Where to start? There are so many places…

I could start with the weather, which was a gorgeous spring day. I could start with the restless feeling that overcame me as I woke on that gorgeous spring day; the kind of day you throw caution to the winds and do whatever you really want to do instead of what's sensible.. Maybe I should start at the HEB, but if you aren't a denizen of the Great State Of Texas you won't have the faintest idea what an HEB is.

See how hard it is to find a starting place?

If you need groceries in Texas, you pretty much have to shop at the HEB. They have a lock on the supermarket business. Being a 40 billion dollar operation, they've pretty much driven out all the competition. Not that I'm complaining - they have just about everything you can think of in the place and a whole lot of stuff you never dreamed of thinking about.

I had been in Texas for a few years before I learned the HEB stands for Howard E Butt. See why he went with his initials? Picture a housewife in 1905 (when the store was founded) saying "I'm going to get some fresh peas from some guy's butt." Even in 1905 there were publicity types what would have turned puce at the very idea.

Actually, the HEB wasn't even founded by old Howard, that honor goes to his mother Florence. Howie took over from Mom and expanded the business, but I have to wonder if it was male chauvinist piggerey that cheated Florence out of her name on her fledgling business.

So anyway, I'm wandering around the HEB on a fine Saturday morning, filling my cart with staples to last the week. I had come to the end of my list, but I couldn't resist placing a pint of double chocolate fudge ice cream on top of the sensible stuff. I came to the end of the freezer aisle and brought my cart to a screeching halt. Before my wondering eyes appeared a flock of young women, fresh of face, long of hair, longer of leg and attired in beribboned, floaty dresses that brushed their ankles as they walked. Now I have to admit I am a great admirer of long, floaty dresses that sway as the wearer progresses onward and, since I was wearing one myself at that exact moment, I wouldn't be able to claim otherwise.

Remember earlier I mentioned this was a day for doing what you want and not what you should? I had spent the week stuffed into a suit-and-tie being a lawyer. Upright posture, serious mien, walls of fancy, bound law books in the office, which nobody had opened in years because we all use computers. Sadly, the genetics I inherited from my parents were completely unsuitable to a Perry Mason or an Arnie Becker, besides which I was far more interested in being Clair Huxtable or Ally McBeal.

Fat chance!

This morning I glued on my forms and spent a bit of time concealing the edges… and a few other things. I happily exchanged my tie for a bra, then chose one of my favorite dresses - the blue one with yellow flowers on the shear gauze skirt that floats around the silken inner skirt. It displays just a hint of cleavage since I really don't want men to look too closely at my boobs.

I had briefly considered the three inch heels that go so nicely with that dress, but sanity prevailed - pushing a shopping cart all morning in three inch heels would rather hobble the rest of the day, if not my tender tootsies. I wore the flats, but they were the ones that had glitter liberally scattered over them. A pair of dangly earrings and a matching necklace that rested just above my pseudo cleavage and I was ready for the day.

So back to the HEB, where the bevy of beauties were thronging the fresh flower department. Someone must have made arrangements in advance, as they were handing out circlets of cut flowers to adorn the heads of the ladies. Naturally I had to get a little closer to see what was going on, and temporarily abandoned my shopping cart to get closer. I have to admit that the HEB 'partners' are pretty efficient; there were two girls handing out the headpieces and one directing the flow of traffic. This was a complex task, as most of the women were gushing over the orchids or the roses and didn't want to move out of the way. Not that I blame them, I was drawn like the proverbial moth to a flame myself.

Suddenly I felt a hand clasp mine and drag me forward. "Hurry up, child. The bus will be leaving soon and you don't want to be late!"

Child? Most of the women looked to be in their early twenties and I was pushing thirty. I was also pushing my luck, I pass reasonably well, but this was far too intimate a scene for me to be comfortable! Before I knew it I was crowned with flowers and swept up in a maelstrom of giggling, excited women. Since I was a good six inches taller than any other member of the feminine flock I could see the vanguard was headed out of the doors.

"Let's go, girls! Everybody on the bus. No dawdling now!" commanded the grandmotherly woman who seemed to be in charge. In no time at all I was linked into a chain of women in floaty dresses snaking their way onto a big bus. The bus was emblazoned with such admonitions as 'We Welcome everyone!' and 'No One Is Illegal.' Rainbow flags flew above the rear view view mirrors and from a flagpole at the back of the bus. My protests, faint with confusion, were ignored and I was seated with a young woman with jet black hair and a frilly white dress with red embroidery along the seams.

