In addition to being disappointed about not attending my high school class reunion as a woman, I was also upset that I was disappointing all my blog's readers and I apologize for that.
There was talk at the reunion about getting together and doing it again when we all turn 70 years old. I am not holding my breath knowing my class' poor track record regarding reunions, but if it does occur, it will give me a second chance.
A few of my old tormentors were in attendance, but I did not socialize with them even though all but one seemed to be on good their behavior. However, the "one" was still the boorish lout he was in high school.
By the way, no one attended crossdressed, but a lot of people were disguised as old people!
Video Redux Dept.
If you have not seen it, the video of my presentation at last month's Hamvention is now viewable here on YouTube.
A ham radio operator who did see it, wrote the following.
I first ventured into Packet as soon as I earned my tech license. But getting started was difficult. No one in my circle of friends knew anything about packet setup, but a digi atop a 2700 foot mountain was incentive enough. So I drove to the Tigard HRO store and bought a book on the subject published by wa1lou. The information in the book explained the pin out for cables, what the settings should be, and go me on the air with a DOS machine, a Radio Shack 202, and a used MFJ 1278 TNC. And I've followed this author, Stanley, throughout the past 30 years. A few years ago wa1lou became editor of the TAPR newsletter. So this year, when TAPR emailed me the forum schedules I took a look did I ever find a surprise: Stanley, wa1lou, looks and sounds like a woman. And carries a purse. It's okay by me. Gender never crossed my mind. I'll still read everything she offers because even though she claims she's not high-tech she can sure simplify the path to success.
I spent most of Saturday helping a relative on a home repair project. It took much longer than expected, so by the time I returned home, I just had time to swap my jeans and T-shirt for slacks and a polo shirt. There was no time to shave everywhere, do my hair and makeup and get fabulously dressed for my high school class reunion.
Needless to say, I am very disappointed about not going to the reunion as a woman. I just have to be satisfied knowing that I would have been one of the better looking woman in attendance (my classmates did not age well).
On the other hand, it was great seeing high school friends and acquaintances who I have not seen in half a century and I had a great time.
My goal was to lose more weight for my high school class reunion. When I got on the scale yesterday morning, I discovered I had lost another five pounds!
I wondered how the dress I purchased for the reunion would look and fit now that I was five pounds lighter. So I slipped on my shapewear, hosiery, heels and the dress I purchased from New York & Company.
It fit perfectly, but when I looked in the mirror, it did not knock my socks off.
While I was waiting for that dress to go on sale, I had purchased another dress, a Calvin Klein floral scuba shift dress, to wear to the reunion in case the New York & Company dress did not go on sale. The Calvin Klein looked fab when I tried it on at Dress Barn, so I slipped out of the New York & Company dress and slipped into the Calvin Klein.
Right away I noticed that the zipper zipped up without effort as compared to struggling with the zipper when I tried it on at Dress Barn. That was a good sign.
And just like the New York & Company dress, the Calvin Klein dress fit perfectly, but when I looked in the mirror, unlike the New York & Company dress, the Calvin Klein dress knocked my socks off! So much so that I changed my plans and decided to wear the Calvin Klein to the reunion.
All I have to do is figure out which shoes and bag to wear with the dress.
Good news is that my wife does not mind that I go out as a woman. While discussing the matter, though, she has asked, "Aren't you afraid of being seen by the neighbors?"
Not at all. Across the street are hundreds of acres of virgin reservoir property, so my nearest neighbors are the birds, the bees and the bears. And the neighbors in their acre lots east and west of our acre lot would have a difficult time seeing me come and gobecause we are so treed-in.
However, I am fairly certain that on a handful of occasions, neighbors have seen me en femme as our vehicles passed each other on the main road in and out of our neighborhood. Don't know whether they figured out it was me en femme or if they thought that some female was borrowing my car.
I do believe that one female neighbor thought she figured me out. A few weeks after our vehicles passed each other while I was dressed to kill, I encountered her while we were walking our dogs. We stopped and chatted briefly, then out of the blue she said, "I see you're wearing pantyhose."
I can't recall if she said "pantyhose" or "knee-highs" or "nylons" or whatever... in any case, she was intimating that I was wearing women's hosiery even though I was in boy mode.
I looked down at my feet trying to figure out why she said that and I saw my feet in a pair of men's socks that were colored light beige. So I looked at her as if she had lobsters crawling out of her ears and said, "No, I'm wearing beige socks."
I should have asked her why she would think I'd be wearing women's hosiery, but I was so glad to have side-stepped her gotcha that I just went on my merry way.
Eye makeup to die for!
