a song of mine "Lets Be Friends"

[Guest DanD]

I was listening to some old songs I wrote earlier, and had forgot about for ages.

This was one of the first songs I wrote shortly after I started hormones. My voice was starting to sound different, but not settled yet on it. Just two accoustic guitars and a bass with the vocal; kind of simple like that.

The lyrics are kind of sarcastic or something. Whatever the word is I am not thinking of right now. at times abstract maybe.

the line: "Tell me what is inside me." is an obvious shot at someone, who assumes they have a clue how i feel deep inside? even better than I do, you know?

Some lines in reference talk about trends and fads, they always say this is a phase youre going through, as it it could be. or a parent or freind, any of those, fads.. while theyre in style?

I liked making things sort of crypic back then, it leaves things open to so many interpretations that way. I could explain what I meant by the lines in it, if you want, maybe i should anyway..i dont know.

even the title line which repeats some, is sort of sincere as an invitation, but also a poke at people who would never be a transpersons freind. The song is called

"Lets Be Friends"

(copyrighted in1995. since it mine, i can post it anywhere of course.) .

Let's start a trend:

let's be friends.

Let's start a fad:

you can be my dad.

Tell me where the answer lies.

Tell me where the answer lies.

Tell me where the answer lies.

Let's be ourselves;

do we need help?

Let's start a way

we can end decay.

Tell me what is inside me.

Tell me what is inside me.

Tell me what is inside me.

Let's start a trend:

now, let's be friends.

Let's start a fad:

you can call me Dan.

Tell me where the answer lies.

Tell me where your answer lies.

Tell me where the answer lies.

(i dont always write the same style, or about the same points of view, or moods. I like variety.)

Edited August 18, 2012 by MaryEllen
Verse promoting self injury removed

[Guest DanD]

oh I see..

But I feel i should explain that the verse that was deleted was NOT promoting self injury. I can see where some might think that, maybe, and I almost put in an explanation with it when i put it on there. -and the other verses.

But it wasnt promoting self injury rather it was a completely accurate transsexual complaint.

and consider this explanation:

"Lets be like cats, and lets get fixed." is not me saying i want "us" (or anyone) to get neutered, but its a complaint again.

You see, in my life experience, people knew I wasnt a girl really, I just never fit in. But they didnt think of me as a guy either, because I was female.. Seemed like I was treated like, I was supposed to be this "perpetual child", who never has any adult feelings, you know? They wouldn't talk to me about anything with adult topics..any adult topic, politics, or anything..I'm no good for. keeping me a neutral gendered child in their minds seemed to work for them, forever if possible.

Nobody knew anything about my love life, they didnt want to know if i even had a love life, unless i was suddenly going to magicly turn into a feminine female and be with a normal guy.

When Michelle transitioned our gay freinds kept calling her MJ instead of Michelle. Because it seems too hard for them to adjust to letting you HAVE a gender at all sometimes. I said to michelle, why do they call you MJ? (old name was Michael Joseph, new name was michelle Ann), so it wasnt even her intiials. We dont treat them weird for being gay after all, so why cant they make an effort to use her name?

some freinds they were too! She used to make a ton of money, and was generous, but when she lost her job for changing her name funny how no one was ever around from that crowd again.

--Its the complaint about these fads. as if being my father (or family) is a fad, or my freind is a fad, or the contrary --when its no longer cool to be your freind or be your family, how some people just walk away!

They knew i didnt fit in as a girl, but they also couldnt accept me as a guy, its like people would prefer us just neutered, like a harmless house cat. and I thought of that image, and threw it in there.. But then how does that make us feel?

When cats get neutered they say they calm down a lot more, and sleep more, and they gain more weight.

When I get depressed I know it affects the way i eat and sleep and it affects the way I digest and process, anything.-food or thoughts, or anything I guess?

I had attempted suicide prior to this song by cutting my wrists, and it fit in the context and rhymed and fit with the word "fixed."