"Aren't you just so excited?" she chirped. Reverend Newmoon himself will be conducting the ceremony!"

Ceremony? What the devil?

"Who did you get? I got Raphael, he certainly looks like a fine man. He's only a year older than me but he's been among the redeemed for three whole years! I'm so excited to meet him at last!"

"I… uh… that's nice…"

"We get to live in Elysium. Raphael is going to be be a gardener and I'm going to be calling people on the phone to spread the word. I'm so excited to be able to tell people about Reverend Newmoon's good news!"

Whoah! Now I was really getting nervous. Phrases like 'good news' and 'live in the Elysium' had a religious context that gave me the willies. I had long ago dumped the 'god' of my parents who thundered and railed about patriarchal men and the blasphemy of me wanting to wear a dress. When Dad found my bra he about went into spontaneous combustion. Darned if I could see how any 'Reverend' could have any good news for me.

And yet… Reverend Newmoon… That rings a faint bell… Back when I was a kid… Wasn't there some Korean dude who… who… Oh yeah! Mass marriages, whole fields of couples standing there to get married en mass.

Holy shit!

"Hey! Calm down!" says my seatmate. "I'm excited too, but it's a long way to El Paso. Like hours and hours before we get to meet our guys."

"El Paso!?" I left my ice cream in my cart. It's gonna melt!"

"What did you do something silly like that for? You knew we only had ten minutes to get our wreaths."

"But… But… It's Double Chocolate!"

"You can't be serious. Eating chocolate ice cream wearing that dress?"

"I have an apron at home to protect the dress!"

"Home is a long way away, girl."

"No it wasn't! It's only a five minute drive from the HEB."

"Well, you certainly should have known you weren't going home."

"Why? I never heard of this Reverend Moonpie dude until you crazy women dragged me on to this bus!"

"Wait! You mean you aren't here to marry the man of your dreams?"

"Marry! Like hell! Especially not a ma…"

At that point a circuit breaker somewhere in my brain either tripped out or reset - your guess is as good as mine as to which way it went. Announcing I was the proud possessor of a penis at that point would be - shall we say? - counterproductive.

"Don't be silly! We're all here to get married to poor immigrants from South Of The Border so that the fascist pigs in the INS or CBP or XYZ - whatever they've changed the initials to this week - won't be able to send the poor people back."

"Uh… I don't think it's that simple." Being a lawyer I knew it wasn't that simple, but try to explain that to a star-struck woman out to save the world.

"I'm not worried, the Reverend Newmoon will take care of all the details."

How do I get myself into these situations?

 

Driving from Austin to El Paso in the Great State Of Texas certainly puts the emphasis on Great. In a car it takes about eight hours, not counting rest breaks. In a bus with several dozen excited women and one confused crossdresser, those rest breaks tend to be rather long. I was kidnapped about ten in the morning. We reached Elysium, the Newmoon compound, in El Paso a little after eleven PM. In that time I had made four trips to the Ladies Room, accompanied by an ever-changing cast of desperate women who needed that stall NOW! I was starting to worry about my makeup supply (How much makeup do you need for a quick trip to the grocery store?) and I chipped a nail on something in that darned bus. I had also had all the crappy pseudo-tacos I could stomach. The … stuff… they call tacos at an institutional rest stop ought to be banned by International Law. I'll take the case pro bono if anyone wants to start a class action.

A flock of angels in deep blue robes greeted us and led us to our dormitories. If I thought mass migrations of women to the facilities were shocking, try being a crossdresser in a women's dorm. A religiously based women's dorm, don't forget. A kidnapped crossdresser who doesn't even have a change of clothes. Turns out it isn't all that big a problem when you are surrounded by women who are filled with the spirit and a need to help their fellow man - or woman - or maybe even someone who can't decide. These people came here with the clear intent to get married. They all seem to have brought their entire trousseau. And here I thought I liked lacy underthings…

By the time I settled in for the night my bra and panties were hastily washed in the sink and hung up to dry. I was modestly covered with an opaque but fashionable nightgown and blessing my choice to glue on my breast forms. Hoping the things would stay on, I went to sleep braless. I sure didn't want to attract attention by sleeping in a bra that really needed washing. As I know from observing women closely, you can sure see their bras under their blouses or T-shirts.