The 1929 installment of the Washington State Kiwanis Follies featured these lovely femulators competing in a beauty pageant.
To play Devil's advocate. From your blog it seems that your H.S classmates were very harsh to you and are not worthy of your time.
Just curious, but what do you hope to achieve by attending your H.S. reunion enfemme? Is it to flaunt your femininity and feminine self to their face and show them you survived? Something else?
Your appearance enfemme might only result in possible embarrassment to your wife, sister and/or daughter, and it might confirm to the bigoted originators of the bullying statements that they were right all along in the comments they made to you in H.S.
Your Law School reunion went very well but college is different than H.S. H.S. students are young and bigoted and may not be forgiving - they were and can still be very cruel. I would not want you or your family to be hurt.
Here is my reply.
Thank you for your thoughtful comments.
My law school and college days were not much different than my high school days. I was treated poorly by some of my law school and college classmates just like my high school classmates. Luckily, none of my tormentors showed up at my law school reunion.
So what do I hope to achieve by attending my high school reunion en femme?
High school was not all gloom and doom. I had a lot of good friends and I hope that some of them will show up so I can introduce them to the real me. I want to have a good time and I know I will have a good time if my old friends show up and accept me as a woman.
As far as any of my tormentors are concerned, I will flaunt my femininity in their face, but I will not give them the time of day.
And by the way, two of my tormentors will be no-shows because they are dead and buried.
Revisiting "Another Reunion"
Yesterday's post titled "Another Reunion" was about my law school reunion in 2012, not about my high school class reunion that is scheduled for this Saturday, June 8.
I stopped counting the number of people who thought yesterday's post was about my high school class reunion, which hasn't taken place yet!
Seven years ago this past Sunday, I attended my law school reunion. So as I anticipate attending my high school class reunion this Saturday, I thought it would be appropriate to look back at what occurred seven years ago when I attended my very first reunion.
Ready to go to the Hall of Fame
My law school reunion experience in 2012 was just fabulous.
For those of you out of the loop, on Saturday evening, I attended my law school reunion at the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Massachusetts.
Getting ready yesterday afternoon, I cut myself badly using a new blade in my razor. It was a deep cut just under my left nostril and it took forever to stop bleeding. As a result, it took me longer to do my makeup, initially working around the cut, then waiting for the bleeding to stop. Luckily, I started doing my makeup early enough so that any technical difficulties would not affect my arrival time at the Hall of Fame.
I was dressed and out the door (after snapping a few photos) at 4:45 PM to make the 50-mile trip by 6 PM when the cocktail hour began. On the way, the traffic message boards on the interstate informed me that the exit I had to take to switch from I-84 to I-91 was closed and it recommended a detour via another highway.
I thought about driving to an exit before the closed exit and trying to work my way to an I-91 entrance, but I was familiar with the recommended detour and figured I would only lose 10 minutes, whereas who knew how much time Plan A would cost me. So I took the detour and lost about 20 minutes instead of 10.
The rest of the trip was smooth-sailing and I arrived at the Hall of Fame at 5:55 PM — perfect timing!
I entered the Hall of Fame complex and quickly found the site of the reunion. I was in error in that I thought that the reunion would be held in the Center Court banquet hall. Instead, it took place in a smaller banquet hall in the complex. It was not as spectacular as I pictured the Center Court, but it was very nice nonetheless.
I checked in and immediately encountered the woman who I had exchanged a few e-mails with concerning the reunion. I introduced myself; she welcomed me and helped me find my name badge.
There were about 20 people already in attendance. I recognized one of my classmates, CR, a woman who I considered an acquaintance, not a long lost friend. I said hello to her and she returned a hello, while looking at my name badge trying to figure out who I was (the badge listed Stana, my real last name, and my class year, 1977).
She was carrying a copy of our class yearbook, so I suggested she look me up in the yearbook to refresh her memory. She did and when she put two-and-two together, she exclaimed, "Oh my god! Stanley, you are beautiful now!"
She gushed over how I had changed and then we chatted a bit trying to catch up on the past 35 years in five minutes. Then she was distracted by another person, who I did not recognize, so I went to the bar and got a glass of white wine.
My classmates and I
I mingled with myself for about five minutes, then CR came around again and pointed me in the direction of a table where other 1977 classmates were gathering, so I headed in that direction. There I found two other female school acquaintances (PM and LF) and one of my best friends (JB) and his wife.
An aside, as it turned out, there were nine people in my class who made it to the reunion. Four women and five men. All the women came solo and all five men came with their wives. I believe that the three other women are unattached.