I thought --but the end result of you people taking away our gender from us, its just cruel, and takes away something valuable in life, and so, you know, alot of us end up killing ourselves, or wasting away somehow... they say there is that 50 percent rule, you know? By age 30, and i was 29 when I dd what i did..

and it shouldnt be like that! the song says.

My life doesnt have to be like that anymore! and so the last verse was the new assertion, the simple reply to what they want from us, and everything---

Let's start a trend:

now, let's be friends.

its me opening again, but this time for real, saying, let be freinds but this time for real. thats why the word NOW is in there.

We werent before really, but its an invitation: Now, Let us be freinds.

Let's start a fad:

you can call me Dan.

and this time, the word fad is used in jest, because its not a fad, but it is something new, and that is, to call me a name they didnt know me by before. Dan. He just introduced himself, in a song.

i didnt write a letter like so many do for family and freinds, I made a recording, and at christmas time, i had a stack of all these new songs i had just wrote and recorded. This was the song which told them my name, aside from the front cover.

Tell me where the answer lies.

Tell me where your answer lies..

Is just me asking them, what do you say? you want to be my real freind and know the real me?

Dont bother putting the verse back in since its not there, but if you would, leave this in after it since it says a lot with few words, and thats what they used to say poetry is.

[MaryEllen]

Thank you for the explanation.

MaryEllen

[Guest DanD]

Thanks for posting it. I can see why you thought what you thought, but at the same time i was kinda bummed about it, because i dont want anyone to think i'd stick something in there that was promoting anything bad, or offended anyone.

guess i should have included the explanation stuff in the first post like i was going to in the first place.

ya know, i was just thinking. some people lve life as onegender, then they transition,,and go to the other.

some might be treated like michelle was, where, she was just a guy as far as most people knew..and then in the in-between stage, she was treated as non-gendered by some people for a while.

But i didnt really live as a girl before, i guess i wasnt goo at faking it, actually i dont remember faking it, is the thing.

I used the old name and stuff because I had to, but, i didnt walk different or even wear such different clothing.

when i was a teen and looked for a job, i'd ask for the manager and theyd say "this guy over here wants to speak to to you"..and then he would come over and say "yes sir what can i do for you today?"

and then I'd ask if theyre hiring and generally he seems to like me, but then i'd get the application form...

And I didnt know what to put on it. would have been nice to just put down the male name and go with the flow...

but it had to be legal and all that, so I'd just about die as i had to put in that old name again.

and then of course, they usually felt so embarassed... and they werent gong to hire me.

If things flowed for me it would have been easier before, but it was just generally very awkward and awful most the time.

one of the first times i went to a gay bar, some gay guy came on to me, you knwo, thought i was a guy. He felt really bad when he found out. freinds would laugh and say, funny i go to the gay bar with them and the girls usually never noticed me but the guys did.

i sometimes find it hard to imagine some male person who is just flowing as a male in so many ways..and yet they are an MTF. thats good acting! or good pretending or whatever it is.

i wasnt so good at it even when i'd try, and i usually didnt try.

but i think thats one big difference between the mtf and the ftm too, is, i was just a "tom-boy", but for a boy to be girlish, he wasn't called such nice things, or treated so well. Girls can wear whatever they want usually.. they dont call them crossdressers do they?

So in some ways its gotta be harder to be MTF i think? Maybe they can handle it so well because theyre women, really, and girls just seem to have some kind of resiliency and patience and contentment about things. and they were raised to be sort of tough too. I know i'm alot more sensitive than most guys are.

well anyway im gonna go for now..c y alater

[Guest miss kindheart]

well after that fine song i added you as a friend Dan

<<<< hug >>>

vanna

[Guest DanD]

aw shucks! {:-] thanks..i got another one..oh ill post is a new thing i guess..

[Guest miss kindheart]

great

Yeah post away

works best if you post one per topic but

what ever you do tis

see you later

<<<< hug >>>>

vanna