 

If I thought going to bed with those women was disorienting, waking up with them on their wedding day made the night before look like a romp in the park. Hmmm… Now romping in a park with many, many scantily clad women has possibilities - at least for a time when I don't have to worry about certain gallant reactions blowing my cover. Actually, I was pretty well into my feminine persona, I was one of the girls and any anatomical irregularities were beside the point.

As I sat on the pot I suddenly realized that when you have a bride at a wedding, you usually need a bridal gown. There was a marked dearth of such garments in the dorm on that morning. When I left the facilities, I uttered the immortal line: "But I haven't a thing to wear!"

Once the laughter ebbed, I found out that when Reverend Mooncalf does his mass marriage thing, everyone is clad in pure white robes. Guys and gals both, apparently. Not that I intended to marry anyone that morning, or maybe any morning, but as a crossdresser I like to blend in. Being one wavelet in a sea of white robes was just fine by me.

Breakfast wasn't too bad, nothing like the institutional pablum I was expecting from what was, after all, a megachurch. There must have been a couple of hundred of us all told, both male and (apparently) female. Somebody must have been up all night cracking eggs, because the scrambled eggs were from real eggs, not the powdered crap. Believe me, I know from the powdered crap; I went to far too many summer camps in the back of beyond, where fresh eggs were only available if you brought your own chicken. For this my parents paid the big bucks to make a man of me. I could almost thank The Reverend Moonshadow for kidnapping me and forcing me to wear a white dress.

When life gives you lemons, and all that crap…

I did have one bitch, however. Seems like the Reverend Newfangled didn't believe in caffeine; that's out-and-out heresy in my church. No coffee! The Rev didn't exactly approve of alcohol, either. That didn't bother me as much as the coffee - more a venial sin than heresy. Frankly, I consider wine nothing more than spoiled grape juice.

Be that as it may, we did have a choice of tea or hot cocoa. I guess like most people the Reverend Moonbean had no idea that in order to turn the cacao bean into chocolate it has to be fermented. I took the tea, no way I was going to drink cocoa in a white dress!

I've got to hand it to the Rev, his deep blue angels were great organizers. In far less time than I expected, clipboards in hand, we were sorted and loaded onto the buses. Well, most of us were - since I wasn't on anybody's clipboard I kind of stood out when everybody else got buckled in. (Safety first!) That's when I got a chance to try out my 'poor little waif girl' expression. Finally someone noticed me.

If you're ever looking for the quintessential Grandmother, a woman who with one look could be nothing other than a kindly old grandmother, then you're looking for Tahlia Clift. Even the sky blue robe couldn't disguise that she was the answer to any poor, lost child's prayer.

I played dumb (not too hard) and eventually they loaded me in with the deacons or vicars or whatever the Reverend Newmoney called the higher-ups. They got pretty sky-blue robes, so I was still a bit of a standout in the crowd.

"Welcome aboard, daughter. I must apologize for the mix-up; only the Lord is perfect, we mortals just do the best we can."

"Well, the Lord - or Somebody - must want me here. I just kind of got swept up in the crowd and before I knew it I was on my way to El Paso. I'm still not quite sure why I'm here."

"Why daughter, we are on a Holy Mission. We go to the border to meet as many of the poor souls as possible who wish to live in what some people call The Land Of The Free. I have always wondered why the very ones who most want others to do their bidding always claim Freedom only for themselves."

"On that we can agree. I have met far too many of that type in court; my clients are often deeply confused. Many of them don't speak English and face death if they are deported. It's depressing how many times we lose the battle, but still it needs to be fought!"

"¿Eres abogada mi hija?" [You are a lawyer, my child?]

"Si. Mi nombre es Marilyn Camsie."

Two things you need to know. One - I speak Spanish in several Mexican dialects fluently. Two - I have often cursed my parents for naming me Marilyn then crawling up my ass insisting I should be more manly. The only other male I know of named Marilyn is Marilyn Manson, with such a sterling example to guide my path how could I have gone wrong? For as much grief as my name has caused me, right now it was pretty handy!

