Prologue

Welcome to my secret (okay, not-so-secret ;-) diary, or blog for 2011.

Diary Entries for 2011

First of all, for the visually-inclined, here's what I looked like at the beginning of April, when I facilitated the local Gender Queery meeting at the Q Center:

Which, of course, leads me to what I've been doing (at least 'en femme'): Not a lot. I've been going out about once or twice a month, to the Gender Queery (GQ) and Trans*Fem meetings at the Q Center, when I'm actually in town. I've managed to miss a couple of meetings of each I think. Either 'cause I'm out of town for various reasons, or cannot dress because my step-son is over with us.

We have a plan to (finally!) tell my step-son about my dressing. As soon as school is over this year. My partner suggested that maybe it's soon time to do so. I've agreed with my partner that it has been for the best to not tell him until now. Between him not being ready for concepts of gender fluidity (particularly when he was 8 or so ;-), forming his own identity, the attitudes of his other family members, the fact that it could have been used against us in custody issues, etc. we simply haven't told him. It's a private matter; one which he didn't need to know in order to be my (our) step-son (son) and for us to love him; and hopefully vice-versa.

So why now? Well, basically, we think he's mature/old enough to know. His identity seems pretty set, he understands concepts of gender, and he's been showing a good amount of maturity lately (Maybe some struggles with that, but then we all do, don't we? ;-). It's also, honestly, an issue of me having the freedom to express myself (reasonably) in my own house. Time for me to be able to leave my house cross-dressed, and not have to sneak around him. Not have to wait until he goes to bed to come home. Perhaps most importantly, though, it's time for him to know me more deeply, and for me to be able to connect with him more personally because I'm not feeling like I'm hiding something from him or keeping something private that I'd rather not keep from him.

I think I've made clear the difference between a (shameful) secret and privacy before. I do believe that my dressing is not something to be ashamed of. It's OK that I have some things that are private; not everyone in my life needs to know everything about me. I do, however, want those I love to know about me in a personal way; I want to share what's important to me with them, and vice-versa. When I think they can handle the details of important things, and respect my privacy-- and more importantly, respect me-- then I will make fewer things private. Like my 'dressing'. I am looking forward to being able to tell my son about this aspect of me, and am certainly hoping that it goes well...

So, what about the other stuff in the last 5 months or so? Well the logistics of my life look much the same. I work my 45-plus hour weeks. I've gone on a vacation w/my sweetie, and have one coming up. We've been taking care of house maintenance; whether it's chores or bigger things. I'm staying involved in the GLBT (LGBT, BGLT, TBLG, GLBTQ, GLBTQQ,... ;-) community. I'm trying to nurture some of my friendships.

Most importantly, though, my partner and I are doing better. Much better, I think. We've been talking some things out. We've been working on getting out of the downward spin of our interactions. I have been working hard on improving my attitude, letting go of my frustrations. She's been doing the same, and has also been working on dealing w/her (until-recently-untreated) menopause symptoms.

A big part of the issue has been me, though. I got profoundly frustrated by a whole set of circumstances, and was also really (really) stressed at/about work and whether I'd be able to provide an income for our family. Since my income is the only one, and my partner was having a very hard time of finding work and/or making her business ideas go (who wouldn't in this economy?), it was a big source of stress. Then there was the decision to invest a big chunk of our savings in something decidely more risky than an FDIC-insured savings account. That caused (and, really, is causing) me some serious stress. It's looking like that investment will stabilize and start producing some decent returns here soon. Add in some family drama (sick relatives, not speaking to other family), me allowing my friendships to lapse or become distant (though, to be fair, my friends let things go too; and except for one or two friends, I often was the one making more of the effort).

Now, how I handle all this is up to me, and it was really hard to handle all these things when my marriage was steadily eroding. Yes, I have the priveledge of marriage, and am grateful for that. I know many in the BGLT community do not. [I think I've decided to alphabetize the letters; it's now BiSexual-Gay-Lesbian-Transgender :)] That being said, when your long-term relationship is impoloding (with some bouts of exploding), it sucks regardless of what you call it or the legal rights that come with it. Again, though, it's nice that the implosion/explosion cycles are getting (much) smaller, placing less stress on the marriage.

So... there you go. More than you asked for about what's going on in the last 5 months, and some of what's coming up in the next one or two. Aren't you glad you decided to wander by and read my blog? If nothing else, you now have a data point outside your own life. I sincerely hope yours has had less stress than mine, that it will continue to get even better like mine is, and that either way you enjoy this journey of life we are on.

