Caught In Slips Pt 8
By Christie Myr

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My thanks as always to Emily63 for providing me with information about places mentioned in this chapter and to Grim City Girl for proofreading the chapter. I ask that any Australian readers look at the foot note at the end of this story.
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On the following Monday at school, the teachers must have previously agreed beforehand to allow the year12 lesson content before recess to be just writing answers to question in our text books and also allow a fair amount of leniency about whispering/talking in class. I had mathematics 1st period where none of us were asked to hand in our answers to the questions set, then double music for 2nd and 3rd periods, where our music teacher simply told us to read chapter 12 from our text book before leaving the room. He’d then return every so often to ensure our noise level didn’t get out of control, as everyone told each other about their experiences during the Formal. Straight after recess, our English teacher bluntly told the class that we’d all had more than enough time to talk about Saturday night, so it was time for heads down, listen to what he was telling us, with no more talking and to start thinking about our finals in four months time!

It took a few more days for most of us to get over Saturday night. Then again for some students, one of whom amazed me when I found out about her, our school Formal left a much more lasting impression. This included someone I knew who found out several weeks later she was pregnant. But society seems more blasé to teenage indiscretions than in it had in my parent’s era and with a short absence from school, my friend had her early motherhood deferred, hopefully for several years to come.

As the start of my final exams crept closer, I redoubled my studying efforts in an extra effort to get a scholarship to University, while wanting to ensure I got my preferred choice of universities as well. That didn’t stop me from playing cricket of a Saturday afternoon or going to practices after school on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Especially now I had my own transport and the thrill of playing on turf wickets to look forward to.

I found the advice our club’s 1st grade spinner (along with others) gave me very helpful, even if my sardonic captain Simon kept reminding me constantly that I was landing the ball all over the shop each time I bowled in the nets. It only made me more determined to want to do better when I bowled in each game. Everyone in the team knew how hard I was trying and every wicket I took saw me being congratulated, even by our captain and I really felt like part of the team. At the pub early Saturday evening after each day’s play, my common sense in appearing not to notice or blush when someone yelled out an obscenity, was silently applauded. I knew that every player who was there tried their best not to say crude words around me and I liked the fact they now me treated as one of the “boys”....if you can understand that.

I must have appeared to my 2nd grade teammates to be slightly touchy or distant on the 2nd day of our game last Saturday though. Between thinking about the results of those final exam subjects I'd already done and worrying about possible questions for exams I still had to sit, isn’t a recipe for playing cricket very well and I played an awful match. Simon quietly took me aside at net practice the following Tuesday and told me privately not to worry about how I played the previous Saturday, because the guys had already guessed I must’ve been having my period and everyone understood it happens from time to time that women can be a bit more moody and sensitive then!

Oh great I thought, everyone in the cricket club thinks just because I’m a girl and I behaved slightly different than I normally did, that it has to be because I’m on my monthlies and not because I’m worried about my final exams. I didn’t know whether to scream at him and tell him tell I wasn’t having a period, but I also saw his look of “male compassion” for understanding about “those things” as he looked at me. So I decided to shut up, recalling my sister telling me that men were hopeless (most times) about knowing when women were menstruating and invariably blamed Mother Nature every time they thought women were being difficult. It allowed dad to start his day with a chuckle, when the following morning at breakfast I told him and mum about what my teammates had assumed.

Then, when I had done my final exam (Music) it was as if I “must” have suddenly gotten another severe case of “cramps,” although this time it was because of post exam nerves. I’d be happy one minute thinking I’d done well in my exams and be miserable the next, thinking about an answer I’d written to a question and getting depressed that I’d got it entirely wrong. Then I’d get annoyed because I couldn’t remember exactly what or how I’d actually written the answer.