Both PM and LF welcomed me with open arms as if we were old girlfriends and not just acquaintances (I think CR had informed them of my presence before I found their table, so they were expecting me). I did not recognize JB immediately, but when I realized it was my old friend, I greeted him warmly and gave him a hug. His wife, EB, introduced herself and she was very welcoming, too. We all exchanged our stories about the last 35 years, but the women were more interested in hearing my story rather than telling theirs to me. So as not to disappoint, I obliged and held an impromptu outreach session.
Another friend, MM, showed up and he greeted me like the old friends we were.
The cocktail hour flew by and before I knew it, PM was beckoning me to join her at the 1977 table in the dining room. I sat down next to PM and we chatted forever, mostly about me. She assumed that I was a post-op transsexual and I explained that I was not. Actually, everyone I talked to about being transgender assumed I was post-op and I explained to all of them that I was not.
PM said that I was undoubtedly a woman and that I was more of a woman than she was! She said she never felt like a "woman" and was not sure what it meant to feel like a woman. I basically said we are what we are, but society pigeonholes us as "men" or "women" according to their "standards."
After dinner, which by the way, was excellent, I had a long discussion with EB about being transgender. EB is in the entertainment industry in the City and as a result, she is familiar with transgenders and knows where I am coming from more or less.
I mentioned to her that her husband, JB, was the person who told me at the law school Halloween party 36 years ago, that he never realized how feminine I was until he saw me in my costume en femme and realized that it was such a good fit for me and my personality, mannerisms, etc.
MM sat down next to me to chat a bit and said that I was very brave to do what I did. And I replied with my standard comeback to the bravery comment, that is, I don't consider it brave to be yourself… to be what who you are. But he said I was too modest and that if he was in the same situation, he doubted if he could do what I did. Maybe, maybe not, but it was very nice of MM to say what he did. In fact, I received nothing but support and positive words from all my classmates.
I did not mix much with the other attendees; there was not much time to do so. But early on, one woman from the class of 2006 introduced herself and we had a short chat about what we had in common, that is, the mispronunciation of our first names. Her name is Zoe and people call her Zo or Zo-ee. About half the people pronounced my name correctly (rhymes with Donna) and the other half got it wrong, but I don't mind.
The only other non-classmate I recall speaking with was a professor who dined at our table and sat right next to me. He began teaching at the school the year after I graduated, so he did not know me from the school, but I asked him about what happened to some of the people I worked with way back when (I worked in the library while attending law school) and he tried to fill me in on what he remembered (not much as it turned out).
The evening ended much too quickly and I was on my way home at 10:30 PM.
I had a wonderful time to put it mildly!
I hope my high school reunion on Saturday is just as wonderful!
I am sure it won't surprise you that I am excited about attending my high school class reunion on Saturday. It will be one of the gutsiest things I have ever done.
When I attended Hamvention for the first time as a woman, I came out to my friends and acquaintances beforehand so as not to surprise anyone. And when I attended my law school reunion as a woman, the organizers posted an online list of the folks attending, so I knew beforehand who would be there and be prepared for any troublemakers (there were none).
So, I am curious who will be attending my high school reunion. How many of my high school friends would I surprise?
There is no online list of attendees. But I did have a list of the 13 women comprising the reunion committee, so I assume they will be attending. I consider 3 of the 13 friendly acquaintances, the rest I hardly knew.
I contacted the only friend who I knew was going and asked if he knew anybody else from our gang who would be attending, but he did not. So all I know for sure is that in addition to me, one member of that old gang of mine will be there.
Today, I begin my trip home from Hamvention. I will post a full report about my long weekend after I unpack and settle in. Meanwhile, I leave you the following which I wrote last Sunday.
In high school, I was voted "Most Likely to Get a Sex Change."
I'm kidding. "Most Likely to Get a Sex Change" was not something voted on by my high school class, but if they had voted on it, I am sure I would have been in the running, if not the winner of that title.
As I mentioned many times before, I have always been feminine. It was not an affectation – being feminine came naturally to me... so natural that I was unaware of it. Only when my speech and mannerisms were highlighted by my peers did I become aware that something was amiss (pun intended).
Throughout my school years, I was abused and bullied because of my girly ways and it was no different in high school. That is why I am anxious to show up at my high school reunion as a woman, a good looking woman at that, and virtually spit in the eyes of my abusers.
However, I am still on the fence about going as a woman.
The indecision is on my mind all the time. I really want to do it and most of you who have commented on it have encouraged me to do it, but it is a very big step and I probably will not make up my mind until the last minute.
Yesterday, I purchased The Dress I will wear if I do decide to go en femme.
