Chapter Nine: The Neighborhood

When school ended for the semester, I began living fulltime as a woman; it caused a bit of stir in my neighborhood, since mother and I had lived in the same house since I was about four years old. The neighbors had seen me grow up as a boy, even though I had been likely characterized as gay. The other kids often called me a “sissy,” so I didn’t think my transition would be too much of a surprise.

I had hoped that our next door neighbor Paul Phillips – who had always been friendly to mom and myself – would accept me openly as Julie, and was surprised when he greeted me with a scowl on the Saturday after school ended. I purposely walked out of the house, wearing a yellow sundress with floral patterns and approached him as he was weeding a flower patch in his backyard.

“Mr. Phillips let me introduce you to Julie,” I said directly to him. He looked up at me, at first not recognizing me.

“Julie?” he said, puzzled.

“Yes, I’m Jason, your next door neighbor, and I’d like to tell you that from now on I’ll be living as a woman.” I spoke directly, almost with pride, even though I had debated with myself for several days over how I would tell him of my decision.

“My God, Jason, what’s going on with you?” His look was one of shock and wonderment.

“Well, sir, since you have been such a good neighbor and you and your wife helped mom and me over some difficult times, I felt I ought to tell you directly about this change in my life,” I said.

“But I don’t understand,” he said.

Paul Phillips and his wife, Marian, had always been friendly and helpful to us, with Paul always ready to offer his natural handyman’s expertise when mom had a problem with plumbing or appliances; in return, I had helped him with yard work and snow shoveling while I was still in school. When Marian took sick, I spent many hours after school and on weekends helping nurse her, even helping to clean the house. When mom died, Paul helped immensely with funeral arrangements at a time I felt hopelessly overwhelmed in both grief and confusion.

I knew Paul must have viewed me as somewhat of a sissy, and probably thought I was gay.

“Remember how hopeless I was when you tried to teach me to throw and catch a baseball?” I asked as I began to explain my transition.

He chuckled. “Yes, I remember it was quite a challenge.”

“Perhaps then you’ll realize that I was never happy as a boy and I began to wish I was a girl,” I continued. “I often felt I was a girl, and finally mom understood and let me begin wearing dresses at home. That made me so happy, and now I realize I really am a woman deep inside me and have begun taking treatments to transition into female.”

He shook his head and then looked at me, his eyes boring into me as I stood in the late morning sun.

“That explains everything,” he said finally.

“What does that explain?”

“Who that girl was I saw leaving your house a few weeks ago and getting into a sports car with a husky, good-looking guy. That was you, wasn’t it?”

I nodded.

“Marian saw the two of you and wondered who the pretty girl was and I told her they must have been friends of yours or something,” he said. “You were so beautiful in the outfit.”

“Thank you, Mr. Phillips. I’m really so happy now and I feel like myself, finally.”

“Oh Marian, Marian,” he yelled. “Come on out here.”

In a few seconds, Marian Phillips emerged from the house; like her husband, she was in her eighties, and had a trim figure. She wore Bermuda shorts and an old faded blouse. She walked haltingly, mainly as she confessed due to growing balance issues.

“What is it, Paul?” she said, a coffee cup in hand.

Before he could answer, she looked at me and said, “And who is this?”

“Meet Julie, she lives next door,” he said, leaving my identity a mystery.

“Oh no!” she exclaimed, her free hand going to cover her mouth. “My God, it’s Jason, isn’t it? You’re just adorable.”

She placed her cup down on the floor of the back porch and rushed over to hug me. “I always felt you’d make a pretty girl, and here you are.”

She hugged me for what seemed an eternity, finally releasing me.

“You’re not disappointed in me?” I asked.

“Not at all, dear,” Paul Phillips said. “We’re not the old fogies you might think we are. We’re aware of changes happening in the world and when you get to be our age, you’ve seen it all.”

“What would your mother say about this, Julie?” Marian Phillips asked, pointedly using my female name.

“I think she’d be happy for me,” I said.

“As long as you’re happy, dear,” she said.

“I am,” I smiled.