"Que el buen Señor te bendiga, niña. Él siempre estará allí cuando lo necesitemos." [May the good Lord bless you, child. He will always be there when we need Him.]

(Don't worry, I won't inflict you English speakers with any more simultaneous translation. Just remember I switched languages freely over the next several hours.)

"A noble sentiment indeed," I replied, "but how do you intend to do anything to improve the situation?"

"Reverend Newmoon has prayed and fasted until he heard the Lord's advice. One way for a person from outside the country to achieve residence is to marry a US citizen. Our ministry has found many men and women who are willing to marry the immigrants so they can stay in this country. We have invited the media to witness the marriages that Reverend Newmoon will perform at the border once our prospective spouses cross the border."

"You have got to be kidding!" I cried. Could anyone be so naive? "Trust me! I'm a lawyer, it just doesn't work that way!"

"Of course not! With any luck we will all be taken off to jail with the national press filming. There aren't enough jail cells to fit us, so we expect to spend the night or even longer in cages like those people were under Trump."

I have an uncle who claims he's Irish. He's a troublemaker, since Camsie is a variant of a Scottish surname. He is prone to exclaim 'Jesus, Mary and All The Saints' when he's under stress. My mother's German mother has been known to exclaim 'Heiliger Strohsack!' [Holy Smokes!] on occasion. A British friend perfers 'Bloody Hell!'. Me, a benighted American whether I'm wearing a bra or not, have my own favorite.

"What the fuck?!"

My sky-blue Grandma must have heard it before, she didn't even frown. "I do believe that happens after the marriage ceremonies."

"Do you realize just how many laws you people are going to break? Have you applied for Form I-129F for all these people? Do you have Form I-485 so they can stay once you all get out of jail? Do you have the marriage licenses? You do know it costs eighty-two bucks for a license, don’t you? For all the hundreds of them…"

"Of course!" came the answer. "You can't apply on line for four hundred odd marriage licenses at one time without getting some attention. Some of the bureaucrats complained, but our lawyers were faster than their lawyers. We have a judge as part of our flock who is ready to issue waivers for the seventy-two hour waiting period, affidavits to prove that the requirement to have personally met your fiancé(e) would result in extreme hardship and even a Democratic state representative or two. Still not enough, but the whole purpose is to overwhelm the system and get busted on national TV."

"Do any of you have proper identification documents?"

"Not a one of us! We don't want them to have an easy time of it."

"Can I offer some lawyerly advice?"

"Certainly. I need to introduce you to Maria, she's been working her tail off trying to make this all come together. She's our Mexican lawyer and she gets the same look as you do when she thinks about all the legal things. Come with me, child."

I followed my gracious grandma very carefully down the aisle of the bus. She introduced me to a woman in another of those sky-blue robes, sitting by herself with a mass of papers in her lap. The woman turned her head to look at me.

One look and the world stopped.

Sadly, the bus didn't. It swerved so I was thrown headfirst into her lap. Her arms surrounded me, her scent overcame me and her laugh drilled into my very core. Suddenly I didn't give a tinker's damn about how many laws these crazy people were going to flout. My only thought was 'sharing a jail cell with Maria would be a very good thing.' Then I realized sharing a life with Maria outside of a jail cell would be a far better idea.

Love at first sight? The Lord works in mysterious ways? I've heard those bits of trite crap many times, but maybe now I was ready to believe it. As luck would have it, my ears were quite functional, despite my current position. "My, you have a lovely smile. Please, sit with me and maybe we can help make this publicity stunt something more lasting and effective."

I sat. We talked. The bus stopped. We got off, holding hands so we wouldn't be separated in the crowd.

Nice excuse, eh?

We were parked near Trump's asinine fence, where we could see the scarred land stretching into the distance. There were six or eight camera trucks, a swarm of storm troopers, and a crowd of people - who knows who they were? - just watching the show. Standing alone in a brilliant red robe, holding a shepherd's crook taller than he was by a good couple of feet, stood The Reverend Newmoon. Before him stood rank upon rank of white-robed men and women, waiting. I have to admit, the guy really knew how to put on a show.

