I just recently managed to find copies of two things that I wrote back in 2003. That year is significant because it was the first year of my transition.

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Healing Transformation

A piece of onion-skin paper, made into a male mask by a 5 year old girl using safety scissors and crayons about forty- four years ago. She didn't make it because she wanted to, but to please her Mommy and Daddy.

The mask is even thinner now than when it was new. There are rips around the mouth where the teeth behind it were clenched to keep from screaming. There are tear -tracks around the eyes from the despair of the one forced to wear it.

It has been taken off several times. Years ago, in private only, and for very short periods, because it was necessary to remove it in order to keep breathing. Recently, voluntarily, eagerly, it was removed for hours or most of a day. It is put back on with greatest reluctance.

The mask is turning brown and crisping at the edges from the force bottled up behind it. A light shines through the eye holes, as bright as the sun.

The mask will fail relatively soon, bursting into flame. The one behind it will then have been revealed to all. A glowing amethyst butterfly, spreading her wings. Some would try to harm her, for they don't like butterflies. Others will say it's only a caterpillar with wings. A few will appreciate her for what she is, and the difficulties she has gone through.

She doesn't care about the nay-sayers, as in her fully revealed freedom from the mask, she flies off to at last sample life's flowers. She will carry her joy with her and share it with those who will let her.

She is herself at last.

Amanda M. Penn
August 13, 2003

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Family

Family. You think you know what the word means? Probably not to me. I have four sisters and only one of them is blood-kin to me. But she and the other three are all heart-kin to me.

Heart-kin? Oh, that means that I connect with them emotionally on a level that is very deep. What I feel for my heart-sisters can partially be described by a word, an old word, Agape. An unselfish platonic, giving love. But even that word doesn't go far enough.

I would put their welfare before my own. If I was sick at the same time as one of my heart sisters, I would get up out of my sick bed to tend to them. I would risk my life to save theirs. I would hunt down with a cold anger any who irreparably hurt them.

Not all people even connect emotionally with their biological immediate family. I have seen those whose blood-sisters were cold, whose mother only looks to see how she can manipulate her daughter, and those who treat the rest of their family a lot worse than they do strangers and pillage their father's money in his old age.

I care for people. I care for those I barely know, I care deeper for those I know. I love my heart-sisters. Their pain makes me hurt. Their happiness gives me joy.

Are there other members of my heart-family out there? I hope so, I really hope so. I like to make friends, and finding heart-kin is so much more than that, it can't really be compared. Are there heart-brothers to me out there? Maybe, but that will be harder to tell. It is hard for men and woman to only be friends, not impossible, but hard. I will have to look deep to see the family connection with any man, for I am very much a woman in my heart, where it counts.

Are you heart-kin to me? I don't know, but we can become friends and see. Some of my heart-sisters I knew immediately. With others, we grew into heart-kinship. It will be fun to try to find out, won't it?

Family, a lovely word, isn't it?

Amanda Michelle Penn
September 10, 2003