I spotted The Dress weeks ago on the New York & Company website, but held off making a purchase because the price was high ($79.95) and I know that New York & Company has lots of sales. I figured I could save some money if I waited and lo and behold, I saw the dress on sale at half price yesterday and ordered it as quick as a Playboy bunny.
You can see The Dress here and below in the "Femulate Her" slot.
I have received lots of advice about attending my high school reunion as a woman or not.
The advice is running about 4:1 in favor of going as a woman. Some of you changed your opinion from "no go" to "go" when I mentioned in my second post that my wife was not attending, so I counted you in the "go" column.
Some of your comments follow.
When faced with the opportunity to go to her reunion as a woman, Trish decided, "...that since I haven't transitioned, it would be misleading to go to my reunion presenting as female --- although some of my classmates do know I'm transgender."
For what it's worth, I have almost no contact with my classmates and I am 100% confident that none of them know I am trans.
Katherine wrote, "Other than 'throwing our traniness in their face and in the face of others' what would be accomplished by your attending en femme? You go out in public and are accepted anytime you want to. I think it would be best for 'them' [my family] for you to attend as Stan and continue to be the understanding, compassionate family man that you are and that you write about."
Joe was a "go":
Look at you! You're Beautiful! A 50 year reunion, means you must be around 67 years old [I'm 68]? You look amazing for a woman of your age! I think it would be a crime not to share yourself with your old classmates.
In a similar vein, Faith wrote:
You should just go! Be you. Be out and be proud. A while back on pride, I posted to social media: To all the bullies who used to harass me and beat me up and call me gay, well, you were right. But you were still assholes!
I have seen recent photos of some of my classmates — the girls who would not consider dating me under any circumstances and the guys who bullied me because I was not a manly man. To put it nicely as possible, they are not as well-preserved as I am and I would love to see their jaws drop when they realize I am the "beautiful" stranger attending their reunion.
Stacey wrote, "My wise friend told me that no matter what you do/what you are for that you will always have someone against it and that as long as what you do/what you are for doesn't hurt anyone then who cares what they think or say."
I have not decided whether to go to the reunion as a woman or as Stan. I have over six weeks to decide and knowing me, I will make up my mind at the last minute.
Anyway, I won't bore you with this anymore, but I will let you know when I make up my mind. Again, thank you all for your input.
Holiday Inn's infamous high school reunion advertisement
Thank you for all for your advice about attending my high school reunion as a woman (or not). Your comments have given me some food for thought and here is what I think.
I should have mentioned in my original post that my wife will not be attending the reunion. She finds my reunions boring because she does not know anyone in my class and feels that the $75 sticker price is a waste of money as far as she is concerned. So she will not be in attendance (and possibly be embarrassed or pitied or questioned about my presentation).
My sister and I are very close, but she has never supported me with regards to my transness. After I came out to her, she was initially surprised and upset by the news and since then, she has never mentioned it. (Out if sight, out of mind.) So why should I be concerned about embarrassing her if I attend the reunion as a woman? For that matter, why should she be embarrassed since she does not seem to care much about my transness.
So I am seriously leaning towards going as a woman. Like Velma advised, "JUST DO IT! Ten years from 'now,' nobody will remember or care what YOU did; except you. Those that DO remember you will RESPECT YOU for your courage to be YOURSELF."
In a similar vein, Rhonda advised, "Do it - you will regret not doing it." I already have a collection of life's regrets and I don't want to add another one to the pile.
Other Thoughts
My high school was a Roman Catholic high school. There were a handful of very religious classmates, but in general, I did not find my Catholic high school classmates much different than my public grammar school classmates. Probably because most of my public grammar school classmates were also Catholic.
That being said, the Catholic religion is notorious for being transphobic. However, I have found that Catholic civilians are no more transphobic than the general population. How this plays out among my Catholic classmates remains to be seen, but my guess is that they will follow the trends of the general population. And I suspect that my female classmates will be more supportive than my male classmates.
Speaking of my male classmates, I had a lot of friends in high school, both male and female, however, most of the jocks were not among my friends. They verbally abused me with regards to my natural femininity. Showing up at my reunion as a woman will prove that they were correct in recognizing my femininity, but were just very rude in the way they acknowledged it.
My high school class is celebrating its 50th anniversary the year with a reunion in June. I attended my law school reunion as a woman in 2012. I had a fabulous time and would like to attend my high school reunion as a woman, too, but I am hesitant about doing so.
I have no qualms about facing my classmates as a woman. I am hesitant because I worry about embarrassing my wife and sister. Both attended my high school one year behind me. People in my class know people in their class and you know how people like to talk.
The reunion is in early June, so I have time to decide. I know what I want to do, but I don't know what to do.