Love,
Kim

January 03, 2011: Happy New Year! (and Ten Months; I'm over-due...)

Over 10 months since updating my site. Apparently I'm doubling the neglect of this site every year, so pretty soon it will only be updated right before I die... ;-)

Anyway, how do I sum up 10 months, and most of 2010? Hmmnn... first of all:

2010 SUCKED!

Okay, now that I have that out of my system... *Sigh* Don't get me totally wrong; there were some nice things about 2010. It's simply that, overall, it sucked. Mostly because my partner and I had (have?) hit what I hope is the low point of our entire marriage/relationship... I hope that we are on the mend. My heart aches. Intensely. My soul isn't doing much better.

I could fill you in on the things that were great (like a vacation with warm blue water, to celebrate my marriage, still having a job) or that totally sucked (pretty much everything else, and most intensely my marriage, my dad being very sick, hanging on to my job because I'm golden hand-cuffed to it, etc.) but you don't really care, do you?

Well, maybe you do because you've bothered to read this far, but I am pretty sure that my wife, me, and maybe a 1 or 2 other people in the world is all who actually read this (unless there's speed-readers that can read everything I've written in well under a minute). Don't believe me? Well, here's some statistics from 2010 (thank you, Google Analytics):

	Page		Page Views	Unique Views	Avg. Time on Page	Bounce Rate	% Exit
1.	Kim’s Pictures		1,264	592	00:00:12	38.10%	7.04%
2.	Index (/)		1,132	725	00:00:34	23.29%	37.46%
3.	Out_n_About		471	209	00:00:37	40.62%	15.29%
4.	Wild Pic’s		353	216	00:00:11	0.00%	10.48%
5.	Links		297	191	00:01:20	37.60%	46.80%
6.	Wedding Pic’s		243	192	00:00:38	66.67%	9.88%
7.	Favorite Pic’s		207	133	00:00:12	0.00%	8.21%
8.	Miscellaneous Pic’s		195	96	00:00:18	0.00%	6.15%
9.	Halloween Pic’s		192	96	00:00:20	100.00%	6.77%
10.	Kim’s Friends		179	154	00:00:47	66.67%	19.55%
11.	More about Kim		172	119	00:00:41	45.16%	23.84%
12.	Kim’s Glamour Pic’s		158	122	00:00:11	0.00%	5.70%
13.	Kim’s Diary/Blog		150	97	00:00:41	54.55%	16.67%
14.	Index.html (/) [Yes, again.]		89	69	00:00:27	46.15%	28.09%
15.	Kim’s Thoughts on Gender		64	51	00:01:28	57.14%	46.88%
16.	Kim’s Shoes		55	45	00:01:22	82.93%	74.55%
17.	Kim’s Poetry		44	40	00:03:32	94.59%	86.36%
18.	Kim’s 2009 Diary		38	31	00:00:27	50.00%	28.95%
19.	Kim’s Thoughts on Sexuality		25	16	00:00:19	100.00%	4.00%
20.	Kim’s 2008 Diary		17	16	00:00:48	100.00%	47.06%

So, students, what can we learn from the above empirical data?

1. All of what Kim has put up here can be absorbed in an average of 1 minute and 43 seconds... [Wait, maybe that's not it...]
2. On average, people visit 4-5 pages [We're getting closer...]
3. The overwhelming interest is in pictures (how I look) vs. who I am or what I say [Aha! That's it! :)]
4. Almost everyone is a new visitor [or they have privacy that deletes tracking cookies or something so Google thinks they're new].
5. If you're actually reading this, you're more unique than most; you're not in the profile of the top 10 most frequently visited pages (visitors to this site). Thank you! :)

Okay, now that I'm done satisfying the geeky side of me, where was I? Oh yes... 2010 Sucked! At this risk of posting something that is much more scatalogical than I usually do, I think to understand some of the depth of how 2010 sucked, you may want to read the following piece (though maybe only if you are not offended by frequent use of the F-word): Dodai Stewart's Rant on 2010 (Jezebel.com)

There. Does that help you understand how I feel at the moment? :-}

So, even though this post may seem short to you, I've spent a decent amount of time thinking about it, finding stat's, figuring out how to post it all, etc. It's hard when one builds a site by hand in HTML. I know there's a better way. I'm an old dog, and I haven't learned the new tricks yet. Anyway...

I hope your 2011 is great, and that mine is significantly better than my 2010 was.

Love,
Kim

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More Diary Left...

Please see my Diary for 2010 for more diary entries.

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