Some of the students at school had used carbon paper to have a copy of their exam answers so they could refer back to the text books to see if they’d answered the questions correctly afterwards. That might’ve been a good idea to try, but as I found out in phone calls with friends who’d done that, it had its draw backs. The girl or guy (once back at home) would realise they’d answered an exam question incorrectly, and “those” commiserating phone calls sharing their upset were always harder to cope with.

When my results finally arrived, they were almost better than I could have hoped for and would see me accepted to every University I applied to, along with a scholarship to cover my tuition. With all my ducks in a row now, there was only the final hurdle left for me to clear.

On the 2nd of January mum, my brother, sister and I took the train to Sydney where the following day I was to be admitted to hospital for my gender reassignment procedure. Dad arranged to be there a few days later, if his work allowed him to. The night before my admittance had me sharing with mum, Sue and my brother the 2 bedroom place I’d bought three years previously. On seeing the state of the unit, mum firmly told my brother and sister “that they’d better get the place cleaned and tidied up before their father arrived”. Fortunately for me I only had to spend the night (on the lounge)!

The next morning just after 8am saw the four us (along with a small valise) being dropped off by taxi outside the entrance of the hospital. Then an hour later I was lying on my private room bed wearing a humiliating small surgical gown that offered only the slightest modicum of decency, talking with the three of them while waiting for my pre-op medications before the procedure. By some cruel twist of fate, the surgeon doing my operation decided (at the last minute) he wanted additional X-Rays taken of me to look over. Almost two hours later he informed mum and I that he wanted to consult with another specialist before he’d change my life forever, and said the operation was deferred for 24 hours. So with “that” news, I was allowed to change into a nightie and then talked some more to my family before they left me, promising they’d “all see me off” in the morning.

The next morning, drugged almost senseless and saying goodbye to everyone, my bed was wheeled away through a maze of corridors and into an operating theatre. After several minutes of listening to medical jargon and watching the operating team move about the room, I was calmly told I’d feel a slight pinprick and then to begin counting backwards from “100”. I reached “98”, became drowsy then can’t tell you another thing about what took place.

I do remember reawakening groggy and disorientated in my room and slightly in pain and I can vaguely recall hearing mum’s voice for a moment as well as someone (mum I guessed) gently squeezing my right hand. Then nothing again until waking up again with the lights on and medical people hovering around me and talking to one another and feeling someone put something or other in my ear (a thermometer I found out later).

What I clearly remember was eventually waking up crying at the pain somewhere around my lower stomach, which was quickly remedied by a nurse, that suddenly had me realising that the pain meant I must be a woman now, because with that same realisation, I also concluded that the pain I was feeling wasn’t in my stomach, but between my legs or more accurately what “wasn’t” between my legs and smiled at the thought.

For the next few hours I laid horizontal listening to the various noises from elsewhere outside my room, until I heard my mother’s loud “whispering” voice outside my room telling someone (?) that they couldn’t stay long and not to get me excited. Then as if by magic my family swept into the room all asking at once how I felt. With a weak “good considering everything” from me, a nurse came in and raised the back of my bed just enough to make want to kiss her in gratitude, as my horizontal position was terribly disorientating and awful if you had to speak to anybody.

The visit had to be a short one as were the others over the next few days to allow my body (and mind) time to acclimatise. Those first few days will forever be etched in my memory, both for my nurse assisted first toilet trip and when I had recovered enough for my family’s first visit with me for as long as they wanted. During it I learnt from a laughing Sue and Greg about how mum had nagged them into cleaning up the unit so that when dad arrived, he didn’t freak out at the mess and how mum had suddenly decided that she and dad would stay in a nearby hotel instead!

I spent almost three weeks in hospital, although twelve days were in a hospice room on the hospital grounds, where I could be close by to visit the hospital physio’s and do more X-Rays and such until I was discharged. It had already been decided that I’d stay until the end of January in Sydney with mum and my brother and sister in the place at Fairfield, then mum would drive me home to Uranquinty until my next check-up in Sydney at the end of April (provided no complications arose). Sue was staying back in Sydney along with Greg and looking around for a job now she was qualified, which was fine by me.

