cherry red spiked heels.

 

The frigid weather, being women alone, and the encroaching dark made us appreciative of his ride. That day a trans person became three dimensional for me. The ride may have saved two lives.

 

How to deal with my unconscious prejudices toward trans people/others?

• Can I recognize that I am doing this, preferably at the time of the thought, before acting?
• Do I accept I had this thought?  Remember:  Thoughts come up to be healed. Also, change is difficult if there is no acceptance that one has done something in the first place.
• Am I, as a Quaker, comfortable with this thought/or action?
• If not, how can I replace faulty with reliable information about the problems/victories of trans people/others?  
• Using accurate details about difficulties with housing, employment, health insurance, see a video in the mind’s eye: a scenario with conversation. See YOURSELF as trans and experiencing this.  Let yourself feel into that role.  Ask, how would I handle this?
• What can I change in attitudes and behavior? What would make escalation into action less likely?  
• Give yourself “a star” inwardly for facing yourself.  Hard to do.

 

This nation, I believe, is suffering from a lack of imagination. Divisiveness and prejudice feed on not being able to place oneself in someone’s red shoes. We can imagine it, IF we value it.