We spent the rest of the morning chatting over coffee; Marian Phillips even suggested that I use her hairdresser. “She’s kept up with the latest fashions,” she said.

I had always admired Mrs. Phillips’ hair styling and we agreed to go together soon to get our hair done.

*****
Not all the neighbors that summer were as supportive of my change as the Phillips. I couldn’t help feel that as the word spread down the street that hundreds of eyes examined me as I walked to the train station. For that reason, I decided to dress as modestly as possible, often wearing slacks or Capri pants, and rarely wearing all but the most neutral of lipstick.

There was a group of young teens that gathered most afternoons in front of the McCloskey home, about two doors down from mine. It was a mixed group of about eight, divided usually about half and half between boys and girls. In previous summers, the group mainly played pickup baseball and football games between the parked cars; sometimes they rode their bicycles along the sidewalks scaring pedestrians as they whipped by. Mainly, however, they were just being kids and it was refreshing to see them out-of-doors playing rather than hunched over computers or playing video games inside. This summer, however, was different; the girls had begun to mature; nearly all of them sprouted modest breasts while the boys – who always lagged behind in the maturing process – still weren’t sprouting scraggly mustaches or beards. I noticed, too, they were playing fewer ballgames in the street, and were hanging together giggling, sometimes a boy and girl would pair off and separate from the group. They were discovering life and, in truth, I envied them; I had rarely played outside when I was their age, feeling too inadequate as a boy to compete in their sporting games and macho pursuits. Also, I had missed those middle years that I wished I would have lived through as a girl.

It was about four o’clock on a warm, weekday afternoon in late June that I had my first serious encounter with the group. I had walked from the train station and was returning from the summer school classes I was taking at the local university branch to receive a master’s in education. I was dressed as you might suspect any young lady in a master’s program would be dressed during the summer. I wore light blue shorts that reached to mid-thigh, sandals that exposed my toes painted in a light pink and a loose-fitting, button-down peach-colored blouse. My hair was tied into a pony tail that poked through the back of a light blue baseball cap and bounced up and down as I walked. I wore a backpack.

I guess I probably was called “cute” by most who observed me that day; I caught some men staring at me, both on the train and in class. One of them, an older man who had touches of gray in his hair and whose few wrinkles in his face made him most handsome had made some small talk with me and I politely reciprocated, answering his questions with a brief smile, hoping that I was not being too welcoming to him. I truly was not interested in a new man friend at this time when I was trying to achieve a career in teaching. Besides, I suspected the man was likely married.

The kids on my street, however, didn’t see me as “cute;” in their eyes I was a “freak” or a “danger” to them.

“Hey, freak, let’s see your sissy cock,” Bobby McCloskey, the scruffy sixteen-year-old youngest child in the large McCloskey family, said confronting me.

He placed himself directly in front of me as I tried to walk through the gathered youth, forcing me to stop. Another boy, equaling unkempt, moved so close to me I could smell the odor of his sweaty body. He added, “Yeah, you fag; let’s see what you got in those shorts.”

Both the boys were as tall as I was, and obviously considerably stronger. As they confronted me, the others – boys and girls – crowded into me, making it impossible to move. I was suddenly afraid what might happen, but I tried to summon up the resolve I had in the classroom and take control of the situation.

“You let me by,” I said, trying to put a commanding, firm tone in my voice, even though I was afraid it came out a bit in a high register and with a bit of a tremble.

“My mom says you’re a pervert,” Bobby snarled at me.

“A pervert,” chimed in a tall, light-complexioned girl called Susie Nordquist who lived across the street and for whom I had been a baby-sitter when I was about fourteen. Her mother was a hard-working, single mother of three trying to keep the house that she had been able to keep in her divorce.

“Susie, you know me, remember how much fun we had when I baby-sat with you,” I challenged her. I remember that as a five- and six-year-old girl she had pleaded, almost to the point of crying, when my time came to leave her when her mother came home. I had great joy in reading books to her, play-acting and even playing with her dolls.

“You’re still a pervert,” she said, her voice quivering, and I realized she didn’t believe her own words, but likely said them to be accepted among the other neighborhood kids, always an important need for girls in their teens.