My last week in Sydney saw me doing a lot of shopping for clothes, especially a new bikini, which was the first thing I wanted to buy. Mum and my sister made sure I now got to enjoy being able to undress around women without having to worry anymore and experience talking to someone about a bra or dress, while either I or they were half naked. It was an amazing experience the first time I did and will forever be etched in my memory. From the very first day outside on “day leave” I wanted to enjoy every minute and thrill of something that I’d been waiting the last three years to have happen. My whole character seemed to change radically as I embraced my new femininity excitedly and with complete abandon.

On returning to Uranquinty, I had just a few days to get ready for my first year at Charles Sturt University. Luckily for me, my wonderful sister had driven back to look after my enrolment details while I’d been hospitalised, so I got the most agreeable timetable for my studies that allowed me to only have to attend lectures three days a week.

With the severe physical restrictions placed on me by the medical staff, I wasn’t allowed to exert myself in any way or do anything strenuous for at least another month. That didn’t mean I couldn’t go out with Mark anywhere. And after I was medically cleared, it allowed me to enjoy his company much more than before. NO, that didn’t mean we had sex. That WAS one of restriction placed on me by my doctors till at least the end of June, besides I was frightened about the prospect of having sex with a boy anyway.

But if I’d been questioned by police, I’d have had to plead guilty to any accusation about Mark being allowed to have free roaming hands, and in truthfulness, I now wanted to enjoy the ministrations of his gentle finger(s) almost anywhere. I had to play the “period” card for a couple of weeks, but Mark didn’t mind the evening I didn’t swat his hand aside.

Mum never failed to remind me to dilate each day. Let’s (for decorum) not go into that subject too far (OMG another unintentional pun), but I discovered I now had an entirely new level of relationship with my mum discussing it so openly. I’d had to endure the embarrassment while I was still in hospital, of mum being allowed (several times) by my doctor/nurse to “observe” as I dilated there. Now I was home, mum must have felt I still needed reassurance, especially when she told me how she’d lost her own virginity, while she watchfully observed me dilate (a new level and slightly thicker sized dildo that particular morning). She always made sure she knew what level I was using and seemed pleased whenever I graduated to the next size up! I’m pretty damn certain she wouldn’t have been so friendly watching my sister have sex with a boy! (to make sure Sue was OK) So……......let’s have no more about the subject, shall we?

The new me saw Janet taking to “girldom” like a duck takes to water. Slacks, jeans and shorts were now a complete no-no, while dresses and skirts were the uniform of the day (which mum fully approved of). It was as if I was walking on a cloud every day, smiling and laughing with others, deliberately flaunting my new body without a care in the world.

My cricket teammates had never seen me in dresses or skirts before. So my first appearance at a Saturday match (sadly as a spectator), in a sundress that I deliberately hadn’t worn a slip under, had seen both them as well as the opposition eagerly wanting to talk to me during the afternoon lunch break. The flattering comments I was receiving from my still amazed teammates, had me only wishing I’d been born a girl in the first place.

I also discovered a new relationship with the other wives and girlfriends there, as they welcomed me into the social world of the WAGS** and quickly learnt of secrets, that while as much as I would have liked to have mentioned them afterwards back at the hotel closest to the game, also told me that I’d been accepted as a woman and not just as a girl playing cricket with their men.

In our team (and the others for that matter) it was the WAGS who usually organised the lunch break BBQ cooking, as well as supplying drinks breaks each hour. That way the players didn’t have to rush around frantically when it was the lunch break searching for something to eat. Instead they could line up with paper plates and plastic cutlery in hand, or with two slices of bread, onto which meat (and usually salad or coleslaw or both) was ladled out for their enjoyment. A ten litre metal jug with boiling water was always available to make scalding hot strong tea, that only required milk and sugar to wash down the BBQ, or else you bought your own cold soft drinks in your personal esky.* In the WWCC’s instance, our team sold cold drinks to anyone and everyone at games for fund raising. The money raised always went towards the end of season trophy night, with anything then leftover being used for the “kitty” end of season weekend trip away for supping (drinking) money.

