Drag #5

[Guest Stacy Wilderness]

Drag #5

I'm at [exact location removed - a park], waiting for a friend

we play music together, or we did

until he disappeared,

he's been depressed

he called me the other day,

today is Sunday, Earth Day,

I suggested we go to a drum circle

at [exact location removed] park,

I'm running late, I've never been there,

but he can't find it either,

I get there first

I walk over to a pointlessly milling

about crowd of vaguely hippiesh looking people

with an odd assortment of African looking drums

the email said it would start at 2, it's now 5,

I don't think they will be starting anytime soon,

but I'm pretty sure this is the drum circle

I'm wearing girls beige colored jeans, a girls blouse,

makeup, a dark brown wig

brown boots with 3" heels

and slinging a bodhran in a case over my shoulder

oddly I'm not nervous walking up to this group,

a girl is cutting fire branches for the bonfire later

I offer to help, but she explains she's just started sawing,

she saws the branch, or tries to

but is slides around on the log that it rests on.

I offer my foot -

my boot heel actually

to hold it in place

the notch of my boot heel is the perfect size and shape for

stepping on the branches she's sawing -like a vise my

boot heels hold the branch in place she saws through

the branch, quickly -next, I step on branch again

and again she saws through the branch we repeat this

several times -we are a good team - her strong arms,

my sexy boots with the 3" heels

if anyone ever asks you what practical use heels have

now you know

my friend D- arrives

I walk over.

this drum circle won't be starting any time soon we both agree

D- wants to walk, so we walk

he's depressed and wants to quit smoking pot -

it helps with the depression but it also doesn't

not any more

I've quit smoking pot,

I quit a 12 pack a day beer habit,

I quit a 2 pack a day cigarette habit and gained 50 pounds

I talk about how it took so much out of me,

how hard it was, it was scary, and hard

impossibly hard

I talk about coming out about being trans, walking out in

public in a dress, how hard that was, how unimaginably

impossible that was -it was a mountain, I say, that was

impossible to face, you can't imagine

but I'm smiling, and I'm walking along with my friend

and people are walking by and it all seemed OK at the time,

which is weird, me smiling, laughing, dressed like a woman,

talking about how impossible it was, how depressed I was,

you can't imagine how depressed I was, you just can't,

how hard it was to quit, how unbelievably impossible it

was to let people see me dressed up, I laugh and people

walk by and hear me laugh,

what do I care, I'm talking to a friend

I knew what caused my depression,

I knew exactly why I was depressed facing that mountain,

that mountain of impossibility of never, ever being me,

and shrinking back into the mind numbing depths of the hopelessness

relieved only by getting stoned out of existence

D- talks about his depression, facing the morning, how hard

it is in morning, being so tired, so depressed

he talks about his fiance, his job, his wonderful son,

we talk about ideation versus making plans,

he knows exactly what I'm talking about

and why -if that line is ever crossed,

(it's unstated, but understood)

I joke about my last job and the first thing I thought

literally when I woke up every morning was

"love!"

I laugh -it's funny, but God I hated that job, all the hiding

repressing, depression, fear

I had to quit

but it was scary

I talk about going to church,

my gay church where I got to meet gay people,

well I didn't actually meet them, but I sat in the same room

with them and that helped at the time

it's not a very religious message

but it's helped me

"being around people is important

not shutting them out

I've been doing that"

D- says

"They should support you" I suggest

but he disagrees, and feels he's been ignoring people

or not returning their calls and shouldn't do that

I nod and walk on

we talk some more

and make our way back to the drum circle

which still hasn't started,

of course

So we decide to start our own jam

I get my dulcimer,

because I want him to hear me play my new instrument

and my harmonicas (of course) and a tin whistle

and a couple bath towels (because I don't want

to get grass stains on my girly jeans)

he brings a couple drums and a guitar

we jam

it's a lovely spring evening

as we start to play a mother and her child

come over the child is fascinated

"He's a boy, right? how old is he? about two?"

"he's one" his mother tells me

I play my harmonica and D- lets the boy

bang on his drum

the drum circle starts up in the background

a persistent rhythm

I adjust my jamming to this new beat

the boy bangs on the drum

he's in 4/4 time and keeping the beat,

he starts bobbing up and down in time,

dancing

it's hilarious

I'm laughing, D-'s laughing, the mother's laughing

the boy looks at us

and goes back to dancing

in a bit the father will come over

he was down by the river

he will have a camera around his neck

and a daughter

my foot will have fallen asleep and I'll need to stand up

and stomp my heels into the grass

the spell will be broken

D- will need to get home.

but he'll hug me before he goes

and he's smiling when he leaves

in a bit I'll be standing there

alone

looking at the drum circle

afraid to go over

feeling like an outsider

an intruder

unsure of whether to go over and join in

or not

I'll feel that vague fear

and give in to that fear,

get in my truck and go home

but that's all in a bit

right now,

thing's are OK

[Guest miss kindheart]

Stacy

It is so nice to read about your life

Your so beautiful

Then again you all ways have been

<<< hug >>>

vanna