“Come on kids, just let me through,” I pleaded, putting more emphasis in my voice, trying to use my age to give me the image of authority.

Just then, I heard a booming voice yell out: “Kids, let that person through.”

Mary McCloskey, the matriarch of the large family, approached slowly, her dark hair straggling from her head and wearing a ratty tee-shirt that did no favor to her large, flabby body. The kids scattered quickly, and Mrs. McCloskey approached:

“Jason Pearson, you’re not only a disgrace to the neighborhood but you’re an abomination in the eyes of God.”

“But Mrs. McCloskey, you don’t understand. I’ve always felt . . .”

“I don’t care what you felt, you queer,” she boomed back. “Why don’t you just move? Get the hell outa this town and dammit, move to a place where all the weirdos go like San Francisco.”

“I have a right to live here, Mrs. McCloskey and I plan to stay, regardless what you think,” I said firmly.

“Not if I have anything to say about it. You’re setting a bad example for the kids,” she said.

“Good bye Mrs. McCloskey. You have a good day,” I said, turning from her and heading to home. My heart was pounding heavily and I had to strain to hold back tears that I knew would erupt into a full-blown crying bout once I was safely inside, behind locked doors.

And that’s just what happened as I locked the front door, leaning against it and crying profusely. With deep sobbing, I lowered all the shades in the house, went to my bedroom and landed flat on my stomach on my bed, burying my head into a pillow. I was a pariah in my own neighborhood.

*****
For the rest of that week, I dreaded the thought of walking down my street, afraid of another confrontation with the neighborhood kids – or, even worse, bumping into that horrid person, Mrs. McCloskey. Fortunately, no such meeting occurred; perhaps the kids found other persons to hound. On Friday afternoon, however, I saw Susie and another girl, whom I didn’t know, talking together in front of Susie’s house across the street. I hurried, trying not to look in her direction and thus avoid an awkward meeting of eyes. I failed; at one point I glanced toward Susie and she saw me, our eyes met and she gave me a faint smile accompanied by a slight movement of her hand that may have been a wave. I know I reddened. I was not sure how to respond. Feeling cowardly, I looked away and bounded up my steps and into my house.

Doubts crept into me that night about my decision to be a woman; was it the right thing to do, considering the price I was paying, facing the potential loss of my teaching career and feeling such an exile in my own neighborhood? A depression began to darken my household, possibly brought on by my continued obsession to keep the shades drawn to block out the outer world. I wondered whether to continue on with my studies and to try to live off the inheritance my mother left me, to move into a lonely oblivion once those dollars were gone.

They say you will never dream of your own death, but I did that night.

“She always was a beautiful girl,” Mrs. Hammond, the school principal said.

The pounding at the door kept thundering into my confused brain; then a loud, gruff voice could be heard: “Miss Pearson, open up. If you don’t, we’re calling 911.”

“Oh my God,” I said, sitting upright in her bed. “It’s not a dream. Somebody’s trying to get to see me.”

The pounding continued, followed by more pleas to open the door. I finally realized I should get up and answer the door; otherwise the pounding would never cease. I felt confused, but had the good sense to put on a robe, run fingers through my mussed hair and put on my fluffy pink slippers. I ran to the door and opened the backdoor, being blinded by the bright morning sunshine making it momentarily impossible to see who was causing such a ruckus.

“Oh, Mrs. Nordquist,” I said when the tall, Nordic image of Susie’s mother emerged into my tear encrusted eyes.

The woman stood before me, holding a plate whose ingredients were covered with a white cloth. Then, I saw Susie peak out, from behind her mother.

“I’m sorry to have awakened you, but frankly dear I was concerned about you,” Mrs. Nordquist began.

Still trying to clear my eyes (which obviously must have looked red and swollen), I struggled to say, “I slept far too long anyway.”

“Excuse me, but how do I address you?” she began.

Obviously, she had always called me Jason before; now, as I stood before her in the pink diaphanous robe, that name wouldn’t have fit.

“I’d like to be called Julie for now, if you’re OK with that,” I volunteered.

