The Josie Pages

Field Notes In/On Transition Ch-Ch-Changes! I’m thinking about going back to school.... I'm a writer and a self publisher, but I'm not good enough at either right now to make a living at it. My gut is telling me to apply at the SFU Writers Studio downtown (where I already know a lot of people), but there's no student loans for the intensive but still part time course... I just found out that you can borrow from your RRSP to cover tuition etc. But after I finish, likely still working in the video store, will I be able to pay back my RRSP? There’s a summer course that is shorter and less expensive, but still too expensive to do without going into more debt. And that one is in Surrey, a commute I’m not into. I could do that, and keep working... or should I try some MA program? I feel like I have very few options for work the rest of my life, and the video store thing doesn't really pay the bills anymore. Any other retail position I could get, (which I do no...

Field Notes In/On Transition. Smile Therapy There seems to be no end to my disappointment in myself and the world around me. I’m having a really hard time keeping my shit together lately, but I am keeping it together. Almost everything about my current job grates on me. All the little things that no one in their right mind gets worked up over for more than a minute or two. I dwell on these things for days, weeks.  I’m very grateful to have a job where I’m accepted, my transition at work could not really have gone any smoother elsewhere, unless maybe I worked somewhere with a health plan and the same awesome accepting coworkers. But to me, having a job like that; with benefits, maybe earning enough that I could save something every month instead of putting myself into deeper and deeper debt is like some kind of pipe dream.  I feel like I have a better shot at winning the lotto. Since I lost some hours in the spring, I’ve been over budget almost exactly the amo...

Field Notes In/On Transition. Owner of a Lonely Heart (Some long ago music to underscore not only how old I am, but maybe my old person taste in music) I have most of my life been a follower, not a leader, at least in the human group of friends sense. Wanting more than anything to be liked and accepted (when I feel/felt worthy of neither in a deep profound way) I more often than not defer to bigger personalities in whatever group dynamic is happening. This is sometimes the place people call the “Friend Zone” but more often than not, for me, it is just deferring your own preference to that of your friend, or friends in a given situation. It’s actually kind of amazing that I never experimented with a wider variety of drugs, sex and, rock n roll given these supplicant circles I am/was caught up in. But in fact I’ve never been able to take those things that far. I get sick from/of booze, or drugs, and/or weirded out with sex, I retreat, stay home, and eventually d...

Field Notes In/On Transition Untitled Long Ass Blog Entry #67 I’m having a really hard time sitting down and writing this blog entry. I’ve been trying to do so every day for over a week. What is holding me back? Fear. I’m afraid of everything it seems. After a life spent “knowing” that I could never succeed, that every dream I had, was just that: a dream, or at least that’s what those I shared those dreams with told me. And to be sure many of those dreams were of the pipe dream variety.  I was regularly labeled by family, teachers, etc as a “dreamer” which if you come from a working class background is akin to being called lazy or some kind of jerk. (turns out that a lot of my “starings into space” that got me in trouble in school were petit mal epilepsy seizures, and that my utter and complete ineptitude with math is from a dyslexia around any series of numbers)  It’s not possible to be a comic book writer or artist (I have done so in my life in fact) or a poet,...

Field Notes In/On Transition Yesterday was a slow ass day. Time, this week has been moving like molasses uphill in February, In Winnipeg. I had this one great little moment when this dad and little girl combo came in to the store.  Nice folks, I chat a lot with the dad, and I don’t recall him ever misgendering me, or even gendering me at all. But he says to his daughter:   “Can you take the movie up to the man at the desk?”  The girl looked at him all serious like... “That’s a Lady! Not a man.” He says, “well then, give them to her.” So she brought them up. Nice moment for me, maybe this guy will if he does gender me, do it correctly. Thank you cute as a button 5 year old girl. The rest of the day though dragged on, no matter how busy it seemed, only a minute or two would go by it seemed. Eventually my shift was over and I wandered home feeling tired for no real reason, and stopped at the market to buy bread, coffee and toilet paper, of cou...

Field Notes In/On Transition Post Pride Wrap up It’s taken me forever to sit down and write this blog post that I meant to do directly after Pride. In my last post I think I mentioned that I was given some free tickets to a Queer Arts Fest show. The day of, of course I spent the day battling some sort of gastro/digestion issue, and was too wiped out to go. my friend who I was giving the second ticket to was ill that day as well, either we both ate something off, caught the same bug, or are on each other’s cycles right now. All or none of these things are possible. I felt bad about not using the tickets, but not running to the bathroom in the middle of a show is something I want to avoid most of the time. Le sigh. I should also go back and talk about “Pride Weekend” as I did participate in some events this year. Marching in “The Trans March” that has moved over to my neighbourhood seemed very important to me, this year. So, I scooted up after work (missing a week of electr...

Field Notes In/On Transition  Thoughts and Actions So far the 2013 summer months seem to have lead to less posting, perhaps, than the first few months of my transition.  So I am trying to get some momentum going for some myself by posting with a few new pictures of myself in recent purchases, every day Josie wear. The First picture is my basic uniform, flattering top and my favourite skirt that I wear as often as anything I own, these sandals I got last summer from my favourite Postal carrier, Kimberly. They are my go to shoes all summer.  Others come out when it rains or I’m going out on the town (which is almost never)but in the summer these sandals rock. This is how I look most days at work. I might be wearing a dress like you see in the other two photos. The one with the “O” pattern is “what it’s all about” as far as I’m concerned. It’s my new favourite dress.  I have some pretty new clothes, my first awesome purchases in a while. The one ...