It was strangely quiet until one of the storm troopers with a bullhorn started blating about illegal assembly and disperse immediately. Nobody paid him any attention, all eyes were on the fence and the flitting shadows visible between the slats. The storm trooper started excoriating the crown once again, but a kid looking to be about eight years old ran up to him and filled his bullhorn with silly string.

The blating stopped and the laughter began.

Just then a trumpet sounded - or maybe I should call it a 'Trump' as in 'The Trump of Doom' or 'The Trump that blew down the Walls of Jericho.' (I really wish I could have come up with a nasty pun about TFG to insert here, but I just couldn't do it.) Dozens of hands appeared gripping the slats of the fence and within seconds there were a dozen grinning heads rising above the unclimbable fence. A cheer arose, followed by the buzzing of several battery powered saws and the walls came tumbling down.

Swarms of white robed figures poured through the fence, to be met by smaller swarms of blue-clad guides. In a remarkably short time the field was filled with couple after couple holding hands and gazing at the Reverend. The storm trooper must have had a backup bullhorn because he started gibbering at us once again; he was still being completely ignored. The good Reverend didn't have a bullhorn, he had a darn good PA system and he easily drowned out the storm trooper.

The Church Of The New Moon - what, you expected someone with mad PR skills like Reverend Moonwalker to name the thing anything else? - claims to be non-denominational, non-sectarian, non-Christian, and a whole slew of other good things, but they sure lifted a lot of the ritual from the kind of church I was forced to attend in my childhood. Cynic that I was, by the time he got done I was feeling a peace and joy like nothing I had ever encountered before.

"My children," quoth the Reverend, "Take the hand of the one you would join your life with and repeat after me…"

It was then I realized that I was still holding Maria's hand.

"I (then your name)…"

"I Maria Christina Isobella Muñoz y Serrano…" came quite clearly to my ears from the lips of the woman whose hand I was holding.

"Freely give you my love and my being…"

"Freely give you my love and my being…"

"Here in the sight of the Lord of Love…"

"Here in the sight of the Lord of Love…"

"For now and ever more."

"For now and ever more."

 

When I was a kid, I learned the word 'flabbergasted' from an old movie I watched with my Grandpa Rory. It sounded so weird I kept repeating it over and over until it wore out my tongue. I hadn't thought of it in many years, but it certainly came back to me at that moment.

I was flabbergasted.

"Maria," I cried, "you don't even know me. I'm not what you think I am…"

"Hush, my love, you are who you are and that is fine by me."

The Reverend continued "The partner will now say 'I (then your name)…'"

Crunch time. Could I say it and really mean it? Could I actually marry this woman who I had known for less than an hour? The woman who thinks that I am a woman, too? Is love at first sight really possible?

I gazed at the adoring face before me and made my decision.

"I, Marilyn Lee Camsie…"

 

No rings, no notice, no courtship, but the kiss! That kiss made up for a whole lot of missing romantic trappings.

My plesant matrimonial fog was rudely dispersed. The storm troopers had apparently abandoned any idea of putting half a thousand of us in jail and had formed a phalanx headed toward the Reverend Newmoon.

"Marilyn, my love! We much reach the padre before those matones reach him. After all, we are his lawyers and if they try to arrest him we must be sure they follow the law scrupulously."

"Of course, darling. Follow me!"

 

So that's how I ended up being kidnapped for an alien. My darling Maria is, of course, a Mexican citizen but that is of little import other than to have us filling out INS forms with obscure designations like I-130 and I-485. One of the reverend's flock was a duly designated member of the El Paso County bureaucracy and issued us a marriage license on the spot once a judge duly waived the seventy-two hour waiting period. Unfortunately, our duly designated member of the El Paso County bureaucracy got fired the next day, but she works for The Church Of The New Moon these days.

We spent much of our honeymoon in police stations, border patrol facilities and jails, defending a whole slew of people who thumbed their noses at the damned stupid crap our so-called leaders dish out. We had the time of our lives!

I resigned from my Austin law firm and, after tying up the loose ends, donated my sober lawyer suits to charity the day before the plastic surgeon installed my new breasts. Mrs Marilyn Camsie-Muñoz y Serrano works for the Church of the New Moon full time defending those of our flock who face persecution or prosecution. I'm also a much happier person. My only worry is that, once we start having children, our grandchildren's hyphenated last name will never be able to fit on a government form.

There are worse problems to have.