She smiled. “Julie it’ll be then. Now, Susie has something to say to you.”

“I’m sorry,” I apologized.

“You must think me very strange. Why don’t you and Susie come in and I’ll explain everything. Only, you need to give me ten minutes to clean myself up. I must look a total disaster.”

I led them into the kitchen and suggested they sit down at the kitchen table. Fortunately, my house was clean and there were no dishes in the sink. One of the traits I must have inherited from mother was her penchant for neatness; my room was always immaculate and I had always hung up my clothes and promptly placed my dirty things into the hamper. Certainly, my room looked nothing like you’d expect from a boy or young man.

“We won’t stay right now, Julie,” Mrs. Nordquist said. “Susie wants to tell you something.”

Susie continued to avoid my eyes, looking down to the floor. Her mother handed her the plate, and Susie took it.

“Stand up straight, Susie, and look Jason . . .er . . . Julie in the eye and speak to her,” Mrs. Nordquist commanded.

Though the teenager was taller than me, she seemed diminished on that summer Saturday morning. She handed me the plate, still covered by the cloth and emitting the scent of fresh bakery. It was warm to the touch.

“Mom and I just baked these cinnamon rolls and thought you might like them, so here they are,” she said.

“Thank you. They smell scrumptious,” I said.

“Was that all you wanted to say, Susie?” Mrs. Nordquist pressed.

The girl looked down at the floor and mumbled, almost too faint to hear, the words, “I’m sorry.”

“You can do better than that,” the girl’s mother said firmly.

Now Susie looked at me; her eyes were red and moist and I tell see she must have been crying.

“I shouldn’t have said that to you last week,” Susie said, her voice becoming stronger. “I remembered how cool you were when I was little and you baby-sat for me. You were always my favorite sitter.”

I smiled. “I remember those times too; you were easy to sit for, Susie, and I always had fun doing it.”

“And the times you took me to the movies and we stopped afterward for hamburgers, too.”

I uncovered the bakery, and said, “These look so yummy.”

“Well really mom baked those, I just helped a little bit,” Susie said.

“No you helped a lot, girl.”

“Susie,” I began. “Please don’t fret about the other day. I know you were with your friends. Your mother was so kind when mom was sick and when she died.”

“That’s what neighbors are for, Julie,” Mrs. Nordquist said. “I remember how your mother helped me out when we first moved into the neighborhood. And, I remember, too, how good you were when I sometimes was short of cash and asked you to wait before I could pay you your baby-sitting money. And you were so good to the kids, too. I just figure there’s a good reason for your change, Julie, and I want my children – and that includes Susie – to be understanding and tolerant of other people. She disappointed me when I heard what they had done to you.”

“Thank you, Heidi,” I said, using the woman’s first name. “I’d really like to tell you my story so you understand, if you’d like. If you can stay, I’ll make a pot of fresh coffee and I’ll explain what’s going on.”

By the time the three of us finished our coffee, I had told Susie and Heidi Nordquist that I had long believed I was a woman. I explained the transition I was going through and that I was now living as a woman as the first step in the process.

“Please look it up on the internet,” I suggested.

Heidi Nordquist smiled. “Actually, Julie, I understand fully your situation, having run across similar stories in my work as a psychiatrist health nurse. You’re not the only young woman or man going through this difficult period. We know it’s something you can’t help.”

“I know of a boy in another high school who is coming to school dressed as a girl, so I guess he – or she – must be going through the same changes,” Susie said.

“Tell you what,” Heidi Nordquist said. “Let us go for now and then why not come over in the mid-afternoon and we can have something to drink and sit in the back and talk. Would you be free then?”

“Yes, I have nothing going, and I’d be glad to join you. I’ll plan on coming as Julie, if that’s OK.”

“Of course,” she said.

“And mom, Julie’s hot, too,” Susie volunteered.

“I’m anxious to see Julie when she is freshened up,” Mrs. Nordquist said. “About four o’clock then?”

“That’ll be fine. I can see it’s going to be a beautiful day. I hope you’ll be there, too, Susie.”

The girl nodded. Yes, I was certain it was going to be a lovely June afternoon.