Our weekend cricket games in the Wagga district (as they were back in Tamworth) in any grade were always played hard and fair. But country comradery always made sure that regardless of how heated the game might get (on the pitch), the lunch break was there to feed as well as socialise. It’d be true to say that Australians like to compete with each other when they’re on the sporting field and sometimes the game can become somewhat “heated”. But it wasn’t as though we were playing for The Ashes and besides, you often ran into opposition players off the field. In that respect, country cricket (at any grade or level) was (and I understand still is) particularly civilised, unlike playing in the city I discovered later on.

Anyway my cricket season was finished the moment I set foot in the train for the trip to Sydney for my reassignment surgery. I simply got to spend the 2nd half of the season as an enthusiastic WAG and loved every moment of it. I wasn’t above going over to watch Mark play if his game was nearby to ours and liked the thought of having a boyfriend I knew liked me just as much as I liked him. His club never succeeded in persuading me to swap over to play for them and the same could be said of Mark with my team, although it might have "now" been nice to have been able to shower and get changed with him in a dressing room afterwards!

On my part time job front, Mr Angepopolus my MacGeneral boss reluctantly (sic) had to let me leave so as to allow one more space to be filled by a younger (and cheaper) new employee. So I again used “dad’s” connections to obtain a casual barmaid’s job at the same hotel Sue had worked at to earn extra spending money. My new employer Garry Rowles (Gaz to the staff and drinking patrons) was as nice a boss as Ange had been at the General Macs. As long as you worked willingly and pleasantly and the patrons liked you, he was fantastic. Luckily for me, he liked how I interacted with the patrons and although he would have liked me to dress more like some of the other barmaids did, he never said anything to me to make me change how I dressed.

Working as a barmaid is a country mile away from slinging burgers at General Macs. Every time I got home now, the pervading smell of spilt alcohol wafted around me. After all, it’s impossible not to spill tiny amounts sometimes when you filled a glass of beer from the serving tap, although I quickly learned the tricks how not to. But when you had to collect the empty glasses you couldn’t help but have the sides of the glasses leave your hands smelling of stale beer and brushing your clothes accidently against tables ensured your clothing was permeated with the smell too. The trick was to never end up carrying a tray full of empties glasses (or full) holding them close to your chest, because that was a disaster just waiting to happen.

I learned two things very quickly as a barmaid. The 1st, was that you tried to wear the same outfits as often as possible and the 2nd was the bigger your boobs or the shorter your skirt, the more you’d get in the tips jar and “that” was important to most of the staff. Two months after I started, my regular clothes were a washing machine ruined mess and stretched completely out of shape. But ideal for working behind the bar!

I also quickly copied my fellow barmaids in wearing as sheer a white top as I could, although I’d never undo any more than the 2nd button. The same thing with skirts, my hemline although short never had my undies on display when leaning over slightly. Likewise I decided against pantyhose or suspenders and stockings, but did occasionally wear stay ups if I was wearing a knee length skirt.

I was easy to work with, because I was always keen to ensure Gazza never saw me not serving and was always doing all the minor chores the other barmaids detested. I was also rostered with either one of three other casuals who dressed more conservatively (along with myself). It took some time (and a girl to girl chat one evening with Denise who stayed behind after her shift for a drink with some friends) to discover that the four of us were paired the way we were, because the “tip” jar was always changed for each staff handover. That way, (I or the other three) never got to benefit from the older full time girls working shifts with us, who dressed shall I say more “alluringly” for the patrons. I was staggered when she told me that the tips total on shifts I shared was often as much as $20 to $30 per less than other shifts.

