5 basic questions

Someone posted 5 basic questions in a Transgender Support group on Facebook ... these are the questions and here are my thoughts.

- Who are you?

- What made you decide to transition?

- When did you find out you wanted to live this way?

- Where are you at in your transition?

- Why do you think that is?

- How do you perceive yourself?

Sonya LaRonde ... long time computer tech, recovering

I started trying to transition ~2001, but my employer (IBM) at time was not very open to LGBT issues - at least in my department.  After an injury, it was time to make major life changes ... taking control of what is important to me.  Transitioning being one of those major on-going events.

For years, I looked into options, and often found closed doors.  Even coming out to my family doctor in 2004, it was still another 7 years before he did anything about it - I started forcing the issue.  I have a serious of injuries that might require surgery, and if "anything" happened, I did not want to be remembered has someone/something I was not.  Because of a strict religious upbringing, it was not permitted to conceive that I might be transsexual ... just thinking anything with the word "sex" in it was pretty much a sin.  This cult would fit in very nicely in the extreme right wing today and screwed me up for the rest of my life - including today  *sigh

5 months HRT, 7 months "full time" (disabilities and related financial issues effect this, unfortunately), legal name change, legal "gender marker" submitted (pending/waiting), just had 6 month "review" (next review might be consultation for SRS).

"Why do you think that is?" - why am I who I am?  I have been trying to figure that out myself.  I have done ANYTHING to lose myself, to try and hide from my inner self ... this is the first time I have actually been honest with myself

hmmm first off part of me is "stuck" in the 80's *giggles .... who am I?  MTF Transsexual, artist, pansexual, sexual deviant (BDSM, leather, ... ok this might be a PG-13 post if I keep on this trend), Wiccan/Pagan, Activist, confused, frustrated (especially at decades of self hate and non-action), passionate about music, theatre lover ... I am finally learning how to be me

Thoughts on Art

Sonya has always been an artist.

While following male mode, she was lead a stray with computers, technology ... but did so as a teacher or support - helping people calm down in sometimes worse day of life: student losing paper, companies down because of technical issues, that sort of thing.  but the more she got into technology, the more she lost herself.   due to back injury and meds, my life has changed.

I have been out of the game sooo long, I know I'll never be able to catch up - it has been 10 years since I lost my company.  I don't want to go back though ... constantly changing tech can be difficult to grasp, and since I did it all (laptops, computers, servers, thin-stations, Internet, and even consumer interfaces - drivers for cameras and such).  I'll always be part geek, hey all our computers run Linux variants,  but it won't be my life, again.

I went too long without creating anything creative.  Websites were to a point, but I didn't WYSIWYG (graphical), I coded it, back end with a text editor ,,, not creative.  with my injury and high meds, I was a zombie, for years ... had to make some difficult life choices,  shake off a lot of stuff, but I started to regain my life.

I started small, exploring with "nail art" (a few people actually look forward to my new looks) outrageous make up designs (Pride eyes) ... all starting to wake up the right side of my brain.

Recently my mind has been going places it hasn't in decades ... seeing images I NEED to get out, techniques I have never used, styles of works I have never considered .... days (8.8.13) I started painting ... again.  seriously, with purpose, not forced or coerced,  for the first-time since I started university in 1990!  Sonya.Artist is waking up and fulfilling her destiny.  As Sean in teens, she was an early accomplished painter and multi media creator - not computers, but incorporating unique items like actual strings in a painting of a Spanish guitar ... could actually be strummed.

I have one project I MUST do ... a recreation of a piece that was one of last I did in old life ... actual painting done with Q-tips/pointillism of a Manet painting.  my old one was huge (feet by feet) this one is more reasonable and off to decent start (planned, blocked and starting painting).  it has to be done in layers, overlying features of the landscape (my paintings are rarely flat), where the grass and hill meets the sky, there is a slightest change in physical depth of Paint, and as I work down - people, fence, horse and riders, all slightly higher than the previous layer ... should be interested.  I am still hampered by back pain ... it has actually kept me away from the canvas in past few days ... but that just means I have to work smarter ... and keep the fire kindled.

Painting ...

I was ... in another life ... a "professional" artist ... that being I had showings and sold pieces ...

That ended 1990 ....

Almost 22 years to the season, I have put paint on canvas on a project that has been very close to me ... I am attempting to re-create a piece that was one of the last pieces that I finished then ... and perhaps a painting that I miss the most - it meant a lot.

Wayy back then, I was very ... perhaps "eclectic" might be a good word, perhaps one of the few areas I could be introverted ... I closed doors, locking myself in with basics - way too much alcohol, a bit of food, oh yea candles ... LOTS of music ...  and 3 days or so later would come out ... with 3-4 finished pieces, and writings (poetry) ... it was VERY rewarding ... I had no real sense of time ... just me.

A lot has changed since ... but here is what I am doing.

Manet's Races at Longchamp:

I took a small section ...

"blocked it" so I could plan the work on canvas ...

and then started it ....

adding first colour ...

--Work as of 15 Aug 2013

I work with pointillism ... hundreds, thousands of individual dots of blurred colour (looks really bad up-close, meant to be viewed from a distance).  I usually do a few layers, just to make sure the colour is "just right" ....

I will update as project continues ...