I did a private experiment after finding that out during my next shift and worked with my blouse opened to the forth button (my blouses had a lot of buttons) that clearly showing my bra lace. This earned me an “extra” $22 in tips (my 50%) more for the shift than usual. I mentioned it to my regular workmate and we both decided that from then on we’d take it in turns (showing off our girls) each shift. I never told dad or mum about it and never walked back into the house after work not buttoned up.

At university I wore whatever I liked and enjoyed no longer having to wear a shapeless school uniform. I also discovered that if I wanted to get noticed and/or be invited to join a study group, I needed to dress to be noticed (invited) and stay that way until I was established in a study group. Then I could dress more demurely although in my case I did it extremely reluctantly, preferring to revel in my new found womanhood. The three girls in our mixed group cold shouldered me to begin with, but soon realised I was just being myself(?) and wasn’t trolling for any of the guys there.

Speaking of university, it certainly was a far cry from learning at Mt Erin College. Back there the teachers wrote notes for you to copy that (supposedly) pertained to potential examination questions. But at university, the lecturers (teachers - a rose by any other name) almost never did that and instead expected each student to take their own notes of each lecture pertaining to important details. That was why being in a study group was the key to passing or failing and even then, the difference in lecture notes between individuals in the group quickly determined who were the smarties opposed to the clutzes. I wasn’t sure how the others in the group saw me, maybe “a clarty” or “a smutz” perhaps.

You also had the opportunity to make lots of new friends at university and unless you were a total nerd or geek, always heard of (or were invited to) social events around and outside campus. In fact it's an old joke that going to university allowed you to learn about the 3B’s (booze, birds(boys) and billiards) as opposed to the school 3R’s (reading riting and rithmatic). I got invited to my fair share of parties and had lots of fun. But I also studied hard too and found I needed to just to keep pace with everyone else. One thing I always did was to never drive “sunflower” when I felt tipsy. I quickly learned how to sleep of a night in the uncomfortable canvas back seat with the hood up to prevent waking up with dew damp clothes too!

On the family front, Sue had gotten a job as a computer programmer/technician for a business at Ashfield (somewhere near to the city) and commuted there each day by train. Apparently she liked working there and was soon being given merit margin increases in pay as her bosses discovered her abilities. My big brother Greg was the one who provided the shock to my parents. Greg had taken up a cadetship as a trainee station manager near Katherine in the Northern Territory of Australia and after two years of it, simply decided he’d had enough and joined the Navy as a seaman!

Dad was practically speechless when Greg came home unexpectedly to drop the bomb on mum and him, which neither condemned him for. He told the three of us at dinner his first night back that he felt that it would give him a chance to travel the world, (for free) and told our parents that he was going to specialise in maritime mechanics and 2nd specialise in engineering. Besides that, he only signed on for an eight year agreement. (Initially as it turned out)

Whenever he was scheduled for sea duty the family always knew they’d soon be receiving countless and bizarre trinkets from other parts of the world, as well as some really incredible photos of sights. I might add that my big brother filed out his seaman’s uniform very well as did a lot of my female university friends and even some of Sue’s old friends thought so too. He wasn’t his ship’s leading male, but he boasted to having plenty of “girls in every port”.

**WAGS - Acronym used to describe Wives and Girlfriends

*Esky- a cooler box filled with ice to keep food and drinks cold.

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I'm thinking ahead about a possible future subplot. I'd like to ask any readers living in Australian if they might send me an email about songs played at hotels (ideally in Sydney), but anywhere in Australia will do fine. Could you please give me the area your talking about, the name of the song and if possible the artist. (That will give me the chance to google them and listen) I may need a few, particularly any that are slow or more of a ballad athough if it's like it is over here, its mainly loud rock, punk and new wave and of course "bloody" Pretenders songs. That was why I included Music in our heroine's school subjects for just such an eventuality

Simply sign in,(if you aren't already) and go to your messages and send an email from off of it to me. I promise I'll reply to each sender and of course credit them (in the foot notes) in the chapter concerned........when I write it.
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